Origin of word "placebo" and placebo quotes

When there was nothing else to offer, placebos were a salve.  The word itself comes from the Latin for "I will please."  In medieval times, hired mourners participating in Vespers for the Dead often chanted the ninth line of Psalm 116: "I shall please the dead in the land of the living."  Because the mourners were hired, there emotions were considered insincere.  People called them "placebos."

—Michael Specter.  “The Power of Nothing.”  The New Yorker.  December 12, 2011.

I had great respect for shamans—and I still do.  I have always believed there is an important component of medicine that involves suggestion, ritual, and belief—all ideas that make scientists scream.

—Ted Kaptchuk, an acupuncturist interviewed by Michael Specter.  “The Power of Nothing.”  The New Yorker.  December 12, 2011.


Kaptchuk practiced acupuncture for half his adult life.  But he stopped twenty years ago.  Despite the popularity of acupuncture, clinical studies continually fail to demonstrate its effectiveness—a fact that Kaptchuk doesn’t dispute.  I asked him how a person who talks about the primacy of data and disdains what he calls the “squishiness” of alternative medicine could rely so heavily on a therapy with no proven value.

Kaptchuk smiled broadly.  “Because I am a damn good healer,” he said.  “That is the difficult truth.  If you needed help and you came to me, you would get better.  Thousands of people have.  Because, in the end, it isn’t really about the needles.  It’s about the man.”

—Ted Kaptchuk, an acupuncturist interviewed by Michael Specter.  “The Power of Nothing.”  The New Yorker.  December 12, 2011.