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Revision as of 09:45, 25 January 2008

Plants Unassessed

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Cartier, scurvy, etc

The statement "The foliage is rich in vitamin C; Native Americans and early European explorers used it to treat scurvy" from the FEIS gives the Silvics manual as its source. However, the latter says "the French explorer Cartier learned from the Indians how to use the tree's foliage to treat scurvy" which says it was just one European expedition (which as far as I know is the truth; Samuel de Champlain sought out this remedy but did not find it). Furthermore, it is not clear whether "Indians" is sufficiently specific, as one of the issues is whether Cartier was meeting the same group as de Champlain (St. Lawrence Iroquoians, Hurons or Iroquois). There is an extensive literature on this subject (just do a google scholar search for "Jacques Cartier scurvy"). Unfortunately, most of it is not online at all, or only available with a subscription. So I'm a little shaky on the subtleties ("has been widely asserted to be aneda" versus "was aneda" versus "probably was aneda" etc). But I do object to removing the link to aneda (which is the right article for lengthy discussions) or with watering down "Jacques Cartier" to "early European explorers". Kingdon (talk) 15:00, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Thuja occidentalis (Arbor vitae): A Review of its Pharmaceutical, Pharmacological and Clinical Properties.

Levine alledges that the study, located here is about Homeopathy. The study appears to be about natural medicine. Can someone review? PouponOnToast (talk) 16:59, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I have the same concerns; the article summary mentions in passing that T. occidentalis is used in homeopathy but doesn't give any indication that the article actually contains information about any such homeopathic uses. This could be a case of homeopathy riding on the coattails of herbal treatments which themselves may or may not have some basis in fact. Unfortunately I don't have access to the original article so can't verify one way or the other. MrDarwin (talk) 17:05, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

That is a good point. I guess without the full article text, we can't say for sure. -- Levine2112 17:38, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

As it turns out, I have access to the full article after all. I have only skimmed it but it does not appear to discuss any homeopathic uses of Thuja occidentalis; the uses and clinical studies the article reviews are all non-homeopathic. As I have stressed elsewhere, "herbal remedies" and "alternative medicine" are not synonymous with "homeopathy" and great care must be taken to distinguish between them. MrDarwin (talk) 18:27, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I guess this is an important warning that it is hasty to say something says something unless you have actually read the thing yourself. PouponOnToast (talk) 18:30, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

EVCAM is not a reliable nor authoritative source. The reference should be removed. Jefffire (talk) 17:03, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Disagree. Regardless, PubMed is. -- Levine2112 17:38, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

No, pubmed is a database. It contains both reliable and unreliable sources. Jefffire (talk) 19:21, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I thought I had found this holy grail with the book "Medicinal Plants of the World", written by two professors (one a botanist, the other a pharmaceutical biologist) and which has been favorably reviewed in the botanical literature--yes, it clearly and explicitly states for several species "X is used in homeopathic remedies", and no, it doesn't make any comments favorable to homeopathy--but when I tried adding that reference to the Thuja occidentalis article, even that was shot down by User:ScienceApologist as having been published by a "fringe publishing press". I have to conclude that there are no possible sources that he and the other editors will consider reliable. MrDarwin (talk) 03:23, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I have to admit, MrDarwin, this is the closest I've seen to a decent rational for inclusion. However, Timber Press is realy quite parochial and doesn't do much to establish the prominence of the homeopathic remedies of interest. In this instance, I'm not trying to disparage Timber Press, but rather I'm trying to make it clear that we need something a bit more mainstream so that we can nail down the prominence of this connected idea to the subject of the article. ScienceApologist (talk) 09:43, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

RfC on homeopathy

Template:RFCsci

Reason: A large debate with no consensus has errupted over the mention of this plant's usage in preparation of homeopathic remedies. While nearly all editors agree (from what I can see) that homeopathy is pseudoscience and quackery, the dispute over whether or not to include a neutrally-worded, sourced statement regarding this species' use continues. Proponents of such a statement have provided several references that they believe meet WP:RS (specifically the ref's included in this edit and diff) that other editors have regarded as unreliable diff (see Talk:Thuja and Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Plants#Thuja and homeopathy for such discussion). Opponents to inclusion of these statements cite WP:FRINGE and WP:UNDUE frequently as their reasons for removing said information diff. Input from outside, uninvolved parties would be greatly appreciated for some perspective. --Rkitko 03:22, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Statements by involved editors

1. Support inclusion - I suppose I'm involved as a participant in the plant project, but I haven't been directly involved in the argument. Anyways, it seems very obvious to me that information about homeopathic use should be included. The sources are clearly sufficient to show that people in significant enough numbers are or were using the plant as a homeopathic "remedy". Whether or not this has any scientific significance is irrelevant- it's simply a cultural element that should be included in the article. I have mentioned that several plant articles, such as Ailanthus altissima, give extensive treatments on use in Chinese medicine, which in many cases is equally dubious from a scientific view, but is regardless important to mention because literally millions of people still buy into it. Another good example would be ginseng- its purported medical effects have not been demonstrated scientifically, but it would be a simple matter of censorship to remove references to its use as a medicinal root. The references supplied are most certainly reliable, and I believe that only someone with an agenda could deny that. DJLayton4 (talk) 04:09, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
2. Need a reliable mainstream independent source asserting the prominence of homeopathic remedies to the subject of this article before inclusion can be made. I have explained the rationale for this here and here. ScienceApologist (talk) 09:45, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Statements by RfC respondents

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