Placebo effect

Avoid unnecessary brain removal with sugar pills!

The Placebo Effect is at the core of any mental manipulation that causes physiological changes in the body.

"Can placebos cause side effects? If so, are the side effects real?" -George Carlin

Honest Placebos

"Honest", "open-label" or "white-label" placebos, where the person taking it knows that they are taking an inactive substance, have been shown to work with nearly the same efficacy as when the patient believes it is medicine. This is due to the subconscious predictive mechanisms in our brain that react to the stimulus of taking a pill regardless of your conscious awareness of what it is. [1] [2]

metaculture sees the utility in harnessing this power to cure a range of ailments that have no known medical cause, stress or anxiety related ailments, pain management, insomnia, and nausea. [3] They can be sold at a much lower cost than dietary supplements and have a lower chance of adverse reactions. They can provide an honest alternative to the plethora of grifters selling expensive snake oil that relies on the same placebo effect. [4]

If you take a placebo and your problem goes away, then you have solved that problem with the lowest possible cost and risk of side-effects. And if it doesn't work, you can always go to the doctor.

Believe in the Power of Placebo

What if your belief in the power of the placebo effect is so strong that you can enhance its potential effectiveness? Could honest placebos be more effective than ones that try to "fool" your brain, if you believe strongly in the placebo effect itself?

Let's find out!

It's certainly worth a shot. You can always go to the doctor if it doesn't work. It can't be emphasized enough that this is not a panacea or a contrarian rejection of modern medicine, as many overzealous placebo advocates tend to claim.

The Epidemic of Over Diagnosis

There is also ample evidence of an epidemic of over diagnosis. In a culture where psychosomatic symptoms are treated the same as the diseases they emulate, questioning self-diagnosis is taboo, and an infinite catalog of possible maladies is only a click away, it is easier than ever to subconsciously take on the characteristic symptoms of a disease.

There is also the problem of the self-fulfilling prophecy of a diagnoses, especially psychological ones. Mild symptoms can often strengthen, and new symptoms can appear just because they are part of the syndrome.

Suzanne O'Sullivan (on over diagnosis)

Religion is Ritualized Placebo

More Than Just Healing

In religion and spirituality, rituals are used to bring about the placebo effect intentionally, providing healing, happiness and other benefits to the practitioner. If you use an expanded definition of the placebo effect, you can make the case that most religious belief and practice revolves around intentionally eliciting the placebo effect.

While placebos are traditionally associated with medicine and healing, they can be used to change any emotional reaction, habit, or state of mind. Confession rituals alleviate guilt. Coming of age rituals like bar mitzvas establish new adult mindsets and help children transition to independence. Rain dances keep you from worrying about your crops. Belief in the omnibenevolent god concept creates optimism.

White Label Religion

In order to take advantage of rituals and reap their psychological rewards, it is not necessary to believe in any supernatural premise on which they may be based. It is enough to believe in the placebo effect itself. This is equivalent to "honest placebos" where we understand the effect we are trying to elicit and the reason for its efficacy.

A belief system based on science and evidence with a well-developed ritual practice will be even more effective at manipulating the placebo effect for our personal and collective emotional benefit, because it can now be done with intentionality. It frees us to experiment, to try out new and creative ways of manipulating the mind to do the things that make us healthy and happy. It gives us the ability to compare the efficacy of these techniques, and provide evidence-based best practices to describe the ones that are proven to work.

Not Very Capitalist

Finding greater ways to enhance the placebo effect through ritual has enormous health improvement potential that would cost nothing. Unfortunately this perverse incentive makes their development unlikely under capitalist healthcare. If people started to recognize the power of the placebo effect, and the many ways it can be produced and enhanced with simple rituals and a strong belief in the power of placebos, it would significantly eat into the profits of the pharmaceuticals, as well as a wide range of dietary supplements, therapies, and other industries that rely on it.

The Placebo Store

Visit The Placebo Store for honest placebos at honest prices to help you get over any ailment that could be all in your head.

Placebo Videos

Placate your mind with these videos about the placebo effect.

Jordan Harbinger - Neuroscientist Dr. Halena Hartmann on the Placebo/Nocebo Effect

Why Does the Placebo Effect Work?

Fear and Faith - Derren Brown

The Power of Mind Over Body

The Placebo Effect

The Neuroscience Behind the Placebo Effect

Placebo Music

It is often as effective as regular music but it's really just a sugar pill.

D4vd - Placebo Effect

Sleepy Crow - Fake Medicine