Hubbard Talks about Math, Physics, Neural Science.

[Mark A. Baker]

... If they can't do that then, IMHO, they've got bupkis re: saying "El Ron was an Idiot, Retard with and IQ of 60-70" based upon Hisself's writings.

Peace.

Face

Your remarks are spot on, Face. The idea that hubbard was just a lucky or malevolent fool is wishful thinking. Hubbard clearly was lacking competence on topics relating to mathematics & the sciences and how they relate to other philosophical endeavors. However he showed near genius abilities at times, especially in his communicative skills. He also could demonstrate blatant idiocy at times.

I've known a few legitimate geniuses personally. That is not an uncommon pattern.

Intelligence is a quality which is not unambiguous nor easily defined. It is clear that no single indicator covers all facets, attempts such as iq to provide such a metric are simply rough indices, not categorically definitive. Hubbard was a smart guy. That doesn't equate to everything he did being smart, or even well understood by him at the time.

One of the clearest distinctions between wisdom & intelligence: wisdom acknowledges the limitations of intellectual reasoning whereas intelligence is often all too easily mislead by its own cleverness.


Mark A. Baker

 

[Hatshepsut]

I looked at this thread title the other day and just read a couple of pages now. It was serendipitous that I was the day before scrutinizing some links about the Greek mystery cults and the use of LSD or ergot in their rites or other choices of plant extracts possibly used in the 'kykeon'.

It made me laugh to realize that a brand of thinkers/philosopher held similar groupings of contemplations in 'one' court. Mathematics and physics and ethics, animism and metempsychosis and MAGICK! It struck me as weird that Pythagoreans corralled math, the heliosphere, and magick and past lives and communicating with entities of a sort. It is also funny that these groups were often run out of town for their undesirable influencing of the politics of the locals. They often were written down in history as being charlatans who practiced witchcraft and were obnoxious know-it-alls. Maybe there is a certain 'breed' of being.

It struck me that LRH in his political intrigues always suggested that LSD was being used to put people into a 'state' where they could be utilized for black opps. Another similarity .... the calling out or evoking of the 'being' responsible for certain 'conditions of existence' present in one's space. Even Hypatia was murdered for witchcraft as a follower of Plotinus among others. These scientific or pseudo-scientific types seem always to emerge from the same 'nut' shell. Even Nicola Tesla was neurotic.

My Inventions: The Autobiography of Nikola Tesla
Chapter 1—Early Life snippet
http://www.lucidcafe.com/library/96jul/teslaauto01.html

During that period I contracted many strange likes, dislikes and habits, some of which I can trace to external impressions while others are unaccountable. I had a violent aversion against the earing of women, but other ornaments, as bracelets, pleased me more or less according to design. The sight of a pearl would almost give me a fit, but I was fascinated with the glitter of crystals or objects with sharp edges and plane surfaces. I would not touch the hair of other people except, perhaps at the point of a revolver. I would get a fever by looking at a peach and if a piece of camphor was anywhere in the house it caused me the keenest discomfort. Even now I am not insensible to some of these upsetting impulses. When I drop little squares of paper in a dish filled with liquid, I always sense a peculiar and awful taste in my mouth. I counted the steps in my walks and calculated the cubical contents of soup plates, coffee cups and pieces of food, otherwise my meal was unenjoyable. All repeated acts or operations I performed had to be divisible by three and if I missed I felt impelled to do it all over again, even if it took hours. Up to the age of eight years, my character was weak and vacillating. I had neither courage or strength to form a firm resolve. My feelings came in waves and surges and variated unceasingly between extremes. My wishes were of consuming force and like the heads of the hydra, they multiplied. I was oppressed by thoughts of pain in life and death and religious fear. I was swayed by superstitious belief and lived in constant dread of the spirit of evil, of ghosts and ogres and other unholy monsters of the dark. Then all at once, there came a tremendous change which altered the course of my whole existence.

:confused2:

 

[Demented LRH]

My cousin’s method of posthumous IQ calculation.

There is a wide variety of IQ tests including the one approved by APA. Some tests consist of multiple choice questions, the others offer binary choice. In some tests equal points are given to each answer, in the others the questions are considered to be of unequal difficulty, so the answers are rated differently.

The test that my cousin designed is based on the same principles that the other IQ tests are. However, this is a posthumous test, so the regular questions cannot be used to conduct it. Instead the subject’s statements regarding the topics such as physical sciences, engineering, math, arts, etc are chosen to evaluate his IQ. The highest IQ score is 200, as in the standard IQ test. If half of the subject’s statements are correct, he gets the score of 100. If 25% of the statements are correct, he gets the score of 50, and so on -- this is a linear correspondence between the percentage of correct answers and the IQ scale.

According to my cousin’s test, Hubbard’s IQ is 64, which is lower than his IQ on the Cox test (68, as I said earlier).

The procedure of selection of the Hubbard statements:

1. Statements regarding the OT data are excluded from the test because of its religious connotation.

2. Statements that come from Hubbard’s novels of any kind are excluded for obvious reasons.

3. Statements that negate each other are not included in the test because their values are undetermined.

Examples of the Hubbard statements that were included in the test:

A). Smoking cures lung cancer (wrong).
B). There is such thing as the survival instinct or the desire to survive (right)
C). Mathematics developed by Newton cannot be as a basis of human knowledge about the universe (wrong).
D). The engrams exist (wrong)
E). It is possible to ascribe 7 dynamics to human activities (right)
F). The auditing can be used to remove the engrams (wrong).
G). Proper horticulture methods can be used to eliminate malnutrition (wrong).
H). There is a civilization on Venus (wrong). Hubbard claimed that in his past life he was hit by a freight train on Venus, which is not a sci-fi story according to him.
I) Homosexuals are responsible for their condition (wrong).
J). Homosexuality is the result of karma (wrong).
K). Civil engineers do not use mathematics in their work (wrong).

Examples of the Hubbard statements that were not included in the test:
A. Dianetics cures homosexuality B. Dianetics does not cure homosexuality.
These statements contradict each other.

C. The 8-th dynamic is the infinity or the infinite, etc. It is unclear what Hubbard meant by that.
===================
The percentage of correct statements is 32, which gives Hubbard’s IQ score of 64.

The test is simple, anyone can do it.

To make the test statistically valid, the Hubbard statements must be selected in random order. This means that after compiling the initial group of statements one must use a generator of random numbers (psychologists usually use the tables of random numbers) to select a subgroup of statements which will be used for the determination of Hubbard’s IQ.

The following question could be asked -- did Hubbard believe in his own statements? Indeed, some have suggested that Hubbard was deliberately talking nonsense because he was enjoying seeing his followers believing his every word. But this is nothing more than unconfirmed hypothesis, there is no data to support it, unless Hubbard wrote somewhere that this was his intention. Conjectures of this sort are not permissible in science because they cannot be proved or disproved. It is akin to saying -- Hubbard’s birth certificate shows incorrect birth date -- without providing any proof of this assertion.

 

[Demented LRH]

Your remarks are spot on, Face. The idea that hubbard was just a lucky or malevolent fool is wishful thinking. Hubbard clearly was lacking competence on topics relating to mathematics & the sciences and how they relate to other philosophical endeavors. However he showed near genius abilities at times, especially in his communicative skills. He also could demonstrate blatant idiocy at times.

I've known a few legitimate geniuses personally. That is not an uncommon pattern.

Intelligence is a quality which is not unambiguous nor easily defined. It is clear that no single indicator covers all facets, attempts such as iq to provide such a metric are simply rough indices, not categorically definitive. Hubbard was a smart guy. That doesn't equate to everything he did being smart, or even well understood by him at the time.

One of the clearest distinctions between wisdom & intelligence: wisdom acknowledges the limitations of intellectual reasoning whereas intelligence is often all too easily mislead by its own cleverness.


Mark A. Baker

Pardon my ignorance, but I do not know whom Face was referring to.
I was using the APA definition of mental retardation for my articles. Whether this definion is correct or not is debatable, but at least it is used by the professionals and there is a dose objectivity in it. Not everyone agrees with the definition and with results of the tests conducted by psychologists, but the disagrrement is just a personal opinion.

 

[Demented LRH]

(Vocabulary note: the magazines that publish scientific articles are called journals, not magazines. "Nature: Nanotechnology" would not like to have itself confused with "People".)

Cox did not publish her historical IQ work in a journal. It was a book published by Stanford University Press, in 1926. I think it must have been the main contents of her doctoral dissertation, since she obtained her PhD from Stanford the following year.

To be sure, Stanford University had standards even back then. But this was still 1926. Peer review as we know it today did not yet exist, and would not exist for decades. Cox's study was published as part of the "Genetic Studies of Genius" series, even though it had nothing to do with genetics.

Genetic Studies of Genius was the great project of Cox's doctoral advisor, Lewis Terman. It is still formally ongoing, long after Terman's death, in the sense that his surviving subjects are still being tracked. But Terman's methods were primitive and ideologically biased. He wrote letters and pulled strings to help his subjects get jobs, for example. This was nice of him, but it essentially destroyed the value of his study, since it left nothing to be learned about the achievement levels of high-IQ people who did not have Stanford professors playing fairy godfather for them.

In 1926, all Cox needed was Terman's say-so to get her book published by Stanford as part of his project. This did not amount to any kind of verification of her methods by modern standards. At the time, by the standards of the day, her work was legitimately worth a Stanford PhD. By today's standards, it was junk science.

Peer reviews always existed, the idea that a scientific magazine would publish a theory without reviewing it seem strange to me; scientific standars were always the same. The Cox data requires a simple statistical method of verification, which already existed at the time when the article was published.
Stanford university was a reputable institution back then, I am sure that they knew the simple statistical techniques that would verify the Cox theory.
A publisher would not pubish an article because it was simply told to do so unless it wants to put its reputation at risk.
As far as I know, Cox was not accused of not using statistical analysis of her data, it just happened so that some scientists disagreed with her just the way some scientists disagreed with Einstein after he published the theory of relativity.

 

[Jump]

...

Here is the procedure that I am proposing -- you submit a statement by Hubbard which, in your view, "shows" that he is a genius, I will respond to your post, the audience will vote by pressing either "like" or "dislike" button. If there are more dislikes than likes, then I lose and you win.
If there are more likes than dislikes, then I win.

Now the ball is in your court.

1. Hubbard quote: "Truth = Agreement"
2. People vote on whether your rebuttal is true
3. ...
4. Profit

 

[Demented LRH]

1. Hubbard quote: "Truth = Agreement"
2. People vote on whether your rebuttal is true
3. ...
4. Profit

Do you think that this statement is something that could be attributed to a genius? If so, I would say that the statement is false because for example, in the begining when Einstein published his theory of relativity vast majority of the scientists were in agreement when they said that his theory is false; the same is true about quantum mechanics -- majority of the scientists, including Einstein, rejected it after it was published.
Do you want to take a vote on that?

 

[Demented LRH]

Saying that Hubbard was a retard is not a wishful thinking; on the contrary, I wish he were a clever conman because I would not feel bad about myself -- the retard fooled me with his Dianetics. But at least I did not believe in the OT data when I was a Scientologist (I was an atheist at that time). It is even more painful for those who believed in both Dianetics and OT data to think that they bought the retard's "sceintific theories". But I got over my bruised ego, and so should they.

An OCMB member wrote that he does not like the idea of Hubbard being retard because only a mentally deficient person would follow a cretin. In response I said this -- You and I were idiots; but we became smart individuals when we made a decision to leave CoS.

"What you were in the past does not matter. The only thing that matters is what you are now. The future is not determined by the past"
Buddha.

 

[Jump]

Do you think that this statement is something that could be attributed to a genius? If so, I would say that the statement is false because for example, in the begining when Einstein published his theory of relativity vast majority of the scientists were in agreement when they said that his theory is false; the same is true about quantum mechanics -- majority of the scientists, including Einstein, rejected it after it was published.
Do you want to take a vote on that?

I was just pointing out a possible logical failing in your proposal using the liar paradox.

But I agree with whoever said that what Hubbard said is just what Hubbard said to deceive people into agreement, that is, to weed out the not easily conned. What Hubbard wrote is probably not a good reflection of what Hubbard actually believed.

The fact that he left a legacy of a worldwide scamming cult is evidence that he was an evil genius. And therefore any of his writings should be treated with the same wariness as for a poisoned apple.

 

[Mimsey Borogrove]

OH, gosh. I read your cousin's method. Wow. If that is supposed to be a reliable test, I am a monkey's uncle. DLRH. Please tell me you are kidding. Please.

You commented in an earlier post you were a superior opponent. Where is your A game? Your cousin's method is laughable, it is so easily biased. Let's do this: Have your cousin read all of the posts on this thread then post a response and have a dialog with us.

Mimsey

 

[Demented LRH]

I was just pointing out a possible logical failing in your proposal using the liar paradox.

But I agree with whoever said that what Hubbard said is just what Hubbard said to deceive people into agreement, that is, to weed out the not easily conned. What Hubbard wrote is probably not a good reflection of what Hubbard actually believed.

The fact that he left a legacy of a worldwide scamming cult is evidence that he was an evil genius. And therefore any of his writings should be treated with the same wariness as for a poisoned apple.

I addressed the topic of what you call liar paradox in the post where I presented my cousin's analysis of Hubbard's statements. I will readress this topic here, too.

"What Hubbard wrote is probably not a good reflection of what Hubbard actually believed"

There is no proof that everything that Hubbard said did not represent his beliefs. Some things that he said were true to him. For example, he believed that the engrams exist because he borrowed the engram concept from Korzybski -- one does not adopt other person's concepts without thinking that they are true.
Hubbard may or may not believe in the material presented in the book The History of Man, so this material should play no role in determination of his IQ.
"Smoking causes lung cancer". This statement is so ridiculous that it is hard to imagine someone saying it without believing in it because it makes him look like a complete idiot.
"There is such thing as the survival instinct" The statement is correct, I do not see why Hubbard would not believe in it.
Some Hubbard statements are unsuitable for the calculation of his IQ, but the others are.

 

[Jump]

I addressed the topic of what you call liar paradox in the post where I presented my cousin's analysis of Hubbard's statements. I will readress this topic here, too.

"What Hubbard wrote is probably not a good reflection of what Hubbard actually believed"

There is no proof that everything that Hubbard said did not represent his beliefs. Some things that he said were true to him. For example, he believed that the engrams exist because he borrowed the engram concept from Korzybski -- one does not adopt other person's concepts without thinking that they were true.
Hubbard may or may not believe in the material presented in the book The History of Man, so this material should play no role in determination of his IQ.
"Smoking causes lung cancer". This statement is so ridiculous that it is hard to imagine someone saying it without believing in it because it makes him look like a complete idiot.
"There is such thing as the survival instinct" The statement is correct, I do not see why Hubbard would not believe in it.
Some Hubbard statements are unsuitable for the calculation of his IQ, but the others are.

I think the quote was: "Not smoking enough causes lung cancer."

 

[Demented LRH]

I think the quote was: "Not smoking enough causes lung cancer."

Yes, I made a typo.

 

[Jump]

B

Yes, I made a typo.

However, your misquote was typographically correct.

Anyway, this methodology seems to be a bit subjective. And who knows what Hubbard was thinking since he was such a manipulative controller.

 

[secretiveoldfag]

B


However, your misquote was typographically correct.

Anyway, this methodology seems to be a bit subjective. And who knows what Hubbard was thinking since he was such a manipulative controller.

One thing one can rely on as being near his inner truth is or are his Admissions (not sure if that is what they are called), that he wrote just before he created Dianetics. And what a lot of evil and dangerous crazy stuff that is!

 

[Jump]

One thing one can rely on as being near his inner truth is or are his Admissions (not sure if that is what they are called), that he wrote just before he created Dianetics. And what a lot of evil and dangerous crazy stuff that is!

The affirmations? Yes I would agree because those were private writings as I understand it.

 

[Demented LRH]

I would like to address the topic of peer reviews here because I could not edit the post where I mentioned this practice.

The practice of peer reviews begun in 1665 and was used ever since.

"A professional peer-review process is found in the Ethics of the Physician written by Ishaq bin Ali al-Rahwi (854–931). "
"Peer review has been a touchstone of modern scientific method only since the middle of the 20th century, the only exception being medicine. Before then, its application was lax in other scientific fields".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peer_review

Psychometrics is a subset of medicine; this is the field of the Cox theory.

The theory itself is not being judged during a peer review; a person who does a review is asked to evaluate if there is enough empirical data to support the theory, if mathematical methods are appropriate for this type of theory, if the scientist's conclusions are based on the mathematical calculations present and not something else. It is NOT required to check the validity of the calculation (a reviewer is not supposed to find mistakes in the calculations).

I read criticism of the Cox theory and it seems unfair to me because none of her critics said that either she did not provide the empirical data to support her reseach or she provided some empirical data that is not enough (If I am wrong about this, I would like someone to correct me).

The critics did not accuse her of using improper statistical methods of analysis of empirical data.

Instead her critics criticised her interpretation of empirical data regarding the prominent individuals. Such criticism is seen as unfouned in all branches of science.

 

[Demented LRH]

B


However, your misquote was typographically correct.

Anyway, this methodology seems to be a bit subjective. And who knows what Hubbard was thinking since he was such a manipulative controller.

You have to take at least some of his writings at face value because you cannot prove that he was lying. Unless he admits that he was lying, there is no way of proving that everything that he said was a lie.
A good criterion for the selection of his writings would be to use the ones that were intended for the general public (Book 1, Science of Survival + a host of other pseudo-scientific books) and not the ones that were intended for the Scientologists (The History of Man, Have You Lived Before, etc).

 

[Student of Trinity]

Psychometrics is a subset of medicine;

No, it's not.

 

[Student of Trinity]

The method of going through Hubbard's writings and adding up correct and incorrect statements is useless for determining his IQ, I'm afraid.

Consider the case of somebody with quite a high IQ, who nonetheless doesn't know everything, but further nonetheless, likes to think they do. They write a lot of books full of nonsense statements about things they don't, despite their intelligence, understand.

There really are people like that. Too damn many, in fact. In a sense, indeed, they are dumb. But by this method, you'd estimate them to have a very low IQ. You'd be wrong.

On the other hand consider somebody who really isn't all that bright, but knows one or two simple things. They write an awful lot of obvious stuff about those things. Again, there really are too many people like that. Your method would count them as brilliant. They're not.