The medical fraternity, aided and abetted by the giant pharmaceutical industry, believes and propagates the idea that mankind cannot remain healthy or win over illnesses without regularly getting medical help and consuming medicines. They, together, have come to the conclusion that there is nothing beyond medicine and doctors in medical science. In this whole game the power of the immune system of the human body and its self-correcting capacity are deliberately suppressed. I am reminded of Sir Francis Bacon’s projected “System of Philosophy”, The Great Instauration. (Novum Organum – 1620 AD), which also believed in similar reductionist logic about this world.



Before Christopher Columbus set sail across the Atlantic, the coat of arms of the Royal Family of Spain had been the impressa, depicting the huge Pillars of Hercules and the Straits of Gibraltar, with the motto, NE PLUS ULTRA. There was “No More Beyond”. It was the pride and glory of Spain that their country was the outpost of the world. “When Columbus made his discovery (of the New World), Spanish Royalty thriftily did the only thing necessary: erased the negative, leaving the giant Pillars of Hercules now bearing the motto, PLUS ULTRA.” 1 There was More Beyond.



“Many of the “new philosophers”, now called “scientists”, led by Sir Francis Bacon, regarded these inscriptions to be very prophetic and significant.” The Pillars were supposed to signify the passage of knowledge just like the sailors, who pass to and fro between these Pillars. Medical scientists of today seem to believe in that motto. They seem to believe that there is NO MORE BEYOND modern medicine, to keep man alive on this planet. The enormous funds that flow from the powerful pharmaceutical industry helps to keep this myth alive, despite many evidences to the contrary. It also reminds me of the farming industry where the petrochemical giants perpetuate the myth that mankind could never be fed adequately unless the farming industry depended on chemical fertilizers. In fact, the first anti-microbial, sulfonamide, also came from the petro-chemical industry.



Both these beliefs are seriously flawed. Modern science of particle physics shows that the human being is only a tiny part of this macrocosm. It is our consciousness, which makes us tick in tune with the universal consciousness. Human body is a dynamic organism constantly run by food and oxygen but, totally dependent on the outside world for its sustenance, its environment. Human being is not a machine like a timepiece, run by its spring. The human body does not work in bits and pieces, as was thought by Rene Descartes; neither does it follow the conventional science of deterministic predictability of Newton and Albert Einstein. On the contrary, it works as a whole (holistic view) following the new science of particle physics of Max Planck, Max Bohm, Werner Heisenbeg, Paul Dirac and, Erwin Schrodinger.2



In their effort to combine the sciences of conventional physics and modern quantum mechanics, present day physicists are trying to get the two together in their “Unified Field” theory. Curiously, this is exactly what the Indian wisdom proclaimed to the world “time out of mind,” in their own inimitable style thus: “the whole universe is the container (space) and the content is universal consciousness”. If that were so, every human being becomes a tiny bit of that universe; totally interdependent and interconnected. Same is the story of agriculture. It is also dynamic and depends, to a large extent, on the soil and the multitude of organisms that go to make the soil fertile. Chemical fertilizers, in the end, would only promote the growth of weeds and sap the soil of its inherent fertility, acquired with the help of a host of microorganisms that inhabit the soil.



There is an awareness of this even in the developed west where some farmers are following the natural organic farming methods. Chemical drugs from the pharmaceutical industry have been responsible for the mushrooming of “super bugs,” the multi-drug resistant microorganisms, in almost all hospitals, threatening patient safety. I only hope that we will not come one full circle to the time of “hospitalism” of the nineteenth century Britain, where seriously ill patients went to the hospital only to go to meet their maker sooner than later and never to return home.



In this scenario, human body would eventually suffer illnesses because of drugs and interventions, and agriculture would grow lots of weeds in place of useful food. Good wholesome food is a vital prerequisite for good health, anyway. The clear writing is already on the walls. Earlier mankind takes note of the warning, the better for the future generations. Many farming lobbies in the west and a few thinking farmers in India have taken note of this to reverse the trend in agriculture. Still the pressure of the multi-billion dollar giant of the petro-chemical industry, helped by our Cartesian reductionist scientists and, the all too obliging media, is trying to keep the dangerous myth alive that chemical fertilizers and genetically modified seeds are our saviours! Genetically modified seeds could be a more dangerous unforeseen threat to mankind. Space does not permit me to go into its details here.



The analogy fits the medical world very well. Doctors, from day one at the medical school, are being brainwashed to believe that the bio-medical model of man as a machine, made up of independent parts, the organs, needs periodic servicing, even when the machine seems to be working well, lest it should break down without prior warning in the future. In addition, they are made to believe that drugs and interventions are the be-all and the end-all of disease management. Most of the reductionist scientists in this field help perpetuate this myth. This mechanistic paradigm of man as a bio-medical model has been the milch cow of the drug industry and the technology giants. Interventions, more so, in apparently healthy population and the sheer numbers, has been financially very rewarding to the medical fraternity and the hospital giants. Medical education, particularly continuing medical education of the practitioners, seems to be totally under the grip of these manipulators.3



The reality, however, is different. The human body is built with enough safety measures to keep it going as long as possible with the help of its environment. The kingpin in this self-preserving and self-sustaining game seems to be the human mind, while the external environment is an important allay. All functions of the human body follow three rhythms – the ultradian, the circadian and, the infradian. Of these the last happens beyond the twenty-four hours’ cycle. Whereas the former two follow the day (24-hrs cycle), the infradian rhythm is the one that is controlled by the external forces; the environment, to a greater extent compared to the former two. In this context, I would like to mention the recent finding that the woman’s menstrual cycle, a twenty-eight days cycle, depends basically on the effect of the moons’ gravitational force on the cortical cells of the brain that initiates and maintains the rhythm.4 Ayurveda, thousands of years ago, proclaimed this thus:


“Kujendu hetu Prathimaasaarthavam”

(Moon is the cause of monthly bleeding)



Ancient Indian science also proclaims that if one could keep one’s mind (consciousness) tranquil, one could remain healthy until death. The modern science of particle physics supports this line of thinking.



The ground reality also supports this premise. Recent studies, many of them very large and prospective to have very high confidence levels, have shown that the human mind is one of the root causes of illnesses. Destructive hostility (hatred) has been shown to be the most important risk factor for heart attacks, while frustration and depression seem to be the real culprits in cancer and anger in haemorrhagic stroke. These cannot be the sole causes; while they are the prime movers.5 Positive attitude has been shown to increase one’s life span by five to seven years! In short, it is not what one eats that eventually kills one, but what eats one seems to be the main culprit.



One could also draw parallels from auditing many of our drug and technology interventions. When doctors went on strike in Israel recently and in Saskatchewan and Los Angels County in the past, mortality and morbidity did fall down significantly. Routine screening and intervening in healthy men, in a milestone, long-term, prospective study, compared to non-intervention but with simple change of life style, did show significantly higher death and disability rates in the former.6 Interventions like coronary bypass surgery and angioplasty in asymptomatic individuals,7 repeated breast scans using mammography, long term hormone replacement therapy in post-menopausal women and, even routine long term ingestion of vitamins and calcium supplements have only resulted in more morbidity and in some cases higher mortality. Even much hyped (and also lucrative) business of long term blood pressure and sugar controlling drugs, as also the cholesterol lowering drugs, did not have the desired and predicted benefits!8



“Time has come”, the Walrus said, while taking the oysters for a walk on the beach eventually to make a meal of them, to distract their attention “ to talk of many things; cabbages and kings; of shoes…………….and polishing wax”. Time has come for the medical fraternity to realize that, like the Walrus, the pharmaceutical and technology lobbies, assisted by the Cartesian reductionist scientists, might only be taking us for a walk up the garden path to make their tills moving. It is time we woke up before it is too late. Let us allow the new generation of medical students to think freely without the shackles of the wrong knowledge their baggage of textbooks contains. The existing knowledge would only make them status-quoists, following the footsteps of their forefathers. “Knowledge advances”, said Karl Popper, “not by repeating known facts, but by refuting false dogmas.” We have to refute the myth that the human body is a machine working in bits and pieces like a clock. I was shocked recently to know that even medical textbooks, at least the majority of them, are written with the help of drug company finances.9 Less said about the research being financed by these companies the better. Even the best of journals had to retract papers. Drug lobby could easily doctor research data to “see in research what they want to see”.10



In conclusion, let me remind the readers that there is a whole new world of medical science waiting to be rediscovered like the “gems of purest ray serene the dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear.” Ayurveda, the mother of all medical wisdoms, has vital treasures, both for promoting health and correcting illness.11 Mind, shown earlier to be the kingpin in the game of human wellness or otherwise, occupies the pride of place in that holistic system. There are other medical care delivery systems as well. A judicious mix of the best in all these systems, along with the hi-tech modern technological medicine for emergency care, would not only benefit mankind, but also make medical facility available for the poorest of the poor. There is “more beyond” modern medicine – PLUS ULTRA.











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11. Hegde BM. Ancient Indian Wisdom and modern Science. Bhavan’s Journal 2000; 46: 42-95