Message-ID: <3988672e.44872033@news.flash.net>
Date: Wed, 02 Aug 2000 18:41:02 GMT
[This is the Aug. 4. 2000 update]
Use a SEARCH ENGINE for the BENNETH WEB SITE:
...which contains details about this issue of HOMEOPATHY and the
RANDI CHALLENGE...
---------------------------------------------------------------------
E-MAIL FROM BENNETH FOLLOWS:
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks, Dan, for passing your discussion on to me. You may post
this reply to the newsgroups, if you wish. The protocol in question
was posted in April 1999 at the insistence of Alain Jean-Mairet.
[dk comment: enter "protocol" in the MARIUS DOT NET search engine]
Randi ignored it and then announced in May that Noble prize laureate
Brian
Josephson was collaborating with Jacques Benveniste to apply for the
award and that he was dropping me in favor of them. Syd then contacted
Josephson, and Josephson wrote back to claim that Randi was lying,
that
he wasn't interested in the Challenge.
[dk comment: enter "Josephson" in the MARIUS DOT NET search engine]
BJ even wrote to me to assure me he wasn't usurping my claim. Randi
then
recanted, but still insisted that he was deferring a test of my claim
to see
what the outcome of the of the J & B test would be with the APS.
Eventually, in July, Randi wrote to me and asked
me to send him one
of my tests. I did, the yeast test, and he said that if nothing had
happened by August he would offer me the award . . . again.
When August arrived, Randi fled to Las Vegas to meet with
Penn and
Teller, who have made the second largest pledge to the Challenge, behind
the million pledged by Adams. By this time he had stopped corresponding
with me, having cut me out of any discussion of the protocol, instead
choosing to use Syd and Alain as "intermediaries", arguing over each
point in the protocol.
This was against his own "rules" about working with
the applicant on
the protocol.
Being suspicious at this point of his goodwill,
I then inquired at
Goldman Sachs about the validity of the Challenge, and they responded
by
demanding that Randi remove their name from his website.
Randi went ballistic and began accusing me
of harassing Goldman
Sachs, and then he started insisting that I was crazy, and demanded
that
I get a notarized statement from a clinical psychologist ascertaining
my
sanity, and indemnify him against aggravating a mental condition.
Last week, Gary Schwartz, a clinical psychologist
and professor of
psychiatry who interviewed me in Tucson at the Human Energy Systems
Lab
on November 2, 1999, met with Randi and Andrew Harter in Florida, and
reports to me that Randi is still insisting that I'm insane.
Schwartz claims Randi is now throwing around
generalizations about
me and others. Schwartz implies that his actions appear to be pretty
sad.
In a phone interview Randi told Winston Wu
that he would still
provide a test of my claim, but that I keep changing the protocol.
The protocol, has been and always will be the same.
It is not a test
of me or my talents, but a test of homeopathic commercial products,
which Randi says are no different than plain water. In January 1999
he
agreed that a test separating homeopathic products, (serially agitated
dilutes . . SADs) from the base of which they were dynamized would
end
the argument, that if I produced that test, it would win the award.
The test he has called for has already been done
by a French team
using a dielectric stress measure, it has been replicated at least
twice, once by an American team and once by an Indian team, and the
results of all three trials have been published.
We currently have abstracts of these and other
trials I can send
you . . . two dozen studies of the physical properties of serially
agitated dilutes (homeopathic remedies). We also have dozens of more
abstracts of studies that report on the biological reactions to SADs.
Any of these tests, both physical measures
and biological measures,
show a marked difference between "homeopathic" dynamized water based
solutions and the plain non dynamized water solutions from which the
test items are prepared. These are tests that demonstrate that
homeopathic products have energetic qualities induced by the process
of
succussion and dilution.
I have repeatedly asked Randi for a test date and place,
and for him
to sign his Challenge and return my application, all of which he has
failed to do. His reasoning for this has been that he won't schedule
a
test prior to there being an agreed upon protocol, which he now refuses
to discuss with me, and he has implied that there can be no protocol
until there has been a preliminary test, which he refuses to schedule.
So far he has never contacted me except to
write to me and others
by e-mail to try to intimidate me with predictions of failure, orders
to
"get on with it", statements about who I am , what I'm going to do,
what's going to or not going to happen or with and out and out libel.
And this happened prior to any evidence that I saw of charges against
him of his assaults on minors.
-------------------------------------------------------------
DK COMMENT
DK: See more on the Randi "challenge" here...
http://www.psicounsel.com/randicha.shtml
------------------------------------------------------------------
The basis of Schwartz' thesis is that in accepting
homeopathy, we
are basically forced to acknowledge a systemic memory system for the
Universe. My studies have concluded the same. As with psychic phenomena,
there is the threat of loss of ego, of separateness and identity,
basically a fear of exposure and condemnation. However, within this
emerging creed, it becomes impossible to lay evil at men's feet, because
it presupposes a destiny none of us can change. WIthout recognizing
that
free will and choice are illusions, the threat of exposure and spiritual
obloquy is more than some people can handle.
In recognizing the principals of spiritual unity
one must confront
his personal demons.
I for one have not found this to be easy. I presume for
others it may
be impossible. But none of this gets Randi off the hook for my $1.6
million.
If Randi still thinks that the test called for can't
be done
successfully, then why does he have to rely on character assassination
to avoid it? Why not just by pass the ad hominems and demonstrate once
and for all all of these studies contradicting his null hypothesis
are
invalid? I suggest that the proposed methods be performed by Bell labs
or a forensic testing facility, or some similar competent testing
facility and that the items in question be a wide variety of commercial
preparations taken right off the shelf.
The Skeptic Challenge now to Randi and his foundation,
to Robert Park
and the American Physical Society and others supporting the null
hypothesis for homeopathy is to disprove the studies reported on in
my
collected abstracts.
My bet is that they won't because they can't, and they know it.
Go check the local supermarket, by the way.
Our local store now
carries shelves of these products from a dozen different manufactures.
Bayer is now considering getting into the business. Homeopathic products
are a billion dollar a year industry growing at 20% a year. My research
doesn't address the numerous double blind clinical trials or the meta
analysis reported in the Lancet, or the Jonas immunological studies
conducted for the National Institute of Health. There are millions
who
swear by these products for treating people with any serious condition.
And not only can you see their effects on animals of all kinds, but
you
can see their double blind effects on plants. Since when do plants
and
dumb animals react to placebos in double blind studies?
The evidence is overwhelming. The case against
homeopathy is a
rapidly losing cause.
John Benneth
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
DK comment: The dialogue in sci.skeptic which
led to the above post, follows
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dan Kettler (DK) wrote:
> Zugzwang wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
DK:>> >Look up "protocol" in the search engine, at the site:
> > >> >
> > >> >
http://www.marius.net
>
> <snip>
>
> > I would think that the original posts are more valid than
> > anyone's website versions.
DK: I would not expect one to find validity in a website
> version. One can _find_ something on a web site,
> then reference DEJA, or other proof, for verification...
> http://www.deja.com/home_ps.shtml
> > >> ...I also read all
> > >> of Benneth's long posts that manifestly did not provide a
> > >> protocol, but quoted long extracts from homeopathic works.
DK:> So, you concluded there was no presented protocol, and that
> his "extracts" were in "lieu
of" a protocol?
> > >> As
> > >> for Marius.net, I've read that too...
DK: > And missed the protocol?
> > ...Benneth focused on some comment by Randi that
> > Benneth claimed to mean that all Benneth had to
> > do was provide a methodology, which Benneth claims
> > he has done and that Randi owes him a million bucks
> > as a result, clearly sidestepping the JREF challenge
> > rules.
> DK: No, not [just] provide "a" methodology, but one
> which contained what Randi agreed were
> certain methods of proving.
DK: >No, not just provide a methodology
> > >and then he wins. Benneth says he wins by
> > >default, because RANDI WILL NOT FOLLOW
> > >THROUGH WITH THE TESTING, NOR WILL HE
> > >SHOW ANY CAUSE FOR NOT DOING SO.
> > The JREF Challenge rules do not provide for wins by default...
DK: > At a certain point, this can go outside of JREF
> rules, into matters of law that
the JREF never
> wrote about.
DK: > That is what Benneth is referring to, here, not JREF rules.
> > As
> > the Deja News archive illustrates, and as both Syd Baumel and
> > Alain Jean-Mairet discovered, it was Benneth who didn't follow
> > through.
DK: > And, that John Benneth disagrees with, and since he's closer to
> those circumstances than I am,
he could argue that point.
> I have sent this to him via
e-mail to see if he's
> inclined to spend more time
going over what he's already
> discussed.
> > It was not up to Randi to divine a protocol from
> > Benneth's recitations of homeopathic literature.
DK: > And, you claim you read www.marius.net where the PROTOCOL
is
> referenced, which
multiple witnesses can attest was sent
> to the JREF in advance
of the deadline ????
DK: > You read www.marius.net and missed that?
> Hmmmmm......
> <snip>
--