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Touch therapy to be anaylzed Thursday
By Diana Matusewic
The Skeptically Oriented Students (SOS) and the St. Cloud Skeptics group are sponsoring a critical analysis of touch therapy Thursday at 7 p.m. in the Atwood Ballroom.
The presenters are two physical therapists from Alexandria: James Beck and Dennis Schroepfer. Both work at the Douglas County Hospital Rehabilitation Services.
"My boss is going to present a historical perspective. I'm going to present some studies both pro and con," Beck said.
There will be an hour long lecture, then an open discussion with the audience.
Psychology instructor and head of SOS, Gerald Mertens, decided to do this analysis when Mary Boltuck (retired psychology faculty) informed him of an incident she had with touch therapy.
"She was at her regular physical therapy session, without consent the therapist went into touch therapy," said Mertens. "There's no scientific evidence that you can run your hands over someone and cure them."
Beck has attended other SOS meetings and when Mertens discovered that Beck is a physical therapist, he asked him if he would be interested in doing the discussion on touch therapy.
"As I understand it, therapeutic touch has its origins in Eastern medicines. It also has some link to hands-on healing that's mentioned in the Bible," Beck said.
Therapeutic touch is a mystical ideology that has its basis in Buddhism and Brahmanism. People who practice therapeutic touch claim that humans produce an energy field.
"They say they're able to feel a disturbance in the energy field. With proper training they can treat emotional and physical disease," Beck said.
Beck and Schroepfer take the counterpoint view because they feel there is not enough evidence to prove that this ideology actually works. They don't believe in alternative medicines, they said; their basis is in science.
"I have to go to prestigious medical journals that I trust so I can do best for my patients," said Beck, "and I have not yet read therapeutic touch."
There are extraordinary claims�including therapeutic touch�that some people wanted to examine, which is why SOS came to be.
"There were a lot of people who saw things they questioned and wanted to explore," Mertens said.
SOS usually has two speakers presenting contrasting view points. Mertens said his favorite SOS debates had a priest defending evolution and a chemist defending creation.
Some of the other past topics include: UFOs, cults and TV psychics.
There are no other future speakers currently planned. Anyone added to the mailing list will be kept up to date on future events.
Mertens said SOS uses skeptic publications like the Skeptical Briefs-Newsletter of the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal to help generate topic ideas.
"SOS attempts to look critically at anything," said Mertes, "its fun to have a meeting where you look at the other side."
Anyone is interested in joining SOS may contact Gerald Mertens at 255-2138.
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