Healing by skeptical trainee healers.

303 Healing is a phenomenon that until quite recently scientists rejected out of hand. Now it seems that, despite grave doubts as to the possibility, even skeptical students— including both scientists and nonscientists—can be trained to carry it out effectively, if only on mice (which are presumably easier to heal than humans). Bengtson’s account (pp. 317–327) of six experiments on healing mice of adenocarcinomas, with very high success rates (average over 90%) seem to imply that anyone anywhere can become a trained healer—at least of mice, if not of human beings. For such a rate of full remission in experimental mice to be achieved by inexperienced ‘healers’ is remarkable, to say the least. Bengtson’s results (pp. 317–327) are therefore of fundamental scientific importance. It is to be hoped that many attempts will be made to reproduce them at Master’s and even undergraduate levels. They are apparently simple, and can be carried out in an appropriate time-frame. Also they have significant implications for many different fields of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). Healing is a phenomenon that is on the increase, with increasing numbers of people participating in it. It is subject to increasing amounts of active research1–4 and comment.5 Bengtson’s paper shows that simple experiments on healing can shed light on core problems in understanding CAM, and indeed in biology and medicine: the utility of randomized control trials in the present day and age6; the occurrence of quantum effects in patient-practioner relations7,8 the phenomenon of placebo9 (N.B.: expectation of cure cannot be induced in mice, so no placebo applies to his experiments10); the nature of the life force or qi.11 These implications show that healing may contribute in key ways to the present rapid development of understanding of CAM. In particular, Bengtson’s theory of resonant bonding can be linked with theories of life energy, common in many fields of complementary medicine, especially Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). There are many well-known techniques and treatments that stimulate life energy in ways appropriate to produce cure.4,11 All cures, spontaneous recovery and “remission,” can then be attributed to changes in “life energy.” Biomedicine still does not recognize life energy, though well-developed theories are now available.12 Such cures are therefore referred to as “placebo-induced”. In systems acknowledging the existence of life energy, every change in health is the result of that—placebo effect included. Even “healing” can be equated with an “induced placebo effect.” There is really no difference. Among Bengtson’s more revealing conclusions are that the emotional state of the skeptical healer seems to affect outcome consistently. That healing occurs more easily when patient and/or practitioner are at ease is a well-established phenomenon. Much emphasis is placed on the value of being deeply relaxed since that facilitates the flow of qi energy.11 Another observation in his experiments (Control Problem 1) was that healing occurred spontaneously when trained healers merely saw groups of control animals in which some had already died. This can be attributed to a well-known phenomenon among healers—that once the training is there, healing can take place spontaneously even without their active intention. It is as if the healing energy flows from a “higher potential” to a “lower potential.” Indeed, this supports Tiller’s recent observations that human attention can somehow increase a measurable kind of “free energy” associated with the the life force or qi.13,14 Like all radical, pioneering research, Bengtson’s work raises many further questions—more than it answers. Many offer new avenues of research with potentially far-reaching implications. For example, if it is possible for inexperienced, skeptical healers using a simple technique learned over a few weeks to achieve 90%–100% healing in mouse carcinomas, what would be the influence of such healers on human cancers? Preliminary work on this could extend the mouse research to investigate any difference in results between (1) mice in-