1. CONTRASTS IN THE HISTORY OF THE MEDICAL MODEL

2. HEALTH AND THE TRADITIONAL VIEW
Medical Model a.k.a. DisEASE Model”

3. HEALTH AND THE TRADITIONAL VIEW
Rooted in Cartesian thinking
Descartes’ view was mechanistic
Newtonian classical physics completed this mechanistic view

4. HEALTH AND THE TRADITIONAL VIEW
Newton developed a consistent mathematical formulation of the mechanistic view of nature – the three dimensional space of classical Euclidian geometry
Elements of the Newtonian world were material particles, small, solid and indestructable objects – the building blocks of all matter

5. HEALTH AND THE TRADITIONAL VIEW
The body was viewed like a clock, that could be divided into mechanical parts, like a machine

6. HEALTH AND THE TRADITIONAL VIEW
From the second half of the seventeenth century to the end of the nineteenth, the Newtonian model dominated all scientific thought
In biomedical science, the Cartesian view of living organisms as machines, constructed from separate parts, still provides the dominant framework today

7. HEALTH AND THE TRADITIONAL VIEW
Scientific paradigms are based on verification and experimental data
The old paradigm is
good!

8. HEALTH AND THE TRADITIONAL VIEW
: Bubonic Plague reduced the population of Europe by two-thirds.
1793: Yellow fever killed more than 6,000 of Philadelphia’s 30,000 residents
Typhoid and Pneumonia killed at a steady rate year after year.
These diseases were caused by microorganisms
People vulnerable to unchanging mortality rates.

9. HEALTH AND THE TRADITIONAL VIEW
1860’s – Medicine became scientific – Era 1
“Germ Theory of Disease” came into use in the English-language medical literature
1920’s – Vaccines (diptheria)
1930’s - Sulfonamides (antibacterial)
1940’s – Antibiotics (penicillin)

10. HEALTH AND THE TRADITIONAL VIEW
Victory over illness seemed possible
We now assume there should be a cure for every disease
Before Era 1 – people did not expect cures, illnesses ran their course w/o complaint
Now, we expect to be healed and healed fast

11. LIMITATIONS OF THE TRADITIONAL VIEW OF HEALTH
Current views of life, death, health, and disease rests solidly on seventeenth-century physics
Newtonian descriptions of space, time, matter, and causation have been radically revised and previous assumptions have been redefined.

12. HEALTH AND THE TRADITIONAL VIEW
The new paradigm does not make the old paradigm wrong, but points out its limitations and extends science to a new horizon.

13. MODERN PHYSICS 20th Century Einstein’s Theory of Relativity: E=MC
1935: “a change in the spin of one particle in a two particle system would affect its twin simultaneously, even if the two had been widely separated in the meantime.”
1960: Chaos Theory

14. THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT The flapping of butterfly's
wing today produces a tiny
change in the state of the
atmosphere causing, over
time, changes that could
result elsewhere in a tornado

15. EINSTEIN’S THEORY
Solves Aristotle's problem of Metaphysics (Prime Mover), by describing the one substance that exists (Space) and its properties (Wave Medium), which then
Solves David Hume's Problem of Causation and Necessary Connection by explaining how matter is necessarily interconnected to other matter in Space by its spherical In and Out Waves.

16. MODERN PHYSICS
1964: Bell’s Theorum: Instantaneous change in widely separated systems did occur (technically impossible to confirm)
1972: Clauser confirmed the statistical predictions of quantum mechanics using photons, calcite crystals, and photomultiplier tubes

17. Contrasting Old and New Models
All accepted features of Newtonian physics:
The nature of space, time, matter, and causation – have been radically revised in modern physics

18. TRADITIONAL MODERN
The body is an object, localized in a specific space, and is an isolated self-contained unit
The body is not an object localized in space, but is in dynamic relationship with all other bodies, sharing energetic exchanges

19. TRADITIONAL MODERN
Health is an individual affair, affecting a single body
Health extends to all other bodies, since all bodies are in a dynamic relationship. Individual health is an illusion

20. TRADITIONAL MODERN
Illness is a process experienced by individual bodies.
Therapy affects individual bodies
Illness is a collective event, since the body is always in relationship with other bodies.
Therapy affects all bodies.

24. Accessible Readings Niels Bohr David Bohm Fritjof Capra William Tiller
Fred Alan Wolf

25. References Space, Time & Medicine, Larry Dossey
Reinventing Medicine, Larry Dossey