The vital force "reincarnated": modeling entelechy as a quantized spinning gyroscopic metaphor for integrated medicine.

The ancient concept of the Vital Force receives a modern incarnation as a metaphorical multidimensional spinning gyroscope. The consequences for a different understanding of health and disease are examined in the context of integrated medicine.

Getting in a Spin over the Therapeutic Process: QBism and a Gyroscopic Model of the Vital Force.

BACKGROUND: In the previous paper, a relatively new interpretation of quantum theory called quantum Bayesianism or QBism was introduced as an alternative quantum metaphor for the therapeutic process (TP). This is because previous metaphors have been based on conventional quantum theory (CQT) and its notion that quantum states belong to a strongly objective shared reality. QBism says no: quantum states are subjective degrees of belief made by the individual agents assigning those states. This suggests QBism's explicit subjectivity is more in line with practitioners' (Pr) and patient's (Px) implicitly subjective TP experience. OBJECTIVE: The objective was to investigate the impact on this suggestion of a gyroscopic model of the vital force, Vf. METHOD: Based on an original starting wavefunction for the Vf, a sequence of equations and transformations between them are generated and then interpreted as the Vf interacting with and moving into and out of disease (Dx) states, in essence, a physics of health. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: These equations and their transformations manage to predict (a) homeopathic aggravation from the curative remedy (Rx), and (b) the logic behind Hahnemann's development of the LM potencies. Further, displaying these equations and their interactions pictorially and geometrically (as a stellated octahedron) suggests that the recently developed gyroscopic model for the Vf supports a metaphor for the TP (based on the subjectivity explicit in QBism) that is indeed viable and potentially superior to previous metaphors based on the strong objectivity of CQT.

Some Remarks on QBism and Its Relevance to Metaphors for the Therapeutic Process Based on Conventional Quantum Theory.

BACKGROUND: Signs and symptoms of dis-ease are considered observable manifestations of an immaterial Vital Force. Likewise, experimental results on quantum systems are thought to indicate the presence of something that does not show up. Consequently, the discourse of conventional quantum theory (CQT) - with non-locality and entanglement being objective (i.e., ontic) facets of reality - has been considered a useful metaphor for the therapeutic process (TP) in homeopathy/CAMs. Thus, Patient-Practitioner-Remedy (PPR) entanglement postulated an ontic non-local interaction between patient (Px), practitioner (Pr), and potentised medicine/curative procedure (Rx), resulting in the patient's "journey to cure." QBism is a new epistemic interpretation of quantum theory. Rooted in the subjectivity of Bayesianism, QBism refutes the notion that the quantum state of a system is a separate ontic property of reality. In QBism, non-locality and entanglement are considered an agent's "subjective degrees of belief," i.e., they are personally epistemic. OBJECTIVE: To examine whether previous CQT-based entanglement metaphors for the therapeutic process need re-evaluation in the light of QBism. METHOD: Px and Rx quantum states/wavefunctions - ΨPx, and ΨRx - are reinterpreted in QBist terms. Unlike CQT, this means each quantum state/wavefunction is postulated to represent only the local subjective "degrees of belief" of an agent who in this case, is the Pr. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Compared to earlier CQT quantum entanglement metaphors, QBism's interpretation of the probabilities inherent in the Px and Rx quantum state/wavefunctions are Bayesian and subjective. Their resulting highly personal epistemology makes them more aligned with (and therefore potentially more useful to) how practitioners might experience the evolution of the TP. Also, because QBism predicts non-locality and entanglement can only be subjective properties of a practitioner's own beliefs, the overall significance of previous ontic non-local CQT-based entanglement metaphors for the TP is questioned.

A new geometrical description of entanglement and the curative homeopathic process.

INTRODUCTION: The Memory of Water, a "local" explanation of homeopathy's efficacy, has been supplemented recently by complementary "nonlocal" hypotheses. One of these envisages "quantum macro-entanglement" among patient, practitioner, and remedy to form a "PPR" entangled state, from which the possibility of cure may manifest. METHODS: Semiotic analysis affords a geometrical description of this entangled state as a patient-centered chiral tetrahedron. Its four corners depict three different types of symptoms (of the patient, the dis-ease, and the remedial substance) and the potentized remedy. RESULTS: Reflecting this state in a practitioner-derived mirror-like "therapeutic state space" generates two notional patient-centered chiral tetrahedra: cure may be thought to arise from their patient-driven combination "through the looking glass" of the therapeutic state space, into one polyhedron called a stella octangula or stellated octahedron; in essence, a 3-dimensional Star of David. CONCLUSIONS: The practitioner helps in forming these notional semiotic polyhedra, but the patient is at their epicenters (i.e., the practitioner facilitates but ultimately does not control the curative process).

Treating Leick with like: response to criticisms of the use of entanglement to illustrate homeopathy.

In criticising papers which recently appeared in Homeopathy, Leick claims that no double blind randomised clinical trials (DBRCTs) show that homeopathy is efficacious, and that specific effects of substances diluted beyond Avogadro's limit are implausible. He states that generalised entanglement models should be able to improve the design of experiments to test ultra-high dilutions, and disparages the authors' understandings of quantum physics. The paper responds to those criticisms. Several DBRCTs have shown that homeopathy has effects which are not due to placebo and these are now supported by preclinical work. This area of theory is in its infancy and it is unreasonable to expect it to have generated experiments at this stage. The authors have used accepted interpretations of quantum theory: Leick's view is coloured by skepticism concerning homeopathy.

Toward a unified theory of homeopathy and conventional medicine.

INTRODUCTION: Could theoretical links exist between homeopathy and conventional medicine? In homeopathy, disturbance of the self-regulating Vital Force (Vf) results in dis-ease as multileveled symptom expression. Treatment aids the Vf as it attempts to restore holistic balance. Conventional medicine (allopathy) deterministically considers external agents (viruses, bacteria, etc.) or internal biochemical imbalances as disease causes. Treatment is geared to eradicating causative factors, sometimes at the expense of the homeostatic immune system. METHOD: A previous mathematical model described the Vf as a quantized gyroscopic "wave function," equating strength of symptom expression to degree of Vf gyroscopic "precession." Diseases and homeopathic remedies were interpreted respectively as braking and accelerating "torques" on Vf "angular momentum." In this paper, approximations applied to the Vf "wave function" could provide insights into why conventional medicine dismisses the action of highly potentized homeopathic remedies. In addition, a simple geometric force diagram provides another mathematical model for allopathic drug action and immune system reaction. RESULTS: The 2 models converge on the same result, delivering conventional biomedicine's conclusion: potentized homeopathic remedies should exert no clinically observable effects. CONCLUSIONS: Following the logic of these models, conventional medicine could be seen as a special case of a broader therapeutic paradigm also containing homeopathy.

"Torque-like" action of remedies and diseases on the vital force and their consequences for homeopathic treatment.

INTRODUCTION: Within the developing theoretical context of quantum macroentanglement, a mathematical model of the Vital Force (Vf) has recently been formulated. It describes the Vf in terms of a hypothetical gyroscope with quantized angular momentum. This enables the Vf's state of health to be represented in terms of a "wave function" derived solely from secondary symptom observables produced in response to disease or homeopathic remedies. So far, this approach has illustrated the biphasal action of remedies, resonance phenomena arising out of homeopathic provings, and aspects of the therapeutic encounter. METHOD: In this paper, the effects of a therapeutic remedy and disease states on the gyroscopic angular momentum characteristics of the Vf were investigated by mathematical manipulation the Vf "wave function." RESULTS: The formulation of the Vf in terms of a quantized gyroscope permits disease to be represented as a braking "torque" decreasing the Vf's angular momentum, causing it to "precess" (i.e., express symptoms). The therapeutic remedy, however, provides an accelerating "torque," increasing the Vf's angular momentum and decreasing precession (i.e., reducing symptom expression). CONCLUSIONS: According to this model, symptom expression corresponds to precession of the Vf "gyroscope." Conversely, complete removal of symptoms is equivalent to cessation of Vf "precession." However, if overprescribed or given in unsuitable potency, the curative remedy (which may also be formulated as a wave function but this time derived solely from changes in Vf secondary symptom observables) may cause the Vf to express proving symptoms. Thus, with only observation of symptoms and changes in them to indicate, indirectly, the state of a patient's Vf, the safest treatment strategy might be for the practitioner to proceed via gradual removal of the symptoms. This is congruent with Hahnemann's later development and use of the LM potencies, as described in his final 6th edition of The organon.

Entanglement, knowledge, and their possible effects on the outcomes of blinded trials of homeopathic provings.

INTRODUCTION: In two recent studies of double-blind placebo-controlled homeopathic provings, entanglement was reported to have occurred between verum and placebo arms of the trials. This contrasts directly with the entanglement-disrupting effects of blinding, recently proposed as the reason for the failure of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) to demonstrate unequivocally the efficacy of homeopathy. It is proposed here that such entanglement between remedy and placebo during these double-blind placebo controlled provings is the direct result of the blinding process. METHOD: A previously developed theoretical model of entanglement in homeopathy among patient, practitioner, and remedy (called PPR entanglement) was used in this investigation. RESULTS: In agreement with the results from the proving studies, the model predicts that application of the double-blind RCT methodology to homeopathic provings leads to entanglement between both remedy and placebo arms of the trial. CONCLUSIONS: These theoretical findings can be understood in terms of the act of blinding leading to loss of information because of quantum-like state superposition of the verum and placebo proving groups. This is compared to conclusions drawn from the well-known double-slit experiment of quantum physics, and quantum information processing. It leads to a suggestion for testing entanglement in homeopathic provings.

Is homeopathy possible?

As a therapeutic intervention, homeopathy is the target of increased scepticism because in the main, its remedies are diluted and succussed (potentized) out of material existence. This puts homeopathy seemingly at odds with the paradigm of conventional science, in particular, that atoms and molecules are the fundamental building blocks of all matter. Accordingly, homeopathy cannot work, so that any reported beneficial effects must, at best, be due to the placebo effect. The purpose of this article is to challenge that conclusion and to suggest that there may well be conventional science-based explanations of how homeopathy could be possible. Homeopathy's key principles are first described. Then the double-blind randomized controlled trial (RCT), the chief means by which homeopathic remedies and prescribing are tested, is shown to be based on a linear reductionism that is too blunt an instrument with which to test the efficacy of complex interventions such as homeopathy The memory of water hypothesis, as a mechanism for how potentized remedies might work, is reviewed, along with some evidence for its existence. A possible rationale for the water memory effect is proposed in terms of a dynamic 'ordering' of water's constantly switching network of intermolecular hydrogen bonds, induced by the manufacturing process of homeopathic remedies. This could lead to a long-range molecular 'coherence' between trillions of mobile water molecules. However, the water memory effect is an essentially pharmacological explanation of homeopathy's putative efficacy. It is pointed out that healing also entails an interaction between consenting beings. From this point of view, an explanation of any therapeutic procedure should include an attempt to describe the nature of the patient-practitioner interaction. From this perspective, a quantum theoretical treatment of the therapeutic process, involving a form of macro-entanglement between patient, practitioner and remedy (PPR), is advanced as another possible explanation of the homeopathy's efficacy. This shows that the reason double-blind RCTs deliver at best only equivocal results on homeopathy's efficacy is because it effectively breaks the PPR entangled state. A comparison is made between the entanglement-breaking effect of double-blind RCTs and the wave-function 'collapsing' effect of observation in orthodox quantum theory. The article concludes by suggesting that the memory of water and PPR entanglement are not competing but most likely complementary hypotheses, and that both are probably required in order to provide a complete description of the homeopathic process. While awaiting experimental evidence of these hypotheses, it is suggested that observations of clinical outcomes would be superior to RCTs for further testing homeopathy's efficacy.

Genus Epidemicus: Are Notions of Entanglement Relevant to the Homeopathic Understanding of Epidemic Disease?

BACKGROUND: Patient-practitioner-remedy (PPR) entanglement postulates non-local triadic interaction between patient (Px), practitioner (Pr) and potentised medicine (Rx), resulting in the patient's journey to cure; the in-depth homeopathic interview is considered a major contributing factor in this process. Also, by modelling entelechy, a quantised gyroscopic analogue of the Vital Force (Vf) has been developed. OBJECTIVE: To discover whether entanglement notions explain the mode of action of homeopathy during the treatment of epidemic diseases, when the individualising in-depth homeopathic interview is neither possible nor necessary. METHOD: The current Vf wave equation applies specifically to the in-depth patient/practitioner consultation in chronic dis-ease. A generalised form of the Vf wave equation, an earlier hypothesis based on quantum field theory (QFT) and PPR entanglement were all re-investigated. RESULTS: The generalised Vf wave equation was found applicable in 3 main conditions: acute self-limiting, chronic and epidemic dis-ease. In the latter, a single, coherent Vf epidemic 'wave function' covering all susceptible beings could be identified, which, after practitioner intervention, disappears. Analogies were drawn between groups of atoms in a p-doped semiconductor and a collection of susceptible beings in an epidemic. Here, genus epidemicus is likened to an 'n-type dopant', which forms a 'p-n junction' with the dis-ease. Using the QFT hypothesis/metaphor, genus epidemicus acts as a 'gauge field' restoring 'global invariance' to the symmetry-broken, symptom-expressing Vf, i.e., restoring health. CONCLUSION: Entanglement hypotheses/metaphors may have application in the homeopathic therapeutic process beyond the one-to-one in-depth interview, and so are relevant to describing the mode of action of homeopathy during treatment of epidemic disease.

Are randomized controlled trials (RCTs) redundant for testing the efficacy of homeopathy? A critique of RCT methodology based on entanglement theory.

INTRODUCTION: Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) have yet to deliver unequivocal results demonstrating the efficacy (or otherwise) of homeopathic remedies and individualized homeopathic prescribing. This could be caused by an implicit assumption inherent in RCT methodology that specific effects of a remedy and any nonspecific effects of consultation are independent of each other. Reported here is a theoretical investigation of the consequences arising from this assumption proving to be false. METHODS: A previously developed theoretical model of entanglement in homeopathy between patient, practitioner, and remedy (called PPR entanglement) was used in this investigation. RESULTS: The adherence to RCT methodology could result in such trials completely disrupting the formation or survival of any three-way PPR entangled state. CONCLUSIONS: Assuming the PPR entangled state is a necessary condition for therapeutic interaction, alternatives to RCTs are urgently required that can take into account possible entangled specific and nonspecific effects during trials of homeopathy. That RCTs sometimes deliver positive results for the use of homeopathic remedies may be caused by residual entanglement arising from homeopathic remedy manufacture.

Patient-Practitioner-Remedy (PPR) entanglement, Part 8: 'Laser-like' action of the homeopathic therapeutic encounter as predicted by a gyroscopic metaphor for the vital force.

BACKGROUND: A preliminary mathematical model for the Vital Force had been developed based on the idea of a metaphorical gyroscope, combined with earlier notions derived from Weak Quantum Theory (WQT) and Patient-Practitioner-Remedy (PPR) Entanglement. This combination generates a hypothetical 'wave function' as a description of the state of the Vital Force that is intimately related to the secondary symptom picture of the therapeutic remedy, and is capable of illustrating certain empirical observations of the homeopathic process, including the bi-phasal action of remedies and some of the results gained from provings. OBJECTIVE: The goal of this present study was to further develop the idea of a Vital Force 'wave function' by generating insights into its mode of reaction to therapeutic intervention by a practitioner. METHODS: In orthodox quantum theory, the time-dependent Schrödinger equation, in which a particle's wave function is operated upon by the Hamiltonian total energy operator, provides information concerning the temporal evolution of the wave function. By analogy, a secondary-symptom-dependent Vital Force equation is postulated in which the Vital Force 'wave function' is operated upon by a so-called 'homeopathic operator'. RESULTS: By inserting the previously developed wave function for the Vital Force into the secondary-symptom-dependent Vital Force equation, another equation is generated mathematically reminiscent of longitudinal mode standing waves set up in the resonant cavity of a laser. CONCLUSION: In the language of therapeutics, it is often said an essential part of the curative process is that practitioners act as 'mirrors' for their patients. Previous papers in this series have shown that this reflective practitioner activity is more than a poetic analogy. Borrowing from the mathematical formalism of quantum theory, with its ideas of entangled, coherent wave-functions as metaphors for the homeopathic process, this mirror-like activity can be seen to be an integral part of the curative therapeutic encounter. The preliminary theoretical investigation reported here develops the metaphor further by suggesting that the effect of this practitioner mirror-like activity on a patient's Vital Force during the therapeutic encounter, might be likened to the sequence of operations by which lasers function. The analogy seems compelling, as an essential feature of laser operation is the arrangement of parallel mirrors placed at both ends of the laser's resonant cavity.

Toward topological descriptions of the therapeutic process: part 3. Two new metaphors based on quantum superposition, wave function "collapse," and conic sections.

INTRODUCTION: Quantum theoretical discourse has previously illustrated (1) the therapeutic process as three-way macro-entanglement (between patient, practitioner, and remedy, called PPR entanglement), and (2) depicted the Vital Force (Vf) as a quantized spinning gyroscope. Combining the two via semiotic geometry leads to a topological description of the patient's journey to cure. In this present article, two new metaphors for the homeopathic therapeutic encounter are described, based on (1) a quantum mechanical model of adaptive mutation (QMAM), and (2) the illuminated geometric patterns generated by a light source attached to a spinning gyroscope. METHODS: (1) QMAM demonstrates how quantum superposition between DNA and mutant adaptations could arise and how environmental pressure "collapses" the DNA wave function to a particular state. In QMAM for the therapeutic process, isolation helps induce coherence between patient, practitioner, and remedy, generating a quantum-like superposition of patient "unwell" and "well" states. (2) The light beam from a precessing gyroscope sweeps out an ellipse, which becomes circular, the faster the gyroscope spins on its axis and the less it precesses. Ellipses have two foci that, as a metaphor for the state of a patient's Vf, are seen to represent the patient's "unwell" and "well" states. RESULTS: Superposition of the patient's "unwell" and "well" states generated by the QMAM metaphor can "collapse" to the cured state, following decoherence at the end of therapeutic process. Similarly, the curative therapeutic process may be thought to "spin up" the patient's Vf, so the precessing ellipse's foci (i.e., the patient's "unwell" and "well" states) merge into a "circular" curative state. CONCLUSIONS: The two new metaphors may be seen as equivalent and semiotic simplifications of the previous more complex topological description of the patient's "journey to cure."

Toward a topological description of the therapeutic process: part 2. Practitioner and patient perspectives of the "journey to cure".

BACKGROUND: The discourse of quantum theory has been used to describe (1) the homeopathic therapeutic process (in terms of three-way macro-entanglement between patient, practitioner, and remedy, called PPR entanglement), and (2) the homeopathic concept of the vital force. METHODS: Combining these two approaches leads to a semiotic (i.e., pertaining to the theory of sign systems in language) geometry that illustrates the nature of this entanglement and how it could facilitate the patient's journey to cure. Here, this geometry is extended further to gain insight into both practitioner and patient perspectives of the process. RESULTS: From the practitioner's perspective, the semiotic geometry predicts PPR entanglement, generating a number of distinguishable therapeutic outcomes that depend on the various patient-, disease-, and remedy-based "contributions" to the overall symptom picture of the remedy arrived at holistically. Furthermore, these outcomes may be seen as different facets of a more generalized PPR entangled state whose semiotic geometrical representation is hyperdimensional. Likewise, the patient's perspective of the journey to cure can also be represented semiotically, this time as a series of cross-sections through a hyperdimensional figure of similar symmetry, entering and leaving the patient's notional "dis-ease" space. CONCLUSIONS: The semiotic geometries representing practitioner and patient experiences of the therapeutic process ultimately converge. Where they differ is that in elaborating the patient's journey to cure, the practitioner's perspective may be seen as from the outside of a whole process. As it is the patient who ultimately is traveling this journey, the patient's perspective is necessarily from the inside, of stages or cross-sections of the whole process.

Emerging economies' need for cheap, efficient health care makes Western anti-homeopathy rhetoric irrelevant: observations from the Canadian Homeopathy Conference, October 2011.

Large-scale use and acceptance of homeopathy in Cuba, Latin America, and India raises questions about the relevance of campaigns mounted against homeopathy in the United Kingdom, Australia, and other nations of the developed world, especially as the developing economies of Asia and Latin America are set to outstrip those of the developed world.

Toward a topological description of the therapeutic process.

INTRODUCTION: Two (2) quantum theoretically based metaphor/models have been proposed recently to describe the therapeutic process in homeopathy in terms of (1) a representation of the vital force (Vf) as a spinning quantized gyroscope, describable as a wave function; and (2) a form of nonorthodox quantum theoretical entanglement (called PPR entanglement) between the patient, practitioner, and remedy. METHOD: Combining these two descriptions permits "normalization" of the Vf gyroscopic wave function. In this context, "normalization" refers to the probability of a patient's symptom totality being expressed and observable to the practitioner within a "therapeutic state space" that has mirror-like characteristics. RESULTS: The Vf gyroscopic wave function contains a constant A related to this symptom totality and its expression. Normalization provides values for A at various stages of the patient's journey to cure, while at the same time suggesting a possible Möbius strip-like "topology" for the practitioner-derived "therapeutic state space." CONCLUSIONS: Changes in the value of A on normalization indicate how expression of symptom totality varies at different stages of the patient's journey to cure, while suggesting a "topology" for the therapeutic process and how the practitioner could be affected by it.