Communist destroy CM!

August 29, 2004

, " " <@c...>

wrote:

But we have

> access to all the same 'classical' and 'pre-modern' books that were around

> before 1949. Let us look at the alternative, apprenticing with a pre-1949

> doctor. How much of the vast 2000 years of history do you think would have

> been left out. Even studying with the above mentioned famous pre-communist

> doctor, one would acquire his take on disease (which is why I am reading it)

> but would miss so much more which such a single viewpoint.

You are absolutely correct Jason. Today's TCM doc, even those raised by

commies, had far

more access to a diverse education than any other era in chinese history. If

Unschuld is

talking about the maoist crap printed in the state texts of a certain era, he is

right about

that. But he is wrong that those books ARE TCM. They are merely textbooks and

according to Scheid, everyone ignored the political stuff anyway. In ancient

times, one was

indocrinated by a single teacher. Those were the days of narrowmindedness.

Also, when

PU talks about diversity, he is talking about the entire corpus of CM. But if

you narrow the

focus to herbology, the supposed diversity pretty much evaporates. The TCM

style of

zang fu herbology has been evolving for about 800 years side by side with the

TCM styles

influenced by SHL and wen bing later on. All of this is mainstream TCM, IMO.

There are

not dozens of obscure styles of herbal practice that had any consensus in

ancient china.

So while fringier practices like acupuncture, diet, qi gong, etc. were no doubt

diverse and

we can't say for sure which method is best, I really don't think this argument

applies to

herbology. My reading of older texts is the same as Jason's. There is nothing

in the

herbal texts since about 1300 that fail to make sense in modern terms (and,

except for

materia medicas, only a handful of important texts were even written before this

time).

The pi wei lun is a little out there, so I await Bob's translated commentaries

fromlater

centuries to put in perspective. But starting with Zhu dan xi, its TCM all the

way. Even the

SHL commentators write in terms of well known pathomechanisms. The herbalists

invented TCM and according to Scheid were very careful to both appease the

communists

with passages they added to books, but never at the expense of the medicine.

They were

no doubt less concerned about acupuncutre and qi gong. And let's be honest,

when TCM

gets a bad rap, the fingers are always pointed at TCM acupuncture or the lack of

spirit in

TCM. By and large, herbalists who have studied premodern texts are more than

happy

with TCM.

August 29, 2004

Unschuld writes in

http://www.acupuncturetoday.com/archives2004/aug/08bauerunschuld.html

" With regard to part A, few people are aware that TCM is a misnomer for an

artificial system of health care ideas and practices generated between 1950

and 1975 by committees in the People's Republic of China, with the aim of

restructuring the vast and heterogenous heritage of Chinese traditional

medicine in such a way that it fitted the principles - Marxist-Maoist type

democracy and modern science and technology - on which the future of the PRC

was to be built. TCM, as it came to be known in the West beginning with the

late 1970s, reflects only a portion of the tremendously variegated body of

knowledge accumulated in the preceding two millennia. While it is entirely

understandable and legitimate for the Chinese leadership to select from this

tradition, and to reinterpret those elements it considers helpful to build a

future meaningful coexistence of modern Western and traditional Chinese

ideas and practices, it is not clear whether populations in Western

countries wish to make the same choices when they are confronted with the

legacy of the past. It is therefore that I distinguish between TCM and

" CTM, " the latter referring to the entirety of health care knowledge,

beliefs and practices prior to the 20th century. "

[Jason]

Maybe I misreading the above, but P.U. seems quite disenchanted with TCM.

He (as others) feel that TCM somehow weeded out all of this vast amount of

knowledge and we are left with this barebones system. I have always been

puzzled by this and am still waiting to see tangible evidence of this.

G.Macicioa, for example, addressed this issue a few years ago at the PCOM

symposium questioning the same issue and defending the diversity of TCM

(stance). G.M. methodically went through the ages and showed how most stuff

that people think that the communist destroyed has long been extracted

(100's of years prior). He also convincingly demonstrated that Taiwan was

far from communist influence and there medicine is almost identical to what

we see in the PRC. When I was there It looked like TCM to me. Furthermore,

I just acquired a book from a famous CHINESE doctor born in 1888, which

peeked around 1940. Although this book was printed just after 1949 and

hence has the hail to mao slogan on the opening page, his ideas (based on

years of clinical experience and study) according to the nature of the book

and the Chinese Prof that I acquired it from are pre-communist. After

reading through it, except for his own clinically experience/ take on

certain diseases, I don't see anything different than a book printed let's

say 30 years later. It all makes sense, no weird woo woo stuff, herbs

functions all seem normal, approached to disease all make sense, theory is

the same as my basic TCM books. Since Unschuld is a far better scholar than

I, I would like him, or someone that thinks along the same lines, explain

what the communist destroyed? AS we have all discussed in the past, the

medicine is not like it was even 200 years ago. But did TCM somehow miss

some important strand of theory lodged in the past? Maybe. But we have

access to all the same 'classical' and 'pre-modern' books that were around

before 1949. Let us look at the alternative, apprenticing with a pre-1949

doctor. How much of the vast 2000 years of history do you think would have

been left out. Even studying with the above mentioned famous pre-communist

doctor, one would acquire his take on disease (which is why I am reading it)

but would miss so much more which such a single viewpoint. Of course a

university education (ala TCM) is not going to include every bit of

incorporation in the 2000 years of history.. But that is IMO a red herring.

The diversity that people cry for is there for the taking? TCM amassed a

tremendous amount of information, one should ask does the amount of

amassment out weigh the minor things left out? And is the alterative any

more encompassing? Granted I am looking at this through a scholarly herbal

literary approach (mainstream CM) - and acupuncture or off beat qi gong

approaches may certainly be a different story, but that is IMO a different

issue. But as Unschuld points out, " Acupuncture, it appears, at no time

played a dominant role in Chinese health care "

Furthermore, some may complain that science was injected into CM at this

1949 point. I disagree because one can look at early works and see WM

already infiltrating CM writings. So I ask, what is 'artificial' about TCM?

I don't see the reason to bash TCM.. Or maybe he is not and I am missing

his point?

Maybe the underlying philosophical influence (i.e. Confucianism) has changed

and that what P.U. is up in arms about, but I ask from a practical

standpoint, what theoretically or treatment strategies have changed?

BTW - I have the utmost respect for P.U., although just have never

understood this viewpoint from him or anyone else.

I am looking forward to ( in Early Communist China,

1945-1963. A Medicine of Revolution) that Paul mentions for more insight

into what he is talking about, but in the meantime I ask anyone who has

evidence to support such a contention to present it, I am very curious.

-

August 29, 2004

Jason,

Although I take some risk offering to speak on Dr. Unschuld's behalf, I will

take a stab. I think the primary aspect of Unschuld's ideas that you have

difficulty understanding or agreeing with has to do with the scope of both time

and cultural diversity a scholar like Unschuld concerns himself with. He speaks

of, for example, a range of folk medicine techniques, widely used in China,

that never found their way into any written texts. Such techniques were

traditional and Chinese, but were never considered within the concept of of what

we call TCM. The scholarly physicians, who depended on recognized texts, would

have looked down their noses at such techniques as folk-medicine of the

uneducated. These methods however, were widely used and so, from the perspective

of a modern historian attempting to convey the full scope of the medical

approaches used by the Chinese people over time, must be considered part of

their traditional medicine. Unschuld, I believe, is just being precise with his

language because his studies have made him aware of Chinese traditional medical

methods none of the rest of us have ever heard of and this makes our tendency to

think of " TCM " as " the " traditional medicine of the Chinese people over the last

2,000 years an oversimplification. China was, a perhaps remains, a much more

diverse, complex, and heterogeneous (one of Unschuld's favorite words) culture

than most of us non-scholars could imagine.

While I hope what I have stated above helps you in some way, I think questioning

authority is a healthy thing. One of the reasons I did those interviews with

Unschuld was so that more could hear his thoughts, whether they agree or

disagree, so that more may become interested in the subject of the roots of

Chinese medicine

Matt Bauer.

-

Chinese Medicine

Sunday, August 29, 2004 8:48 AM