Michael Specter Quotes

Well, we all age, but I'd been taking herbal supplements for a long time.

Medicine's good for some people. Not for me.

As soon as a handful of scientists come up with an intervention shown to influence aging in other species, they begin selling it as an intervention for humans, even though there may not be evidence it works.

Alternative medicine plays into this exaggerated notion that you can prevent disease simply by doing the right thing.

There is actually quite a lot of crossover between the quacks and drug companies. They use the same tricks and tactics to bamboozle people into buying their pills, but drug firms can afford to use slightly more sophisticated versions.

I drink lots of water, and I've been trying to do daily wheatgrass shots, but they're awful, and I have to plug my nose.

I've always been like a guinea pig when it comes to health trends.

When patients reject official advice and proved medicine, they become more susceptible to quackery.

High street homeopaths, who typically do not have any serious medical training, are allowed to treat you and me for almost any condition.

No disorders have employed so many quacks, as those that have no cure; and no sciences have exercised so many quills, as those that have no certainty.

But however mysterious is nature , however ignorant the doctor, however imperfect the present state of physical science , the patronage and the success of quacks and quackeries are infinitely more wonderful than those of honest and laborious men of science and their careful experiments.

Homeopathy pills are, after all, empty little sugar pills which seem to work, and so they embody [..] how we can be misled into thinking that any intervention is more effective than it really is.

Treat persons who profess to be able to cure disease as you treat fortune tellers.

If anybody had that cure out there like so many people swear to me they do, you'd be two things: you'd be very rich, and you'd be very famous. Otherwise, shut up.

Love and toothache have many cures, but none infallible, except possession and dispossession.

I appreciate health care that gets to the root cause of our symptoms and promotes wellness, rather than the one-size-fits-all drug-based approach to treating disease. I love maintaining an optimal quality of life - naturally.

Although the trends are promising and reishi mushrooms exhibit a number of interesting medicinal properties, modern scientific techniques have yet to affirm its traditional 'panacea polypore' status.

Well, I've seen a bunch of acupuncturists and one of my sister-in-laws is an herbalist. So I know a lot about alternative medicine. I don't know a lot about the practice but I know about the world.

I grew up with an impatience with the anti-scientific. So I'm a bit miffed with our current love affair with all things Eastern. If I sneeze on the set, 40 people hand me echinacea. But I'd no sooner take that than eat a pencil. Maybe that's why I took up boxing. It's my response to men in white pajamas feeling each other's chi.

Growing up, I had really bad skin. I had a skin disorder. Yes, I did. And my mother went to great lengths to try to find something to remedy it. I remember she took a trip to Madagascar and came back with all these alternative, medicinal herbs and stuff. They didn't smell so good, but I think they worked some magic.

When a place advertises itself as 'World Famous,' you may be sure it isn't.

I am very interested in Ayurvedic medicine and hope to explore it more someday. I only have a very superficial understanding of the whole thing right now. But learning what my body type is has shifted my whole self-care regime a bit, and I feel better because of it.

There are some fantastic, brilliant alternative doctors out there.

Homeopathy - an invention of the Father of Lies! I have tried it and found it wanting. I would swallow their whole doles' medicine chest for sixpence, and be sure of finding myself neither better nor worse for it.

It was indeed not very sound. However, those who had taken it, were in a fairer way of recovery than the others at the end of the fortnight, which was the length of time all these different courses were continued, except the oranges.