Homeopathy and the science of high dilutions: when to believe the unbelievable

In 1988, an editorial in journal Nature [1] titled “When to believe the unbelievable” observed that the famous high-dilution experiments by Benveniste’s group [2] had no physical basis and suggested that “prudent people should, for the time being, suspend judgment.” However, judgment was not suspended at all, but in the following weeks the authors were condemned and ridiculed for the alleged lack of replication of their findings. Twenty-four years later, although the idea that solutions beyond Avogadro’s constant may exhibit biological and pharmacological activity remains “unbelievable” to the common sense, things are changing dramatically. Several groups of researchers from countries all over the world are devoted to this puzzling subject, which has weighty implications not only for pharmacology (homeopathy) but also for biology, physics and the environmental sciences. The XXVI meeting of GIRI (International Research Group on Very-low dose and High-Dilution Effects), scheduled to take place in Florence on September 20-22, 2012, will present a growing body of evidence attesting to the effects of high dilutions (HD). The program is organized around four main axes: physicochemical features of HD, studies in plants and the field, clinical and veterinary evidence, and laboratory models.