CROWN, JANUARY 2016One weekday morning last summer, I was in the local park. It was a cheerful south London scene, with kids splashing in water fountains and playing soccer on the grass. I perched on the edge of the sandpit with two other mothers, clutching sunscreen and rice cakes as we watched our children build lopsided castles with brightly colored plastic spades.
One of the women, a bright, articulate mom I had just met, was explaining how a homeopathic medicine had cured her of a longstanding, debilitating eczema. “I love homeopathy!” she said. As a scientist, I had to protest. Homeopathy is effectively water (or sugar pills) in fancy bottles—any active substance in these treatments is diluted far beyond the point at which any single molecule of the original could possibly remain. “But there’s nothing in homeopathic remedies,” I said.
My new friend looked at me scornfully. “Nothing measurable,” she replied, as if I were slightly dim not for grasping that its healing properties are due to an indefinable essence that’s beyond scientists’ reach. And in those two words, I felt that she summed up one of ...
