h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

in your expose of alternative medicine you didn't include psychology. The whole concept of "mental illness" is not worthy of the word science. (which doesn't mean it cant be cared for and dealt with) The paradigm of "illness" in the medical sense is when a certain known condition, caused by certain known agent, and cured by another known agent.

The field of Psychology (and Psychiatry also as far as as a talking cure is used) is still far from the positivist determination of exact causes and cures. So much is determined by the individual experiencing the symptoms, and cures are likewise "custom made" never so called off the rack(generic). While brain dysfunction is in fact an ilness, and science has found many appearant psychological states caused by the anatomy of the brain, so called hysteria or neurosis has not found any conclusive evidence for over 100 years. The cures when there are cures, have more to do with the will power of the patient, than the use of language to elucidate the etiology and remove the cause.

So I nominate the field of Psychology to be included with those other non-scientific treatments. Maybe it should be treated as an art form rather than a science.