While a study like the one mentioned in this article is nice, let’s look at its relative value as a way of knowing and believing in something: Do we NOW think acupuncture at BL-67 will help vision because some research and an MRI showed it to be true? What about the way it was found to be effective by the Chinese over 1000 years ago? The empirical evidence rooted in the experience of millions of Chinese people over hundreds and hundreds of years is frequently invalidated by people with the notion that a single research study can show us the “truth.” WHAT IF that research had had negative results? How many of us would basically think that shows acupuncture doesn’t work? Would the experiences of those millions of people be suddenly wrong? Research is okay, but lets not fall into the trap of thinking it is the only way of knowing the truth. How many of you now believe that echinacea doesn’t work because a study came out this year saying so? Preposterous. The US Pharmacopoeia listed echinacea as an effective drug up until the 1930s. It was used by more than 1/10th of the doctors in the US between 1870 and 1900. Thousands of people were helped by it long before its more recent popularity since the 1980s. If a study tells you garlic helps your heart, but people have been using it for 400 years to help their hearts, is it the study or the 400 years that informs your belief? What happens if another study comes out saying otherwise? And then a further study the following year says that in fact it does? Research is fine, but it insults every tradition of medicine on earth to assume it is the only, or even the best, way of evaluating efficacy.