Man of Honour
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So was your mate faking it?
Do you believe in Hypnotism?
- Thread starter Tobes
- Start date
So was your mate faking it?
Caporegime
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Theres no such thing as hypnotism as people think there is. Its simply a placebo that allows people to do things they want to. Power of the mind.
In case of fears of flying or anxiety its very simple. As long as you think it might work then you go in hoping it will. YOu are say, scared of flying, but you REALLY don't want to be. you simply need an excuse to not be scared of flying, thats all "hypnotism" gives you.
Same with anxiety, you don't want it, you want to believe anything can cure you. AS long as someone else has helped you believe it can work your mind simply uses it as, i guess a cover story allowing you to think you won't be anxious anymore.
THats all there is to it, thats all there is to a lot of fixes. Not sure if i believe it or not yet but a lot of people for instance are now questioning of anti-depression meds are doing anything in reality or are just working as a placebo effect. I guess its impossible to know. Its been shown before that in the same way someone with pain thinks he's getting painkillers the pain may go when he just gets saline. The opposite is true also, even if someone is getting the real pain meds if they are led to believe they are getting a placebo then the pain may simply not go away.
So now Prozac(the biggest anti-depression drug people think might just have placebo effects now) might decrease in usefulness as people start to think its just a placebo, but is this down to it really being a placebo and the placebo effects not working anymore? Or is it down to essentially increased resistance of people who think its a placebo and it not working as effectively.
Thats why hypnotism couldn't be "disproved", at least not for 50 years and some breakthrough in brain medical science that would allow us to know when someones thinking something subconciously and to determine if a scan can see if somethings a subconcious effect(placebo) or a real effect.
This is why hypnotists that go to say clubs or whatever, comedy nights, they pick on the most gullible looking people. who are they? the ones that follow every latest fashion fad are fairly obvious as people dictate to them how to dress. People that are obviously trying to fit in, a good hypnotist is good at reading people mostly. The guy that came to our uni picked 6 people of which i knew 5 and they were the "needed, loner, want to fit in" types and 4 of them were wearing every cliched "cool" thing in fashion at the moment.
Every person who believes in UFO's and every other ridiculous thing around believes in hypnotism, and every sane level headed non gullible person i know doesn't believe in it.
In case of fears of flying or anxiety its very simple. As long as you think it might work then you go in hoping it will. YOu are say, scared of flying, but you REALLY don't want to be. you simply need an excuse to not be scared of flying, thats all "hypnotism" gives you.
Same with anxiety, you don't want it, you want to believe anything can cure you. AS long as someone else has helped you believe it can work your mind simply uses it as, i guess a cover story allowing you to think you won't be anxious anymore.
THats all there is to it, thats all there is to a lot of fixes. Not sure if i believe it or not yet but a lot of people for instance are now questioning of anti-depression meds are doing anything in reality or are just working as a placebo effect. I guess its impossible to know. Its been shown before that in the same way someone with pain thinks he's getting painkillers the pain may go when he just gets saline. The opposite is true also, even if someone is getting the real pain meds if they are led to believe they are getting a placebo then the pain may simply not go away.
So now Prozac(the biggest anti-depression drug people think might just have placebo effects now) might decrease in usefulness as people start to think its just a placebo, but is this down to it really being a placebo and the placebo effects not working anymore? Or is it down to essentially increased resistance of people who think its a placebo and it not working as effectively.
Thats why hypnotism couldn't be "disproved", at least not for 50 years and some breakthrough in brain medical science that would allow us to know when someones thinking something subconciously and to determine if a scan can see if somethings a subconcious effect(placebo) or a real effect.
This is why hypnotists that go to say clubs or whatever, comedy nights, they pick on the most gullible looking people. who are they? the ones that follow every latest fashion fad are fairly obvious as people dictate to them how to dress. People that are obviously trying to fit in, a good hypnotist is good at reading people mostly. The guy that came to our uni picked 6 people of which i knew 5 and they were the "needed, loner, want to fit in" types and 4 of them were wearing every cliched "cool" thing in fashion at the moment.
Every person who believes in UFO's and every other ridiculous thing around believes in hypnotism, and every sane level headed non gullible person i know doesn't believe in it.
Man of Honour
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1 - Agreed
2 - Complete rubbish. Prozac is a drug and definitely not a placebo.
A placebo would be a white pill with absolutely no drugs in it but the Psych told you it was Prozac.
3 - Complete rubbish.
I'm one of the biggest sceptics on here and voiced my opinions over and over and I do believe in 'hypnotism' because even though I've not experienced it myself, I have been in scores of situations where I know it wasn't false.
Like I said earlier, I was 30 when I witnessed my own family members going under.
And don't forget that hypnotherapy is used all around the world and has been confirmed by top governing bodies like the British Medical Association to be real.
I'm not arguing with them and I'm sure they're not conspiracy believers either.
Soldato
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Wow very board brush statements there drunkenmaster!
A bit like saying religion is a placebo because you don't believe in it... although I'm not going into that, it's a whole new thread!
A bit like saying religion is a placebo because you don't believe in it... although I'm not going into that, it's a whole new thread!
The irony of the above post being that science does not yet understand how the placebo effect functions, it's basically a 'simplest possible' mechanism to describe effects that science can currently find no explaination for, and therefore shouldn't occur, but do.
The problems with Prozac and other SSRIs are more to do with the fact that it is as yet only a supposition that every single case of depression is linked to low levels of serotonin in the brain. So there's a case for misdiagnosis but you can't call them a placebo as they contain very real active ingredients which do have strong effects.
I also wish people would stop linking stage hypnosis to hypnotherapy. The first is purely a means to provide entertainment and a spectacle, the second is a tool to help people re-program their own thinking in ways they wouldn't be able to by themselves. The only time the second won't work is if someone sits there during a session thinking of when they'll do their weekly shop and what club they'll go to on friday and what sport there is to watch on the weekend and so on and so forth.
Well thats the thing. He always told me he was unaware of it and here's the odd bit - it lasted for 24hrs...or so. This was back when we were in uni (97'ish). Of course when I saw it in action I didn't know what to believe - I still don't to this day.
Caporegime
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just because prozac is infact a drug and not sugar, that doesn't mean its not a placebo, it just means its not sugar. Theres LOTS and LOTS and LOTS of studies all now showing that Prozac may infact not being having much clinical effect on a huge portion of the people that take it, so you can't say its complete rubbish, especially as i said its a theory and its impossible to prove and went on to say why. So way to go for disagreeing with a point I personally didn't come up with on my own and I myself said its impossible to know for sure.
Also the last personal statement isn't complete rubbish either. I may not of made it remotely clear, although 99% of whats writen on forums is personal beliefs, but that is what it was, my personal experience. the few people I know who think it work, and the few people who went up on stage i knew are all people who believe in ghosts and any other random completely unproven crap.
The fact that even if Prozac(responding more to the last post than the earlier one decided i was talking rubbish) does have significant clinical effects still wouldn't mean its not a placebo. You can take ibuprofen for headaches, and then have someone come up with a perfectly believable study on why it also is great for antidepression, put some people with depression on it and it could help with their depression. It still has a very real chemical effect, but doesn't mean its not working as a placebo for depression.
A placebo can be ANYTHING< it doesn't have to be an almost chemical inert or insignificant thing for it to be a placebo, that IS complete rubbish.
AS i thoroughly went through, anything thats thought to have a placebo effect( when you don't know its a placebo for sure, IE when it isn't something chemically insignificant) is that by the mere mention of it being a placebo you can effect in very real terms the potency of whatever it is making it appear to be a placebo. This is why its very hard to prove, or even know if Prozac as in my example is or isn't a placebo.
Any anti-depressant even being described can give a depressed person HOPE in and of itself, before you even take the medication. Often with clinically depressed people they've all but given up, if not completely given up hope and that leads to further thoughts of dread. the simply idea that something they will do could well help already gives them hope and can start the process of lifting someone out of depression alone. Hence why depression is such a hard process to understand, and treat.
I think a lot of the studies with depression seem to indicate some of those things based on its mostly the less severly depressed people that seem to "maybe" be getting a placebo effect, and as i understand it some of these studies suggest that because people get better, well, quicker than they really should on prozac, meaning that maybe that initial hope and a realisation they went to get help all lifts them out of depression before prozac really has a chance for effect as it takes what 4-6 weeks for effects to really kick in(supposedly).
AS to the Irony Dolph, i understand what you're saying but, I'm not sure its accurate. Placebo isn't a be all and end all term like Occams razor stating that in the case of Prozac that the simplest explaination is it doesn't work, it must be the placebo effect but we don't know what that is.
The placebo effect is understood to some degree, your mind can in simple terms i guess choose to believe whatever it wants to can it not? Someone with depression can beat it without drugs, you can persuade yourself to be confident, you can persuade yourself to pretend to bang someone on a pool table and pretend you aren't doing it of your own free will.
I guess in reality mostly placebo's would describe, not sure how to put it, placebo's are an excuse to ignore what our concious brain would normally tell us not to do?
Also the last personal statement isn't complete rubbish either. I may not of made it remotely clear, although 99% of whats writen on forums is personal beliefs, but that is what it was, my personal experience. the few people I know who think it work, and the few people who went up on stage i knew are all people who believe in ghosts and any other random completely unproven crap.
The fact that even if Prozac(responding more to the last post than the earlier one decided i was talking rubbish) does have significant clinical effects still wouldn't mean its not a placebo. You can take ibuprofen for headaches, and then have someone come up with a perfectly believable study on why it also is great for antidepression, put some people with depression on it and it could help with their depression. It still has a very real chemical effect, but doesn't mean its not working as a placebo for depression.
A placebo can be ANYTHING< it doesn't have to be an almost chemical inert or insignificant thing for it to be a placebo, that IS complete rubbish.
AS i thoroughly went through, anything thats thought to have a placebo effect( when you don't know its a placebo for sure, IE when it isn't something chemically insignificant) is that by the mere mention of it being a placebo you can effect in very real terms the potency of whatever it is making it appear to be a placebo. This is why its very hard to prove, or even know if Prozac as in my example is or isn't a placebo.
Any anti-depressant even being described can give a depressed person HOPE in and of itself, before you even take the medication. Often with clinically depressed people they've all but given up, if not completely given up hope and that leads to further thoughts of dread. the simply idea that something they will do could well help already gives them hope and can start the process of lifting someone out of depression alone. Hence why depression is such a hard process to understand, and treat.
I think a lot of the studies with depression seem to indicate some of those things based on its mostly the less severly depressed people that seem to "maybe" be getting a placebo effect, and as i understand it some of these studies suggest that because people get better, well, quicker than they really should on prozac, meaning that maybe that initial hope and a realisation they went to get help all lifts them out of depression before prozac really has a chance for effect as it takes what 4-6 weeks for effects to really kick in(supposedly).
AS to the Irony Dolph, i understand what you're saying but, I'm not sure its accurate. Placebo isn't a be all and end all term like Occams razor stating that in the case of Prozac that the simplest explaination is it doesn't work, it must be the placebo effect but we don't know what that is.
The placebo effect is understood to some degree, your mind can in simple terms i guess choose to believe whatever it wants to can it not? Someone with depression can beat it without drugs, you can persuade yourself to be confident, you can persuade yourself to pretend to bang someone on a pool table and pretend you aren't doing it of your own free will.
I guess in reality mostly placebo's would describe, not sure how to put it, placebo's are an excuse to ignore what our concious brain would normally tell us not to do?
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Those that are saying thats it's not real are therefore saying that all the people saying they have been hypnotised (myself included) are lying?
I can see why its hard to believe if you haven't experenced it yourself but I can honestly say it is real!
Syphs wife 2 be!
I can see why its hard to believe if you haven't experenced it yourself but I can honestly say it is real!
Syphs wife 2 be!
Man of Honour
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DOCUMENTARY: Alternative Therapies
On: BBC 2 Midlands (102)
Date: Monday 17th March 2008 (starting in 3 hours and 5 minutes)
Time: 21:00 to 22:00 (1 hour long)
Hypnotherapy.
Kathy Sykes, professor of Science and Society at Bristol, examines alternative therapies in Europe and the US. Half a million people in England use hypnotherapy every year. It's claimed it can help with addiction, phobias, allergies and even breast enlargement. Kathy meets Richard, who wants to quit smoking, Nicola, who wants to eat less and Mandy, who wants teeth implants without anaesthetic. Kathy tries hypnosis herself and discovers the scientific explanation for the hypnotic trance.
(Stereo, Widescreen, Subtitles, Audio Described)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Excerpt taken from DigiGuide - the world's best TV guide available from http://www.getdigiguide.com/?p=1&r=1295
Copyright (c) GipsyMedia Limited.
On: BBC 2 Midlands (102)
Date: Monday 17th March 2008 (starting in 3 hours and 5 minutes)
Time: 21:00 to 22:00 (1 hour long)
Hypnotherapy.
Kathy Sykes, professor of Science and Society at Bristol, examines alternative therapies in Europe and the US. Half a million people in England use hypnotherapy every year. It's claimed it can help with addiction, phobias, allergies and even breast enlargement. Kathy meets Richard, who wants to quit smoking, Nicola, who wants to eat less and Mandy, who wants teeth implants without anaesthetic. Kathy tries hypnosis herself and discovers the scientific explanation for the hypnotic trance.
(Stereo, Widescreen, Subtitles, Audio Described)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Excerpt taken from DigiGuide - the world's best TV guide available from http://www.getdigiguide.com/?p=1&r=1295
Copyright (c) GipsyMedia Limited.