You may be interested in more than what conventional pharmaceuticals offer. Many people hope that certain herbs can take the place of antibiotics, acid blockers, laxatives, anti-inflammatories, pain relievers, antispasmodics, and antidepressants. In some cases, people have simply found those prescriptions ineffective. In other cases, they caused side effects, or they presented certain dangers. If a drug can’t check all the boxes, then maybe an herb can.

While this is a reasonable starting point, there is a deeper approach that is far more compelling and fascinating, and — I would argue — useful. When you limit yourself to seeking herbs that have an equivalent function to modern drugs, what you get are more tools that follow the same logic as regular medicine. However, what if it wasn’t the drugs that limited progress with your health? What if it was the logic itself?

The updated version of this article continues here.