My India 12 - 1950-55

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(3) Homeopathy: This system of therapy was not as prevalent in our Village as it was in Bengal, where every alternative system of thought used to be welcome (I don't know now).

But we had an uncle who was notoriously anti-allopathic, perhaps due to its cost and side-effects. He used to dabble in homeopathy (among other things like magnets to cure BP) extensively and made us his guinea pigs.

Homeopathy is the most wacky thing I have ever known.

The practitioner would first ask all sorts of irrelevant questions like if I liked salt better than sugar, or if I prefer lying down prone or supine or on the right or left side when I went to bed, or if I like mornings or evenings a la Milton's L'Allegro, il Penseroso.

And he would make a file of it as if it is part of my CV.

Then he would urge me to stop all other medications and trust him and him only.

[Aside: In our Village, we had a charming street beggar who would dress up like a widow in all-white with false protruding teeth and go forth from house to house regaling us with her impromptu sound bytes. One such is a piece in which we would be cordially invited to the lunch party at her home; on empty stomach so that proper justice would be done to her hospitality; not do any cooking at all for the day; just take rest; BUT await her final 'house-call' before setting out for her @home lunch party]

Then he (my uncle) would produce minuscule globules, all white and identical, from his identical non-descript vials.

And would ask us to take them in without touching them, straight into the throat.

Then he would ask us to give up coffee, tea and all other good things of life.

And would warn us that our suffering would phenomenally get worse before his drug takes over.

The system is pucca.

If it fails to work, he would point out various lapses on our part from correctly describing our resume', to not heeding his precautions (which no red-blooded human can follow in toto).

Once I had a brief exchange of ideas with Dr. HKB of Behala, who was a Degree-holder and also had a thriving practice. He gave me Hahnemann's 'Principles of Homeopathy' to read, which I did try.

The two preposterous features of this system are;

1. Every ailment is caused by imbibing some chemical or other in large doses; and the cure consists of taking in the same bloody chemical in tiny doses.

2. The 'potency' of the drug increases with its increasing dilution.

Obviously, both are laughable at first sight and a Physics student would jeer at them.

But, one day, Dr. RGC, with whom I shared an Office Room and wonderful time at KGP for a year narrated this incident:

When he was a naughty kid of 12 or so, he used to fool around with his father's medicine chest at their home in Allahabad. His dad was a practicing homeopath as a hobby.

One fine morning, before breakfast, RGC impulsively swallowed a palmful of pills from the vial labeled: 'Lycopodium 2X'. As he sat down to breakfast, his extremely fair face developed red rashes. His dad looked at him asked him to immediately go over to his medicine chest and swallow just two pills of 'Lycopodium 6X'.

Dr. RGC didn't elaborate on what happened then, but this set me thinking.

Maybe there is something in it after all.

First, I recalled the allopathic 'vaccine' therapy, which we whole-heartedly welcome since it at least eliminated the dreaded small-pox from the Earth for the nonce at least.

And, what is a vaccine? Is it not the same damn germ that produces small-pox, suitably diluted and altered? Yet, we don't object to it. We cite 'acquired immunity' and stuff in its support.

The detail is in the dilution process. Some vaccines are the same germ in a different form, others are dead germs suitably grown in, ahem, mice.

Homeopathy does have an elaborate 'system' of dilution. You have to take the chemical and 'triturate' it. Which means it should be crushed, ground, dissolved in a suitable solvent and the concoction shaken vigorously a counted number of times, say a thousand depending on the 'potency' you want.

This gets really curious: What happens in dilution and trituration?

A probable answer is that the globules get tinier and tinier.

What is it that increases as the bits get tinier in size?

Obviously the surface area exposed. That gets more and more for the same initial volume of the stuff.

[Aside: Around 1967, there was a bit question in JEE: "A 1 liter kettle has boiling water in it. Another 10 liter kettle of the same metal, shape etc also has boiling water in it.

Which of the two cools faster, and why?

I posed this question to my illiterate but all-wise mom.

She replied at once: "The smaller thing cools faster"

I asked her why.

She scowled; "Why not? Every housewife know it. That is why"]

So, what is the chemical effect of increased surface area?

One obvious answer is: 'Catalysis'.

I rest my case; just as a plea not to reject wacky things outright.

However, Dr. HKB couldn't cure my problem. I had to wait till I got married to an allopathic medico, who tried Metrozyl which worked somewhat.

But the complete cure came only with 'one-meal-a day' (not to be confused with 'miss-a-meal-a-day), externally administered enzyme supports like: 'Aristozyme'; and intake of soil micronutrients.



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