> Ted Kaptchuk, a Harvard Medical School professor and one of the lead researchers, theorizes that the placebo effect is, in the words of the Times article, “a biological response to an act of caring; that somehow the encounter itself calls forth healing and that the more intense and focused it is, the more healing it evokes.”
I dug up an article in which he explores this further and it's an angle I haven't considered before [1]:
> More recently, however, experts have concluded that reacting to a placebo is not proof that a certain treatment doesn't work, but rather that another, non-pharmacological mechanism may be present.
> How placebos work is still not quite understood, but it involves a complex neurobiological reaction that includes everything from increases in feel-good neurotransmitters, like endorphins and dopamine, to greater activity in certain brain regions linked to moods, emotional reactions, and self-awareness. All of it can have therapeutic benefit. "The placebo effect is a way for your brain to tell the body what it needs to feel better," says Kaptchuk.
> But placebos are not all about releasing brainpower. You also need the ritual of treatment. [...] You receive all kinds of exotic pills and undergo strange procedures. All this can have a profound impact on how the body perceives symptoms because you feel you are getting attention and care."
If reiki can evoke this effect consistently, reliably and cheaply at scale (and this is believable, because according to TFA, the lot of the practice is just physical touch in ways that the body might perceive as caring?) - perhaps there actually is value in it?
[1] https://www.health.harvard.edu/mental-health/the-power-of-th...