Creating Waves of Awareness
Germ Theory: Our Dialogue
Dear Readers,
It is not uncommon among medical men that homeopaths are considered not up-to-date and old fashioned in field of present day knowledge regarding the cause of disease. The maisms theory for cause of disease was apparently refuted by many physicians worldwide starting from Girolamo Fracastoro who proposed in 1546 that epidemic diseases are caused by transferable seed-like entities that could transmit infection by direct or indirect contact or even without contact over long distances.
Microorganisms were first observed by Anton van Leeuwenhoek and he is considered the father of microbiology.
IN 1854, John Snow further contributed towards the germ theory by tracing the source of the epidemic cholera in London. He determined through statistical data that the cases of the disease was not consistent with the miasma theory but he identified drinking water as the carrier for transmission of the disease. He found that cases occurred in the homes which obtained their water from the Broad Street pump located almost in the center of the outbreak.
Though back in 1668, Italian physician Francesco Redi provided early evidence against spontaneous generation. He devised an experiment in 1668 where he used three jars. He placed a meat loaf in each of the three jars. He had one of the jars open, another one tightly sealed, and the last one covered with gauze. After a few days, he observed that the meat loaf in the open jar was covered by maggots, and the jar covered with gauze had maggots on the surface of the gauze. However, the tightly sealed jar had no maggots inside or outside it.
In 1860s Louis Pasteur further demonstrated between that fermentation and the growth of microorganisms in broths came from outside in form of spores rather being generated from within the broth.
But the truly resultant effort came form Robert Koch in 1890. He was the first scientist to devise postulates and conducted experiments to verify the germ theory of disease.
The postulates are mentioned below :-
1) The microorganism must be found in abundance in all organisms suffering from the disease, but should not be found in healthy animals.
2) The microorganism must be isolated from a diseased organism and grown in pure culture.
3) The cultured microorganism should cause disease when introduced into a healthy organism.
4) The microorganism must be reisolated from the inoculated, diseased experimental host and identified as being identical to the original specific causative agent.
Dear reader, these, very clear and crystal, four postulates are very important for consideration, evaluation and application of Germ Theory.
However, the results of the findings against these four very important postulates, never became the subject of debate among the medical scholars.
Lets examine the few;
Postulate #1:
"The microorganism must be found in abundance in all organisms suffering from the disease, but should not be found in healthy animals."
This postulate was abandoned by Koch when he discovered that asymptomatic carriers of cholera are rather abundant, people who are healthy but do have cholera microorganism and even of typhoid. So this became common feature that there are many people who are simply, the healthy people but carriers of many infectious diseases, especially viruses such as polio, herpes, HIV and hepatitis C and yet they are healthy.
We would come to the 2nd postulate later, let us see the 3rd at this moment.
Postulate #3:
"The cultured microorganism SHOULD cause disease when introduced into a healthy organism."
Great postulate, we would all agree, because this is the base of the germ theory. The word capitalized in above postulate is "SHOULD". Actually, Koch started with the word "MUST" intially. The postulate would have read as "..that a microorganism MUST cause disease when introduced into a healthy organism...".
But the findings of Koch proved that for tuberculosis and cholera, not all organisms exposed to the infectious agent acquired the disease or infection. This non-infection or failure of Postulate#3 might be due to many reasons like general health and good immune functioning or acquired immunity or genetic immunity.
So the postulate was not formed to become a cutting edge evidence that germs are causes of disease in organisms, due the fact that it do not assert a "MUST" statement, rather was proved otherwise by the great scholar himself.
returning to the second postulate;
Postulate # 2:
"The microorganism must be isolated from a diseased organism and grown in pure culture."
So the last of the four;
Postulate # 4: "The microorganism must be reisolated from the inoculated, diseased experimental host and identified as being identical to the original specific causative agent".
This forth postulate that was the required proof that a certain disease was caused by a certain microorganism by re-isolation of the initially introduced microorganism from the subject organism and comparing the two never infact was proved.
Therefore, the evidence that satisfies Koch's postulates is not-sufficient to establish causation of the disease by microorganism.
We would also like to comment on the experiments of Francesco Redi and Louis Pasture as both used dead things for their experiments and we do not challenge the germ theory if it is based upon the dead things.
Homeopathy consider Living Organisms as bench mark testing and Biological assay of living organisms for all of its evidences and efficacy.
Homeopath Dr. Syed Furqan Ahmed
DHMS - RHMP
Islamabad
Pakistan.
P.S. References Available.
It is not uncommon among medical men that homeopaths are considered not up-to-date and old fashioned in field of present day knowledge regarding the cause of disease. The maisms theory for cause of disease was apparently refuted by many physicians worldwide starting from Girolamo Fracastoro who proposed in 1546 that epidemic diseases are caused by transferable seed-like entities that could transmit infection by direct or indirect contact or even without contact over long distances.
Microorganisms were first observed by Anton van Leeuwenhoek and he is considered the father of microbiology.
IN 1854, John Snow further contributed towards the germ theory by tracing the source of the epidemic cholera in London. He determined through statistical data that the cases of the disease was not consistent with the miasma theory but he identified drinking water as the carrier for transmission of the disease. He found that cases occurred in the homes which obtained their water from the Broad Street pump located almost in the center of the outbreak.
Though back in 1668, Italian physician Francesco Redi provided early evidence against spontaneous generation. He devised an experiment in 1668 where he used three jars. He placed a meat loaf in each of the three jars. He had one of the jars open, another one tightly sealed, and the last one covered with gauze. After a few days, he observed that the meat loaf in the open jar was covered by maggots, and the jar covered with gauze had maggots on the surface of the gauze. However, the tightly sealed jar had no maggots inside or outside it.
In 1860s Louis Pasteur further demonstrated between that fermentation and the growth of microorganisms in broths came from outside in form of spores rather being generated from within the broth.
But the truly resultant effort came form Robert Koch in 1890. He was the first scientist to devise postulates and conducted experiments to verify the germ theory of disease.
The postulates are mentioned below :-
1) The microorganism must be found in abundance in all organisms suffering from the disease, but should not be found in healthy animals.
2) The microorganism must be isolated from a diseased organism and grown in pure culture.
3) The cultured microorganism should cause disease when introduced into a healthy organism.
4) The microorganism must be reisolated from the inoculated, diseased experimental host and identified as being identical to the original specific causative agent.
Dear reader, these, very clear and crystal, four postulates are very important for consideration, evaluation and application of Germ Theory.
However, the results of the findings against these four very important postulates, never became the subject of debate among the medical scholars.
Lets examine the few;
Postulate #1:
"The microorganism must be found in abundance in all organisms suffering from the disease, but should not be found in healthy animals."
This postulate was abandoned by Koch when he discovered that asymptomatic carriers of cholera are rather abundant, people who are healthy but do have cholera microorganism and even of typhoid. So this became common feature that there are many people who are simply, the healthy people but carriers of many infectious diseases, especially viruses such as polio, herpes, HIV and hepatitis C and yet they are healthy.
We would come to the 2nd postulate later, let us see the 3rd at this moment.
Postulate #3:
"The cultured microorganism SHOULD cause disease when introduced into a healthy organism."
Great postulate, we would all agree, because this is the base of the germ theory. The word capitalized in above postulate is "SHOULD". Actually, Koch started with the word "MUST" intially. The postulate would have read as "..that a microorganism MUST cause disease when introduced into a healthy organism...".
But the findings of Koch proved that for tuberculosis and cholera, not all organisms exposed to the infectious agent acquired the disease or infection. This non-infection or failure of Postulate#3 might be due to many reasons like general health and good immune functioning or acquired immunity or genetic immunity.
So the postulate was not formed to become a cutting edge evidence that germs are causes of disease in organisms, due the fact that it do not assert a "MUST" statement, rather was proved otherwise by the great scholar himself.
returning to the second postulate;
Postulate # 2:
"The microorganism must be isolated from a diseased organism and grown in pure culture."
So the last of the four;
Postulate # 4: "The microorganism must be reisolated from the inoculated, diseased experimental host and identified as being identical to the original specific causative agent".
This forth postulate that was the required proof that a certain disease was caused by a certain microorganism by re-isolation of the initially introduced microorganism from the subject organism and comparing the two never infact was proved.
Therefore, the evidence that satisfies Koch's postulates is not-sufficient to establish causation of the disease by microorganism.
We would also like to comment on the experiments of Francesco Redi and Louis Pasture as both used dead things for their experiments and we do not challenge the germ theory if it is based upon the dead things.
Homeopathy consider Living Organisms as bench mark testing and Biological assay of living organisms for all of its evidences and efficacy.
Homeopath Dr. Syed Furqan Ahmed
DHMS - RHMP
Islamabad
Pakistan.
P.S. References Available.
The text of above discussion is also available at http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?topic=12734&post=52624&ui...
Tags: and, caused, discussed, diseases, due, germ, germs., homeopaths, infections, microbiology
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Gina Tyler DHOM on -
Myself and Kaviraj have posted alot of information on the false theory of germs- search HWC for all our posts.
Why Louis Pasteur's Germ Theory Is A Curse
by Nancy Appleton, Ph.D.
In the late nineteenth century, Louis Pasteur's "germ theory" became the medical paradigm, the controlling medical idea, for the Western world. In its simplest form, the germ theory proposes that the body is sterile and that germs from the air cause disease. The medical community started to look for the right pill to kill off the germ. This concept became ingrained into medicine and medical research. Most research goes to looking for the right pill for a specific disease.
If new ideas concerning the cause of disease do not fit into this theory that airborne germs cause disease and the answer to illness is finding the right pill to cure the disease, then these new ideas fall on deaf ears. Any paradigm, or group of ideas, is difficult to break into if the new ideas do not add to the original ideas.
The billion dollar pharmaceutical industry has taken away some of the symptoms and pain but has not found the answer to many infectious and most all degenerative diseases. In the U. S., in spite of all the money, research, and volunteer hours spent, all major degenerative diseases are increasing per 100,000. Diabetes is increasing at an alarming rate. Infectious diseases are also on the rise. Every year, old symptoms are given new names-names like Herpes, AIDS, Epstein-Barr virus, Candida Albicans, chronic fatigue syndrome, environmental illness, and fibromyalgia - to make them appear to be the work of new germs. People live in hope that soon a magic pill will be found. Unless we turn this nonsense around, the list will only grow in the future. The medical community and the individual must start looking at what is causing the illness rather than how to cure the illness.
The responsibility for health has been taken away from the individual. If germs from the air cause disease then the medical community must find the answer. The individual is not responsible. What can we do to stop germs from the air getting in our mouths and our whole body? According to the germ theory, we can do nothing for a cure or to stop the cause of disease. There are always germs in the air. We are breathing in these germs right now. Some of us get sick and some of us do not get sick. For some of us who do get sick, the cold lingers for days. Others of us seem to get well very fast. It seems a more logical explanation is that germs are allowed to cause problems in our body when we do not have a strong immune system.
In primitive villages today there are very few degenerative diseases but it they are coming. As sugar and other processed foods arrive and people move into the cities, where lives become distressful, due to crime, pollution, drugs, and poor living conditions, degenerative disease becomes prevalent. When people do get symptoms, they believes that pills and modern technology will heal them. Medical clinics pop up in the cities to help "cure" people with magic pills. They do not understand that they are creating this mess themselves In order for germs and disease not to become a problem in our body, we need to take responsibility back for our health. There are parts of our twentieth century life style that could be causing us to suppress our immune systems. What we eat, think, say, do, and feel can affect our immune system, positively or negatively. If we eat whole foods, do not let stress become distress, not let negative thoughts become a problem, and exercise, then our immune system will be able to function well and germs will not be able to become a problem in our body. Stop doing to the body what you did to make it sick and the body will heal itself. Detoxify the body, give it the nutrients it needs and the body will be able to defend us against infectious and degenerative diseases.
Nancy Appleton, Ph.D.
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Permalink Reply by Gina Tyler DHOM on
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What does Hahnemann think about Germ theory:
Hahnemann revealed the errors inherent to the inconsistent medical ideas of his time, while searching for a sound and factually-based grounding for medical practice. He "detaches himself entirely from his contemporaries by his conception of the nature of disease." [Haehl, I, 291] Nonsense, “is his description of the materia peccans, which was then generally accepted as the cause of disease." [Haehl, I, 291] He dismissed "mechanical or chemical alterations of the material substance of the body," [Haehl, I, 291] as being the cause of disease, which he did not believe to be "dependent on a material morbific substance...[but resulting from] merely spirit-like [conceptual] dynamic derangements of the life." [Haehl, I, 291] It is this "morbidly affected vital energy alone [that] produces disease." [Haehl, I, 291] He "strenuously...rejected and fought against the theories of disease origin and diagnosis, as known in his time." [Haehl, I, 290] He "had to do with a confused babble of inferences and unproveable assertions." [Haehl, I, 290] He dismissed "the crass materialism" [Haehl, I, 290] of his day, and "became disillusioned and dissatisfied with current medical practice. He…began experiments, later called ‘provings’, on himself and other healthy individuals." [Flinn, 425-7]
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