Subluxations: Mr. SmartyPants Responds

Yesterday, a reader took issue with an earlier post, here.

"Anonymous" and I would likely not disagree as much as one might gather from our apparently contrary postings. Yes, I still think Palmer was a crank; yes, Anonymous reads far too much - and in much the wrong direction - into my background assumptions regarding the post; and yes, Anonymous could use getting to know some more/different "Western medicos" [e.g., here and here (remember, if you turn down a certain path, you meet only those on the same road)]; but more to my current point, the comment posted by Anonymous affords an opportunity to draw attention to a link I have had under the "Health" category since the inception of this blog: a wonderful book of essays exploring a personalist concept of health. Why does this matter? Well: there is this and this to start (the latter being an example of philosophy changing opinions: pain and suffering are not identical realities).

Finally, with a bit of humor in my typo-matic fingers, in response to a question asked by Anonymous:

Would it have been OK in your book had he used (spinal misalignment), instead of the mysterious (and according to allopathic medical authorities, nonexistent) "subluxation"? Would he have been excused for confusing correlation with cause?

Well, no - not really: for then we would be excusing someone who claimed that spinal misalignment is the cause of 95% of all diseases, with the other 5% caused by displaced joints. I mean, really: Huntington's Disease, smallpox, polio, Crohn's disease, hemophilia, influenza, HIV, cancer, heart disease, PTSD, RSI, etc., etc., etc.): the effect of either spinal misalignment or displaced joints!?!