Despite a recent dubious claim that placebos don't require deception (critiqued here), placebos appear to function on the basis that a subject believes X will have effect Y. Without knowing too much detail, we say that the subject's mind/body will assist or attempt to achieve Y upon the perception that X causes Y.
Can a person, without self-deception [1] and with knowledge of the placebo effect, induce a placebo response? Or can a person knowledgeable of the placebo effect induce the same "reactions" that a placebo can normally be used to induce?
Consider a silly example.
Persons A and B each have a headache. They are told that balancing a spoon on one's nose eliminates headaches with very high success rates by conducting electricity via the sinuses. Person A believes the claim. Person A balances a spoon on their nose, and their headache is eliminated.
Person B, having a background in medicine, doesn't believe it at all. Person B, to prove the point, balances the spoon on their nose and remains in pain.
At this point, is there any way for Person B to "simply decide" that this ritual, which he knows to be an attempt at a placebo, to start working?
Would there be a difference using a pill instead of something purely ritualistic?
[1] self-deception. [for the purpose of this question,] any mental activity in the general category of suspending one's "participation" in the full body knowledge they normally possess.
