The rabbit hole is probably very deep.<p>But some of these things are well-understood. So if you test a pill and it is green, tiny, makes your tommy hurt for 10 minutes - then make sure that your placebo has the same properties in the your double blind experiment.<p>Secondly you can break things down and find out why they work. Why does mindfulness meditation stop the pain of being burnt?<p>Psychology as a science has many problems; in a way I think they believe too much - have too many strong ideas. I guess that is why the treatments have changed so much thru the years - and the diagnosises too - people have completely different (psychological) diseases today than a few decades ago.<p>Also their experiments are often underpowered or have methodological errors.<p>Maybe they should devote themselves to studying placebo rather than perceived actual treatments.<p>It would be useful to know if the pill should be red or green, the nurse brunette or blonde.<p>:-p