Philosophy
Homeopathy is a vitalist philosophy that interprets diseases and sickness as caused by disturbances in an immaterial vital force or life force. Disturbances are believed to manifest themselves first in mental symptoms, and eventually progress to physical disease if untreated. Homeopathy rejects germ theory, viewing the presence of pathogens as a symptom, rather than cause, of disease.
Homeopathy maintains that the vital force has the ability to react and adapt to internal and external causes, which homeopaths refer to as the "law of susceptibility" (as with the "law of similars" this is a term of art and not a natural law, and it lacks significant scientific acceptance).
The law of susceptibility implies that a negative state of mind can attract hypothetical disease entities called "miasms" to invade the body and produce symptoms of diseases. However, Hahnemann rejected the notion of a disease as a separate thing or invading entity, and insisted it was always part of the "living whole". Hahnemann proposed homeopathy in reaction to the state of traditional Western medicine at that time, which often was brutal and more harmful than helpful. Hahnemann coined the expression "allopathic medicine", which was used to pejoratively refer to traditional Western medicine.
Read more about this topic: Homeopathic Remedies
Famous quotes containing the word philosophy:
“It is not easy to make our lives respectable by any course of activity. We must repeatedly withdraw into our shells of thought, like the tortoise, somewhat helplessly; yet there is more than philosophy in that.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“It was fit that I should live on rice, mainly, who loved so well the philosophy of India.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“A new philosophy generally means in practice the praise of some old vice.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)