Et mørkt kapittel

I forrige blogginnlegg skrev jeg at påstander om å kunne kurere kreft viste alternativindustriens mørkeste side. Påstander om å kunne påvirke kreftsykdom finnes også i Alexanderteknikkens historie om vi går tilbake i tid.

I forordet til sin første bok, Man's Supreme Inheritance, skrev Frederick Matthias Alexander: 

In the work which will follow I shall deal with the detailed evidence of the application of my theory to life, of cases and cures, and all the substance of experience. And there are many reasons why I should hesitate no longer in making my preliminary appeal, chief among them being the appalling physical deterioration that can be seen by any intelligent observer who will walk the streets of London or New York, for example, and note the form and aspect of the average individuals who make up the crowd. So much for the surface signs. What inferences can we not draw from the statistics? To take three instances only: What of the disproportionate and undeniable increase in the cases of cancer, appendicitis and insanity? For that increase goes on despite the fact that we have taken the subject seriously to heart (Alexander 1996, s. xx-xxi). ¹ 

Alexander skriver deretter kritisk om vitenskapelige forsøk på å finne patogener som forsårsaker kreft, (suksessen med HPV-vaksinen viser at han tok fullstendig feil), og tilbyr sin egen løsning:

Therefore I look to that wonderful instrument, the human body, for the true solution of our difficulty, an instrument so inimitably adaptable, so full of marvellous potentialities of resistance and recuperation, that it is able, when properly used, to overcome all the forces of disease which may be arrayed against it (ibid, xxii).

Alexander mente altså at om vi bruker kroppen på best mulig måte vil det kunne motvirke alle slags sykdommer. Han sier det ikke direkte, men ut ifra sammenhengen må vi tolke det dithen at dette også inkluderer kreft.

Helbredelse ved tro

I kapittelet Conscious Control kritiserer Alexander «faith healing» og skriver at «Faith-healing is dangerous in its practice and uncertain in its results» (ibid, 30). Men han er samtidig positiv til ideen om at endring av mentale vaner kan ha effekt på kroppsvevet:

The ... way in which this act of faith operates is in the breaking down of a whole set of mental habits, and in the substitution for them of a new set. The new habits may or may not be beneficial from the outset apart from the effect produced by the emotional state, which is hardly ever maintained for a long period, but even so the breaking down of the old habits of thought does produce such an effect as will in some cases influence the whole arrangement of the cells forming the tissues, and dissipate a morbid condition such as cancer (ibid). 

Feilaktige og forutinntatte forestillinger

I kapittelet «Synopsis of Claim»² nevnes også kreft: 

My next claim is that the limitations and imperfections referred to above, as well as cancer, appendicitis, bronchitis, tuberculosis, etc., are too often permitted to remain uneradicated and frequently undetected, and so to develop in consequence of the failure to recognize that the real cause of the development of such diseases is to be found in the erroneous preconceived ideas of the persons immediately concerned, ideas which affect the organism in the manner described in Part I of this book (ibid, 114). ³ 

Årsaken til alvorlige sykdommer som kreft og tuberkulose er altså «erroneous preconceived ideas», og Alexander skriver videre:

The only experience which the average man or woman has in the use of the different parts of the human organism is through his or her subconsciousness. The result is a subconscious direction which in the imperfectly co-ordinated person is based on bad experiences and on the erroneous preconceived ideas before mentioned. Small wonder, then, that such direction is faulty and leads to the development of serious defects and imperfections (ibid). 

Feilaktig ubevisst kontroll og styring (direction) leder til utvikling av «alvorlige defekter». Som vi skal se senere er løsningen å erstatte den ubevisste kontrollen med en bevisst uttenkt kontroll. 

Kur ved re-koordinering 

I kapittelet «Notes and Instances»⁴ besvarer Alexander spørsmål fra leserne av første utgave av Man's Supreme Inheritance. Et av spørsmålene er: «How are the principles of Conscious Control to be applied to the cure of specific bad habits, or to the cure of specific diseases?» (ibid, 176). Alexander skriver igjen om det han mener er årsak til problemene: 

In the first place, all specific bad habits, such as overindulgence in food, drink, tobacco, etc., evidence a lack of "control" in a certain direction, and the greater number of specific disorders, such as asthma, tuberculosis, cancer, nervous complaints, etc., indicate interference with the normal conditions of the body, lack of control, and imperfect working of the human mechanisms, with displacement of the different parts of that mechanism, loss of vitality and its inevitable concomitant, lower activity of functioning in all the vital organs. When the subject has arrived at this condition, harmful habits become established, and the standard of resistance to disease is seriously lowered (ibid, 177).

«Re-education» (Alexanderteknikk) var ifølge Alexander nødvendig del av «behandlingen»: 

To regain normal health and power in such cases, what I have called "reeducation" is absolutely imperative. This treatment begins, in practically all cases, by instructions in the primary factors connected with the eradication of erroneous preconceived ideas connected with bad habits, and the simplest correct mental and physical co-ordination. The displaced parts of the body must be restored to their proper positions by re-education in a correct and controlled use of the muscular mechanisms. In this process the blood is purified, the circulation is gradually improved, and all the injurious accumulations are removed by the internal massage which is part and parcel of the increased vital activity from such re-education (ibid).

Vanene som fører til den usunne tilstand kan bare endres gjennom bevisst kontroll:

Thus the first stage in the eradication of bad habits and disorders is reached when improved conditions of health are established. Nor must it be forgotten that in this process of re-education a great object lesson is given to the controlling mind. In the very breaking up of maleficent co-ordinations or vicious circles which have become established, a new impulse is given to certain intellectual functions which have been thrown out of play. The reflex action which is setting up morbid conditions can only be controlled and altered by a deliberate realization of the guiding process which is to be substituted, and these new impulses to the conscious mind have, analogically, very much the same effect as is produced on the body by the internal massage referred to above. The old accumulations of subconscious thought are dispersed, and room is made for new conceptions and realizations (ibid).

Alexander synes å ha en forestilling om at sykdom har sammenheng med oppsamling av giftstoffer i organismen og at den må renses. En forestilling som lever i beste velgående i alternativindustrien.

Dommen

I 1944 publiserte tidskriftet «Manpower» en lederartikkel med sterk kritikk av Alexander og hans metode. Tittelen var Quackery versus Physical Education. Manpower var tidsskriftet til «National Advisory Council for Physical Education» i Sør-Afrika, og artikkelen var skrevet av bladets redaktør, Dr. Ernst Jokl.⁵  Alexander så sitt livsverk truet og gikk til injuriesøksmål. Det endte med at Alexander vant og fikk en erstatning på 1000 pund. I ettertid har alexanderlærere sett dette som en frikjenning av Alexander som kvakksalver. Men dette er ikke riktig. Dommer Clayden ga i sin dom en god beskrivelse av Alexanderteknikken, men sier også: 

The conclusion to which I come is that the defendants have shown that Mr Alexander is a quack in the sense that he makes ignorant pretence to medical skill; they have shown that many of the physiological reasons put forward are wrong; they have shown that in its claims to cure the system constitutes dangerous quackery; but in these matters they misrepresented the views of Mr Alexander and in showing how foolish were these views, which he did not put forward, they have in the article called him much more of a quack than they were entitled to do. In addition they have failed in my view to prove that the system cannot bring about the results which it does claim in the improvement of health and the prevention of disease, and again they have made matters worse by overstating the claims made for the system (Alexander vs. Jokl And Others). ⁶

Alexander vant saken, ikke fordi han ikke var en kvakksalver, men fordi han ble beskyldt for å være mer kvakksalver enn han viste seg å være.

Relaterte blogginnlegg

Wishful thinking

Habitual reactions 

Alternativ idioti 

Alexanderteknikk og kreft?

Noter 

(1) Det er kjent at Alexander benyttet en «ghost writer» for sin første bok. En forfatter ved navn John D. Beresford. Samarbeidet ble avsluttet tidlig i prosessen, men man antar at deler av dette første forordet som er sitert, og de to første kapitlene, er formulert av Beresford. Innhold og meninger må likevel tillegges Alexander. 
Det er interessant at wikipediartikkelen om Beresford siterer denne kommentaren til noen av hans romaner: «He has used his novelist's skill to convince the sensitive reader that the age of miracles is not over, and that, in certain circumstances, the spirit may exercise what seem to us miraculous powers over the substance of the body. This he did in 'The Camberwell Miracle' and 'Peckover'; and in this absorbing novel, he returns to the theme, with the study of a man fitting himself to become a great healer.» Beresford synes å dele noen av Alexanders ideer. 

(2) Man's Supreme Inheritance er egentlig en samling av tekster Alexander skrev over flere år. Første del av boken ble utgitt i 1910. I 1911 utkom en «addenda». I 1918 Ble boken gitt ut på ny og inkluderte da Conscious Control (1912) og The Theory and Practice of a A New Method of Respiratory Re-education (1907) som utgjør henholdsvis andre og tredje del av boken. Kapittelet «Synopsis of Claim» som siteres her er skrevet i 1912.

(3) Alexander nevner her også tuberkulose. Alexander skrev i 1903 en artikkel med tittelen The Prevention and Cure of Consumption (Alexander 1995) hvor han indirekte hevder å kunne påvirke tuberkulose. 

(4) Kapittelet «Notes and instances» utgjør Addenda til Man's Supreme Inheritance, skrevet i 1911.

(5) Ernst Jokl (1907-1997) var tyskfødt lege og «Director of physical education» i Sør-Afrika. I 1942 fikk han en demonstrasjon av Alexanderteknikken fra Alexanders assistent Irene Tasker som hadde flyttet til Sør-Afrika i 1935. Men hun avslo å gi ham timer da hun mente han ikke viste den rette instillingen. Hun ba ham i stedet oppsøke Alexander selv i London, noe som neppe var særlig realistisk midt under krigen. (Bloch 2004). Kanskje hadde historien vært en annen om Jokl hadde lært teknikken å kjenne gjennom timer og ikke gjennom å lese Alexanders bøker?

Jokl har et dårlig rykte i Alexanderteknikk-kretser, men ser ut til å vært både kompetent og et anstendig menneske: Dr. Ernst F. Jokl, a Pioneer In Sports Medicine, Dies at 90

(6) Jokls artikkel hadde en svært nedsettende tone og avslutter på denne måten:  «It seems indeed appropriate that Mr Alexander’s concepts, although alleged by its founder to apply to normal human beings, are in reality based upon experimental evidence obtained from decerebrate preparations». (Decerebrate= forsøksdyr som har fått store deler av hjernen fjernet). Men det ser ut til at Alexander vant saken først og fremst fordi Jokl ikke hadde forstått helt hva Alexanderteknikken gikk ut på og kom med påstander om teknikken som ikke var riktige. I dommen heter det: «To be effective, the justification must be as broad as the libel. In the present case, defendants had said that there was quackery in the field of physical education, and dishonest quackery in the field of medicine, both in claims to cure and in claims to prevent disease and improve health. They had proved only quackery and dishonest quackery, in the sense that quackery is always dishonest, in the claims to cure. Even in that regard they had made the quackery appear to be worse than it was and they had alleged dishonesty to a greater degree than would be implicit in the quackery itself. The justification was not, in these circumstances, as broad as the libel» (Alexander versus Jokl and Others).

Litteratur

Alexander. FM. 1995. Articles and Lectures. Mouritz. 

Alexander, FM. 1996 (1918). Man's Supreme Inheritance. Mouritz.

Bloch, Michael. 2004. F.M. The Life of Frederick Mathias Alexander. Little, Brown.

Jokl, Ernst. (1944). Quackery versus Physical Education (editorial) Manpower (Volkskragte), vol. 2, no. 2, pp. 1–26. 

Supreme Court of South Africa (Witwatersrand Local Division). Frederick Matthias Alexander versus Ernst Jokl, Eustace H. Cluve, Bernard M. Clarke. 19th February, 1948.