5. Why The Placebo Effect Is A Thing

Joe Giddens/PA Wire

Truly, the allure of Brian Molko is totally mind boggling. Oh, not that placebo. The placebo effect in medicine is a well-documented phenomenon where, in blind studies, participants who are given actual medicine and thoughts that are given a pill which does nothing - but told they are being given legit meds - both get better.

A doctor could give you a jelly bean, but if it was wrapped up like an aspirin and he told you it was an aspirin, it could theoretically have the exact same effect. And we're at a loss as to why. Mind over matter, or something. Actually, maybe not, since one scientist did a study where he found that it was more biochemical. In his experiment into the placebo effect, Fabrizio Benedetti induced pain in participants and controlled it with morphine, until the last day of the study, when the drug was replaced with saline, and it had the same effect.

Then he repeated the study, but added the morphine-blocking naloxone to the saline, and the pain continued. What the what? Yes, we agree, it's crazy. It's not just a mind over matter thing, it's an example of the brain actually affecting the body's inner workings and chemistry. Which is pretty bonkers, especially considering that we have zero clue why that happens, and no matter how much research we put into finding out, we've yet to get any closer to an answer. Just more examples of an unexplained phenomenon.