 How much would you pay for nothing? So did you hear the one about the world's funniest suicide attempt? A couple of years ago, in January of 2010, in fact, groups of skeptics around the world in the United Kingdom, America, Australia, and New Zealand gathered in the world's funniest attempted suicide. Now, okay, normally attempted suicide isn't all that funny, but in this case, it's hilarious. Because all these skeptics around the world tried to kill themselves with overdoses of homeopathic remedies. Now that's funny. Why is it funny? Because no one died in the attempt. I mean, I suppose that's a good thing for most everyone involved. Everyone except that is for the New Zealand Council of Homeopaths, a representative of which later admitted publicly that, quote, there's not one molecule of the original substance remaining, close quote, in the dilute forms of these remedies that you buy over the counter. So whatever the supposed active ingredient is, whatever the medicine is, the dilute, what you are diluting the original substance with is the only thing you're actually buying. I didn't say that. The Council of Homeopaths did. Whether the dilute is water or alcohol or sugar, that's what you're buying, that's what you're paying with these ludicrously criminally high prices for, because eventually the contents of the bottle is so dilute it is chemically indistinguishable from the dilute. Been to the drug store lately, your local pharmacy probably has an aisle full of homeopathic remedies. Know what's in them? Belladonna, chamomilea, echinacea, graphite, hypericum, hegnacea, lycopodium, phosphorus, sulfur, parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme. Homeopathic cabinet! Really, all these are just a few of the ingredients that homeopathic remedies are based on, along with a lot of others you've probably never heard of. Now, many of these ingredients are poisons that could kill you. Many are substances that have no demonstrable record of having any effect as a medication whatsoever, one way or the other. But really, we shouldn't even be calling these things ingredients at all, because that is the very nature of homeopathy. When you buy a bottle of homeopathic medicine, you are paying good money for nothing. Because homeopathy, a crackpot 19th century notion, has to do with one, using chemicals that create symptoms similar to the symptoms of a disease, based on the notion that light cures light, the so-called law of similars. So in other words, if a plant or a chemical makes your nose run, well, that same ingredient can out cure you of a nasal infection. And two, that you then take that chemical and dilute it over and over again, mixing it with distilled water and shaking it and then diluting it again and again and again and again, beyond the limits of Avogadro's number, which is the point at which effectively no molecules of the original substance remain in the solution. But wait, there's more, because after all the diluting and the shaking and the shaking and the diluting, the water now somehow retains a memory of the original substance. And why doesn't that water retain a memory of every pollutant that's ever been in contact with it, of its little ocean childhood and every fish that ever took a crap in it? When you buy into homeopathy, you are barely a medical step or two beyond cupping and the application of leeches, except that you no longer bleed to death. Now, we didn't just discover all this the other day. In 1842, physician and author Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote an essay entitled, Homeopathy and Its Kindred Delusions. Nice choice of words there, Ollie. As a honest liar, I'm interested in deception, but with homeopathy, it's sometimes difficult to tell the deceivers from the deceived. Is it the manufacturers? Is it the doctors? Is it the pharmacists who sell these products? Do they know or do they not know that they are selling nothing? Do they tell their customers? Are they willing to tell their customers? And it's only in this contemporary western world of people with too much money, too much education, too much good health and too much spare time in their hands where the same people are more eager to believe that their doctors and pharmaceutical suppliers are the enemy and that the useless, conman, homeopathic profiteers and alternative healers at their local yoga parlor are somehow their real friends. Now, homeopathy is one of the most scientifically studied alternative medicine practices in the history of modern science, and I will leave it to other readily available sources to provide you with the details of the mathematics, of the procedures for the diluting, of the magical shaking known as seccussion, of the notion that like cures like, or the lunatic idea that water can retain a memory of substances it no longer actually contains. All the mystery magical voodoo that describe and define homeopathy. But no matter which aspect of homeopathy you are examining, the bottom line is, it is magic. Oh, it's not like the kind of magic that I do where something actually happens. It's a delusion. It's wishful thinking. It's epistemological hedonism. You know, if it feels good, believe it. It's also obscenely expensive. It is a waste. It is a tragic loss of resources to all of humanity, if you think about it. Look, let someone say it plainly now. Okay, I'll say it plainly. Homeopathy is downright idiotic. Now, perhaps you think I exaggerate. Perhaps I am merely unkind. Well, consider this item that came across my desk for a product called Nelson's Noctura, a homeopathic remedy for insomnia. Reading directly from the website, it says, quote, All right, so let me get this prescription straight, Doc. Hmm, these medical geniuses suggest that getting a good night's sleep instead of a bad night's sleep will reduce stress and help me sleep. Well, Captain Obvious, you don't say. Why don't we insomniacs just go out and get some damn sleep then, huh? Thanks for the advice. But here's the best part. This is a medication for the relief of insomnia. Now, to me, that suggests sleeping. But note these safety assurances right in the website. Does not cause drowsiness. What? Does not cause drowsiness. You're trying to get some sleep, but this will not cause drowsiness. Don't worry about that. Well, WTFF! What the hell doesn't do then? Now, people like to ask, what's the harm? What's the harm in homeopathy, even if it's just water or sugar pills? What's the harm if that's what folks want, if it offers a little comfort? Well, putting aside those cases, if people with life-threatening conditions who abandon conventional medicine, you know, that's medicine that works, in place of ineffectual alternative therapies, put life-threatening risks aside for now. Just think about what else you could do. What else you could do with your time, do with your brain, do with your valuable human resources instead of investing them in literally nothing. How many schools could we build? How many libraries could we keep open just a few more hours every week? How many children could we feed? Write your own list of what it is that you value with the energy, the time, the resources, wasted on nothing. And those aren't the only costs. There's also, of course, the money. So, how much would you pay for nothing? A 2009 report told us that Americans spent $3 billion that year on homeopathy. That's right, $3 billion a year on nothing. Isn't there something we could do with that money? And isn't something better than nothing? This is Jamie Ian Swiss and I am The Honest Liar.