A reply to Ben Kavoussi MS and all the so-called anti-quackery groups

Transcription

1 Tong Ren - The Future Medicine A reply to Ben Kavoussi MS and all the so-called anti-quackery groups Tong Ren healing is getting popular in the New England area. So far we have about 7,000 people who use this healing system in New England. Tong Ren healing has spread around the world as a new form of healing. Of course, this causes many responses of criticism aimed at our new concepts. It doesn't matter whether the criticisms are positive or negative. We are glad that the public pays attention to us. It means we are really moving up. Why are we often criticized? It is easy to understand because we, the Tong Ren practitioners, do not follow any traditional theory. We do not criticize others; in fact we respect other healing systems, including religious healing or psychic healing. Any healing system that works to heal people is helpful; the only difference is the healing rate or percentage in question. Any type of healing, if it does not help, will disappear from earth by the law of natural selection. On June 16, 2011, the Tong Ren healing system was criticized again. This time in an extensive article written and published by Ben Kavoussi MS, an acupuncturist and anti-quackery activist. This article Exorcism and Sorcery as Health Benefits?! is published in the Science Based Medicine (SBM) website. First, let s view what Ben said in his writing. The first sentence is: As unbelievable as this might sound, voodoopuncture is no fiction at all. It is funny that it doesn t matter what you call Tong Ren, because so far no one can stop the believers; they keep coming to us. Why so?! Because of the healing result and benefit they receive. In our healing class, about half of the patients have late stage cancer or terminal illnesses. It is not fiction at all have you ever cared about what the patient is thinking? Why do the patients come to us? Or have you interviewed them from your loving heart? We know the answer. Of course, you know the answer as well. What is going to happen if their doctor or

2 healer cannot help them? They are looking for a new way to survive and find the hope of life. This is a natural human instinct that no one can stop. The principle of magical correspondence in TCM is called wu xing ( 五行 ) in Chinese, and is known as the Five Phases/Elements Theory in English. His whole article criticizes the TCM theory as well. We do not deny your critique that TCM is the ancient traditional Chinese medical theory developed from the Bronze Age and that is why it is called TCM. This theory in summation is old. All of our Tong Ren healing theory follows modern medical information and upto-date scientific knowledge. Yet, we guarantee that you have never read Tom Tam s books or even explored tomtam.com as well. Of course any anti-quackery activist and so-called scientist with a Masters in Science can write a long article to criticize others without studying or researching. We are not fiction at all, but your criticisms are fiction, misleading to the public and without shame. Of course, you believe that you are right and do not need to apologize because you assume that "Voodoopuncture" uses TCM theory. We don t want to argue and deny your writing or criticize TCM theory. But we still wonder - how could you write an article without doing any research to support your statements? Now, we wonder are you an anti-quackery activist or a quackery activist? Out of respect we won't answer, but we will let people make up their own minds. There are nine references in this article but not one is cited from Tom Tam s books. Mr. Kavoussi's purpose seems only to criticize without any scientific investigation. Without a doubt, this article has spent a lot of time addressing the study of the ancient healing systems such as TCM. To understand the history is important, but the more important thing to do is to develop or promote a new healing system. As in the case of computers, we constantly need to update our technology. We cannot always complain about the slow speed of the 286 megahertz computer. The right thing to do is not to keep complaining, but to update your computer. In the practice of medicine the same approach must be applied. Don't pay too much attention to the ancient medicine (AM); pay more

3 attention to the future medicine (FM). Tong Ren healing is looking forward to the FM but not the AM. A historian always looks back in order to look forward; it is not useful to trap one's mind in the Bronze Age. Mr. Kavoussi writes The main Tong Ren Master in the US is an acupuncturist in the Boston area by the name of Tom Tam. Mr. Ben Kavoussi, Tong Ren has no Master, only a Lazy Bum, and Tom Tam is bum number 1. Mr. Kavoussi errs immediately as there has never been any claim by Tom Tam to be a Master or consider himself to be superior to others. The Tong Ren healing system never seeks glory and honor; it just serves the public as its mission. If you want to write a better article, the best way is to join us, even if your purpose is only to criticize and point out how ugly we are. Our door is always open. Tong Ren's healing power is from the collective unconscious, if any one calls himself a Tong Ren Master, it is he who must be the quack. In this case, we really would need your help as an anti-quackery activist. Moving on from Ben Kavoussi's criticisms against Tong Ren Healing, we can discuss Science - Based Medicine (SBM) because we do have one concept in common, and that concept is that we never follow TCM theory in our healing system. So who is behind SBM? Science-Based Medicine is dedicated to evaluating medical treatments and products of interest to the public in a scientific light, and promoting the highest standards and traditions of science in health care. This sounds so good and sophisticated. In a scientific light, and promoting the highest standards. Everyone says they look at things in a Scientific Light. So what is the meaning of scientific light? The meaning is confusing. When time changes the knowledge of science must follow this change. Do you follow changes as time moves on or keep your focus on the old honor to maintain an image of glory? Promoting the highest standards: What is meant by "highest standards"? We can see that the SBM members have their inner smile and unconsciousness saying the knowledge

4 they have is of "the highest standard", believing they are the way, and of the truth. This is not fiction at all. If anyone doesn t follow them, then they must be a quack or practice woo. If someone asks them a question: Do you know how to treat my asthma?" We know the answer, that we should not question them. Ben Kavoussi MS, acupuncturist, anti-quackery activist himself knows the story. He never asks back why, when they are promoting the highest standards, they cannot even heal him of his asthma. The healing result is not important to them, but the evidence that they have a particular degree of education is a big deal. Can Tong Ren healing get rid of the asthma? Ben has never asked us this question. Now let's consider the traditions of science in health care. The traditions of science in health care are based on using drugs and surgery; healing cancer still depends on the Three Bigs: Chemo, Radiation and Surgery. If anyone says we can use energy for healing, then what is going on?! Everybody wants to protect their healing way or traditions of health care. It is so nice to keep the power and glory. If we do not follow their traditions, and walk in our own way, this is called a medical revolution. Then the skeptics, along with their criticizing will come to us. We are living in an age of high-tech. The Tong Ren healing system is already healing people via the cell phone, MP3, internet and/or Skype. Should we give up our high tech healing and go back to the traditional old way? Anyone can laugh at Tong Ren and call it Voodoopuncture, but no one can stop it, just as no one can stop their kids from using a computer. Online information about alternative medicine is overwhelmingly credulous and uncritical, and even mainstream media and some medical schools have bought into the hype and failed to ask the hard questions. We provide a much needed alternative perspective the scientific perspective. Tong Ren healing does not belong to the camp of alternative medicine, because Tong Ren is a combination of modern medical knowledge and TCM techniques. So this criticism of Tong Ren makes no sense.

5 Good science is the best and only way to determine which treatments and products are truly safe and effective. That idea is already formalized in a movement known as evidence-based medicine (EBM). EBM is a vital and positive influence on the practice of medicine, but it has limitations and problems in practice: it often overemphasizes the value of evidence from clinical trials alone, with some unintended consequences, such as taxpayer dollars spent on more research of questionable value. The idea of SBM is not to compete with EBM, but a call to enhance it with a broader view: to answer the question what works? we must give more importance to our cumulative scientific knowledge from all relevant disciplines. Treatments and products which are truly safe and effective are not only from good science. Lots of products and treatment methods can be proven by experiential healing without proof from science as in the case of herbal products we popularly use. Healing can be an experience developed from scientific knowledge. Also a healing system can be derived from experience based data which is yet to be explained by limited scientific knowledge. Tong Ren healing is still developing based on experiential data, and currently at a level without having been proved by scientific study. But we must pay attention to the question: Which is truly safe, the Tong Ren healing or chemo and radiation? We cannot give an answer, the best way is to ask the patients --- Let the patient judge what works?. Someone pays attention to the SBM or EBM, but we and our patients only care about what works?. It is a commonsense question which requires no argument. SBM s authors are all medically trained and have spent years writing for the public about science and medicine, tirelessly advocating for high scientific standards in health care." "We deal with many controversial topics on this website, but even the idea of science-based medicine itself is often criticized by doctors and scientists, concerned that SBM is an unnecessary challenge to the idealism of EBM. It is so strange that all of their members must be medically trained and have spent

6 years writing for the public about science and medicine, tirelessly advocating for high scientific standards in health care. If some one doesn t have the same education or background, can they join their club? The Tong Ren healing system is available to educate everyone, no matter what type of background you have. You may get the healing benefit from us and if you have the willingness to heal others, you can join us easily. In fact, the SBM selects the members and articles. They limit the voices of others, so that the public cannot comment on their website. They always repeat again and again that they use the highest scientific standards in health care. Yet, history is emotionless, if you are a scientist, then you know the way of natural selection. Don't use a special title and background to frighten people, just show them the healing results, not the paper certification or gold medal. Healing is a big market; even the U.S government cannot afford it. SBM is a completely independent endeavor. We receive no industry funding and have no conflicts of interest. Our only goal is to promote high standards of science in medicine. We believe that SBM never gets a penny from the drug companies, but, to say they promote high standards of science in medicine is advertising and promotion for the drug companies. Besides the knowledge of drugs and chemicals, what do they know about healing? If one doesn t use drugs or surgery, the other options are non-drug healing modalities such as acupuncture, Tui Na, or other energy healing. What is going on? They must come out and fight with others, because they represent the "high standards of science in medicine". Again, their scientific medical knowledge is limited as the scope only encompasses the bio-chemical focus, knowing nothing about the bio-electrical and its effectiveness. We never deny or criticize the use of drugs, but in turn, don't deny the use of bioelectricity and this scientific knowledge for the purpose of healing. Now is the time for us to ask questions. Medical studying believes that there are the Chemical effects and Electrical effects within human body. We ask these groups: Do you believe or have any

7 knowledge about the Bio-electrical effect? Or do you only know about the Biochemical effect? Without acknowledging the knowledge we have scientifically about bio signals, this means you only know half of the healing story. Should this half of an important perspective in science be excluded from the high standards of science in medicine? So far Western medicine only gives a PhD for the bio-chemist, but we never hear about the PhD for Bio-electricity, so we ask "why?" Would the drug companies like people to have a PhD in bio-electricity? Who would benefit from this kind of PhD? Or kindly give them a free ticket for travel around the world? Or is it more beneficial to hire the "experts" to criticize or deny the use of Bio-electricity in healing? Should Science-Based Medicine include the knowledge of bio-electricity or only favor the bio-chemical experts? Who discovered the concept of bioelectricity in history, TCM or the Western medical doctor? As Tom Tam always says, relax and don't be so serious. We are all lazy bums.