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This page is scientifically inaccurate and negatively biased

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Wow! Quite apart from the overall racist tone, this page is objectively inaccurate and misleading. There is a LOT of reliable evidence about various TCM mechanisms of action, readily available on google scholar. Much of the research relates to areas of medical science that are relatively new to western understanding eg inflammatory responses, the HPA axis, the nervous system, the microbiome/s and how all of these systems talk to each other. The sources cited here are outdated and mostly disproven - the critique uses sources from 2008 to justify the bulk of the argument (back when we were still using flip phones). It’s very sad that wiki has such a poor quality page for TCM, it’s an incredibly interesting field both scientifically and culturally. It’s also potentially turning people away from using potentially effective TCM treatments for conditions that are difficult to treat otherwise, like chronic pain disorders This really needs to be fixed. 49.185.83.184 (talk) 06:07, 6 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia follows reliable sources and for biomedical claims needs WP:MEDRS. Bon courage (talk) 06:13, 6 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Kowtowing to WP:BESTSOURCES is not racism. You don't get away with pushing quackery at Wikipedia just because you accuse Wikipedians of racism. WP:NOTDUMB.
There will always be crappy papers which have not been debunked yet. Mainly because a lot of papers are simply ignored by mainstream scientists, instead of taking them seriously.
A few rare TCM remedies could be developed into mainstream medicines. But this requires hard work instead of rhetorical ploys. Accusations of racism are not what gets your medicine approved on US/EU market.
Let's take the microbiome: the evidence that all TCM cures are good at the microbiome is simply missing. That's just hand waving at the idea of microbiome. It's not a claim that could be taken seriously, unless there are WP:MEDRS-compliant sources for thousands of TCM remedies.
Chinese medical scientists lack funds for performing research, lack freedom of speech, lack a culture of contradicting their peers if objective evidence so demands—they're basically educated that speaking truth to power is insanity. They know that criticizing TCM could make some CCP boss angry, and that would mean jail time. Totalitarianism is a ruthless game, and science is its victim. The PRC government is not interested whether TCM is effective, they just see it as a cash cow. Research about its effectiveness could only ruin the cash flow. tgeorgescu (talk) 09:50, 6 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I agree 100%. The first line is completely inaccurate and such a far-reaching claim should be viewed with skepticism. "A large share of its claims are pseudoscientific, with the majority of treatments having no robust evidence of effectiveness or logical mechanism of action." This shows a complete disregard for hundreds of papers (peer reviewed included) published. A few minutes searching National Institutes of Health should help the authors discover papers written in English, since they implied that the ones written in Chinese are not valuable. There is some good information this document, but now I feel that it is being used to hide the claim that TCM is fringe science. The article left me with a completely negative feeling about TCM, even though as a researcher I know the information to be inaccurate and based on narrow references and bias. Shumanji (talk) 00:00, 19 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Biomedicine is rife with dodgy papers and fraud, see the replication crisis article for details. Many papers supporting TCM are also in journals specifically about TCM, which raises concerns about bias and conflict of interest. Hemiauchenia (talk) 00:38, 19 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Article should not be in the pseudoscience category

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Has run its course. Bon courage (talk) 07:56, 12 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

It is no more pseudoscience than something like alchemy. You can't just put the entirety of TCM in the pseudoscience category when at least some of it has been proven. SecretSpectre (talk) 00:07, 19 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

TCM, in its actual incarnation, is a product of the 20th century, specifically the Cultural Revolution.
Also, since it has tens of thousands of remedies, tens of them are effective by mere chance. That does not "prove" TCM.
And there is a dirty secret of why the Chinese herbal teas are effective against illness, see the quote from Katan above. tgeorgescu (talk) 00:23, 19 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I usually think it's best to disregard these perennial complaints, but I have to comment that I agree that TCM is little different in this regard than alchemy is. In fact, it's a good comparison. --Tryptofish (talk) 16:16, 19 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  1. Most TCM formulae etc. have been around for a thousand years, before the cultural revolution
  2. Is that not how discoveries are made? Most of the formulations were made before the very concept of science itself. I think it is more of a proto-science.
  3. Some unscrupulous actors does not mean the entire thing is invalid. I, for one, have never seen pharmaceuticals in TCM. People regularly use Western medicine to claim all sorts of rubbish too. Or maybe we could have a separate article for controversies in TCM like those claims have.
SecretSpectre (talk) 23:31, 19 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
No, it does not mean that the entire thing is invalid. But claiming that the entire thing (or most of it) is valid falls under WP:ECREE. Simply because those preparations have been used for thousands of years does not imply that those are effective against illness. People are prone to believe they have been healed due to those preparations, instead of realizing they were healed because those illnesses heal by themselves.
Again, the progress of Western medicine lies in jettisoning all sorts of superstitions, including Western superstitions. Impertinence in respect to received opinion was the path to success.
I can agree that 200 years ago, TCM was protoscience. But today it is mostly bunk.
Science is a gauntlet of skepticism. That's normal, that's how it should be. Subjecting TCM to organized skepticism isn't racism. Same as seeking to falsify the theory of relativity isn't antisemitism. It's just what scientists do for a living. tgeorgescu (talk) 07:10, 20 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Absolutely, there are large amounts of peer reviewed journal articles showing the effectiveness of acupuncture, Chinese herbs, and Qi ging for many things.
No wonder universities don't allow Wikipedia to be used as a reference for any assessments! 2001:4479:910B:7B00:A107:CBC8:E3AC:9176 (talk) 11:25, 26 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
See organized skepticism and WP:LUNATICS for why TCM is getting bad press. We simply don't believe Comrade Mao on his word of honor that TCM is effective.
If you're seeking to argue that TCM has mainstream scientific support: you're at the wrong website. tgeorgescu (talk) 13:57, 26 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Do you have any sources to back up how TCM was made by "Comrade Mao" instead of continuing to make reductio ad stalinum arguments SecretSpectre (talk) 01:49, 2 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
A few are cited in the article. Slate's article, titled Chairman Mao Invented Traditional Chinese Medicine is a good place to start. MrOllie (talk) 02:14, 2 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
My great-grandmother was the herbalist of the village. Her wish to help others was genuine, but sincerity is not enough: her views about medicine were fanciful.
So, you see, I do not single out the Chinese. This is not a conflict between races, but a conflict between traditional lore and the scientific worldview.
It would cost hundreds of billions of dollars to sort out which TCM remedies are effective. And the Chinese government knows that such research can only hurt the Chinese economy, through tarnishing the reputation of TCM.
https://www.azquotes.com/quotes/topics/salary.html
Saw https://www.nrdc.org/stories/rhino-horns-are-basically-just-giant-toenails-and-these-images-wont-let-you-forget-it ? But some people never learn, and still think rhino horns are a potent medicine. But, well, those are people for whom scientific education is unaffordable. tgeorgescu (talk) 07:46, 3 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Nobody here is accusing you of racism
And folk medicine isn't exactly pseudoscience either SecretSpectre (talk) 07:56, 3 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
https://www.bbc.co.uk/teach/class-clips-video/articles/zgqrdnb — we don't revive the remedies of the Tudor doctors. Folk medicine is largely obsolete in the age of evidence-based medicine. tgeorgescu (talk) 08:52, 3 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Nobody here is accusing you of racism People are claiming that using the word "pseudoscience" is racist, so, you are wrong.
folk medicine isn't exactly pseudoscience When it pretends to be science, as acupuncture and other TCM variants do, yes, it is. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:03, 3 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry, who is this "people" who claim pseudoscience is a racist term? SecretSpectre (talk) 09:06, 3 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
See Special:Contributions/202.40.137.199.
Let's see:
The philosophy of TCM is fanciful according to modern anatomy.
The way TCM MDs diagnose people is fanciful according to modern nosology.
The vast majority of TCM remedies have neither biological plausibility, nor they never stood the test of RCTs. Most of those remedies are fanciful according to modern pharmacognosy.
This stuff gets taught at the university.
Isn't this delusion on a grand scale?
And Mao got away with it by labeling reality-based MDs as counterrevolutionaries. All MDs who dared to say that TCM is crazy ended in the concentration camp. That's how one gets scientific consensus in a totalitarian country. Displaying evidence of critical thinking was the ultimate proof one is an enemy of the people. tgeorgescu (talk) 15:27, 3 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
That is misrepresentation. The link you posted and the contributions said nothing about pseudoscience, not even this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive1166#User:Tgeorgescu_racist_remarks
NOt a word talked about pseudoscience.
You are still talking about Mao who died in 1976, with inflammatory remarks such as "concentration camp" and "a totalitarian country". I do not know why Wikipedia can tolerate this kind of remarks, which are mostly inaccurate and are made without any evidence. Wikipedia's tolerance and bias towards long time contributors are astonishing. 202.40.137.196 (talk) 07:23, 12 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@SecretSpectre I'm sorry, it looks like you are intimidated and won't reply to this anymore. 202.40.137.196 (talk) 07:24, 12 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Stop using this page as a forum. We have reliable sources saying that large parts of TCM are pseudoscience, and we do not have reliable sources saying that there are no large parts of TCM which are pseudoscience. End of story. Bye. --Hob Gadling (talk) 07:55, 12 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
there are large amounts of peer reviewed journal articles showing the effectiveness of acupuncture, Chinese herbs, and Qi ging for many things There are also large amounts of peer reviewed journal articles "showing" the effectiveness of homeopathy, which does not work. "Peer reviewed journal articles" is not enough of a criterion. What is needed is a higher level of sources. See WP:MEDRS. --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:08, 27 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Replaced source on Mao not believing in TCM

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I was interested by this claim, so I checked the source to find out more. Previously, it was this one. That's a perfectly respectable source, but the claim is sort of a footnote in an article not very focused on history, written by a non-historian. Looking closer and following the old source's own references, that writer seems to be mainly relying on this Slate article. Said article is a more detailed historical treatment by an academic specializing in a related field, so it seems more appropriate as a source. The claim itself can be traced back to The Private Life of Chairman Mao which is an imperfect but important primary source. Given that, and the sensitive nature of this article, I will also attribute the claim.

This is just a routine improvement, but given how important and touchy this article I felt I ought to explain my edit. Nicknimh (talk) 01:09, 13 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

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