Background
It has by far been well accepted that medical study of the human body is both the starting point and final destination of all kinds of medical paradigms. The medical paradigm standardizes all work dealing with medical matters and is therefore the concentrated expression for medical methodology. Recently, the continuous probing and rethinking on medical paradigms both locally and abroad have deepened the knowledge on methodological principles in the study of medicine.
Throughout the history of human medical study, the evolution of the medical paradigm has experienced five development stages, namely, the spiritualism medical paradigm, natural philosophical medical paradigm, mechanistic medical paradigm, biomedical paradigm and bio-psycho-social medical paradigm. Changes from the previous biomedical paradigm to the current bio-psycho-social paradigm in medical care has stimulated profound thinking on medical affairs, such as 4P (preventive, predictive, personalized and participatory) Medicine driven by the human genome project; translational medicine proposed by NIH (National Institutes of Health) Roadmap, which devotes in building a fast channel from laboratory to bedside and aims at efficiently and effectively transforming findings of medical biology fundamental research into theory, methods and drugs for clinical application; et cetera. In summary, the new medical paradigms mentioned above emphasize the following: putting clinical practice as a starting point of medical study, integrating complex thinking into medical processes, attaching greater importance to effectiveness, paying more attention to physical and psychological factors as well as social factors, advocating individual diagnosis and treatment, and last but not least, taking a human-centered approach to problem-solving in the human health field. These suggestions have vigorously promoted the study of TCM and western medicine on the human body in China [
1].
As is well known, there are two schools of thought in medical study in China: one of which is TCM and the other is western medicine. For quite some time, in academia and scholarship, some people have deemed that western medicine is the result of the contemporary advancement in science and technology and therefore has a more promising prospect as today’s modern medicine, and that TCM is nothing but merely traditional medical experiences passed down since ancient China (which has not yet formed its systematic theory in terms of science and technology and is hence deemed more problematic). Such judgment is superficial and very unfair because as much as people may argue: both medicines have developed independently up till today; both have achieved great advancements and have faced pressure from very harsh challenges but maintained a firm stand.
With this background in mind, many domestic experts in related fields have been working on the strategies for the development of TCM. It is recognized that the human body is a complex giant system and synthetic integration methods should be applied to the complex systems [
2]. Issues of complexity of human body study [
3] have been raised, as well as the comparison of TCM with its counterpart in terms of models of diagnosis and treatment [
4].
More importantly, the integration of clinical and scientific research paradigms based on the real world has been proposed [
5,
6]. Making use of modern information science and technology, especially data technology, very well reflects the distinct characteristics and advantages of syndrome differentiation for individual diagnosis and treatment of TCM. The main features of the new paradigm are data-driven, knowledge-provision, intelligence-orientation, as well as normalization. It relies on the inheritance and innovation of TCM in clinical practice, and aims at promoting the formation of a new community comprising clinical and scientific research of TCM. This could be achieved with the support of corresponding methods and technique platforms, with TCM clinicians at the core and bringing together scientists, researchers and engineers from different disciplines to the multidisciplinary research of medicine. At the heart of the paradigm of TCM in the real world is clinical and research integration, with human-centered, data-oriented and problem-based characteristics. It insists on the belief that medical practice and scientific research complement each other and are mutually promoting, hence emphasizing practicability and functionality. These seem rather profound and well far-sighted.
As emphasized earlier in the paper, in the field of human body study, methodological challenges are crucial and need to be addressed due to the fact that methodology, in almost any research field, plays a key role in making further progress. In addition, methodology is abstract, being neither visible nor tangible, and is hence easily overlooked.
Generally speaking, methodology is the embodiment of worldview and serves as the macro-guidelines for practice. The worldview that is possessed determines what methodology will be utilized, so the scientific view that is held will determine what methodology of scientific study will be employed. If the right methodology is used to conduct research work, various challenges can be better resolved and remarkable progress in research work can be produced; if improper methodology is used, the studies will no doubt face setbacks or even fail. Therefore, methodology is critical as to whether a scientific study will be successful.
Methods
Two scientific views and two methodologies
Information and matter are basic objects of scientific research. Looking back into the history of science development, it is recognized that the research object has been expanded from physical matter to information. With the expansion of the research object, a new scientific view and scientific methodology has also grown correspondingly. As a result, two scientific views and two methodologies have coexisted for the time being. Of the two, one is the elder scientific view-methodology raised from the study of matter and the systems of matter, and the other is the new scientific view-methodology raised from the study of information and information systems.
Due to the characteristics of matter as research objects and human knowledge in modern time, the elder scientific view and methodology formed, more or less, a mechanically materialistic view of the world. On the other hand, due to the characteristics of information and the human knowledge in contemporary time, the new scientific view and methodology reflects, to a certain extent, the attitudes of dialectical materialism. The historical progress on scientific views and methodologies (from the elder to the new) is indeed a great success.
The scientific view and methodology in the study of physical matter system
The primary scientific view in physical matter study is the physical matter view. According to this view, it holds that the objective world is composed of physical matter systems. The purpose of studying physical matter systems is to explicate physical matters’ structures and, based on the understanding of them, to expound on various properties and functions of those systems.
Under the guidance of physical matter view, the research methods of physical matter system exploit various means to investigate the structure of the physical matter system from the macro level to micro levels. It is believed that only when the microstructure of a physical matter system is clarified, can its properties and functions then be explained. Only then can the physical matter system be understood. For a complicated physical matter system, it should be divided into simpler sub-systems and then one by one be observed and investigated with specific theoretical methods and experimental means to clarify their macro and microstructures. In terms of scientific view and methodology, the structure, properties and functions of a complex system can be elucidated as long as the structures, properties and functions of all its sub-systems have been thoroughly comprehended. This is the well-known methodology of “divide and conquer,” or “reductionism.” The basic feature of the methodology is dividing for analysis. Directed by the method of “divide and conquer,” the study area of physical matter has constantly been divided into smaller and smaller parts. As a result, more and more new research branches and disciplines in the study of physical matter were boosted, finer and deeper progresses in the study were produced, and more and more profound understandings on the physical world were achieved. All these contributions led the modern sciences and technology to the great prosperity never seen before.
Some of the major characteristics of “divide and conquer” methodology for the study of physical matter are mentioned as follows.
Localization: This scientific view of the methodology deems that the world is composed of various physical matter systems and the methods employed are to study them respectively. Whenever a physical matter system is studied, the attention of study is concentrated on it while other physical matter systems are seldom considered. If a system is complicated enough, it will be divided into a number of sub-systems, and the attention of study will exclusively be given to each of the sub-system respectively with seldom considering the influence from other sub-systems.
In depth: When various physical matter systems (or the sub-systems) are investigated, more often than not, the exploration goes directly into the one under study paying no attention to any other systems (sub-systems) to get rid of the complicated interaction among the systems (sub-systems). Thus the research into the one concerned can be done profoundly.
Statics: In the scientific methodology for the study in physical matter, the structure, properties and functions of an object under investigation are treated as in static condition. At least during the time span when the study is conducted, they are considered static.
Determinism: According to scientific methodology for the study in physical matter, the structure, properties and functions of the object under investigation are of definite determinacy. Of them, Laplace Determinism is the representative.
It should be pointed out that for the physical matter systems studies, the methodology of “divide and conquer” is effective. Benefiting from the methodology, humans’ understanding of various physical matter systems continues deepening.
The scientific view and methodology for the study in information system
The information system is dominantly featured by information and its dynamics. Although it needs physical matter and energy, the role that physical matter and energy plays in an information system is to support and serve the information and its dynamics.
The information system is usually an open system and interacts with the outside world: it receives information from the outside world to generate its own product that in turn takes action on the outside world. For instance, the human brain is an open complicated information system. It constantly receives relevant information from the outside world on one hand and interacts with the outside world through its action on the other hand. Thus, the interactions between humans and the outside environment are constantly taking place to implement the human’s purpose of continuously understanding the world and properly coping with it.
It is obvious that the objectives and methods for the study of information system are distinct from those used for the study of physical matter and its system. The purpose of research in information system is not to explain its matter structure and properties, but rather to study how it should generate proper strategy to interact with the outside world when dealing with the information obtained. This will enable it to better finish its task of fitting into and changing the outside world, that is to say, to accomplish the conversion of “information gained from the outside world” into “the action strategy generated by information system.” This is what is known as information conversion. As far as the medical study on the human body is concerned, a practitioner’s task is to give a proper medical strategy for treatment so as to have the patient recovered based on the patient’s information obtained.
How is the information system of human body able to produce proper action strategy after collecting the information from the outside world? It is well known that “information” merely expresses the phenomena of an object’s dynamic motion, while “knowledge” can actually represent the essence of the object’s dynamics. Thus, after receiving the information from the outside world, the system should first process it and convert it to knowledge. Based on the knowledge, proper strategy (intelligence) can then be deduced for dealing with the outside world. The steps stated above are in fact the information-knowledge-intelligence conversion.
All in all, the scientific view for the study of open and complex information systems such as human bodies is information view rather than physical matter view. The view of information focuses on information instead of matter, on how they can understand the outside world and produce right strategy to interact with the outside world (rather than the matter structure). The core of the methodology of information science is the implementation of proper information conversion, which can concisely be expressed as “information-knowledge-intelligence conversion.”
A few primary features of the methodology of information science are as follows:
Integrity: From obtaining the information from the outside world to producing right action strategy, the information system implements a series of information conversion. All the processes form a systematic unity. Ultimately, whether an action strategy is appropriate is determined by the whole system rather than any one part or parts of it.
Interaction: From receiving the outside environment information to producing right action strategy, the series of information conversion implemented are mutually linked and interacted with one another, instead of isolated; the information system per se keeps linking to, and interacting with, the outside world as well.
Dynamics: The series of information conversion carried on in information system remains dynamic. Unavoidably, the whole information system remains in a state of constantly changing rather than a static one.
Complexity: When will an information system obtain outside-world information? What kind of information will it gain from the outside world? When would the interference with the information be received? The study in the open complicated information system is full of various uncertainties. How is the outside information, associated with the relevant knowledge and the goal for the system, processed to produce the right strategy? The research into all the issues is very tangled.
Abstraction: Compared with the physical matter, information is an entity that is very abstract to be studied. In view of this, the dynamics of information and its conversions are also relatively abstract. However, the ultimate effect from the abstract information and its conversion can be technically implemented and practically utilized. Hence, both primary scientific views and methodologies mentioned above are precious treasures of human’s society.
Recent progresses in the methodology of information science
The scientific methodology for physical matter research has existed for hundreds of years. It is unnecessary to re-elaborate it for people are relatively aware of it. Yet, the methodology of information science took shape through research practice just in a few past decades and therefore it is necessary to make it more familiar by mentioning some of its typical progresses achieved recently.
Comprehensive information theory
Up till now, the theory of information recognized by the international academic world is “A Mathematical Theory of Communication” created by C. E. Shannon in 1948. Communication technology guided by the theory has advanced very well since then, which has led to the era of information today. However, the theory has some serious flaws: it focuses only on the form factor of information, ignoring the related content and value factors. It is difficult for people to make decisions if only the form of information is available and the content and value factors are unknown. To overcome this problem, a new theory named “Comprehensive Information Theory” was established in 1988. With this new theory, the form, content, and value factors of information are taken into account [
7]. By using the comprehensive information theory, intelligent decision-making can be made in principle.
Explicitly, the flaw that existed in the Shannon theory is due to its employment of the elder methodology of “divide and conquer,” which deals separately with the factors of form, content, and value of information. The success of the comprehensive information theory is attributed to the implementation of comprehensive view of information and the unifying treatment of its form, content, and value as an inseparable unity. This is just the central idea of information methodology.
The law of information conversion
The typical mission of the information system is as follows: First, to convert the information received from outside world to comprehensive information. Secondly, to produce the relevant knowledge from comprehensive information obtained. Thirdly, to convert the comprehensive information to intelligent strategy based on the knowledge and goal of the system as a guide. Last but not least, to convert the intelligent strategy to intelligent action in order to react to the outside world. The process of the series of complex conversions is named “information-knowledge-intelligence conversion,” or more precisely “law of information conversion.” The methods and techniques needed for implementing the above information conversions have been set up [
8].
Similarly, the reason why the important “law of information conversion” was not discovered previously is because of the influence exerted by the methodology of “divide and conquer.” A study on information processes that should have been treated as one entirety had been divided into sections (sensing, communication, computing, and control) and these were investigated separately. In contrast, in order to explore the generative mechanism of how “intelligent strategy” was derived from the “outside world information,” the whole information dynamic process was studied as an entirety with mutual interactions among all its components and then the law of information conversion was discovered.
The unified theory of artificial intelligence
The traditional scientific theory declared that a system possesses three dimensions, i.e., structure, function, and behavior. Following the “divide and conquer” methodology, the international study in artificial intelligence took three approaches: simulating the structure of the human brain, which gave rise to the research of artificial neural networks; simulating the functions of the human brain, which produced the research of physical symbol system; and simulating the behavior of intelligent system, which gave birth to the method of senor-motor system. However, the three approaches were unable to form the composition. It was discovered later, by using the information methodology that, as far as intelligence system is concerned, the “mechanism of intelligence generation” should be the core of the whole system. Therefore, a new approach of “mechanism simulation” was proposed, which is completely distinct from those of the three academic schools of thought mentioned above. Further research into the new approach found that the approaches of the three academic schools of thought that used to stand separately were amazingly unified and concordantly coexisted within the approach of “mechanism simulation.” Thus, the unified theory of artificial intelligence comes into being [
8].
Here again, we can see that the three intentional major artificial intelligence theories could not have been merged together before. This was directly due to the influence of the “divide and conquer” methodology. However, the unified theory of artificial intelligence established later is a successful application of the methodology of “law of information conversion.”
Advanced artificial intelligence theory
On the basis of aforementioned results, it was discovered in a further study that there is no interaction between the artificial intelligence system studied and the outside world. Moreover, it was shown that the existed model has no consciousness and emotion at all. Thus, it is neither a complete artificial intelligence system model nor a real one.
With further research work conducted, the new model and theory of the “advanced artificial intelligence” was established, which is based on the principle of information conversion with consciousness, emotion, and intelligence harmoniously integrated. These caught the attention of people from all around the world. In 2008 and 2010, international conferences with the theme “advanced artificial intelligence” were successfully organized and an academic publication entitled
International Journal for Advanced Intelligence was created. The fundamental theory and related research outcomes concerning advanced artificial intelligence can be found in literature [
9].
Note that the new theories mentioned resulted from the voluntary use of the methodology of information science whenever problems were identified in the methodology of “divide and conquer.” This explicitly shows that, with “information conversion” as its symbol, the methodology of information science is an effective way to resolve various issues in the open and complicated information system. It is very delightful to see that, in recent years, people in the field of TCM pay more attention to the research and application of methodology. Promising results have been achieved in the field of human body information gathering, expression, sharing, and knowledge bases construction, etc.
In summarization, there are two categories of scientific methodology that exist in academic research. One is the older category, the dividing for analysis, also known as the “divide and conquer,” which has proven very powerful in physical matter study. On the other hand, the newer category is the “law of information conversion,” which has also proven very effective and promising in information study. It has been interestingly noted that both these methodologies very well complement each other, as can be seen from the discussions in sections “ The scientific view and methodology in the study of physical matter system” and “ The scientific view and methodology for the study in information system” above.
Discussion
Anyone would agree that, in the study of the human body, the first issue to be clarified is the definition of the human body. The paper holds that the human body is not only a complicated physical matter system, but a complex information system as well. What is more is that it is an open, sophisticated and dynamic system, in which the physical matter and the information mutually interact with each other.
Two kinds of methodologies of TCM and western medicine for comparison
Western medicine treats the human body mainly as a physical matter system, and thus employs the methodology of “divide and conquer,” or reductionism. Numerous devices and instruments have been designed and developed. From a macro to micro view (from organs to tissue, cells, molecules, and genes), western medicine studies parts of the human body, including energy generation and transmission, targets, pathways, and detailed mechanism of protein functions, and manages to set up the criteria for physical matter structures of the human body. It focuses on human diseases, corrects abnormal physiological or pathological conditions by identifying them in the patient’s physical structures, and also energy processing.
TCM, on the other hand, sees the human body as an open information system (although the term “information” has not been formally used before). Using a dynamic, holistic, and systematic view, TCM serves to grasp the states of physical dynamics presented in space, and also the courses and patterns in time by observation and deduction by seeking the rationale behind them. It focuses on patients themselves by treating each individual as a whole in terms of biology, psychology, and sociology. TCM employs the methodology of information conversion on the basis of the human body system as a whole (although it may not be understood thoroughly). By inspection, olfaction and auscultation, interrogation and palpation, information about the patient’s body is collected and intervention strategies are generated for the patient using pattern differentiation.
Pattern differentiation for treatment in TCM embodies information conception of methodological positions
Pattern differentiation for treatment in TCM is a vivid paradigm of the information methodology. With patients placed at the core, pattern differentiation for treatment is a holistic, dynamic, personalized, and complicated intervention process focusing on regulating the patient’s conditions by closely combining patterns, interventions and effectiveness altogether. Effectiveness refers to evaluation of the effect of treatment and includes both the patient’s objective clinical symptoms as well as subjective feelings. Focusing on the Yin-Yang balance, TCM sets up a direct and complicated correlation between intervention and its physician as the host, and the functional conditions of the patient as the guest. “Pattern” is used to describe and summarize the guest’s dynamic state under the guidance of TCM theory. That means, the state and trend of a guest’s dynamics in space, in other words, a guest’s clinical manifestations, i.e., the “symptoms and signs,” are described and summarized; the “symptoms and signs with coherence” in terms of TCM theory is the description and summarization of the guest’s dynamic changes. That is, it highlights and depicts the processes and patterns of the guest’s dynamic states manifesting in time. The “pattern” and the “symptoms and signs with coherence” simply add up to “the pattern, and symptoms and signs with coherence.” It highlights the guest’s dynamic state in a specific time and space, which possesses the character of time-space dynamics.
The complicated process of intervention in TCM may be depicted with the model of cybernetics, which says that, in order to control an entity (to improve the functions or development of an entity under study), information and knowledge must be obtained by generating actions on it. In view of this, the basis of controlling is information and knowledge. All information and knowledge transmitted and extracted are used for controlling, and any controlling processes to be realized depend on the information feed-forward or feedback. It refers to the information transmitted out and the outcome of an action fed back by the controlling system, which affects the information that is retransmitted out to achieve constrained effect in order to achieve the preset goals. In the process of TCM’s pattern differentiation for treatment, “pattern” is the entity under control, effectiveness is the key feedback information in the model of cybernetics; treatment is a mechanism that takes action on the entity under control. With patterns, interventions, and effectiveness closely combined, medications are constantly administered so as to allow the human body’s conditions to take a turn for the better. With the knowledge accumulated, TCM has established its own medical system.
A new TCM navigational chart in human body
The human body can be described as the sea, and the process of life is similar to navigating through the waters. As far as seafarers are concerned, the information about the water currents and marine environment is a matter of life and death. The complex reactions of the human body to the intervention by TCM are just like those huge waves in the sea. The major diseases are analogous to nautical courses. By exploiting the techniques of big data, a new TCM navigational chart in human body can be drawn. Authored by Zhongjing Zhang, a famous ancient physician who studied the conditions caused by cold,
On Harm Caused by Cold is a navigational chart that has effectively guided TCM clinical practice for two millennia. This ancient navigational chart was scripted based on valuable data collected from a great deal of medical work, as well as literature in the form of clinical records and notes. The drawing process of the chart involved extracting the data from records and then creating the final chart based on the author’s profundity of knowledge and experience. However, owing to constrains of the available forms of ancient medical works, the amount of medical information that can be obtained, read, and extracted is limited. As a result, the information in most “nautical log books”— TCM works and literature—has not been systematically extracted and exploited yet. On top of this, knowledge hidden in the vast amounts of messy data has yet to be excavated. Most of the essence in the TCM treasury house has yet to be activated and utilized as well [
10].
To draw a new navigational chart, it is necessary to first alter our conception and view. We should not only be concerned with the causality but also pay more attention to the correlation. Only then, armed with technology of big data, driven by clinical issues, guided by data, and underlain by mathematical models, can the inheritance-innovation outcomes be activated, derived from the rich experience of millennia in TCM practice. In view of the characteristics of data analysis of TCM, such as multidimensional, nonlinear, dynamic characteristics, the tasks of big data mining including association rules analysis, time series module, cluster analysis, classification and predication, can find useful and unknown knowledge underlying phenomena.
And more, a new data acquisition system based on the Internet of Things, can improve greatly the convenience and accuracy of big data collection of TCM. This will greatly enhance the ability of individualized diagnosis and treatment using pattern differentiation in terms of TCM theory, hence greatly increasing the capability of human health prediction and preservation, and disease prevention.
Navigating with the chart, TCM underpinned by big data should transform from a traditional experience-based medicine to an evidence-based one. This is the very meaning of informatics for the framework of TCM real-world clinical study. Guided by the methodology of information science, TCM will undergo a thorough transformation.
It is obvious that TCM and western medicine respectively follow and employ distinct scientific view and methodology in their study of the human body. Both have made extraordinary achievements but are faced with harsh challenges as well.
Combination of TCM and western medicine by combining two kinds of methodologies
We hold that both TCM and western medicine have shortcomings in the understanding of the human body and their research work: the western medicine ignores the nature of a human body as an information system; it lacks the systematic understanding of interconnection and interaction inside the body as a whole. TCM, on the other hand, overlooks the structure of the body, especially the microstructure of the body, and masters little information about the body’s internal parts, lacking deep understanding of the law of information conversion.
We emphasize that the human body is both a complicated physical matter system and a complex information system, which are inseparable and complementary to each other. These are the primary features of the human body. During the process of the human body’s linkage and interaction with the external setting, it needs systematic support and tacit assistance from its physical matter system to accomplish a series of information conversion. The linkage and interaction between the open information system (doctor) and the object (patient) in real world, which is also the entire process of information conversions, can be shown in Fig. 1 below.
(1)The information generated constantly by the outside environment, which is called ontological information, acts on human body;
(2)The ontological information obtained by sensing system of the body is then converted to epistemological information, namely, “comprehensive information”;
(3)The epistemological information is converted into knowledge, which is called the process of cognition;
(4)Guided by the goal of the body, the human brain converts both the epistemological information and knowledge into intelligent strategy;
(5)The execution system converts the intelligent strategy into intelligent actions to react on the outside setting;
(6)Evaluating whether the reaction induced by the strategy achieves the goal, if so, we deem that the right knowledge had been obtained and proper strategy generated. The knowledge can be sent to the knowledgebase to expand its content; if the outcome of the reaction is not good or totally not right, the error and deviation should be fed back to the human brain. By supplementing new knowledge to optimize the strategy and action, the goal should be gradually approached and finally achieve to ultimately resolve the problem;
(7)Return to the first step to receive and process the new information from the external setting, and a cycle of information conversion starts anew.
It is clear from the descriptions above that the human body study is unable to be successful with either only the methodology of physical matter view—analyzing by dividing, or merely the methodology of information view and information conversion. Both methodologies should be effectively integrated to fulfill the goal of their tacit complement. The comprehensive understanding of the human body should be supported and deepened by the body’s micro and macro information; obtaining and processing the micro and macro information should be governed and guided by the comprehensive understanding of the body.
As mentioned earlier in the paper, the methodology of information conversion is a systematic one. It aims to systematically and interactively study the issues in question; in contrast, the method of analyzing by dividing is the one that confines study to one part or parts of the whole issue under study. It intends to partially study the issue in statics (though the study may go deeper). Obviously, both methodologies have their specific strengths and they should be efficiently integrated.
Is it possible to integrate both methodologies? The answer is most likely, yes. They are not incompatible like water and fire. In the 1960s, the study in the integration of TCM and the western medicine was proposed in China, which was very reasonable and far-sighted. From a methodological point of view, they can well be integrated for the two are complementary.
The methodology of information science should play the role of framework, while the methodology of physical matter science plays the role of supplementation of the framework
In light of the basic purpose of the human body study and the respective characteristics of both methodologies, we deem that the methodology of information science for information conversion should play the role of framework, while the methodology of physical matter science for analyzing by dividing should play the role of supplementation of the framework. This is because of the fact that the goal of the human body study is to generate the strategy for the intervention of illnesses based on information collected (If no sick conditions are identified, the strategy should be treated as the suggestion for health promotion and disease prevention). This is what the methodology of information conversion does, thus the methodology of information science should be treated as the framework. Nevertheless, the prerequisite is that the patients’ information should be collected accurately and completely (including both the micro and the macro information). Furthermore, to extract the “knowledge” of patient’s health conditions, the obtained “information” of the body should be processed and the relevant intervention strategies should be generated. These are the important roles the methodology of analyzing by dividing can play.
Some may consider that western medicine should take a leading role while TCM be the follower in the practice of the integration of both medicines. Their argument is that the technologies for diagnosis and treatment in western medicine are more advanced, which are underpinned by means of contemporary science and technology; on the contrary, those of TCM are more primitive and lack the support of modern science and technology—its practice of diagnosis and treatment rely merely on the ability and experiences of the physicians themselves.
Admittedly, these facts do exist, but from the perspectives of the purpose of human body study and the natures of both methodologies, the conception should be well observed that the macro holistic view plays the leading role while the micro view does a supplementary one. This is the primary principle.
TCM still cannot sleep without any worries, the integration of the methodology of information science and the methodology of physical matter science results in TCM facing heavier tasks: TCM should take great efforts to keep up with modern science and technology (especially information science technology and intelligent technology) in order to precisely and fully capture human body information; at the same time, it should also manage to theorize its practice experiences accumulated over the millennia; greater endeavors should also be taken to explore and understand the mechanism of information-knowledge-intelligence conversion behind the human body—an open, dynamic, and complex system in which physical matters and information are interacted. The theory and knowledge obtained should be used in clinical practice to resolve problems and they should also be tested constantly and improved. It is a task with no easy way out. On the other hand, based on the advanced technologies and the advantages of its micro-view knowledge, western medicine should try hard to grasp the macro-view knowledge of the open information system of the human body.
It is certain that the integration of the two medicines should be more scientific, deeper, and more comprehensive and efficient than using any one of them alone. With both methodologies efficiently integrated, doctors and physicians will not only have sufficient information for diagnosis, but have a deeper understanding of the human body as an entire system from the macro view and also theoretic grounds for information conversion. These will enable research on the human body to make greater progress—the fruit that TCM and western medicine produce together in hand.
Perspectives
In fact, study of the human body has been advanced up till now. Both TCM and the western medicine are faced with enormous challenges. It would not be wise to have both developed independently. As both methodologies have not yet been consolidated, amalgamated, integrated efficiently so far, TCM and its counterpart have undergone quite some confusion. Nevertheless, if great effort is taken to efficiently integrate the two methodologies harmoniously, then either TCM or the western medicine may proceed with great rapidity. In so doing, whatever that is currently unknown of the human body can then be expected to be made known of in the near future. Of course, it is absolutely impossible to exhaust all knowledge of human body within limited time, for our environments are constantly changing and the human body keeps changing as well. However, as long as the right scientific views and methodologies are established and employed, the available knowledge of the human body can then be constantly expanded, deepened, and better research results will be continuously achieved so as to better secure the health of the human race.
Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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