“It is easier to split an atom than to change a belief.” — Albert Einstein
Indeed, human beings have a natural tendency to resist change and innovation, often using a considerable amount of their energy to defend what they already believe. This has been known for a long time. It applies to everyone, and perhaps even more so to scientists, who may find it particularly difficult to accept new theories when those theories threaten the power, financial interests, or prestige of an established scientific order.
When I began studying the natural sciences, I was convinced that I would enter the brilliant community of men and women who devoted their entire lives to the disinterested pursuit of truth and knowledge, ultimately seeking to contribute to the happiness of humanity.
At that time, I believed that the scientific process was based exclusively on objective facts and that scientists tirelessly sought to identify the relationships of cause and effect between different phenomena.
I also believed that researchers were open-minded, willing to engage in dialogue, constantly prepared to reconsider their hypotheses, and receptive to opposing views.
After spending five years in this world, I decided to leave it. I was grateful to have been intellectually shaped by exceptional teachers and trained in rigorous and critical thinking, but I was also deeply disappointed by what I perceived as intolerance, narrow-mindedness, fraud, the relentless pursuit of publications, and the dependence of scientists on their sponsors.
I had not yet imagined that, in the medical world — supposedly devoted to life and health — these conflicts could be even harsher.
I then began studying philosophy while also working for two years as a researcher in education. In 1984, I became particularly interested in the epistemology of medicine — that is, the critical study of how medicine functions, its assumptions, and its methods of reasoning.
Gradually, I became familiar with many different approaches to health and healing, from conventional scientific medicine to Chinese medicine and the wide range of approaches commonly described as “alternative” or “complementary” medicine.
As a scientist, philosopher, and educator, I used the tools I had been taught to examine and test the consistency of different theories and claims.
Above all, however, I experimented with several of these approaches myself, becoming both an observer and, in a sense, the subject of my own observations.
My conclusion was that medicine may be undergoing a profound transformation — perhaps comparable, in its intellectual significance, to the revolution that took place in physics with Copernicus, Kepler, and Galileo in the sixteenth century.
And, as happened with those pioneers, proponents of new approaches may encounter resistance, criticism, and hostility from established institutions.
WHY IS MEDICINE AT AN IMPASSE?
In the early 1980s, private conversations with colleagues working in medical and biological research had already made me uneasy.
“Medicine is at an impasse. We have known this for several years, but we do not know where to direct our research.”
These observations, according to the author, concerned medical research as a whole rather than one isolated field.
Such concerns were expressed informally, because researchers feared that openly challenging established assumptions might jeopardize the funding necessary for their laboratories to continue operating.
At the time, therefore, I had only fragmented information about the difficulties experienced by researchers in medicine and biology. I did not yet understand why they were facing such an impasse.
I gradually came to believe that many scientists were working within a system that placed significant constraints on freedom of thought, research, and expression.
Those who were supposedly carrying humanity’s greatest hopes sometimes appeared, to me, more like intimidated workers dependent on a powerful medical-industrial system — a system capable of influencing not only what was considered scientifically legitimate, but also what should be developed, produced, and commercially supported.
Meanwhile, various statistics appeared to indicate worsening trends in a number of chronic diseases and health conditions.
According to the author’s interpretation, despite increasing healthcare expenditure, the overall quality of health and life in Western societies had deteriorated.
From that point onward, my studies, conversations with different practitioners, and personal experiences led me to question whether modern medicine was not only facing an impasse, but also whether some of its underlying assumptions might be leading it in the wrong direction.
This brought me back to a principle traditionally attributed to Hippocrates:
“First, do no harm.”
THE FOUNDATIONS OF MODERN MEDICAL THINKING
To understand this perspective, let us examine what the author identifies as some of the foundations of modern medical thinking. They can be summarized as follows:
- Disease exists and is something undesirable that must be eliminated.
- Disease is identified through pathological symptoms such as pain, redness, fever, rashes, diarrhea, vomiting, and so forth.
- Treating disease means eliminating these symptoms as quickly as possible, using the available arsenal of medicines and medical interventions.
- Disease is essentially a physical reality affecting a particular organ or part of the body, understood primarily as a biological, physical, or chemical mechanism that can become dysfunctional.
- Many diseases are attributed to pathogens, carcinogens, or allergens. Prevention therefore seeks to avoid these factors, while treatment seeks to eliminate or neutralize them when possible.
- Some diseases are considered to have a genetic origin and to be transmitted from one generation to another. This is described as heredity.
- When therapeutic interventions prove unsuccessful, removal of the affected organ may become necessary in order to preserve the patient’s life.
In the language of epistemology, these kinds of propositions can be understood as fundamental assumptions underlying a particular theory or practice.
In this article, I will challenge these assumptions, examining their internal consistency and presenting observations which, according to the author, are real but are frequently dismissed or rejected by researchers.
ILLNESS IS NO LONGER WHAT IT USED TO BE
What if reality were completely different?
What if appearances were misleading?
What if reversing some of these assumptions could provide a different interpretation of certain observations associated with approaches outside mainstream medicine?
I invite you to explore this alternative perspective with me — not as an established truth, but as a hypothesis for thought and investigation.
If something in these ideas resonates with you, do not remain satisfied with simply reading the article. Investigate the subject further and examine the evidence for yourself.
So let us reconsider the classical assumptions of medicine.
NEW AXIOM No. 1
Disease does not exist as an inevitable entity that must simply be eliminated.
According to a number of traditional approaches, what exists is not so much “the disease” as the patient.
The physician or practitioner should therefore focus on the individual as a whole.
According to this view, what we call “disease” may be interpreted as a sign of an underlying imbalance, which can sometimes be related to the person’s physical, psychological, behavioral, or environmental circumstances.
The implication is that illness should not automatically be regarded as an inevitable destiny.
NEW AXIOM No. 2
Symptoms may be understood as visible expressions of an underlying imbalance rather than being identical with the imbalance itself.
To understand this idea, consider a simple metaphor.
Imagine the human body as a vehicle and compare it with a car.
When the water level in the radiator falls or the engine oil becomes insufficient, the problem may not immediately be visible. The imbalance is already there, even though it cannot yet be seen or heard.
Eventually, if the engine overheats beyond a certain threshold, a component may fail and steam may suddenly escape.
At that moment, something becomes visible.
These are the symptoms.
The release of steam is not necessarily the underlying mechanical problem; it is an observable event associated with the system’s attempt to respond to an abnormal condition.
Modern cars have another mechanism to warn the driver: warning lights on the dashboard.
When something requires attention, a light comes on, inviting the driver to investigate the situation.
What would you think of a mechanic who advised you simply to unscrew or break the warning light?
The author uses this metaphor to argue that medicine can sometimes focus too heavily on suppressing symptoms without sufficiently investigating what those symptoms may be communicating.
If we change our perspective and regard symptoms as information, they may become clues that encourage us to investigate the underlying condition.
In this interpretation, we should distinguish between the underlying imbalance and the visible manifestations through which the body communicates that something is wrong.
NEW AXIOM No. 3
Treatment should begin by listening to symptoms and interpreting them as signposts that may help us understand the path toward restoring health.
According to this perspective, symptoms are not merely obstacles to be eliminated.
They may also provide information about what is happening within the organism.
The author compares this process with the image of a house in which waste gradually accumulates.
Imagine that you are forbidden to take your rubbish outside. You begin storing it inside one room. Weeks later, another room is filled, followed by another.
Eventually, the entire house becomes unpleasant and unhealthy.
At some point, you decide to remove the rubbish.
From one perspective, this appears to be the moment when the problem begins.
From another perspective, however, it is the moment when the house begins to recover its balance.
The same metaphor is applied to the human organism.
According to this interpretation, the underlying imbalance may remain silent for a long period. Symptoms may appear only when the body begins responding to that imbalance.
The symptoms therefore become the visible part of a process that began earlier.
This leads to the author’s proposition that the appearance of symptoms may sometimes represent an attempt by the organism to restore balance.
NEW AXIOM No. 4
Illness is multidimensional and connected with a complex, systemic reality in which many factors continuously interact.
The author challenges a strict separation between the physical and psychological dimensions of health.
A person’s psychological state, interpersonal conflicts, loss of meaning, philosophical dilemmas, and chronic stress can influence physical well-being.
Conversely, physical problems can profoundly affect emotional and psychological well-being.
From this perspective, attempting to understand a human being by completely separating the physical, psychological, social, and spiritual dimensions may provide an incomplete picture.
The physical can influence the psychological, just as the psychological can influence the physical.
The author therefore advocates a more holistic and systemic approach to health — one that attempts to understand the relationships between different parts of the organism rather than viewing each organ as an isolated mechanism.
NEW AXIOM No. 5
The factors associated with disease should not automatically be viewed as isolated enemies; their role must be understood within the broader biological system.
The author questions the assumption that every pathogen or environmental factor can be regarded as a simple, independent cause of disease.
To illustrate the point, he offers another metaphor.
Imagine a serious road accident.
When emergency services arrive, we may observe police officers, paramedics, firefighters, and doctors at the scene.
A journalist arriving later might repeatedly observe the same pattern:
accident → emergency services arrive.
If the journalist did not know the sequence of events, he could mistakenly conclude that the police officers, firefighters, paramedics, and doctors were responsible for causing the accidents.
Statistically, based solely on observations made after the accident, the correlation might appear remarkably strong.
But the conclusion would obviously be wrong.
The accident happened before the emergency services arrived.
The author suggests that a similar error can occur when we confuse the appearance of a biological agent or symptom with the original cause of a condition.
According to this hypothesis, biological processes may be more complex than a simple model in which one isolated “enemy” causes the entire disease.
This perspective therefore places greater emphasis on the overall biological environment and on the condition of the organism itself.
The same reasoning is extended by the author to carcinogens and allergens, although these claims represent the author’s theoretical position rather than established medical consensus.
NEW AXIOM No. 6
Genetics should not necessarily be interpreted through a rigid model of genetic determinism.
The author questions the idea that a particular genetic characteristic automatically determines a particular disease.
He uses the metaphor of the road accident once again.
If we discover the photograph of an accident after it has occurred, the photograph records what happened, but it did not cause the accident.
In the same way, according to this argument, a genetic characteristic associated with a disease should not automatically be assumed to be the sole cause of that disease.
Modern biology, however, also demonstrates that genes and their expression interact with environmental and physiological conditions in complex ways.
The author therefore argues for a more dynamic understanding of heredity — one in which biology, environment, experience, and physiological regulation continuously interact.
NEW AXIOM No. 7
Saving a patient’s life cannot be reduced simply to removing an affected organ.
According to the author’s holistic framework, what is commonly called disease may represent the visible expression of a much more complex process.
An organ may therefore be viewed as the location where a problem manifests itself rather than necessarily being the ultimate origin of the problem.
From this perspective, removing an organ may remove the physical site where the problem is expressed, while leaving other underlying factors untouched.
The author therefore argues that health should be approached by considering the whole individual and the complex interactions that contribute to the person’s condition.
This does not mean that surgery has no legitimate place in medicine. Rather, within the author’s philosophical framework, surgery should not automatically be regarded as the complete explanation or solution to every complex health problem.
A DIFFERENT WAY OF THINKING ABOUT HEALTH
These seven new axioms are presented by the author as the result of many years of personal study and engagement with traditional and holistic approaches to health.
They were also inspired, he says, by researchers who had the courage to challenge established assumptions and step outside what he describes as the dominant intellectual framework of the scientific community.
The central question is therefore not whether one should simply reject conventional medicine.
The deeper question is whether science itself should remain open to questioning its own assumptions.
Science advances when hypotheses can be challenged, evidence can be examined, and ideas can be revised.
The history of science demonstrates that ideas once considered unquestionable can eventually be replaced by more comprehensive explanations.
The real danger, therefore, is not questioning established knowledge.
The danger is believing that knowledge has reached its final form.
Perhaps the most important freedom in science is the freedom to ask:
What if we are looking at the problem from the wrong direction?
And perhaps the most important responsibility of both science and medicine is not to defend a particular doctrine, but to remain faithful to the search for truth.
The question is not whether we should believe one theory or another. The question is whether we remain free enough to investigate.
