I would like for you to find or produce one or more arguments that
support the position that even though completely ineffective
treatments may not cause direct harm to the subject, harm is still
caused because other treatments that would have been effective are not
pursued. There are two domains where I could easily see this
happening: medicine and education.

In medicine, suppose you believe that putting river rocks on your back
will cure your cancer. Certainly, this treatment will cause no harm
(in fact, there may be a placebo effect but please ignore that angle
for this question). The problem is that you have a limited amount of
time and energy. Expending it on the river rock treatment precludes
you or diverts you from going the more traditional cancer treatment
route where you would more likely have success.

In education: Suppose I think that the cause of many reading problems
is uncontrolled eye movements. I design a system that gives little kids
practice in moving their eyes more rapidly and accurately. Turns out,
though, that this doesn't have any bearing on reading ability. Once
again, I've done no -direct- harm because of the training, but I have
done harm because the time spent practicing eye movements could have
been spent on more productive activities that -do- improve reading.

Is there a name for this problem? Have authoritative articles been written on it?

My primary interest is in arguments related to the harm caused by
ineffective educational practices, but I would be satisfied with
well-articulated arguments from any domain.

Good luck.

---

Clarification of Question by alwayscurious-ga on 17 Dec 2003 10:44 PST

By the way...here are three webpages that discuss the concept I'm
interested in. They're on the right track, I would just like more
detail from an authoritative source or sources. (Supporting data would
be great.)

Indirect harm from ?opportunity cost? 
http://www.aidslaw.ca/Maincontent/issues/cts/cam/ethicalissues.htm

THE HARM IN PROMOTING UNPROVEN TREATMENTS 
http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/autism.html

The "Opportunity Cost" of Useless Therapy 
http://target.com/target_group/pharmacy/healthinfo/alt_care/alt_care_article.jhtml?mzFile=fgnm04

Just to kick some ideas around:

With a progressive treatable illness there is a forseeable and
preventable loss of health that defines the opportunity cost (an
economic concept) of foregoing the appropriate treatment in favor of
an ineffective (perhaps even dangerous) one.

To apply these sorts of arguments in an educational setting one must,
I think, give up some of the strengths of that argument.  For one
thing ignorance, though "treatable", does not so readily present
itself as "progressive".  True, some learning (like a second language)
may be more easily acquired in one's youth, but on the whole a poor
educational practice will not necessarily compound one's own igorance
or even (if public school availability is allowed) pass onto
succeeding generations.

Some vitality can perhaps be restored to the argument by looking at an
earnings potential as related to educational attainments.  If a "good"
educational practice were shown to increase college admissions rates,
for example, then one could with justification tie the expected
increase in earnings potential to that pedagogical technique.

To limit our argument strictly to "opportunity costs" as they are
ordinarily defined in economics studies, requires us to then identify
a delay in college admissions, and the corresponding delay in higher
earnings, which we could assess as an opportunity cost for a
hypothetical poor educational practice.

regards, mathtalk-ga

it is obvious that your premis is correct.  and anymore comment would just be
wasted conversation.  it's like the chicken and the egg.