
The Magic Feather Effect
The Science of Alternative Medicine and the Surprising Power of Belief
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.99/mo for the first 3 months

Buy for $18.74
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Gabra Zackman
-
By:
-
Melanie Warner
About this listen
The acclaimed author of Pandora’s Lunchbox and former New York Times reporter takes an enlightening, engaging, deep dive into the world of alternative medicine and the surprising science that explains why it may work.
We all know someone who has had a seemingly miraculous cure from an alternative form of medicine: a friend whose chronic back pain vanished after sessions with an acupuncturist or chiropractor; a relative with digestive issues who recovered with herbal remedies; a colleague whose autoimmune disorder went into sudden, inexplicable remission thanks to an energy healer or healing retreat.
The tales are far too common to be complete fabrications, yet too anecdotal and outside the medical mainstream to be taken seriously scientifically. How do we explain them and the growing popularity of alternative medicine more generally? Is there a biological basis for practices like acupuncture, tai chi, chiropractic, and energy healing? Who are the faithful patients and practitioners who tell these stories and speak of such mystical-seeming concepts as qi, chakras, and meridians in the first place?
In The Magic Feather Effect, author and journalist Melanie Warner attempts to answer these questions, taking us on a vivid, fascinating journey through the world of alternative medicine. Crossing continents and sides of the debate, visiting prestigious research clinics and ordinary people’s homes, she investigates the scientific underpinning for the purportedly magical results of these practices and reveals not only the medical power of beliefs and placebo effects, but also the range, limits, and uses of the surprising system of self-healing that resides inside us.
Equal parts helpful, illuminating, and compelling, The Magic Feather Effect is a brilliant exploration of some of the world’s most popular health treatments, the people who seek them, the scientists who study them, and the reasons they may work.
©2019 Melanie Warner (P)2019 Simon & SchusterListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Violence Project
- How to Stop a Mass Shooting Epidemic
- By: Jillian Peterson, James Densley
- Narrated by: Laurel Lefkow
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Violence Project is about an examination of the phenomenon of mass shootings in America and an urgent call to implement evidence-based strategies to stop these tragedies. Using first-person accounts from the perpetrators themselves, along with data from the writers’ groundbreaking research on mass shooters, The Violence Project charts new pathways to prevention and innovative ways to stop the social contagion of violence.
-
-
Very insightful, apolitical, and well written
- By mk_89 on 09-18-21
By: Jillian Peterson, and others
-
The Brain's Way of Healing
- Remarkable Discoveries and Recoveries from the Frontiers of Neuroplasticity
- By: Norman Doidge M.D.
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 15 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Brain That Changes Itself, Norman Doidge described the most important breakthrough in our understanding of the brain in 400 years: the discovery that the brain can change its own structure and function in response to mental experience - what we call neuroplasticity. His revolutionary new book shows, for the first time, how the amazing process of neuroplastic healing really works. It describes natural, noninvasive avenues into the brain provided by the forms of energy around us.
-
-
Extremely helpful understanding my TBI.
- By Robert Deramo on 02-12-15
-
The Deepest Well
- Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity
- By: Dr. Nadine Burke Harris
- Narrated by: Dr. Nadine Burke Harris
- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Two-thirds of us have experienced at least one adverse childhood experience, or ACE, such as abuse, neglect, parental substance dependence, or mental illness. Even though these events may have occurred long ago, they have the power to haunt us long into adulthood, and now we have found that they may even contribute to lifelong illness. Dr. Nadine Burke Harris, the founder/CEO of the Center for Youth Wellness and recipient of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation Humanism in Medicine Award, expands on similar topics as in her popular TED talk.
-
-
A waste of time.
- By Sharrie DeCouto on 06-13-18
-
You Are the Placebo
- Making Your Mind Matter
- By: Dr. Joe Dispenza
- Narrated by: Adam Boyce
- Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Is it possible to heal by thought alone - without drugs or surgery? The truth is that it happens more often than you might expect. In You Are the Placebo, Dr. Joe Dispenza shares numerous documented cases of those who reversed cancer, heart disease, depression, crippling arthritis, and even the tremors of Parkinson’s disease by believing in a placebo. Similarly, Dr. Joe tells of how others have gotten sick and even died the victims of a hex or voodoo curse - or after being misdiagnosed with a fatal illness.
-
-
Terrible Choice for Audio
- By Amazon Customer on 08-20-20
By: Dr. Joe Dispenza
-
Healing Back Pain
- By: John E. Sarno M.D.
- Narrated by: John E. Sarno M.D.
- Length: 3 hrs and 23 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With case histories and the results of in-depth mind-body research, Dr. Sarno describes how patients recognize the emotional roots of their back pain and sever the connections between mental and physical pain - and how, just by listening to this program, you may start recovering from back pain today!
-
-
This book saved my life!
- By OCGabe on 06-05-18
-
The Mindbody Prescription
- Healing the Body, Healing the Pain
- By: John E. Sarno M.D.
- Narrated by: Brian Holsopple
- Length: 7 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Dr. John E. Sarno's Healing Back Pain is a New York Times best seller that has helped over 500,000 readers. Continuing the research since his ground-breaking book, the renowned physician now presents his most complete work yet on the vital connection between mental and bodily health.... Musculoskeletal pain disorders have reached epidemic proportions in the United States, with most doctors failing to recognize their underlying cause.
-
-
Life changing
- By Rob Roberts on 06-18-16
-
The Violence Project
- How to Stop a Mass Shooting Epidemic
- By: Jillian Peterson, James Densley
- Narrated by: Laurel Lefkow
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Violence Project is about an examination of the phenomenon of mass shootings in America and an urgent call to implement evidence-based strategies to stop these tragedies. Using first-person accounts from the perpetrators themselves, along with data from the writers’ groundbreaking research on mass shooters, The Violence Project charts new pathways to prevention and innovative ways to stop the social contagion of violence.
-
-
Very insightful, apolitical, and well written
- By mk_89 on 09-18-21
By: Jillian Peterson, and others
-
The Brain's Way of Healing
- Remarkable Discoveries and Recoveries from the Frontiers of Neuroplasticity
- By: Norman Doidge M.D.
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 15 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Brain That Changes Itself, Norman Doidge described the most important breakthrough in our understanding of the brain in 400 years: the discovery that the brain can change its own structure and function in response to mental experience - what we call neuroplasticity. His revolutionary new book shows, for the first time, how the amazing process of neuroplastic healing really works. It describes natural, noninvasive avenues into the brain provided by the forms of energy around us.
-
-
Extremely helpful understanding my TBI.
- By Robert Deramo on 02-12-15
-
The Deepest Well
- Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity
- By: Dr. Nadine Burke Harris
- Narrated by: Dr. Nadine Burke Harris
- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Two-thirds of us have experienced at least one adverse childhood experience, or ACE, such as abuse, neglect, parental substance dependence, or mental illness. Even though these events may have occurred long ago, they have the power to haunt us long into adulthood, and now we have found that they may even contribute to lifelong illness. Dr. Nadine Burke Harris, the founder/CEO of the Center for Youth Wellness and recipient of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation Humanism in Medicine Award, expands on similar topics as in her popular TED talk.
-
-
A waste of time.
- By Sharrie DeCouto on 06-13-18
-
You Are the Placebo
- Making Your Mind Matter
- By: Dr. Joe Dispenza
- Narrated by: Adam Boyce
- Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Is it possible to heal by thought alone - without drugs or surgery? The truth is that it happens more often than you might expect. In You Are the Placebo, Dr. Joe Dispenza shares numerous documented cases of those who reversed cancer, heart disease, depression, crippling arthritis, and even the tremors of Parkinson’s disease by believing in a placebo. Similarly, Dr. Joe tells of how others have gotten sick and even died the victims of a hex or voodoo curse - or after being misdiagnosed with a fatal illness.
-
-
Terrible Choice for Audio
- By Amazon Customer on 08-20-20
By: Dr. Joe Dispenza
-
Healing Back Pain
- By: John E. Sarno M.D.
- Narrated by: John E. Sarno M.D.
- Length: 3 hrs and 23 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With case histories and the results of in-depth mind-body research, Dr. Sarno describes how patients recognize the emotional roots of their back pain and sever the connections between mental and physical pain - and how, just by listening to this program, you may start recovering from back pain today!
-
-
This book saved my life!
- By OCGabe on 06-05-18
-
The Mindbody Prescription
- Healing the Body, Healing the Pain
- By: John E. Sarno M.D.
- Narrated by: Brian Holsopple
- Length: 7 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Dr. John E. Sarno's Healing Back Pain is a New York Times best seller that has helped over 500,000 readers. Continuing the research since his ground-breaking book, the renowned physician now presents his most complete work yet on the vital connection between mental and bodily health.... Musculoskeletal pain disorders have reached epidemic proportions in the United States, with most doctors failing to recognize their underlying cause.
-
-
Life changing
- By Rob Roberts on 06-18-16
-
Accessing the Healing Power of the Vagus Nerve
- Self-Help Exercises for Anxiety, Depression, Trauma, and Autism
- By: Stanley Rosenberg, Benjamin Shield - foreword
- Narrated by: Derek Botten
- Length: 8 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This practical guide to understanding the cranial nerves as the key to our psychological and physical well-being builds on Stephen Porges’s Polyvagal Theory - one of the most important recent developments in human neurobiology. Drawing on more than 30 years of experience as a craniosacral therapist and Rolfer, Stanley Rosenberg explores the crucial role that the vagus nerve plays in determining our psychological and emotional states and explains that a myriad of common psychological and physical symptoms.
-
-
Not useful as an audio book, not useful at all.
- By Change on 01-17-20
By: Stanley Rosenberg, and others
-
Complications
- A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science
- By: Atul Gawande
- Narrated by: William David Griffith
- Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Sometimes in medicine the only way to know what is truly going on in a patient is to operate, to look inside with one's own eyes. This book is exploratory surgery on medicine itself, laying bare a science not in its idealized form but as it actually is - complicated, perplexing, and profoundly human.
-
-
It's about time...
- By T.K. on 05-31-03
By: Atul Gawande
-
Cured
- Strengthen Your Immune System and Heal Your Life
- By: Jeffrey Rediger MD
- Narrated by: Jeffrey Rediger MD
- Length: 14 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Cured, Dr. Rediger digs down to the root causes of illness, showing how to create an environment that sets the stage for healing. He reveals the patterns behind healing and lays out the physical and mental principles associated with recovery: first, we need to physically heal our diet and our immune systems. Next, we need to mentally heal our stress response and our identities. Through rigorous research, Dr. Rediger shows that much of our physical reality is created in our minds. Our perception changes our experience, even to the point of changing our physical bodies.
-
-
Great information desperately in need of an editor
- By Vicki on 04-13-20
-
Freedom from Body Memory
- Awaken the Courage to Let Go of the Past
- By: Jonathan Tripodi
- Narrated by: Jonathan Tripodi
- Length: 6 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From his personal awakening to body memory in Part I and through the history, science, and case studies in Part II, Jonathan illuminates a healing path that is often missed in traditional healthcare. The release of body memory is one of the most enlightening and liberating experiences; and creates change in the body and in one's life that are often considered impossible.
-
-
Life changing | must read
- By Amazon Customer on 09-04-20
By: Jonathan Tripodi
-
Crooked: Man-Made Disease Explained
- By: Forrest Maready
- Narrated by: Forrest Maready
- Length: 8 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Why do babies have lopsided smiles? Why are so many people's eyes misaligned? What started as a simple search to understand this phenomenon turned into a two-year quest that uncovered hidden links between our crooked faces and some of the most puzzling diseases of our time. Crooked methodically goes through the most recent scientific research and connects the dots from the outbreak of metallic medicine in 1800s England to the eruption of neurological and autoimmune disorders so many are suffering from today.
-
-
Amazing open minded review of man made diseases
- By Grover 4 on 08-09-19
By: Forrest Maready
-
Energy Medicine
- Balancing Your Body's Energies for Optimal Health, Joy, and Vitality
- By: Donna Eden, David Feinstein
- Narrated by: Vanessa Daniels
- Length: 13 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this updated and expanded edition of her alternative-health classic, Donna Eden shows listeners how to work with the body's energy systems to boost vitality and stamina, strengthen the immune system, relieve pain and common complaints such as colds and tension headaches, sharpen mind and memory, and enhance overall health with an invigorating five-minute daily routine.
-
-
Now I know.
- By Katie Lerchen on 07-11-16
By: Donna Eden, and others
-
The Fellowship of the River
- A Medical Doctor's Exploration into Traditional Amazonian Plant Medicine
- By: Joseph Tafur MD
- Narrated by: Joseph Tafur, Luis Robledo
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Western medicine has not been particularly successful at getting people relief from conditions like depression, chronic pain, migraine headaches, addiction, and PTSD. Dr. Tafur helps us to understand why. Too often, the Western medical approach fails to address the emotional dimension of illness. This is where traditional plant medicines, with their ability to alter consciousness and open channels of communication to our emotions, offer so much promise.
-
-
Essential knowledge for our times
- By Ksky on 10-17-18
By: Joseph Tafur MD
-
The Pleasure Shock
- The Rise of Deep Brain Stimulation and Its Forgotten Inventor
- By: Lone Frank
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 8 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The technology invented by psychiatrist Robert G. Heath at Tulane University in 1950s and 60s has been described as one of "the most controversial yet largely undocumented experiments in US history" - controversial to us because Heath's patients included incarcerated convicts and gay men to be 'cured' of their sexual preference; controversial in its day because his work was allegedly part of MKUltra, the CIA's notorious "mind control" project. As a result, Heath's cutting-edge research and legacy were put under lock and key, buried in Tulane's archives.
-
-
Thought provoking
- By Anonymous User on 12-30-22
By: Lone Frank
-
Earthing
- The Most Important Health Discovery Ever?
- By: Martin Zucker, Clinton Ober, Stephen T Sinatra
- Narrated by: Paul Costanzo
- Length: 8 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Throughout most of evolution humans walked barefoot and slept on the ground, largely oblivious that the surface of the Earth contains limitless healing energy. Science has discovered this energy as free-flowing electrons constantly replenished by solar radiation and lightning. Few people know it, but the ground provides a subtle electric signal that maintains health and governs the intricate mechanisms that make our bodies work - just like plugging a lamp into a power socket makes it light up.
-
-
Outstanding. This information really IS Important
- By Geri on 08-27-12
By: Martin Zucker, and others
-
Suggestible You
- The Curious Science of Your Brain’s Ability to Deceive, Transform, and Heal
- By: Erik Vance
- Narrated by: Richard Powers
- Length: 9 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This riveting narrative explores the world of placebos, hypnosis, false memories, and neurology to reveal the groundbreaking science of our suggestible minds. Could the secrets to personal health lie within our own brains? Journalist Erik Vance explores the surprising ways our expectations and beliefs influence our bodily responses to pain, disease, and everyday events.
-
-
Is The Power Within Us? Well, Maybe...
- By Gillian on 05-02-17
By: Erik Vance
-
How Doctors Think
- By: Jerome Groopman M.D.
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard
- Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On average, a physician will interrupt a patient describing her symptoms within 12 seconds. In that short time, many doctors decide on the likely diagnosis and best treatment. Often, decisions made this way are correct, but at crucial moments they can also be wrong: with catastrophic consequences. In this myth-shattering book, Jerome Groopman pinpoints the forces and thought processes behind the decisions doctors make.
-
-
Disappointing
- By Audiophile on 05-13-07
-
Molecules of Emotion
- Why You Feel the Way You Feel
- By: Candace B. Pert Ph.D.
- Narrated by: Candace B. Pert Ph.D.
- Length: 3 hrs and 3 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
How do our thoughts and emotions affect our health? Are our bodies and minds distinct from one another, or do they function together as parts of an interconnected system? Neuroscientist Candace Pert provides startling and decisive answers to these and other challenging questions that scientists and philosophers have pondered for centuries. She explains the scientific basis of popular wisdom and phenomena like "gut feelings" and makes comprehensible recent discoveries in cancer and AIDS research.
-
-
Very disappointing
- By Yuliya on 05-29-07
What listeners say about The Magic Feather Effect
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Bennett
- 03-02-21
Amazing
Wonderful book, the amount of research that must’ve gone into writing this book is really mind blowing!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Trebla
- 03-31-19
A painful discussion of an important topic
Rather than explaining the brain/ consciousness interactions, Warner gives magical descriptions of episodic subjective “cures.” It’s only when talking about science based concepts does she invoke actual data. She has hurt society’s grasp of reality,
The damage caused by alternative practices is completely ignored-too many times have important conditions been missed and treatment delayed because of this alternative universe.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful