Saturday morning, 30th January 2010, I – along with many other people – will be taking a massive overdose.  As it happens, I’ll be doing so in a seminar room at the Wellcome Trust, so there will probably be lots of medical sorts nearby.

I’ll tell them not to intervene.  I may even encourage them to join me in overdosing.

I’m not being foolish.  I’ve thought about this a lot.

Oh, yes.  I ought to mention.  It’ll be homeopathic remedies on which I’ll be “overdosing”, and the stunt is part of the 10:23 campaign’s attempts to show, graphically, that homeopathy is not only bollocks, but bollocks that is taking up NHS resources, and with is making people think that they can do without real medicine.  The idea is to gather people together in public places to have mass overdoses.  Follow the link to see if there’ll be any such events near you.

Meanwhile, James Garvey comments here, and seems to be on the money:

But there is harm [to things like homeopathy], the mental analogue of the cellular degradation associated with heavy background radiation.  These things don’t usually damage us directly — sometimes they even seem of use.  But all the while, almost imperceptibly, we all get a little more stupid as a result of having them around.

Still – it would be unfair to insist that homeopathy lacks any credibility at all – there’s this scientific rationale for homeopathy (WARNING: may contain parody, though it can only be a matter of time until it’s cited in all seriousness…):

This paper is a first step towards a full, quantum understanding of homeopathy. It is clear that quantum mechanics is the only way to understand the success of homeopathic medicine in a physical context. It is also immediately clear that doctors should avoid patients after treatment. Patients must also be aware of their responsibility in this respect. What is not yet clear is whether conscious observation of patient by doctor pre-treatment may result in the collapse of the wave-function as well. Double blind trials with doctors either seeing or not seeing their patients should be carried out in a strictly controlled environment to ascertain the importance of total patient-avoidance by homeopaths.

(Thanks to Legless for the pointer.)

Lastly, The Times has a nice little article on just how much active ingredient there is in the average homeopathic “remedy”.  It’s a real jaw-to-the-floor thing.

UPDATE: I’m still here.  Obviously.