Recently I was involved in a conversation between a physicist, Bill, and a former physician, Steve, who now does what he calls “energy healing.” I had a vague idea of what he meant by that, but Bill took umbrage. “The word ‘energy’ has a very precise meaning in physics and the physical sciences,” he said. “I see it bandied about in the most outlandish ways, to make it mean something it doesn’t. That really bothers me.” We went on a bit about this subject, and finally all agreed that there had to be another way to name what in the alternative healing field is commonly referred to as “energy,” as in energy healing, the energy in foods, good or bad energy, and so on and so forth.
To show you how extensive this argument is, let me quote from the online encyclopedia Wikipedia (under “energy”):
Non-Scientific Energy
The term “energy” is widely used in a spiritual or non-scientific way that cannot be quantified.
To mathematicians, engineers and scientists, the word “energy” has a strict and quantifiable definition. Any usage of the word that violates this definition must be termed pseudoscience. They argue that the mixing of the non-scientific and scientific definitions of the word creates confusion.
Examples of pseudoscience are mysticism and parapsychology in fields such as acupuncture and reiki. Paranormal researchers will often refer to “psychokinetic energy” when attempting to explain paranormal phenomena or the concept of a spirit or soul.
