225 Debunking a Medical Treatment
225 揭穿医疗骗局
A nine-year-old schoolgirl single-handedly cooks up a science-fair experiment that ends up debunking a widely practiced medical treatment. Emily Rosa's target was a practice known as therapeutic touch (TT for short), whose advocates manipulate patients' "energy field" to make them feel better and even, say some, to cure them of various ills. Yet Emily's test shows that these energy fields can't be detected, even by trained TT practitioners. Obviously mindful of the publicity value of the situation, Journal editor George Lundberg appeared on TV to declare, "Age doesn't matter. It's good science that matters, and this is good science."
一个9岁的女学生独立地设计了一个科学展览试验，这项试验揭穿了一个应用广泛的医疗骗局。艾米莉·罗莎的目标是针对一种被称为接触治疗的实例。这种治疗方法鼓吹能控制病人的“能量场”使患者身体好转，甚至还宣称能治愈患者的各种疾病。然而艾米莉的试验表明这些能量场是无法察觉的，即使是训练有泰的接触治疗。专家”。明显地，这一实验有很大的公众影响．报刊编辑乔治·伦德伯格在电视讲话中宣称：”年龄不是问题，关键是好的科学方法，而这就是很好的科学方法。”
Emily's mother Linda Rosa, a registered nurse, has been campaigning against TT for nearly a decade. Linda first thought about TT in the late '80s, when she learned it was on the approved list for continuing nursing education in Colorado. Its 100,000 trained practitioners (48,000 in the U. S.) don't even touch their patients. Instead, they waved their hands a few inches from the patient's body, pushing energy fields around until they' re in "balance." TT advocates say these manipulations can help heal wounds, relieve pain and reduce fever. The claims are taken seriously enough that TT therapists are frequently hired by leading hospitals, at up to $ 70 an hour, to smooth patients' energy, sometimes during surgery.
艾米莉的妈妈琳达·罗莎是一名资深护士，她已与接触治疗斗争了近十年。琳达初次关注接触治疗是在80年代末，当时她得知这种治疗方法被列入了美国科罗拉多州护理继续教育的课程中。100，000个受过这方面训练的人《美国有48，000个人）甚至都不接触他们的病人。相反，他们在离病人身体几英寸的地方挥动着他们的双手，推动他们的能量场直到他们达到“衡”。接触治疗倡导者说这些操作能够帮助治愈伤口，减缓痛苦和降低热度。这些说法受到高度重视，因此接触治疗的临床医学家经常受聘于各大医院，帮助安抚病人的情绪，有时还用于手术中，他们的报酬高达每小时70美元。
Yet Rosa could not find any evidence that it works. To provide such proof, TT therapists would have to sit down for independent testing--something they haven't been eager to do, even though James Randi has offered more than $1 million to anyone who can demonstrate the existence of a human energy field. (He's had one taker so far. She failed.) A skeptic might conclude that TT practitioners are afraid to lay their beliefs on the line. But who could turn down an innocent fourth-grader? Says Emily:"I think they didn't take me very seriously because I'm a kid."
但是罗莎没有找到这种方法有效的任何证据。要提供此类证据，接触治疗方面的临床医学家不得不坐下来做一个独立的测试——他们从没想过要这样做，即使詹姆士·兰迪曾悬赏一百多万美元，来寻找能证明人类能量场存在的人（到目前为止有一位女士接受过这一挑战，但是她失败了）。对这种治疗法持怀疑态度的人也许会得出一个结论从事接触治疗的医学家害怕表现他们在这方面的信心。但是，谁又能拒绝一个天真的四年级学生呢？艾米莉说：“我想他们根本不把我放在眼里，因为我只不过是个孩子。”
The experiment was straight forward: 21 TT therapists stuck their hands, palms up, through a screen. Emily held her own hand over one of theirs--left or right--and the practitioners had to say which hand it was. When the results were recorded, they'd done no better than they would have by simply guessing. If there was an energy field, they couldn't feel it.
这个试验很简单：通过屏幕，我们可以看到21位治疗专家紧握双拳，然后放在一起。艾米莉把她自己的手放在这些手中间——左手或右手——参与的人要说出哪一只手是艾米莉的，根据记录的结果来看，他们做得并没有比即性猜测好。所以即使存在能量场，他们也无法感知它的存在。