The world would be a worse place without color, light, and sound. But it would be better off without a therapy that uses these phenomena instead of medicine to treat disease and illness.

This describes vibrational therapy, which is a form of vitalism. This is the metaphysical belief that organisms possess an inner spirit that bestows the gift of life.

Vibrational therapy goes by many names, as different regions attempt to put their cultural spin on it, but is usually known as energy medicine in the United States. By whatever name, it is based on the assumption that health is determined by the flow or blocking of an unproven energy that runs through meridians, chakras, or reflex zones, none of which have been shown to exist. When the energy stops flowing, vibrational medics apply their crystallized Drano.

As energyandvibation.com tries to explain it, “All matter vibrates to a precise frequency and by using resonant vibration, balance of matter can be restored. Trauma and disease often results in states of either no movement or constant movement. Vibrational Energy Medicine therapies mirror trauma and disease to the system so that it can self-correct.” Light, color, sound, stones, crystals, and even geometry are all supposed methods for accessing and altering this vibration.

The field makes generous use of the appeal to tradition fallacy. The aforementioned website claims crystal medicine has its roots in dynastic Egypt and hints that Jesus used it too, though it fails to specify which gem helped him walk on water. If your incredulity meter has yet to peak, they also ponder that the field has its roots in Atlantis. However ancient or fictitious the place of its birth, this has no bearing on whether it works. And vitalism should have ended with the advent of Germ Theory, antibiotics, and vaccines. Sadly, the idea that our health is contingent on the manipulation of an imaginary energy traveling through undetectable portals remains. There are many who think that stones, crystals, tuning forks, crystal bowls, and infused water will aid in their wellbeing.

Seeming successes are due the fluctuating nature of illnesses, post hoc reasoning, and communal reinforcement. Failures are not considered such, but rather reasons to continue searching for the right frequency and proper gem/crystal/sound/light/color to treat the condition. Since the auras, chakras, and soul stars are only visible to the practitioner, you have to take their enlightened word. There is no equivalent of X-rays or blood pressure cuffs in this field.  

Not only is no scientific instrument able to detect this energy, no practitioner has explained what type of energy it is, how it is accessed or controlled, and how it benefits the recipient. We are only assured that balance is met and the proper frequency is communicated, again without an explanation of what that means or why it matters.

Some proponents claim that each gem (or other conduit) has a specific healing property, which nature will lead you to, or more accurately to the New Age medic who sells it. Doing this enables them to do a nifty two-step around the notion of subjecting the claim to a double blind study. They can argue that each person responds differently, so the study would be invalid.

Dr. Steven Novella brilliantly noted that alternative medics use science like a drunk uses a lamppost: For support, not illumination. Accordingly, some vibrational medicine practitioners are fond of noting that the sun provides energy, which leads to a chemical reaction that coverts some of that energy to Vitamin D. This is true. But vibrational medicine further asserts that this change is caused by vibrations and therefore falls under their umbrella. There may be vibrations in the skin and photons during the process, but that’s incidental and is not the sources of the benefit.

Lisa Simpson bemoaned that a wealthy school’s periodic table had 250 elements while Springfield Elementary and the rest of us are stuck at 118. Even more shortchanged are vibrational medics, who lay claim to only four, none of which are actually elements. Again, from energyandvibation.com: “Our world is comprised four basic elements. These are air, earth, fire, and water. Understanding what each element represents helps us evaluate where our individual strengths and weaknesses are. Healers have found that focusing on the elements and the vibrational energies associated with each of them is helpful when determining treatments.”

Failing to understand what an element is would seemingly be enough to repel mainstream science, and overwhelmingly, it does. But most pseudosciences have at least one iconoclastic mainstream proponent who jumps on their alternative bandwagon. Jason Lisle wastes his astronomy doctorate promoting the Institute for Creation Research. After earning his Ph.D. in anthropology, Jeffrey Meldrum has spent 20 years chasing Bigfoot. Yale’s Dr. David Katz spends his time and his school’s money championing homeopathy.

For vibrational medicine, we have Dr. Richard Gerber. His possession of a legitimate medical degree fails to preclude him from making this pronouncement: “Only by viewing the body as a multi-dimensional energy system can we begin to approach how the soul manifests through molecular biology. That comes down to the whole issue of reincarnation and karma. There are various people doing past life regression work who are beginning to envision the soul’s progress through life, and illness as an expression of obstacles the soul is trying to overcome.”

Gerber offered no mechanism on how this is accomplished, so I was most interested in the energyandvibration section labeled, “How does vibrational energy medicine work?”

To avoid keeping you in suspense, I’ll tell you that the answer never comes. It begins by taking a swipe at mainstream medicine for treating the symptom but not the cause of an illness. This is a typical alt-med ploy and is incorrect. Beyond treating the symptom, a doctor will also consider the whole person when planning a treatment program by taking into account genetics, habits, and health history. Alt-med will vaguely claim to be treating the persons’ spirits and emotions, never explaining what this means, how they do it, or how it works.

In a second evasion of their own question, the website tells us, “Rather than treat the heart directly if there is a heart problem, a vibrational energy medicine practitioner will instead work with the energy systems of the heart.” I do appreciate the assurance that vibrational medics will not be conducting open heart surgery with amethyst crystals. Instead, they will “work with the heart chakra, the heart reflex zone on the feet or hands, the emotional layer of the energy field, and the air element in Polarity Therapy.”

The closest they ever come to trying to answer the question they raised is when they employ this piece of false equivalence: “When the C string of a harp is struck, all the C strings of all other harps nearby begin to vibrate. The C strings are in resonance with one another. The different parts of our physical, emotional, mental and spiritual being also resonate to various frequencies of vibration.” This is as mistaken as saying that harps, like humans, can benefit from a balanced diet.

At healingcrystals.com, I was given a crystal assessment and was advised to “Be open and honest during communications.” I’d like to think this post has accomplished that.

I have battled alternative medicine on this blog and in Facebook threads, conversations, letters to the editor, and e-mails to hospitals. While the embrace of ideas with no scientific backing or even plausibility is unfortunate (or tragic in cases like Jessica Ainscough), adults in the end have to make these decisions for themselves.

However, in many cases, they are also making those decisions for their children, which is problematic when it comes to issues like vaccine refusal. Even more revolting are those who disallow all medicine for their children, as is done by members of Followers of Christ church. This extremist sect in Idaho allows children to die from treatable conditions, protected by a statute that allows them to do precisely this.

While not tragic like treating childhood leukemia with anointing oil, there is another way stupid adult decisions impact those whose care they have been entrusted with. That’s because alternative medicine is also practiced in the veterinary field.

It comes with varying degrees of danger. Persons who perform Reiki on their cat are wasting their time and annoying the pet, but as long as genuine treatment is also employed, no harm is done. Substantially worse is the advice dispensed by veterinarian Will Falconer, who recommends jettisoning antibiotics in favor of homeopathy. He began doing this himself after treating his calico’s uterine infection with Chinese herbs, flushes, and something he concocted from rotten beef. As a doctor, Falconer should understand the post hoc reasoning fallacy and the fluctuating nature of many illnesses. Instead, he reports that the cat’s recovery was “an a-ha moment and I tossed my antibiotics in the trash.”

A wise move, says veterinarian Wendy Jensen, who cites some shortcomings in medicine – namely that it has yet to conquer all disease and death – to take a non sequitur dive into deciding we all need homeopathy. She writes, “The reason homeopathy does what scientific medicine cannot is because it doesn’t heal the body but the immortal soul, also known as the Vital Force. Illness begins at the energetic level and this is the level at which homeopathy heals.” No word on how this treatment works with rabies.

Alt-vets like these two will cite a bulldog here or a cockatoo there that showed some improvement, but anecdotes cannot alter the fact that there has never empirical evidence of homeopathy’s efficiency. Homeopaths have done nothing to increase lifespans, arrest disease, mitigate symptoms, or ensure that waiting rooms have more variety in their magazine selection. In short, they have made no verifiable contribution to the health field.

Again, if a 30-year-old person wants to treat their tuberculosis with a homeopathic potion, I strongly advise against it and will point out the invalid nature of the treatment, but in the end it’s their decision to make. However, those 30 in dog years should not be subjected to it.

Homeopathy won’t harm by itself, but could allow a serious condition to go untreated. A more direct danger comes from cupping, which the blog Skeptvet has documented  with disturbing pictures of canine and equine victims. Cupping is placing a glass or plastic container on the skin and creating a partial vacuum with heat or a suction pump. This leaves a visible bruise, which is supposed to help with preventing injury, treating afflictions, increasing blood flow, expelling toxins, moving chi, or winning gold medals.

The aforementioned blog is run by a veterinarian who fights alt-vet tactics. These techniques include the Tellington Therapeutic Touch for Turtles, a creation of its namesake, Linda Tellington. She actually uses it on all animals, I just used turtles for alliterative purposes.  

Tellington uses science terms without being scientific, such as in this sentence: “The intent of the Therapeutic Touch is to activate the function of the cells and awaken cellular intelligence and turn on the electric lights of the body.” And if your doctor dreams fizzled when you flunked anatomy and physiology, your second chance has arrived. Tellington assures us, “It is not necessary to understand anatomy to be successful in speeding up the healing of injuries or ailments.”

Her website includes a standard list of several dozen disparate ailments that the touch can cure. It covers pretty much any affliction except for the likes of blindness or the inability to walk, since it would be readily apparent the touch was doing no good against those. For her evidence of all this, Tellington cites “anecdotal evidence,” an oxymoron.

There are three reasons why anecdotes must be discounted in medical research and why double blind studies must always be the gold standard of evidence. First, “Thyme cured Grandma’s gout” and other tales are unreliable because uncontrolled observations are prone to error, misinterpretation, false conclusions, and selective memory.

Second, testimonials can be found to support every treatment ever devised, no matter if they are useless, harmful, or even fatal. If anecdotes are proof, everything works. Most important, nearly 100,000 years of trial-and-error treatments and their accompanying anecdotes left humans with no increase in quality or quantity of life. Conversely, 200 years of Germ Theory, vaccines, double blind studies, and the Scientific Method have tripled lifespans, conquered some diseases, and mitigated others.

Probably the most extreme of the alt-vets is Patricia Jordan, who authored “Mark of the Best Hidden in Plain Sight: The Case Against Vaccination.” She offers up silly phrases and the appeal to nature fallacy in an unusual mix of ideas that would be endorsed by both New Agers and Young Earthers. She writes, “True health and wellness comes from a very natural setting and from the relationship of the individual in balance with the earth and all the treasures a healthy ecosystem has to offer. Vaccines are the grafting of man and beast. They and drugs are at odds with the intelligence of the almighty design.”

With examples like these, it’s easy to see why Skeptvet said veterinarians who are using these alternative practices should stop. Failing that, they should stop abusing the professional title they use to lure unsuspecting pet owners who want their furry friend cured. “They should not present themselves as veterinarians,” she wrote, “but as homeopaths, herbalists, or whatever type of alternative practitioner fits their ideology.”

That way, veterinarians can practice their medicine and Jordan can continue doing what the sagebrush and invisible force in the sky are telling her to.

Halotherapy offers the chance to lounge in a cushy chair and wear a comfy robe while listening to soothing music, with it all taking place in ideal temperatures and conditions. I would like to report on this first hand, but the therapy takes place in a salt mine. I’m not inherently anti-salt mine, but the nearest one is much further away than my sectional, which would seem to offer the same relaxation and climate control advantages.

The reason for necessitating the salt mine is the alleged health benefits of breathing in such locales. Like most unproven therapies, the claims are all over the medical map. It is used mainly for respiratory issues, but proponents also tout its ability to slay depression, eczema, migraines, digestive issues, and dozens of other maladies.

Such inconsistency is almost always a pseudoscience giveaway. The mainstream medicine equivalent would be like a person with a herniated disc and another person with a malfunctioning gall bladder both expecting to be cured by the same podiatrist techniques. Double blind testing will, over time, show what works and what doesn’t. That’s how we know that anti-inflammatory drugs are successful against arthritis, while we have no reason to suspect arthritis would be impacted by salt mine sojourns, despite proponents making this very claim. Also unexplained is how much salt breathing is optimal or how it prompts the body to make the changes necessary to provide the alleged benefits.

It’s also a variety show amongst practitioners as to which salt is best. Some laud their salt’s purity, playing on the fallacy that pure is necessarily good. This is mistaken, as unadulterated mercury would be highly detrimental if consumed. And while probably not fatal, swallowing pure capsaicin would make one wish they were dead.

Meanwhile, others halotherapists stress the impurity of their product, highlighting the number of minerals they supplement their salt with, figuring that more has to be better.

Back to the purists, some of them insist that only Himalayan pink salt can achieve  maximum benefit because it is the most pure. The real appeal factor they’re going for, however, isn’t purity, but the idea of the salt coming from a mountain a long ways away. In Kathmandu, Himalayan salt is sold as just a seasoning, not as a cure all. And anyway, the salt actually comes from the far less exotic location of Pakistan’s Punjab region, and the mines are nearly 200 miles from the Himalayas.

Of course, mainstream medicine also features disagreements about the best treatment methods. Reasonable people can arrive at different conclusions, doctors are subject to human error, and science is forever questioning itself. But a doctor understands the mechanism behind the medicine and would know that penicillin works by interfering with the synthesis of complex molecules in bacterial cell walls. Salt therapists have no agreement on how their product would achieve any benefit.

About half of halotherapists maintain the salt is beneficial once it enters the patient’s lungs. The other half gets a little more complex, saying the caves produce negative ions that destroy bacteria. But according to Brian Dunning at Skeptoid, “An ionizer can help draw bacteria out of the air but it doesn’t hurt the bacteria. To kill bacteria, you need not negative ions, but ozone, which consists of three oxygen atoms.” And when the ozone is concentrated enough to kill bacteria, it may be deadly to the humans that house them. Thus, the only way to prove the efficiency of this treatment is to kill the patients.

Halotherapy sometimes takes place in manmade spas that employ machines which grind salt into fine particles, then dispatch it via the air. That has not caught on as much as treatment in a salt mine because persons who seek out this treatment are susceptible to the Naturalistic Fallacy.

For example, honeycolony.com greets us with a quick appeal to this fallacy on its home page. Without offering evidence for any of this, the website proclaims, “Standard iodized table salt has been chemically treated to such a degree that it no longer has any value for your body. You can find a number of natural salts, such as sea salt, at your natural food store, and Himalayan salt is considered to be the most nutrient-dense salt of all.” 

As far as I can tell, there has been only one peer-reviewed paper on halotherapy, in the journal Allergy and Asthma Proceedings. It concluded salt therapy was an unproven treatment that lacked any support from double blind studies. Because the therapy resulted not from testing or development, practitioners cannot explain what it does, what mechanism it uses, or how it should be administered.

That leaves honeycolony.com to make the hackneyed and mistaken alt-med claim about detoxification, as well as employing the appeal to tradition fallacy by chiding skeptics who ignore the eastern Europeans who “have been using salt caves as therapy for hundreds of years.” 

These Romanians, Moldovans, and Kosovars, by the way, are reporting relief from allergies, neurological disorders, rheumatism, and locomotor system dysfunctions. Honeycolony thus completes the alt-med quartet by emphasizing anonymous anecdotes over data.  

I still want to conduct my own studies. I’ve got the furniture, clothing, music, and temperature, I just need to add some salt to the equation. French fires should to the trick.

Cupping involves heating the air inside a glass cup, inverting it, and placing it on a body part, usually the back or stomach. This creates a vacuum, which binds the cup to the body and sucks the skin upward for about 10 minutes.

Practitioners claim there are various benefits. Some of these are impossibly vague or even nonexistent, and include unblocking chi, restoring health, or improving circulation. There are also claims it can activate the lymphatic system or clear the colon. But if your lymphatic system and colon are misfiring, you need much more than a rudimentary sucking device and a chanting shaman in superfluous beads who burns incense and plays Ancient Future CDs.

Other supposed benefits are the ability to cure depression, arthritis, influenza, migraines, infertility, insomnia, herpes, cramps, asthma, and cellulite cancer. There is no research to support any of this, but there is strong evidence that cupping causes pain, excessive fluid accumulation, and purple skin from ruptured blood vessels.

Forms of cupping were used by ancient peoples in China, North America, Assyria, Greece, and Egypt, and this history is usually touted by its practitioners. Of course, where and when a technique was used is unrelated to its efficiency, and there is no science that supports cupping’s claims, which contradict our knowledge of anatomy and physiology, as well as of Germ Theory.

Those who favor the Chinese version usually combine cupping with acupuncture and place the cup on supposed meridian points, whose locations vary by practitioner. Another tactic is to use cupping in conjunction with a massage, the latter of which can speed muscle healing and reduce tissue inflammation. By conflating the massage with cupping, the benefit can be given to the wrong technique. When coupled with an implied ancient wisdom, this can convince some patients that it works.

This alternative medicine itself has an alternative, wet cupping, in which the skin is punctured before the cup is emplaced. The negative pressure then draws out blood, so this procedure is little more than bloodletting that incorporates a heat source. The goal is to suck toxins from the body, though practitioners never specify what toxins are extracted, nor do they explain how low pressure would cause sweat glands to secrete toxins instead of sweat. In fact, the only way this technique will work is if it’s used on poison dart frogs.

After delivering Cleveland’s first professional sports championship in 52 years, LeBron James stood in a large cylinder for three minutes so his body could be exposed to temperatures as low as -300. The frigid temps, 159 degrees from absolute zero, are reached through nitrogen-cooled vapors that are the centerpiece of whole body cryotherapy. It is a nouveau approach that counts many athletes among its clients, with James being the most famous. The players consider the therapy a way to relieve aches and to speed body recovery.

Normally by the time I get around to writing about an untraditional tactic or technique, there are a series of failed double blind studies in its wake, or perhaps a refusal by proponents to engage such studies or other meaningful research. With whole body cryotherapy, however, not much investigation has been done and properly-designed trials are lacking. There is insufficient research on the effects the therapy has on blood pressure, heart rate, metabolism, and so forth.

This has not stopped proponents from claiming victory over rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, asthma, Alzheimer’s, anxiety, chronic pain, depression, fibromyalgia, insomnia, migraines, and obesity. They have taken potential physiological effects and abruptly extrapolated them into all manner of health benefits.

The FDA warns there is no evidence to support any of this, and that the therapy can be dangerous. The biggest hazard is asphyxiation, which can happen when the liquid nitrogen cools the vapor. Also, this introduction of nitrogen into a sealed enclosure decreases oxygen, which can lead to hypoxia and unconsciousness. Other risks include frostbite, burns, and eye injuries.

Dr. Steven Novella has noted that the technique might justify preliminary studies, but that proponents have leapfrogged several more obstacles to call this a wonder therapy. For example, cryohealthcare.com uses anecdotal evidence to bolster support for its assertion that WBC effectively treats stress, insomnia, rheumatism, muscle tension, joint pain, and skin conditions.

Those at cancerdefeated.com are even less morally constrained, and claim WBC will treat cancer. The hocus pocus is described thusly: “While in the pod, your skin temperature drops so fast, your body thinks it’s in a state of hypothermia. Because of that, blood drains out of your extremities and into your core, which is the body’s natural response to keep you alive by saving your vital organs. This reaction to hypothermia nitrifies and oxidizes your blood before it’s released back into the rest of your body. The process actually elevates your red blood cell count as part of a natural defense mechanism.”

Accompanying this are the hackneyed references to detoxification, immune system boosters, and improved circulation, all of Novella calls “the trifecta of alternative medicine bogus claims.”

Again, Novella stresses that the therapy could prove to have value. He explained, “Reductions in muscle and skin tissue temperature after WBC exposure may stimulate cutaneous receptors and excite the sympathetic adrenergic fibers, causing constriction of local arterioles and venules.”

This means that WBC “may be effective in relieving soreness or muscle pain. Cryotherapy is a reasonably plausible treatment for various conditions, but requires further study before the net health effects can be sorted out for specific indications.”

The problem is that providers aren’t waiting for the results of any study. They are jumping to conclusions with a vertical leap that would put to shame their most famous client.

One day, cable TV executive Clinton Ober was sitting on a park bench when, in the great tradition of scientific discovery, he observed that all people were wearing shoes. He further realized there were many illnesses and disease in the world, and that almost 100 percent of the sufferers wear also wearing shoes. He hypothesized there must be a connection.

Earthing, or grounding, is the idea that achieving and maintaining health requires humans to be literally in touch with Earth. Shoes, as well as floors, tents, tights, red carpets, and stilts, all prevent Earthing and deprive people of crucial health benefits. Ober co-authored the book, “Earthing,” whose subtitle declares grounding to be most important health discovery ever. Take that, Jonas Salk. Up yours, antibiotics.

Of the many logical fallacies this field entails, the most glaring is Special Pleading, as it’s just fine for products sold by “Earthing” authors to come between Earth and your feet.

The book’s description reads, “For most of our evolutionary history, humans have had continuous contact with the Earth. Throughout time, we humans have sat, stood, strolled, and slept on the ground, with the skin of our bodies touching the skin of the Earth. This contact served as a conduit for transferring the Earth’s natural, gentle negative charge underfoot into the body. Reconnecting with the Earth upholds the electrical stability of our bodies and serves as a foundation for vitality, health, and healing.” If there were any Neanderthals left, we could ask them about the results of receiving this constant influx of health benefits.

As to modern day homo sapiens, let’s see what Earthing can do for chronic footwear victims. According to the book, shoes block the constant supply of the free electrons that shield and nourish Earth.

But while electrons are everywhere, the suggestion that the human body alone can manipulate them for our benefit is unfounded. As physicist blogger Clint Orzel explained, “Ordinary interactions with many materials will strip electrons off your body. But that never lasts long, as the doorknob spark illustrates. In the process of shuffling across a carpeted floor, you lose…several billion electrons, but as soon as you touch a metal object, you get them all back. It’s impossible to build up and maintain a significant charge imbalance between your body and the rest of the world because everything we interact with contains electrons, and they move back and forth between objects all the time.”

The book contains the usual alt-med nods to balance, tradition, energy, and anecdotes, but “Earthing” authors do get creative with lines such as this: “Our connection with the earth carries information, helping align us with the greater network of intelligence of our planet.”

“Earthing” is also unusually literal with its appeal to nature fallacy, getting that word in thrice in its description of the technique’s panacea power: “Earthing connects us to Nature and Nature is the ultimate source of health and healing. Earthing is a return to the healing power of Nature and a simple but powerful way to restore your health.” Cheap, easy, painless, natural, buy our product. This thing crosses off all the items on the alt-med checklist.

It also appeals to tradition, specifically the Native Americans and Greeks, besides throwing in the standard Qi reference. Another line lets us know that “Wild animals never get sick,” and indeed, I have yet to see a warthog at the doctor.

Let’s move onto the website earthing.com. In a typical evidence-free assertion, the website’s authors write that, “Earth’s natural energy is foundational for vibrant health. Disconnected from the Earth, we feel fatigued. When we re-connect with the Earth, balance is restored!” In a more specific claim, it asserts, “We know that inflammation is caused by free radicals and that free radicals are neutralized with electrons from any source. Electrons are the source of the neutralizing power of antioxidants.” But skeptic author, Dr. Harriet Hall, notes that, “It’s more accurate to say inflammation causes free radicals. And to neutralize free radicals you need antioxidant molecules, not free electrons.”

Then we have the blog, “The Most Dangerous Invention,” which boasts that, “Standing barefoot on the earth has a wide variety of effects on the human body.” The effects for me are scars, burns, blisters, and insect bites. And as you probably know by now, the most dangerous invention referenced in this blog’s title is shoes. Your enemy may have nuclear weapons, but you can respond with Hush Puppies.

Today we’ll consider the delightful notion that every entity above the molecular level leaves a permanent record of its entire history and, when combined with a gizmo doohickey, will cure what ails you.

Proponents call it “quantum holographic healing,” though we will see that it features none of those things. Quantumholographichealing.com tells us, “Everything in the universe constantly gives off a unique energy pattern that remains for all time and can be read by those who know how. Every word, deed, and intention creates a permanent record.” Putting this into our quackery-skeptic translator,we get: “Quantum holographic healing is a modern-day Akashic Record, accessible by those with psychic means, or rather the ability to pay someone who has these psychic means.”

The website insists that E=MC² is the key since matter (a hologram) can be converted into energy (magic healing). I hadn’t realized Einstein suggested his equation had panacea implications.

Pseudoscience red flags are sprinkled throughout the website. First, it highlights what is to come, as opposed to what’s been discovered. “It’s how we will experience wellness 50 years from now. There will be wide-spread acceptance of vibrational medicine.” There would be wide-spread acceptance of it today if had been proven effective, as evidenced by penicillin.

A good example of the scientific illiteracy of this site is this line: “Most medical research focuses on chemicals.” As if this were a bad distinction, or even a changeable one. Since all matter contains chemicals, any medicine – traditional, quantum or otherwise – will necessarily have chemicals.

Another pseudoscience flag is offering a fix that is quick, painless, and relatively cheap ($249): “The solutions we are looking for can be easily found utilizing Quantum mechanics.”

Moving onto how it works, well let’s throw some science terms out and see if a coherent thought emerges. “Every particle of matter, every cell, organ, arm and leg, every disease-causing pathogen has an energetic frequency signature. Your body is continually broadcasting what it needs. We can know instantly from hundreds of miles away exactly what it is you need.”

This is the cusp on a great awakening, we are assured. “If you’re not looking at the state of your health from the perspective of your Quantum Hologram, then you’re still living in the Dark Ages of leaches, bloodletting, and swallowing nostrums. We need to leave that antiquated model behind and step into the modern Quantum World.” After brushing aside the superstitions of yesteryear, the author then segues awkwardly into a contradictory appeal to tradition fallacy (red flag number three). “This Quantum World is very similar to world-wide authentic Native Wisdom. Native cultures all shared the same sacred secret being rediscovered in our understanding of the Quantum Hologram.”

The anonymous author hypothesizes, by which I mean throws out a baseless guess, that, “We are living as three-dimensional beings imbedded in a holographic universe of infinite dimensions. We are perceivers of the Quantum Universe and receivers of the information radiating from the Quantum Holograph. Your Quantum Hologram is the blueprint that determines and builds your three-dimensional world. You either feel ill or well depending on what’s stored in your Hologram. Quantum Holographic Healing changes your Quantum Hologram by erasing harmful pathogenic information so that it cannot manifest in your body.”

He then states that this information may reveal a need to improve diet and exercise habits, which of course would make one healthier without having to tinker with a hologram.

Once we start this tinkering, we find that it can be a panacea, which is read flag number four. Hydrocortisone is used to treat eczema because research and double blind studies showed this to be effective. It would never be used to treat a torn tendon. There are no such restrictions on alternative medicine, so “whether it’s fibromyalgia or sudden diarrhea, your issue comes down to a body imbalance that can be identified by interrogating your Quantum Hologram.”

There’s nothing on the site about Germ Theory, genetics, anatomy, biochemistry, or antibiotics. No time for any of that, for it’s time to start “clearing,” without explaining what is being cleared, how it’s done, or why this is beneficial. It does offer that the device accomplishing this will be the Bicom 2000. This is a small rectangular device with short legs and all kinds of gauges, dials, and buttons. It looks like a CB, although the similarities end there since the CB works as advertised.

In describing this device, it’s time for the website to again sound science-y and see what sticks. “The Bicom 2000 is a receiver-amplifier-broadcaster. It works with wave function and frequency information. A therapy vial containing the quantum information needed to clear the particular issue from your body and therefore from your Hologram, is placed in brass input container. The Bicom 2000 reads and captures that information, makes it stronger, and broadcasts it into your blood spot which in turn, through both quantum entanglement and quantum non-locality, broadcasts it to you and to your Quantum Hologram.” The only part of this that makes any sense is the final sentence: “These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This therapy and/or information is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.”

The website states that a patient’s initial therapy is meant to be balancing (another quack buzzword with no biological or medical meaning). It will also “reset your health field,” another medically meaningless phrase. And, in red flag number five, it will remove toxins from your body, which only the liver and kidneys can accomplish. This hackneyed alt-med claim is taken even further in this instance with the assertion that the technique will prevent future toxins from entering the body.

The author also writes that patients will immediately feel the results, although in the next paragraph he suggests his definition of immediate is “weeks or months.” For while the hologram shift is instantaneous, our lame 3-D bodies take a while to adjust.

Onto red flag number six, which is no peer review or data, but instead anecdotes. Such as one from Stan, who lets us know he has more energy and is feeling great. He adds, “I am now willing to do all you recommend to reach health level 995.” I’m unsure what Bicon 2000 is doing for the patient, but it seems to be getting the doctor unquestioned loyalty.

As to how the practitioner knows hologram healing works, he said his hologram reading revealed this. It has also allowed him to “finally learn my true place in the Universe,” which is presumably to be a pseudoscientific huckster. He also offers that, “Reading energy fields will enable you to distinguish between hard facts and invented stories.” My energy field is letting me know where Quantum Healing lies on that spectrum.