Cat's Squirrel
Gold Meritorious Patron
Thanks Vin, that's a good explanation.
A Flaw in Study Tech
- Thread starter The Anabaptist Jacques
- Start date
Thanks Vin, that's a good explanation.
Vinaire
Sponsor
Hi Cat, I hope you are no longer upset with me. I apologize for being offensive in the past.
.
La La Lou Lou
Crusader
perhaps having semi-illiterate people as word clearers is half the problem. A fully literate person would spot that it's the punctuation or syntax or what ever that's not understood.
That would perhaps be the problem in having star rate check out's done by people who themselves don't know a colon from their elbow.
My ability to understand the English language has been helped by forcefully eating the Webster's dictionary in word chain after word chain, but I could have done the same thing by reading many more books. And gained more knowledge and viewpoints too.
That would perhaps be the problem in having star rate check out's done by people who themselves don't know a colon from their elbow.
My ability to understand the English language has been helped by forcefully eating the Webster's dictionary in word chain after word chain, but I could have done the same thing by reading many more books. And gained more knowledge and viewpoints too.
La La Lou Lou
Crusader
I just remembered twinning on starrate check outs and competitive mu finding. AAAaaaaaaaRGggggggggggggggggg! Those days were crap!
nozeno
Gold Meritorious Patron
I hope you all realize that the significance you attach to your staff or scientology experiences has a time decay, (like options). That is, assuming that it wasn't "all that" traumatic.
You will get over it , I hope.
Assuming it was "all that" is what makes blogs and message boards thrive in the absence of real fucking nastiness.
You will get over it , I hope.
Assuming it was "all that" is what makes blogs and message boards thrive in the absence of real fucking nastiness.
Cat's Squirrel
Gold Meritorious Patron
You mean the John Denver thing? No problem. It was a difference of opinion, it happens.
Royal Prince Xenu
Trust the Psi Corps.
I agree with this. I don't remember which book I was "studying" but I got seriously hung-up on the word "above". It took about half an hour with the Sup to figure out that it meant text abovementioned. When I complained that the insertion of a simple comma would have averted the whole problem I was told flatly, "That's how LRH wrote it. He's right. You're wrong."
Perhaps it's these minor issues that give DM the excuse to "rewrite" the Basics?
Clueless Morgan
Patron with Honors
The really big problem with study tech is that it has influenced mainstream education.
Back in 2008 (that was before I got figuratively "into" the subject of Scientology) I had a very nice English teacher - let's call her Miss X. However, she had one quirk: instead of telling us the meanings of words if we didn't know them like other teachers did it, she always urged us to look in the dictionary. Noticing something here?
She really did this *all* the time. She even explained to us that "Two of the major obstacles to text comprehension are not knowing and misunderstanding words."
This is a quote by LRH which you can find in DMSMH as the "important note":
(Fair Use for demonstration purposes only)
So this is exactly what LRH says: Misunderstood and not understood words are major obstacles to text comprehension.
Now you can accuse Miss X of being anything - she was a late time hippie, she's opposed to authoritarian education et cetera, but she's not a Scientologist or even an Applied Scholastics person. And because it was her first year teaching my school's adapted version of the British curriculum, I'm sure she followed it word by word.
Also, a teacher who usually never did this and doesn't do this anymore, in that particular school year ('08/'09) actually was doing this as well. So probably, this was put in as a guideline in the curriculum. Fair enough, we get a fair amount of non-English speakers in every year, and it may have been an internal school guideline to ease access to what is taught in the English lessons to them, but it still kind of bugs me.
Does anyone here have kids who visit regular British schools, or British-oriented schools anywhere else, who were in Year 7 in 08/09 and can confirm this? Or is there anyone *here* who can confirm this.
By the way, for US people, the system my school and the UK I believe too uses makes Year 7 equal to your Grade 6... ...that's how it makes sense. Year 9 becomes pupils of 13/14 years of age, which you would assign "Grade 8" to.
My theory is, an Applied Scholastics guy or perhaps even Scientologist managed to get into the curriculum board... ...of course I could just be paranoid again, but really, the coincidence is just too great somehow, is it not?
Oh, and in case people get confused again: Yes, I do apply certain tech and use some FZ/Clearbird tech and guidance, however I do by far not believe in everything uttered by LRH or used and applied by the Church of Psychoterrorology. This includes Xenu, various space opera and super power stories, study tech, the Purif RD, etc. etc. etc. Also I think LRH himself was incredibly arrogant, violent and psychologically ill. I do not like Narconon or any of the stupid front groups. It's like some people like a portion of what Jesus said (like "Love thy neighbour as thyself") but consider him a con-man who did some cheap magic tricks and said a load of bogus as well (like the whole reaffirming that adultery can bring you into a place where they'll roast you alive, and proposing total obedience to a nonexistent being - i.e. God)
Back in 2008 (that was before I got figuratively "into" the subject of Scientology) I had a very nice English teacher - let's call her Miss X. However, she had one quirk: instead of telling us the meanings of words if we didn't know them like other teachers did it, she always urged us to look in the dictionary. Noticing something here?
She really did this *all* the time. She even explained to us that "Two of the major obstacles to text comprehension are not knowing and misunderstanding words."
This is a quote by LRH which you can find in DMSMH as the "important note":
(Fair Use for demonstration purposes only)
So this is exactly what LRH says: Misunderstood and not understood words are major obstacles to text comprehension.
Now you can accuse Miss X of being anything - she was a late time hippie, she's opposed to authoritarian education et cetera, but she's not a Scientologist or even an Applied Scholastics person. And because it was her first year teaching my school's adapted version of the British curriculum, I'm sure she followed it word by word.
Also, a teacher who usually never did this and doesn't do this anymore, in that particular school year ('08/'09) actually was doing this as well. So probably, this was put in as a guideline in the curriculum. Fair enough, we get a fair amount of non-English speakers in every year, and it may have been an internal school guideline to ease access to what is taught in the English lessons to them, but it still kind of bugs me.
Does anyone here have kids who visit regular British schools, or British-oriented schools anywhere else, who were in Year 7 in 08/09 and can confirm this? Or is there anyone *here* who can confirm this.
By the way, for US people, the system my school and the UK I believe too uses makes Year 7 equal to your Grade 6... ...that's how it makes sense. Year 9 becomes pupils of 13/14 years of age, which you would assign "Grade 8" to.
My theory is, an Applied Scholastics guy or perhaps even Scientologist managed to get into the curriculum board... ...of course I could just be paranoid again, but really, the coincidence is just too great somehow, is it not?
Oh, and in case people get confused again: Yes, I do apply certain tech and use some FZ/Clearbird tech and guidance, however I do by far not believe in everything uttered by LRH or used and applied by the Church of Psychoterrorology. This includes Xenu, various space opera and super power stories, study tech, the Purif RD, etc. etc. etc. Also I think LRH himself was incredibly arrogant, violent and psychologically ill. I do not like Narconon or any of the stupid front groups. It's like some people like a portion of what Jesus said (like "Love thy neighbour as thyself") but consider him a con-man who did some cheap magic tricks and said a load of bogus as well (like the whole reaffirming that adultery can bring you into a place where they'll roast you alive, and proposing total obedience to a nonexistent being - i.e. God)
Student of Trinity
Silver Meritorious Patron
Teachers made kids look words up in dictionaries long before Hubbard was born, and they'll continue to do so long after he is forgotten. Looking up unfamiliar words is in itself just a good idea.
What's stupid is Hubbard's insistence that not knowing definitions of words is the only possible source of misunderstanding. That, and an insistence that clay models are helpful no matter what, seem to be the only parts of Study Tech that are original to Hubbard. And they are, of course, idiotic.
What's stupid is Hubbard's insistence that not knowing definitions of words is the only possible source of misunderstanding. That, and an insistence that clay models are helpful no matter what, seem to be the only parts of Study Tech that are original to Hubbard. And they are, of course, idiotic.
Clueless Morgan
Patron with Honors
Indeed. One has just to look at Hardeep Singh Kohli's face when reading "Fundamentals of Thought" 
Terril park
Sponsor
"What's stupid is Hubbard's insistence that not knowing definitions of words is the only possible source of misunderstanding. "
This of course is incorrect. 3 barriers, MUs , out gradients and lack of mass.
I understand that as a university student/ graduate/ whatever you are among the most able in resolving study problems.
So lets try a thought experiment.
Try and explain in words only how the Honda variable valve inlet system
works and generates potentialy greater power.
Examine the answers of those not familiar in this area. Or, Lol,
no answers.
Possibly you may struggle, I expect not, possibly I might, but am reasonably confident.
Thought experiment, thought experiment.
Clueless Morgan
Patron with Honors
"What's stupid is Hubbard's insistence that not knowing definitions of words is the only possible source of misunderstanding. "
This of course is incorrect. 3 barriers, MUs , out gradients and lack of mass.
I understand that as a university student/ graduate/ whatever you are among the most able in resolving study problems.
So lets try a thought experiment.
Try and explain in words only how the Honda variable valve inlet system
works and generates potentialy greater power.
Examine the answers of those not familiar in this area. Or, Lol,
no answers.
Possibly you may struggle, I expect not, possibly I might, but am reasonably confident.
Thought experiment, thought experiment.
Well, you do this question then:
The mind, the spirit and the body are interconnected. What state of havingness can we incidentally discharge by extorting the mind?
Is there one word in there you don't understand? If yes, look it up, if no: Why don't you understand the question then? And if you answered "yes" and looked it up, why do you still not understand the question?
Student of Trinity
Silver Meritorious Patron
If Hubbard acknowledged those three possible sources of misunderstanding, and not just M/Us, then I stand corrected. And I'd love to try explaining Honda engines, and think I could do it if I understood whatever this was myself, but in fact I don't. If this is a really important example to you, Terril, I could try to find time to Google that stuff, figure it out by reading (without touching any clay), and compose a short treatise.
I still think Hubbard's system is idiotic, because all three of these pillars you mention suffer the same problem. Each of them is valid up to a limited point — but everyone already knows them up to this point, and doesn't need Hubbard to tell them. Past this point, Hubbard seems to be claiming to have an efficient, algorithmic system for learning, where it's always clear what to do next to move toward understanding, and that next step always works. That would be quite awesome if it were true, but it's absurdly false. To imagine that it even could be true is to be stuck at a childish intellectual level.
There is no algorithm for learning, no royal road to understanding, no such thing as really workable 'study tech'. Complex concepts are more than the sum of the dictionary definitions of the words in their descriptions. Figuring out how to break a big problem down into smaller parts is an irreducibly catch-as-catch-can, case-by-case art, which is itself already more than half the battle of understanding. Concrete examples can be so subtle in how they exemplify an abstract concept that seeing how they relate to the concept is itself a major concept to be understood.
Study tech seems to me to be like much of the rest of Scientology: basic stuff that is better and cheaper elsewhere, plus grandiose claims that don't really work, and whose failure would be obvious if it weren't for all of Hubbard's manipulative appeals to vanity.
I still think Hubbard's system is idiotic, because all three of these pillars you mention suffer the same problem. Each of them is valid up to a limited point — but everyone already knows them up to this point, and doesn't need Hubbard to tell them. Past this point, Hubbard seems to be claiming to have an efficient, algorithmic system for learning, where it's always clear what to do next to move toward understanding, and that next step always works. That would be quite awesome if it were true, but it's absurdly false. To imagine that it even could be true is to be stuck at a childish intellectual level.
There is no algorithm for learning, no royal road to understanding, no such thing as really workable 'study tech'. Complex concepts are more than the sum of the dictionary definitions of the words in their descriptions. Figuring out how to break a big problem down into smaller parts is an irreducibly catch-as-catch-can, case-by-case art, which is itself already more than half the battle of understanding. Concrete examples can be so subtle in how they exemplify an abstract concept that seeing how they relate to the concept is itself a major concept to be understood.
Study tech seems to me to be like much of the rest of Scientology: basic stuff that is better and cheaper elsewhere, plus grandiose claims that don't really work, and whose failure would be obvious if it weren't for all of Hubbard's manipulative appeals to vanity.
Cat's Squirrel
Gold Meritorious Patron
Student of Trinity
Silver Meritorious Patron
Actually, Honda's variable valve inlet system doesn't seem to be too hard to explain.
A piston engine works by igniting fuel inside a metal chamber with one movable wall. The explosion blows the wall outwards; the wall pushes a stick that drives a wheel around; when the wheel swings all the way around, it pushes the wall back inwards. The cycle can repeat, up to a hundred or so times per second. Each explosion drives the wheel around, and the wheel turns gears that can eventually turn car wheels or whatever.
But you have to squirt a fresh shot of fuel into the chamber (usually called a cylinder because that's it's normal shape) on each cycle, and also suck out the residue from the last explosion. This squirting and sucking is done through valves — holes in the cylinder walls with plugs that can push in and out to open and close. The valves have to open to let in fuel or suck out exhaust, but have to be closed during each explosion. Something has to open and close the valves, and has to do it at the right times.
The trick is that the engine itself does this: stuck on the side of the main turning wheel is another wheel, that turns with it, but which is lopsided, sticking out longer on one side than on the other. Whenever the lopsided wheel's long end swings around, as the round main wheel turns, the long end of the lopsided wheel pushes a stick that opens and closes the valve. A lopsided wheel used to push on a stick as it turns is called a cam. Exactly when the valve opens and closes in each cycle of the engine depends on the exact shape of the cam.
Depending on the details of how fast the explosions are repeating, how hot the explosions are, and how big the cylinder chamber is, the explosions will actually drive the wheel harder or less hard if the fuel is shot in a bit sooner or a bit later in the cycle. The optimum timing for the same engine can be different if it is running fast or slow.
So a clever engineer at Honda figured out a way to have two cams instead of one: one shaped to work the valve at times better for high speeds, one shaped better for low speeds. The engine switches over from one cam to the other at an intermediate speed. So it ends up getting more power from the same fuel across a wider range of speeds, than an engine with only one cam.
A piston engine works by igniting fuel inside a metal chamber with one movable wall. The explosion blows the wall outwards; the wall pushes a stick that drives a wheel around; when the wheel swings all the way around, it pushes the wall back inwards. The cycle can repeat, up to a hundred or so times per second. Each explosion drives the wheel around, and the wheel turns gears that can eventually turn car wheels or whatever.
But you have to squirt a fresh shot of fuel into the chamber (usually called a cylinder because that's it's normal shape) on each cycle, and also suck out the residue from the last explosion. This squirting and sucking is done through valves — holes in the cylinder walls with plugs that can push in and out to open and close. The valves have to open to let in fuel or suck out exhaust, but have to be closed during each explosion. Something has to open and close the valves, and has to do it at the right times.
The trick is that the engine itself does this: stuck on the side of the main turning wheel is another wheel, that turns with it, but which is lopsided, sticking out longer on one side than on the other. Whenever the lopsided wheel's long end swings around, as the round main wheel turns, the long end of the lopsided wheel pushes a stick that opens and closes the valve. A lopsided wheel used to push on a stick as it turns is called a cam. Exactly when the valve opens and closes in each cycle of the engine depends on the exact shape of the cam.
Depending on the details of how fast the explosions are repeating, how hot the explosions are, and how big the cylinder chamber is, the explosions will actually drive the wheel harder or less hard if the fuel is shot in a bit sooner or a bit later in the cycle. The optimum timing for the same engine can be different if it is running fast or slow.
So a clever engineer at Honda figured out a way to have two cams instead of one: one shaped to work the valve at times better for high speeds, one shaped better for low speeds. The engine switches over from one cam to the other at an intermediate speed. So it ends up getting more power from the same fuel across a wider range of speeds, than an engine with only one cam.
Vinaire
Sponsor
That's pretty good.
Actually, a lot is inferred from the context. That is why one looks at all the definitions and finds the right one.
I was a Word clearer. It never made sense to me to clear up all the definitions. The student cleared the definitions he needed to. I usually went straight for the root meaning, and then for the definition that made the most sense in the context.
I let the student make as many sentences as he needed to understand the passage. Sometimes it was rapidly looking several words briefly without making any sentences to decide if the problem was there or somewhere else.
I didn't impose anything on the student. I just guided the student. After all it is the student's confusion, and the student would know when the confusion was gone. I also made sure I myself understod the area.
I also asked questions similar to those in KHTK #4 VIEWPOINT to get the student to follow his non-optimum attention to the actual area of difficulty. I got the student to look without thinking. I even got the student to make real examples from his experience, and got him not to resist looking at whatever came up.
My word clearing sessions used to be very exciting and never boring. The student could discover if the error was in the text itself, and if there were a different way of looking at it.
.
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Terril park
Sponsor
Well you demonstrate why you are a student of trinity.
Really brilliant effort, but not perfect. But then if you google " Honda variable valve timing "you will find examples not as good, and some I believe written by Honda engineers.
Here is one of the websites on googling such, and its an excellent demonstration of why having the mass of something is really helpful in
study. It has two animations of the variable valve system working, one
the low power, economical, way, the other the high power less economical way. Also shown is a different method of varying valve timing as used by Toyota. Despite the excellence of this demonstration even they do not
fully explain how the blue locking pin is moved.
http://www.carbibles.com/fuel_engine_bible_vvt.html
Terril park
Sponsor
I agree with you mostly.
However one should look at the context in which study tech is used
also.
Those who go to university have shown themselves to have whatever mental equipment is required to succeed there. Many who potentially
have such abilities, through inadequate education, or a preference for
other activities may never have developed such abilities, and in fact a large portion of the world's population is in fact illiterate.
Its the case that most highly trained auditors are good at study and pretty intelligent. Flag 2005 who occasionally posts here told how 95%
of those at flag for auditor training were not considered good enough to
succeed in the study regime and taken off training. And thats with all
the study tech! Becoming a good class VI auditor is probably equivalent to
the work involved in getting a university degree, and note that one has to actually demonstrate good results quite extensively.
Scientology takes everyone of whatever educational background or lack
of and tries to get them to be excellent students. With varying success.
I guess those with the greatest native ability do best. Some struggle and
are slow to learn, but with some persistence can learn.
A university graduate would have a lesser need of study tech than most.
Those of comparative native ability and intelligence but little schooling
can find study tech extremely helpful and can soar.
Those of low inherent ability can actually succeed in study even
though it requires much effort.
Study tech is not magic. It is however a useful tool.
