The Theory of Chinese Medicine by Hong Hai

Author:Hong Hai
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781783264292
Publisher: Imperial College Press
Published: 2014-03-09T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 6

TCM Models in Explanation and Prediction

It does not matter if a cat is white or black as long as it catches mice.

Deng Xiaoping

A modern interpretation of Chinese medicine must aim to (a) show how TCM theory may be reconstructed to be understandable from the vantage point of biomedical science and (b) assess the evidential credentials of the thus reconstructed theory.

Toward the first aim, I have argued that TCM entities are a combination of real entities and theoretical/fictional constructs, and that the systems of organs and meridians are merely ways of classifying and organising physiological activities to fit into the models of TCM theory. This reconstruction of TCM theory departs from the classical interpretation of all TCM entities as real and organs as somatic structures as in modern anatomy.

In this chapter, I present the key models of TCM theory, not as immutable laws of nature, but as heuristic models found from clinical experience to be useful guides for diagnosis and therapy. I examine a number of key models in TCM theory and interpret them wherever possible from a biomedical standpoint, thereby taking the second essential step towards reconstructing TCM theory. In the next chapter, I address the second aim of the book, showing how and to what extent TCM evidential credentials may be evaluated through clinical trials and case studies.

Before examining the principal models used in TCM it is necessary to consider the concepts of yin and yang that lie at the base of much of Chinese philosophy and Chinese medical theory.

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