Hacker News Reader

Comment by IshKebab | Hacker News Reader

They could do with defining what "the placebo effect" they are refuting actually is.

I thought placebo proponents were usually advocating it for things like pain relief, tinnitus, fatigue, etc. Things where what you are consciously thinking can make a difference to your experience even if it doesn't actually fix the underlying issue.

I think that's quite a bit different from thinking that placebos actually heal wounds.

View on HN

As I understand it, the placebo effect is seen in controlled trials that use a placebo, where both the drug under study, and the placebo, produce effects. To argue that a drug is effective, it has to be more effective than the placebo.

A completely separate issue is whether placebos should be used clinically.

It's hard to tell if the author is using either of those definitions.

This is pretty controversial, but the placebo effect does appear to heal physical problems sometimes too.

https://movementdisorders.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.100...

Isn't stress known to reduce body's healing processes. Stress, lack of sleep and proper rest. If you believe something is taking care of you, you will have reduced stress, sleep and rest better. Wouldn't it be logical to expect faster healing. Also human bodies can heal naturally as well.

Stress increases cortisol and cortisol for a long time wrecks the immune system. There are a lot of other things that effect cortisol levels, but it's at least on very plausible pathway for some getting sick more easily.

Some placebo proponents would advocate for things like pain, nausea etc.

However, others advocate it for cancer, and run studies where people imagine they don’t have cancer and then measure their tumours to see if they shrink.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com