Developments in science over the last century have provided us with the realistic possibility of explaining spiritual and psychic phenomena in terms of rational science. Phenomena like spiritual healing, telepathy, clairvoyance, mystical vision and communication with spirits in the afterlife, so long rejected by most scientists, are becoming increasingly the focus of experimental study.

In the Summer 2007 issue of the Action Against Allergy Newsletter, a medical practitioner in Bournemouth UK, Dr John Millward, made several valid points about the attitude of the medical profession to disease and to nutrition. In May of 2006, a group of physicians and scientists in Britain sent a letter to the chief executives of health trusts urging them to reject alternative medical treatments as ‘unproven or disproved’. In addition to being circulated within the NHS, the letter was also sent to Prince Charles, a known advocate of the use of alternative therapies.

Regrettably, the Oxford zoologist Professor Richard Dawkins has now extended his attack on religion to include alternative therapies as equally vacuous. We certainly need to be protected from bogus practitioners selling ‘snake oil’, but genuine therapists have a very real part to play in therapy of those who have some kind of biochemical or physiological imbalance that makes them feel less than well.

Professor Richard Dawkins of Oxford has taken issue with religion for some years now, the argument being that if we cannot subject religious experiences to the rigour of scientific double-blind tests, then it must be rejected as ‘superstitious nonsense’. Dawkins maintains that religion is an enemy of reason and the root of all evil as well.