A big thanks to quackometer correspondent, a broadcaster, journalist and nutritional therapist, Suzi Grant for bringing me to the attention of the wonderful sounding healing technique of Phytobiophysics®. (please don’t sue me…) This is a technique that is being promoted by the Institute of Phytobiophysics which follows the Mossop Philosophy through its products and courses. The Mossop philosophy is supposed to:
harnesses the vibration energy of plants to release energy blocks in the human body so that balance is re-established for all levels of consciousness; spiritual, emotional, mental and physical.
So far, just the usual pseudoscience, sounding a bit like a Bach Remedy. However, the Mossop Philosophy is based on the ‘discoveries’ of Professor Dame Diana Mossop. Wow. Regular quackometer followers will now just how much flaunted titles excite the little black duck. A Professor and a Dame! That has to be worth a little dig.
So before we inquire a little deeper, just what are the claims of Prof. Dame Mossop and the science of Phytobiophysics?
The Professor apparently suffered from malaria and did not respond well to real medicine as it was at the time. During some convalescence in the Far East and some ‘organic nutrition’, the Dame became convinced that illness was caused by ‘unhappiness’ and that plants provided the ‘vibrations’ to cure us. Much ‘research’ followed before Diana was able to bring forth her extensive range of healing flower products to the world.
The Dame now runs a web site selling flower essences, a bit like Bach Remedies, but somewhere (its a bit confusing) vodka is used rather than brandy and the flower vibrations are ‘amplified’ and not ‘diluted, as in homeopathy’. One has to wonder just how much vodka is not reaching the manufacturing stage.
Now, flowers are nice, and I might not mind too much, but PDDM (I can’t be bothered to type her full name all the time), claims that her pills (manufactured by a homeopathy factory, apparently) are much stronger than homeopathic pills (not hard) and bach remedies (for brandy lovers only) and can cure viral diseases. Oooh. Scary. Viral infections can be lethal and need proper medical care. We are are now getting into danger territory – the sort of territory that gives rise to HIV deniers and the bonkers thinking of some unfortunately misguided African politicians that will undoubtedly end in the deaths of millions of people unless some very clear thought is applied. Whilst I see nowhere on PDDM’s web site to suggest that she is in this genocidal thought camp, claims for viral cures really do need to be backed up with sound evidence. The stakes are high. Who knows who will misuse this technique.
Anyway, the web site and her biography leave many questions unanswered. But for my correspondent, Suzi Grant, Prof Dame Mossop is someone I “might like to talk to … before deciding it is also ‘quackery'”. Suzi is a journalist and so I would like to apply some journalistic techniques here. Basically, checking my facts, not taking anyone’s word for it, and asking the obvious questions.
So, here are the questions I would like to ask the Professor Dame…
- You claim to have been made a Dame in 1993 after being “honoured with a Knighthood by the International Order Knights of Malta of St John of Jerusalem for her contribution to medical research”.
– So, you were not made a Dame by the Queen – the usual route? I can find no mention on the web of the International Knights’ Order you talk of (is this organisation the same as the Knights Hospitaller?) and no mention of anyone else similarly honoured. Does this organisation exist? If they do, why their secrecy? Why are you allowed to talk about them and no-one else? Puzzling.
- You claim to be a Professor, but I see in your biography no mention of any academic degrees.
– What subjects have you studied at postgraduate level? Who awarded your Professorship? To me it looks like the only organisation that could have done this is the ‘Institution’ you set up yourself to sell your products. Did you award the title to yourself? Most web retailers do not call their founder a Professor. Puzzling.
- You claim that your ‘Institution’ is “affiliated to the Open International University for Complementary medicine”. Looking at the Open International University web site, it would appear that the sole function of this organisation is to organise a shin dig for various complementary therapists once a year. This university would appear to have no students, no lecturers, no premises and no courses. Puzzling.
- You claim your bizarrely unique Dameship is for your ‘contribution to medical research’ and yet nothing appears to be published on this. You claim to be “the author of seven unpublished books”. Why are they unpublished? Why hold back your knowledge from the world if it really is so important? How did the da Vinci Code people who gave you your Dameship know you had made a contribution to medical research?
- On that note, how do you yourself know what you claim to be true? What experiments have you done? Where have you published your papers, Professor? I can find no mention of Phytobiophysics® on pubmed. Surely, you are not telling me that Phytobiophysics® has no independently peer-reviewed and published work in respected medical journals? Puzzling.
- You claim that “unlike bacteria, viruses are electrical in nature – they interfere with the electrical field forces of the body”. Those are all words in a gramatically correct sentence, but they appear to make no sense. Are you aware of viral theory? In what possible sense are viruses ‘electrical in nature’? This looks like classical pseudo-scientific gibberish and as the black duck would say, you don’t appear to know the meaning of the words. Is the consensus and well established view of viruses being either fragments of DNA or RNA wrapped in a protein caspid wrong? A nobel prize becons if you are in any sense right. Puzzling.
- Why do the flowers have to be picked at the full moon? So you can see? Why not take a torch? Or even do it during daylight? What if it is cloudy? Deeply puzzled.
I could go on. But the depth of ridiculousness is far too much for one blog. Next time perhaps…
I will end on an odd observation. Diana Mossop (I shall drop the titles for now until I get my answers) claims to have helped supermodel Jodie Kidd through a bit of a crisis. Great. Good Stuff. But didn’t my last suspect Professor, the Distinguished Provost of the Royal College of Alternative Medicine, Professor Joseph Chikelue Obi also have thing about supermodels, only this time Kate Moss?
What is it with supermodels? I must investigate…
Hmm, so you didn’t Google for the Knights of Malta? An ancient order indeed so there could be some truth in this.
http://www.orderofmalta.org/knights_malta.asp?idlingua=5
However, this whole thing sounds to me to be based on practice seen in many a hospital. If someone is sick you give then a bunch of flowers and happiness returns instantly.
I googled – “International Order Knights of Malta of St John of Jerusalem” – is this the same organisation? A mistype? Or a different order? Can anyone help?
Let me make myself clear on the Dameship thing. If you were awarded and Dameness then surely you would get the name of the awarding instiution right? There are lots of orders of St John out there (a full list can be found here http://www.knights-of-st-john.co.uk/)
No mention of the International Order Knights of Malta. Dame M may have just made a typo – but I am puzzled.
On your other point KL, I think Iwould rather have the bunch of flowers if Iwas ill, rather than the vodka infused sugar tablet. But in any case, a bunch of flowers does not fight viral infections…
How ironic that at the top of your page I see a Google ad for ‘Bach Flower Remedies’!
“the author of seven unpublished books”
What a great claim that is! I really really wish I’d written seven books that were so shite that nobody would publish them. I could really impress people then.
well, whatever her title – i have used this treatment as have people i know, and it has been fantastic.
Firstly I understand that everyone is entitled to their opinion, but don’t knock something til you try it!! I personally thank the person who introduced me to the therapist I use as I have had numerous sucesses with phytobiophysics, to name one I had a very painful lump on my wrist that I went to my GP with, had x rays and went to a chiropractor and none of them could help or even knew what it was, mentioned it to my therapist at my next visit and he explained after testing me that it was a calcium deposit as my body was storing and not absorbing calcium as I was deficient in magnesium and gave me tablets two weeks later pain and lump gone and has never returned!!! This is just one instance I have a lot more but just want you to understand that if you want discredit this system you really should look into it a lot more!!
The problem is that the only articles on it are here, no one else seems to know anything about it… I would never put something in my body without first knowing what was in it… it would seem to be a crock.
Dear Anonymous. With your testimonial you are falling for the oldest quack trick in the book. “It works for me!” Anecdotes for this mean nothing. How do you know the lump would not have cleared up without Phytobiophysics? You don’t and you cannot. As most quacks like to say, the body is its own best healer and things get better whether you do something or not. The only way to know if phytobiophsics really works is to do proper controlled trials. And Dame Mossop will not do this as her business may vanish overnight if the results are not good.
Dear Canard Noir
Have your tried it – I suppose not. To me you are a sad individual! Science couldn’t do much with electricity some 200 years ago, but now we take it for granted. Just because our lame science can’t explain it yet means it is rubbish. Every experience is a well worth experience ot have had – go on and try it before you knock it!
Good Grief. This last comment is the sort that depresses me most. If you are connected with the sale of this stuff then be very ashamed. If you genuinely believe this stuff works, then you need to read a little more about the placebo effect and tell me why your experience is not just a delusion.
As for the comment about electricity – our understanding of electricity is the result of thousands of physicists, mathematicians and engineers working hard to understand this phenomenon and put it to use. The results of this effort as here for everyone to see – this ‘lame science’ is the thing that allows lame comments to be posted on the internet. The blitherings of the pseudoscientist take us nowhere in this world.
You know, there are plenty of things I don’t need to try in order to know they are rubbish. Take voodoo healing. There are people who genuinely believe this to be true. Have you tried Voodoo? Thought not.
Phytobiophysics is just voodoo in a pretty summer frock and straw hat.
Well said – absolute bulls@it!
This sentiment is everything wrong with the world. Why we’re sick. Why we’re angry. Why we don’t follow our dreams. Why we’d rather stay on a little box that makes telephone calls then dig deeper. Dig deeper. Ask questions that don’t end in no. Suspend disbelief and know you won’t fall off the cliff. Abandon fear and embrace something you don’t know.
Voodoo healing does not exist. Voodoo is actually an indigenous African Religion practiced by the Zulu people. A very happy people. When they ended up in Haiti a rebranding of voodoo during the horror movie craze of the 1930s gave voodoo WRONG name we hear today. Wade Davis wrote a great book on it.
Love a little man and quit knocking things because they don’t fit in your box. There’s a lot of other boxes you haven’t tried.
Well, my dear little black duck, you provided me with the most entertaining half hour on the internet for ages. Just diagnosed with MS, so more than a passing interest in anything that might help (removing my tooth fillings? deep breathing exercises? gin on the NHS? – guess which one I made up).Seriously, illness makes you scared and vulnerable and that’s why these people thrive.So Doctor (ho ho) Gillian McKeith will continue watch her bank balance grow by selling massively overpriced seeds etc that are widely available elsewhere. And I think gathering flowers by moonlight sounds charming. Absolutely barmy and useless, but charming. Keep up the good work.
Well said!
I introduced myself to Phytobiophysics on 2 occasions 3 years apart. On the first occasion I experienced such an intense response (pounding headaches, swollen throat, exceptional thirst etc…(only 5ml of vodka and some sugar tablets canard noir))that I gave up.
3 years later I returned to deal with the shock of an accident. If I had any expectation of the treatment it was that it would support me emotionally and help me through the shock. Oh no! I responded in the same way (pounding headaches, swollen throat, exceptional thirst etc). The only common factor was that I was taking Phytobiophysics formulas. The symptoms cleared in about 1 week and for the first time in about 6 years I no longer felt that I had a big black oppressive cloud hanging over me. Whatever I had cleared from my body during that time had a dramatically positive effect on my well-being.
After a series of Phytobiophysics treatments, during which time I felt increasingly better, Phytobiophysics is now my chosen method of healthcare.
Don’t get me wrong, if I broke a leg I’d be glad to have surgeons, doctors and a hospital to visit. However, I don’t need scientists to verify the effectiveness of my primary choice in healthcare…my body tells me all I need to know.
Look within, canard noir, look within. xxx
This may be anecdotal canard noir but it is only one in a series of positive personal experiences with Phytobiophysics. Having met a plethora of Phytobiophysics users I know that I am not alone.
Cynicism is healthy, canard noir, closed-mindedness however…..
Good for you. I won’t break the spell. But you of course may do by looking up ‘placebo’.
Retrospectively, I am very glad to have experienced the same symptoms from (unfinished) treatment 3 years apart. The same “package” of symptoms would be highly unkikely to be repeated twice by virtue of a placebo and then, despite all further treatments, never repeated again. I had no expectation of the treatments for the “placebo” to fulfil….no framework in my mind
within which the reality of my treatment would fit. My anticipation of the treatment was a blank slate…to be experienced free of judgement and pre-conceptions.
We all feel safer staying within the confines of what we already “know ” and what we have been conditioned to believe. However, sometimes as our knowledge increases and we “know” more we are prompted to question our current beliefs and step otside the safe confines of our existing knowlege.
Besides, I’m sure many people mocked the early proponents and believers that the world was round….but look what we believe now!!
Your anecdote has convinced me. I take it all back. Sorry, Prof Dame Mossop.
And the world is undoubtedly flat.
The good news is that you’ve heard of Phytobiophysics and if, during your walk on the flat earth before you walk off the end, you find yourself in a position where you could benefit from using it, you know where to find it.
With love, canard noir, I wish you health and happiness always.
Cher Canard Noir,
What’s wrong with the placebo effect? You seem unaware of the wealth of research showing that placebos do in fact work. Some of the research is a little embarrassing for so-called western medicine. The evidence is that the patient plays a major part in healing his or herself, whatever the form of healing.
The shift in our thinking that is going on is, I think, that our attitude to our illness is just as important as any supposed objective symptoms/facts about it. Possibly more so. People can be healed in all sorts of ‘quirky’ ways (and are not always healed by the supposedly science based ways that you want to restrict us to). Frankly, “it worked for me” is good enough for most. Obviously if it fails to work a couple of times you go elsewhere (and that is why I never go near my GP – except when I need a sickie which I don’t as I’m now retired.)
I have some experience of phytobiophysics as my partner is a practitioner, and has had a number of successes with both me and our children, not to speak of others, including animals. Such things as good will on the part of the healer, good attitude on the part of the patient, can contribute to the result even in western scenarios of medicine. The evidence increasingly is that it is the key factor, and that love/good vibrations genuinely can heal. I accept it requires rethinking things a bit, and getting over dogmatic notions.
There’s nothing wrong with giving people flowers, I expect. But analysing the properties of flowers and colours and measuring people’s energies (which the latest research suggests are, yes, fundamentally electrical)to find which they are out of balance in doesn’t sound so crazy to me. And, as I say, it works. Not all the time. But enough times. As someone else said, why don’t you try it instead of moaning on? I understand you have a blog to keep up!
What’s wrong with the placebo effect? You seem unaware of the wealth of research showing that placebos do in fact work.
Of course I am aware that placebos work. Am I daft? Medicines are tested against a placebo to see if they are better than a placebo, something that phytobiophysics has not felt it necessary to do.
The problem with placebos is twofold:
1) They can only work so far. Placebos do not cure cancer or in fact anything that our body could not cope with on its own. That rules out tons of nasties.
2) In order to benefit from a placebo, you have to believe the pill is actually going to work. That creates a dilemma for someone like Prof Dame Mossop. You either have to lie to your patient (not too hot in today’s patient centric world), or you have to be mad-as-a-box-of-frogs and deluded yourself.
Which is Mossop, a manipulative liar or simply deluded?
What you singularily fail to appreciate is that a placebo depends upon mental attitudes;If this is the case then the placebo effect demonstrates to me beyond doubt the effectiveness of Phytobiophysics,flower essences, acupuncture and homoeopathy and other types of energy medecine that you have prejudged and determined to be gobbleydegook or merely placebo.
My clinical exeperience with these things suggests that very young children and animals who have no mental notions as to what they are taking respond better to energy medecine precisely because they do not share the fixed and negative perceptions that you have. I could reccomend numerous flower essences to help balance your mental state but i wonder if the ‘negative placebo effect’ of your fixed position would allow it to be truly effective.If Diana Mossop is deluded then I am pleased to join her and countless other practitioners and proffesionals who no doubt have a great deal more knowledge wisdom and experience in these matters than you.It may also be of benefit for you to study the basis of clinical trials which are termed double reverse blind trials devised originally for the testing of chemical pesticide effiveness on crops. The reason this limited pharmaceutical/chemical experimental structure has difficulty with Holistic medecine is precisely because it deals with a single fixed problem whereas, holistic medecine deals with the whole body and treats a person as a whole rather than identifying and chemically altering a particular symptom or bacterial pattern.As a result of this Holistic medecine relies in large part on empirical (observation) techniques which of course are the foundations of all science as we know it.Like it or not you cannot debase natural healing based on empirical science without debasing all science.Furthermore it may be of interest to others reading this blog (since you, le canard, are now simply trying to shore up your uninformed opinions)to think about who actually tries holistic medecine;it is in large part those who have been failed by the current medical paradigm and are seeking answers to their health beyond chemical palliatives and blank stares.It is precisely with this failed group( the largest part of my patient base) that I achieve good results.To term everyone involved in Holistic medecine as liars or deluded is patently crackers! I am deeply saddened by your attitudes as they represent the divide between those of us who know via experience and those who do not wish to know;I hope that your narrow minded views do not dissuade anyone from seeking a natural solution to their problems.
Wow! pause for breath…
What you singularly fail to appreciate is that a placebo depends upon mental attitudes
Isn’t that what I said? You have to believe it is real medicine for the placebo to work – mental attitude. I am not sure what you are saying, but if it is that the effects of phytobiophysics are due to the placebo effect then we are in complete agreement. That would then make you a liar to your patients as you tell them all that pseudoscience about vibrations and chakras. If you think that phytobiophysics does more than the placebo, then there ought to be damn good evidence that shows this. Otherwise you may just be deluded.
Your knowledge of trials is somewhat distorted by the usual canards of ‘alternative’ medicine. Trials do not deal with a ‘single fixed problem’ as you suggest, but simply ask if the test medicine works better than a placebo. You can choose whatever ‘whole body’ criteria you like to test this. There is no mystery here.
Without such tests, how can you be sure you are not fooling yourself? To not test, appears to be the arrogant stand – not the skeptic like me. As we are repeatedly told, the human body has a great capacity to heal itself. Is that all you ever see? The placebo and some wishful thinking?
Modern medicine’s greatest breakthrough in the past hundred years was the abandonment of the authority of the practitioners subjective views to the authority of the objective trial. This has probably saved more lives than any drug, therapy or intervention. When will Mossop take the same humble step?
Oh, and on the ‘children and animals’ thing. I don’t know what sort of children and animals you deal with, but in my experience, both very much appreciate care and attention when ill. One can then report that they are ‘feeling better’.
This is an important part of the placebo effect. It is not just a physiological response to the ‘hypnotic shamanistic healing ritual’ that is going on. It is peoples’ expectations, wishful thinking, selective memory, regression to the mean fallacy and, sometimes even plain fraud, that all contribute to the subjective experience that a quack medicine works. For anyone to claim they are immune to these things, even in treating children and animals, is a major delusion and (these days) and abdication of the responsibility of one who claims to heal.
There is only one real way around this tyranny of subjectivity – fair trails – blinded and randomised.
If it works then it shouldn’t matter if its in the mind, because of the pill or just chance, the fact that it helps should be good enough.
I use phytobiophysics on a continuous basis. I have 2 children – one five and one 6 months. My 5 year old has never attended a GP and my 6 month old is following the same track. They have both had their fair share of teething, colds, temperatures etc but Phytobiophysics has worked. I don’t know how – and frankly I don’t care, they work and my children are in great health.
There are plenty of western medicine medications that work but with side effects. These have no side effects – so happy days. Just try it – it may open your eyes…
If it works then it shouldn’t matter if its in the mind
Well with that comment, I think we are getting to the nub. I really do not mind if people want to feel better by taking some expensive flower infused vodka. Great. The problem is that the people who sell such stuff must be liars or delusional. If it is all in the mind, then it works by convincing people it is not all in the mind. Doesn’t it? Mossop does not say, ‘this is all bollocks, but wish hard enough and you will convince yourself it is true’. No one would fall for that.
But tell people you are capturing the vibrational energies of beautiful flowers – and you are in business. People want to belive that lovely natural flowers can shortcut the hars realities of illness.
But I do not think that most quacks are liars. They really believe their own bullshit.
So, a little teething pain – a self limiting condition – maybe ok. But a viral infection, as Mossop advocates, is entirely different. Do you really want your health advice for your kids coming from a delusional quack? Who is really beenfiting here?
Wow a very interesting chat/debate on who Pro.Diana Mossop is. Whether she is a dame or a quack, whether her products is a placebo effects or genuine. I couldn’t agree more with anonymous. My dear Le Canard Noir, it seems to be either you are economically threatened or a frog looking up from a well and say..hey that is the whole. You would have to agree that basically all modern medicine produces side effects and no modern medicine can restore health to a person. What can modern medicine do is to cure the symptoms or suppress the symptoms, am I right? Have you ever heard of a patient feeling wholeness and happy after a chemotherapy or feeling good that he/she pays thousands of dollars/pounds to get hey symptoms relief/ suppressed? I am not against modern medicine because if there were an emergency, I would be the first to see a doctor, but I don’t discount the possibilities of complimentary or alternative therapies as being useful too. If your muscles are tired, do you want to take ponstan(pain killer) or some muscle relaxant or go to a massage therapist? If doctors says that your stage 4 cancer cannot be cured or helped anymore, are you going to sit down and wait for the angels of death or whoever to come to bring you back to heaven or would you go out and try find a cure in alternative and complimentary medicine? Are you aware that there are many cases where alternative and complimentary therapies succeeded when modern medicine have failed? About your character assassination, do you really believe that she is a quack when if she does not post a threat to you? I am just wondering if you believe in God? If you do,why believe when science cannot prove God exist.
Do you agree that there are many things science cannot prove and many things science have prove to be wrong only later to find out that there are possibilities that the wrong was actually right. The are certainly a lot of things going around out there which science cannot prove their existence and effectiveness.
“It is a mistake to believe that a science consist in nothing but conclusively proved propositions and it is unjust to demand that it should . It is a demand only made by those who feel a craving for authority in some form and a need to replace the religious catechism by something else, even if it be a scientific one. Science in its catechism has but a few apodictic precepts; it consist mainly of statements which it has developed to varying degrees of probability. The capacity to be content with these approximations to certainty and the ability to carry on constructive work despite the lack of final confirmation are actually a mark of a scientific hsbit of the mind.”
Please don’t mock yourself by commenting on things that you know not or so little.
Chi Masters – indeed, I guess that it is you who does not understand science. Of course, there are many things that science cannot answer yet and some things it may have got wrong. This is not evidence for Mossop’s claims though. My gripe with her claims is not just that she has no good evidence for the claims she makes, but that what she says also flatly contradicts very well established science that is supported by tons of evidence.
We have a choice. Either, vast areas of science are wrong and the huge amount of evidence flawed and DM is right, or you are you want to live in a world where wishful thinking is more important than evidence.
Le Canard Noir-What sort of good evidence would you acknowledge to be good? If what she does is not accepted by the scientific community than it is not good evidence, is that what you are trying to say? Also, very well established facts can be wrong too as you have agreed so I really don’t understand your statement. Please enlightened me. As far as I know with my puny mind, if the science were to accept what she claims, it will blow the so called the scientific evidence off the chart. People will go on a riot cos suddenly they realize that there are products in the market that have no side effects. People would realize that there is hope after medicine have failed. I personally know that there is no way the scientific community would acknowledge her findings. If you say there is none(her findings) please read her articles and pay her a visit. Talk to her. I personally do not use her products but I have seen what her products does/help her clients. Kids with autism becomes more focus and are able to interact more deeply with others, whereas before her products, these kids were just like any other autistic children and I am not saying only one kid, but many.
There are quacks out there that makes millions of bucks and are misleading the public and Le Canard Noir is doing a good job exposing them but sadly, it has also created a subconscious defense shield against all those who claims to be able to do what science cannot proof. I wonder whether psychologist are quacks or psychiatric are doctors?
Re. Knights of Malta, there are indeed several Orders claiming descent from the historic Knights of St John founded during the crusades. The real order is the Knights of Malta, a Catholic order based in Rome and headed by a Grand Master who is not an albino monk or anything like that, but a very respectable gent called Fra. Andrew Bertie who is a cousin of Queen Elizabeth. The Order has an international structure, but the name of Diana Mossop does not feature among the dames in its British Association. Also entirely respectable is the Venerable Order of St John, which is a revival of the English Priory of the Knights of Malta suppressed by Henry VIII. It is best known for the St John’s Ambulance Brigade. I doubt if Diana Mossop is a Dame of this order as she would not then be calling herself a Dame of Malta. There are lots of other ‘unrecognised’ (i.e. bogus) orders of St John. The best book on the Catholic order is Henry Sire’s ‘The Knights of Malta’ (Yale U.P., 1993).
Le canard noir’s instinct is completely right on this. I have checked it out, and Diana Mossop is nothing like a Dame. The Order of Malta has never heard of her. Presumably all her other ‘qualifications’ are similarly bogus.
Regarding the claim if DM is a dame or not, I heard that she was once link with the Open University of Sri Lanka… and that PHDs, Degrees can be bought a price without having to go to attend any training or courses. Maybe she got her Dame from this Open University?
Talking about healing without so called scientific medicines maybe it is worth to read some enlightening explanation about the effectiveness of holistic health care comparing to modern treatment by Dr Deepak Chopra MD. He wrote a lot about the non modern medicine or holistic healing that works well when common medicines fails. While he himself is a well known medical doctor in US.
Chopra – quantum mystic man? Are you serious?
Dr Chopra wrote some best seller books. I suggest that you also read “Healing Beyond the Body” by Larry Dosey, M.D.; “There’s Spiritualk Solution to Every Problem” by Wayne W. Dyer and another best seller : “Your Body Believes Every Word You Say” by Barbara Hoberman Levine. I also recommend you to read about Non Local Power from the internet. There are many proof that people get helped by alternative healing as long as we want to learn the fact and open our mind.
I appreciate the way you evaluate others by using intelligent logical thinking and highly scientific approach.
Thank you for your compliment. I only wish people like Chopra did the same.
Chopra misunderstands and misuses quantum theory with the effect that the gullible are fooled into thinking he is profound. It is OK to have an open mind, but it is also important to use it.
Do you think that Chopra does not use his mind? So, how about that many people who are willing to buy his books, are they also considered as do not use their mind?
If we are too confident on our opinion, we have to be prepared on risk of unexpected things that may harm our serenity. Nothing in the world is 100% true. We have to learn to respect other people. Do you agree Blacky Duck?
Undoubtedly, Chopra does indeed use his mind. To what ends though is uncertain. It is the people who believe him who are not using their minds.
His abuses of quantum babble are well documented. He uses quantum language to impress the desperate to believe. Chopra has no real understanding of quantum theory. His followers, less.
A quick test: complete the following sentence: position is to momentum and time is to …
If you cannot answer this and know why the answer is correct, you have absolutely no idea about quantum theory. If you wish to be bamboozled by pseudoscience, that is your call. Mossop above does the same thing when she talks about light and so on.
Respect for other people is a good thing, but it is not automatic. People need to earn respect. When you deliberately misrepresent science in order to sell things, that that marks people a few points down in my ‘respect’ calculation.
What do you think about this?
Dr. Walker received his doctorate from the University of Maryland in 1964. He has dedicated his life to answering one riddle—it is the central question of philosophy and the oft-forgotten origin of scientific thought itself: What is consciousness? When we ask, “Who are we; what are we; why are we here?” are we not asking, “What is the nature of consciousness; can neither science nor religion explain who am I? In Dr. Walker’s opinion, his answer to this question incidentally also answers the question: what are psi phenomena; what is their cause?
Dr. Walker received the Outstanding Contribution Award from the Parapsychological Association in 2001.
Position Statement:
Members of the parapsychological community are often asked about their belief or skepticism about the reality of parapsychological phenomena. I have this to say: the phenomena are real. I have 9 reasons for this statement. I give them in ascending order of their importance.
1. I have seen them happen.
2. I have done them—made them happen.
3. I have experimentally verified their reality in formal, reported experimentation.
4. J. B. Rhine adequately verified their reality experimentally.
5. A large number of competent experimental scientists have independently confirmed and expanded on Rhine’s work.
6. The phenomena are consistent with quantum mechanical principles.
7. These phenomena can and have been incorporated into a theory known as the Quantum Observer Theory of Psi Phenomena.
8. With these phenomena included, physics provides a more complete scientific understanding than we would have in their absence.
9. Careful and competent researchers have independently tested and verified surprising and unexpected predictions of this Quantum Observer Theory of Psi Phenomena.
What do I think of this?
Utter nonsense.
Your desire to believe what you want to be true is far stronger than your desire to find out what is true.
The pages on this blog are full of people with made up titles, awards and nonsense theories.
You should have stopped at parapsychology.
“Your desire to believe what you want to be true is far stronger than your desire to find out what is true.”
What do I hate most? I hate neo cheating! All kinds of new versions of cheating. All activities that only take value but fails to provide value to others.
Talking about true, is truth monopolized only by one or two groups? I always pursue the true or maybe true things if it can contribute value to others.
Do we have to blame people who really and actually help others who desperate from uncured disease? If we make fun of people who sincerely help others then we have to ask ourselves whether we try to find truth or we have the satisfactions to see other people fail and look ridiculous.
Hi all,
the subjective interpretation of one’s symptoms is the most important factor when chosing treatment and someone might walk around with an undiagnosed broken limb when someone else might go to extreme investigative lenghts to find out that he is suffering from a sprain. I have spent years to qualify as a pharmacist and eventually realised that there is more than meets the eye in my lifetime. We are just travelling through life and no-one is physically immortal…”Quackery” is just a word that doesn’t mean much in the absolute. I am much more concerned by the intention of the therapist and the high price of flower formulas. But if it works for you, that is the most important thing in the world, for you.
Apologies if you can’t get my gist.
Good luck
Hi, interesting blog…I´ve seen one of Ms Mossops books so some of them must have been published!!
I was introduced to Phytobiophysics by an excellent acupuncturist I was seeing in Ireland to try n relieve extreme period pains. I have to confess that I thought he was a little strange when he began prodding my toe n making a connective circuit to a galvenometer whilst asking me to touch one by one little bottles of pillules. He then made me up two bottles of water with vibrations to take drops of daily. However what he told me from the notes he had taken was somewhat akin to seeing a fortune teller..with regard to my past and present states of health!
There were a few strange things that he suggested as a cause to my problems such as vaccine damage…and traces of simian(monkey) viruses within my system. I found it all a bit full on and was sceptical, but the remedies worked really well to relieve my pain in conjunction with acupuncture…if it was placaebo effect then yay for that! I checked out the major blockage in my lower right hand quadrant as suggested by the practitioner…and discovered a grapefruit sized cyst in my right ovary.
I also did a long distance diagnosis for my mum(by putting a swab from her mouth into the galvanometer and having my toe prodded) and seriously the readings were completely different and the diagnosis of her health issues were spot on and specific…down to details such as a predisposition to benign breast lumps in the right breast…a spooky coincidence…maybe??
I felt the phytobiophysics really helped me and used the birthing harmony kit for the birth of my son. I had a wonderful experience of natural birth, and maybe I just have a high pain tolerance but found that everything was very easy to cope with both physically and emotionally and even the staff at the hospital were pleasantly amazed…it was a seventeen hour labour not an ‘out he popped’ scenario by the way.
I don´t know Diane Mossop personally and quite frankly couldn´t care less who in this world is a Dame or not…being one myself of course!!??
I hear her son is now practicing in London showing on the big screen the direct effects of the remedies on the live blood using microscope technology…so if you want to see it with your own eyes…or disprove it as you seem intent on doing then mosy on over to see him…not sure of his name sorry…or send a journalist along. I´d be interested to hear the outcome.
All I can say is it worked for me!!YAY for flower power!
Is this a spoof? Come on, own up someone.
Spoof??No tis the troof!!
I would like to know if you realise how we see colour? and how is colour mesuared? what colour are you attracted to? I think is pretty obvious to anyone working with complimentary therapies where your problems lie. Everybody is entitled to their own oppinion, by the thoery nobody is wrong, we all just see things differently. Perhaps you are the type of person who would rather spend their money and put their trust in multinational pharmaceuticals. Thats totally up to you. I, however, have saved time, energy and money working with these remedies, on myself and my family. Keep up the good work Diana!
Yes, I do realise how we see colour. But I am sure Diana does not from her musings.
I expect you dont believe oil is ending either!
And to answer your question, if I was seriously ill, I would putmy faith in pharmaceuticals. In fact, it would not take faith. I could rely on some pretty good evidence.
Do you deny that antibiotics have saved millions of lives?
So, did you send anyone to investigate the effects of the flower remedies on the big screen???I wanna hear the sceptics take on it!
You can't teach an old dog new tricks…
I put my faith in modern medicine when I was diagnosed with polymyalgia rheumatica at an unusually early age. Steroid treatment is standard but even double the usual dose didn't work. I did put on 2 stone in weight and start to lose my hair though. Then they decided to use an immunosuppressant along side the steroid and the bone protecting drug I needed to protect against the steroids. That concoction made me vomit every 10 minutes for four hours after taking it so they gave me another drug to stop me being sick and another one to protect my stomach. As none of this helped my original condition they changed the immunosuppressant.
This one affected my liver, which became grossly enlarged so they gave me statins which gave me chronic cramp in my legs. By now I was 3 stone overweight and had lost half my hair. My head was so full of inflammation that my eyes wouldn't focus because of the pressure, eating was a nightmare because everything tasted disgusting and despite the drugs I struggled to keep anything down.I was in constant pain and lived like a zombie, unable to concentrate or think straight. It frightened my 10 year old daughter to see me like that.
This prompted a change to another immunosuppressant, not because of my deteriorating health but because none of it was helping the original condition. The third immunosuppressant didn't work well enough so they added in the second one again. That's when I went into anaphalatic shock and after that I refused to take anything except the steriods, which you can't just stop. I tried adding in some of the other drugs after a while but everything prompted an allergic reaction as soon as I took it.
I have now spent two years trying to come off the steroids but if I drop them too low all my original pain comes back. At least I know now what the origin of the pain is, if I'm careful I can eat most things and I can see again, I've lost 2 stone, my hair is growing back and my liver has recovered. Unfortunately my progress doesn't satisfy modern medicine and they want to start treating me with the same immunosuppressants all over again.
I DON'T THINK SO!
I put my faith in modern medicine and followed it blindly, literally, until my body couldn't take it anymore, with zero impact on my original condition.
It's all very well knocking alternative therapies but personally speaking I will now try out anything which doesn't involve putting toxic chemicals into my system. The specialist has told me there is no cure for polymyalgia, only stategies to control it. My immune system is attacking me and I can only wait for it to stop. If flower formulas can do anthing to help me cope, I'm not expecting a miracle, then surely it's better for my overall health and quality of life to try with an open mind.
Modern medicine doesn't have an answer for everything. Somethings it does very well but there were all kinds of medicine before the modern chemically based variety. Many of these have been forgotten but now chemists are beginning to find the equivalents of manufactured drugs in plants. Who knows what other things will be discovered, tried and maybe proved in the future. A century ago it would never have been thought possible to do an organ transplant.
As modern, enlightened (or maybe not) beings shouldn't we be open to all new ideas, especially if they don't have dangerous side effects?
You have a problem with Mossop making money out of it? What about the big drug companies making money? How about this new vaccine against cervical cancer which we are expected to give to 13 year old girls which wasn't trialled on girls that young and no one has told us about the side effects which have put hundreds in hospital in the USA? Isn't that as questionable or even more so?
I am sorry to hear you have been through so much. Despite medicines admitted failures, this does not mean that lone mavericks out there do. Indeed, they are much less likely to. If phytobiophysics worked, it would be adopted into real medicine.
But it does not. It is just the fantastically musings of what looks like an eccentric person. No harm in that – unless you spend lots of money and are given false hope.
After a brief skim through the above comments, I couldn't see any from someone who had met or been treated by Diana Mossop (apologies to any that I missed). I have both met and been treated by Diana Mossop having been recommended to her by a friend.
I had been diagnosed with Intermediate Uveitis by the excellent eye doctors at Moorfields Eye Hospital (not a nice problem, affects the vision, treated by steriods normally but my eye reacted so badly to them the doctors could justify continuing the treatment until the risk of going blind from Uveitis was greater than the risk of glaucoma), but after many visits, blood tests and other unpleasant test they were unable to diagnose the cause.
Diana Mossop, using her "quackery", not only diagnosed the cause as a virus in the mitral valve of my heart affecting the blood supply's ability to clear away debris (ie dead cells) from the eye but using her Phytobiophysics pills cleared the problem up so much that within 4 weeks the doctors at Moorfields couldn't believe it and (unsuprisingly) refused to acknowledge the pills may have had any effect.
For me, I don't care if it was placebo or not. I can see out of my left eye, which I couldn't do 2 years ago and Diana Mossop can call herself what she likes………I think she's great.
shit, my ex wife just took my son to see her
My dear ducklet:
2 things to consider: (1) "fragments of DNA RNA wrapped in a protein…" is a description of what a virus looks like,NOT a description of how it behaves. As you well know, (if you have indeed done your research, )modern medicine has no effective answer to viruses as yet…possibly because being able to describe the look of something is not the same as being able to deal with it.
(2) describing something in electrical terms is not , as you call it, "pseudoscience", it is physics.
Hi bd – not sure if you are being coherent.
Point 1) appears to contain no real point
Point 2) is wrong. Pseudoscience manifests when scientific language is used to give the appearance of knowledge when you are actually speaking nonsense. Just because someone uses scientific terms does not mean they are being scientific.
” If phytobiophysics worked, it would be adopted into real medicine.”
I wish it would be if it was available on the nhs it would save it lots of money but the pharmaceutical companies would be losing – isn’t it them who train the doctors there fore i can not see them investigating alternative remedies out of the goodness of their hearts for our benefits ..
Anyway … after years of being very unwell and my health declining as time was going on with pills to mask the pain , anti biotics for my severe kidney infections ( on drips in hospital if i left it too late to get anti sickness tabs and anti biotics from my gp) .. I had operations for Endometriosis ( to remove the tissues but it always grew back) and was developing more and more allergies , had no energy and generally in a bad way with no real help to cure me …
My friend recommended i see Diana after he had great experiences with his health through her but i was giving up due to being told i was incurable by every so called expert i saw. Obviously i did go to see Diana , after a hell of a lot of nagging from my friend , and it was the best thing i have ever done people are amazed how healthy i am now and have no allergies .. it did take about two years to completely heal and to be honest i wasn’t too bothered how it worked at the time but i now understand the principle theory of phyto and feel lucky that i have a friend who cared enough to nag me into giving her treatment a go.
I have no doubt that there are many quacks out there making money , just like in our health service there are people lining their pockets and failing us. Maybe the thing to do would be to contact people like myself who has a history of operations and hospital visits to back up the phyto remedies and bring attention to the government so they could offer the treatment to patients who “have no hope” .. and find out if phytobiophysics really works , would they care to?
I have no experience with other alternative medicines but am sure we would all benefit if there was more research into remedies that people claim work – if conventional medicine has all the answers we would not need to fund own alternative treatment .
Interesting discussion, despite my super hardcore sceptic outlook I have a small but fairly strong piece of evidence for Photobiophysics, the analysis stage, that is.
My mother recently visited somewhere to get an allergy test (at some acupuncture place in Ireland) but was persuaded to take a Phytobiophysics Heartlock & Journey analysis. They attach some electrical monitor to the hand a small program generates and prints out an ‘Emotional and spiritual journey’ analysis.
The printout does appear to very accurately chart all 4 of her major emotional traumas throughout her life from.
She claims she didn’t speak to the man running the program about anything, indeed the traumas would be rather too personal for her to address with anyone but close friends or family.
I am looking to find out whether they are using a more ‘well known’ stress analysis technique and then selling the pills on the back of it.
Hi,
Has anybody tried this?
Diagnose a patient seeking Phyto-biophysics help and make him/her believe (lie or delude or whatever) that Phyto-biophysics can help. This is to “uplift” his/her mind power, etc. Then,
a) Give him/her some sugar tablets(something that looks like a Phytobiophysics tablets). Is this a good placebo?
b) Give him/her the real Phytobiophysics vibrational coated tablets.
The practioner should perform (a) first for a certain period of time where it suppose to take effect. Measure the result and hopefully he/she didn’t improve and started to loose confident/belief in Phyto-biophysics.
Then, convince him/her to continue trying (this time with (b)) and then measure the result.
OK?
It seems to me, that many of the people who are posting disparaging opinions on Phytobiophysics probably have never tried them. It also seems that the pharmaceuticals whose only interest is keeping a billion dollar industry extremely profitable for their shareholders, at the detriment of those reliant and trusting enough to take any pill prescribed to them by someone in a white coat, have forgotten the origins of their profession. How many of the routinely prescribed drugs are plant /flower based? Digoxin for example is nothing more than the overpriced brand-name for Digitalis, or Foxglove to the common man.
The primary difference between conventional medicine and Phytobiophysics is, that the pharmaceutical profession are looking for a 1 drug cures all; to some degree they have achieved this, even though different dosages effect individual patients to varying degrees.
In comparison, Phytobiophysics starting point is that each client is an individual, therefore any medication or in this case remedy, will by its innate quality have an individual effect on each person treated. Certainly there may be similarities, and patterns indicating how the properties of each essence actually affect the client, however their effects remain as individual as the client is unique.
As someone who has tried both conventional medicine and Phytobiophysics, I don’t see why I have to choose one or the other; I think what is often forgotten is that this is complementary therapy, not necessarily an alternative. When I needed surgery, I turned to a surgeon; however when the only option left was pain management that involved heavy duty narcotics to manage my pain, I turned to Phytobiophysics.
On a very personal level, I’ve found the results of Phytobiophysics astounding; I have emerged from being crippled with pain, and bedridden by the violent side-effects of prescribed narcotics, to being virtually pain free, and with the ability to function fully. In essence, surgery maintained my ability to walk, but Phytobiophysics gave me back my life.
Perhaps the pharmaceuticals and medical professional who exist in their pockets, might do well to remember that sometimes it is prudent to look to your heritage in order to move forward.
I propose a new cure for all disease: Cut off one of your fingers. (Which finger will be determined by my licensed professionals, because we’re treating each patient as an individual.)
And of course you’re not allowed to criticize me before you tried it. Dare?
I have looked at various comments on this web page with a sense of sadnes that you appear to condem a person before you have even tried what she is offereing which is to help you to heal at a very deep level without the use of drugs, if you look around you anywhere in the world you will see that flowers grow under the most extreme of circumstance so why then should they not help us with our healing. Any complimentary therapy should run along side conventional medicines it is not for anyone to tell us to only use one system we all have choice your choice is to deride something you know nothing about what a shame. Phytobiophyscis is the science of colour and light, neither of which any of us can live without. I suffered 41years of pain which NO medical doctor or system could help me with, I also sufferd with vaccination problems and many virus the only system to help me was the phytobiophysics, Doctors cannot even give antibiotics for virus they say let it run it’s course, this system can help virus very quickly, look to your life to see what problems have been created that have caused you pain and suffering, storing that pain in the body creates illness at all levels this is the only system that I know of that works so deeply within the body that creates wellnes almost instantly yes you may have a healing crisis but the end result will be wellness a wellness that you may never have known before, so I suggest that you try before you talk such rubbish about something you know nothing about.
Whoah! I got as far as:
Total skeptic here: was recommended by a friend to see DM, as she’d pretty much cured her of a long-term illness conventional medicine could not help.
In a similar situation myself, only 10 years further down the line with a chronic illness with no known cause and no effective treatment let alone cure, and having tried absolutely EVERYTHING the NHS and alternative practitioners could provide, I thought “Fuck it, I’ve got nothing to lose by trying DM’s approach.”
My friend warned me not to look as DM’s website as it’s apparent quackery would put me off going, and she was right: it was 6 months of continued illness and ever-increasing impatience before I again thought, “Fuck it, and fuck the apparent quackery on her website, I’ve got nothing to lose by trying DM’s approach.”
My friend said it had taken 2 visits over 2 months(ish) to see a difference in her health: for me it was after the third visit that there was a definite shift towards good health and normality. I was stunned.
For the first time since the mid-nineties I could live a relatively normal life and even think about going back to work (yes, I’d been that ill for that long). My husband couldn’t believe it either, and we’ve had many a discussion concerning how something can help your health improve if you simply don’t believe in it. It can’t be the placebo effect because I think the whole phytobiowhatever system’s complete bullshit.
However, for me the DM process does work, and despite the fact that a year later I may be healthier yet still remain a total cynic/ skeptic about her approach (how could it help/ make me better when it’s patently bullshit?!) I have to concede that somewhere, somehow, something is working.
I’m now going to take my autistic child to see DM and see if it has as positive an effect – especially as again, there is no magic pill, no cure, nothing out there in conventional medicine that can help autism.
Anyway, I absolutely agree that DM’s path to wellness sounds like complete and utter crap. Even when she now explains it all during my sporadic top-up appointments my eyes glaze over and I think, “You don’t seriously expect me to believe this rubbish do you?” And, “Diana, you’re clearly very intelligent, yet so very earnest and genuine about your approach, how come YOU believe this rubbish?”
However, I wish I’d gone to see her 6 months previous to my initial appointment and NOT looked at her gobbledygook website first, as I would have been far better much earlier.
I’m still utterly skeptical about the way DM’s method is presented and explained, but I’ve tried it and it WORKS – despite my continued cynicism and disbelief. And so might you!
Thank you Diana for that comment.
You’re kidding me, right?!
A) I’m not Diana
B) I still don’t believe in the phytobiophysics bullshit
C) Just because it worked for me doesn’t mean my opinion isn’t valid in this discussion.
Yes, despite my positive experience of DM I was totally on the side of the anti-quackery debate in this article, until the author proved he wouldn’t even begin to consider differing opinions from his own.
Closed-mindedness and the inability to listen to people you disagree with can be both unhelpful and dangerous – on whichever side of whichever argument you sit.
What a shame.
Well then, not-Diana. What other possible explanations are there for you apparent better health other than PB being a cure? If there are other possibilities (of which there are many) why have you discounted them?
My image of the person writing this article is: closed, angry, irritated. I know people like you that really enjoy drinking a few canned beers everyday and burping loudly. I guess once something reaches this page it’s because some industry is scared people are getting smart.
Thank you for sharing with us the contents of your imagination.
Well, I try a few whacky treatments due to long term debilitating ME….and many well trained doctors don’t believe it exists! I tried to read all the comments about dame professor H but its like plodding through a book!. You must have a lot of time on your hands black duck.please, if you are of a scientific bent, get to work on finding a treatment for ME/CFS .you would be well loved if you did.time better spent than on all this argee bargee about people who are obviously deluded
It looks like in 2022 she was given admission to The Order of St. John (as a member rather than as a dame). That’s 16 years after your article was even written. Was she not in it before or was she downgraded from Dame in 2022?
It appears she was given membership due to volunteering with (then leading?) a St. John’s Ambulance team in Jersey, not as a comment on her phytobiophysics work. Making such mention of it on her website does of course suggest to people that it is an endorsement of her phytobiophysics work. Hate typing that word cause it isn’t even a real thing!
Jersey is a tiny island with not a big population so it won’t be so difficult to become leader of such a team or to be recognised for the work.
https://www.thegazette.co.uk/notice/4065364
https://www.stjohnengland.org.uk/new-appointments-in-the-order-of-st-john-have-been-announced-4/