Scientology: hard and soft, tech and religion

[yon8008]

In this paragraph you make it perfectly clear who and what you are

Smilla, Thank you. Your response was fast and sharp, and I am looking at this again. Below, you can see my genuine introspection :

Am I a totally mind-fucked loser hypocrite?
Am I so wrong about everything that my communications themselves are a net value destruction?
Is there value in biting, one line, invalidation?
Am I really behind the ideas of ostracism or profitable rehabilitation? :shark:
----
My commitment is to use this forum as a tool for personal growth. This board is incredibly valuable to me, because as I put forward my ideas, I encounter alternative perspectives which I can use to refine my understanding. That is what I mean by honesty as a process, and that is a premise which I'll stand behind.

Is it valid to evaluate people, projects, and interactions in terms of value destruction and value creation? Who is building, who is tearing down? (I see here, that there is more opportunity for personal reflection/clarification.) It still seems important to me to identify the gun toting thugs, and steer clear, and point out the dark alleys wherein they lurk to those that I care about.

I do genuinely wish that there was a workable solution to criminality. I do believe that the long range solution is to evolve some system that criminals would voluntarily seek out to help them straighten their lives out "profitable rehabilitation". I also believe that if people were able to identify legalized crime (like the legal confiscation of value by the Federal Reserve through inflation) that the answer to such would be non-violent non-cooperation or ostracism. But I see now that I have insinuated that single line critics of my posts should be treated like criminals. Yuck.
---------
So Smilla, again, thank you for the .

Anyone else, If you'd like to continue to help me get un-mind-fucked, I work better when an alternative contrasting perspective is juxtaposed with my irrationality. Occasionally the one line will get through.

 

[Winston Smith]

oh my

 

[Zinjifar]

Is it valid to evaluate people, projects, and interactions in terms of value destruction and value creation?

Scientology is a net destruction of family, sanity, fortune and sacred honor. Is opposition to Scientology's influence in the world of value?

Absolutely yes.

Zinj

 

[Smilla]

Scientology is a net destruction of family, sanity, fortune and sacred honor. Is opposition to Scientology's influence in the world of value?

Absolutely yes.

Zinj

^^THIS^^

 

[Mystic]

^^THIS^^

^^^THAT^^^

 

[Student of Trinity]

I'm not particularly trying to defend soft Scientology. I just think it's sensible to prioritize: the first Principle of War is, Selection and Maintenance of the Aim. Soft Scientology may have its problems, but I don't think it's really any worse than a zillion other more or less moonbatty movements, and fighting human moonbattery is like fighting the sea.

Insisting that any and all forms of Scientology are bad and all bad means having to waste time on side issues, and this has an opportunity cost. I think it's better to draw a line and sign a truce with everything to one side of it, in order to focus attention on the real enemies on the other side. To me it seems that this soft/hard distinction is a good line to draw, but even if that's not the right line, drawing some kind of line just seems practical.

I want to distinguish soft Scientology from hard, not in order to discuss soft Scientology, but to make it easier to avoid discussing it. I'd like to be able to cut off derailments of discussions into defenses of soft Scientology, by quickly throwing a 'soft is okay' sop to soft Scientology, and getting it off the table. I'm personally not really quite as cynical as this may sound, and when I have time for it I may be willing to listen to a soft Scientologist with genuine respect. But as a practical matter, when I only have so much time to spare, what I want from the hard/soft distinction is a formulaic tool for quick re-focusing of discussions. It's, um, a piece of tech.

 

[yon8008]

..., drawing some kind of line just seems practical.

How about conformity with the law of the land.
And after that, those aspects which blatantly destroy lives.

 

[Zinjifar]

How about conformity with the law of the land.
And after that, those aspects which blatantly destroy lives.

Excellent start

Zinj

 

[Mark A. Baker]

What kind of enlightened person would pass up the chance to change history with such an immense discovery — and pass it up so casually as not even to mention the issue?

Well, traditionally "enlightened persons" have'nt shown much interest in history apart from a general desire to encourage their fellow humans from continuing their more destructive & generally less beneficial traditional forms of endeavor.

Those who do tend to be interested in such things, such as myself, tend also to be a bit overly pedantic in personal habits & interests. As such, they are "out of touch" with the mainstream.

The one unifying theme on this board & the ex-scientology community more generally is the need to end the abusive practices of the Co$. Broadly speaking this entails getting Co$ compliance with local laws. Although even here the "libertarians" among us occasionally raise objection to the presumption of the supremacy of law. Though, for the purposes of ending church abuses, even they mostly keep such mutterings to themselves.

However, once the field is opened beyond simply "ending the abuses", unifying themes are often hard to come by among critics & former members of the Co$.

The physical questions you pose are interesting in themselves, but for reasons previously stated they do not address the underlying metaphysical questions of interest to the many scientologists & ex-scientologists who are drawn to matters of spirituality. It really seeks to address what is at most a subset of metaphysics or scientology and that is the science of the physical manifestations of aspects of underlying metaphysical realities.

IMO, such questions are too subtle for broad popular discourse. Too high a standard of education as to methods & means is required before a general discussion can be expected to unfold reasonably. Some among us are apt to usurp such questions & discussions as somehow "disproving" the reality of spiritual experience. Others would seek to interpret such things precisely to the contrary, i.e. in support of such realities. Both attitudes are logically presumptuous.

It's not that your questions are not worth posing. It is simply that given the "hot button" nature of things associated with the subject of scientology & the Co$, human passions are involved which don't respond well to the clinical dissection & analysis of physical data which you are interested in raising for discussion.

Mostly what gets generated is a great deal of "heat" & very little "light".


With regard to the clinical study of the effects of auditing, an experiment I'd like to see run, given access to adequate resources, is the observation of any effects on the brain function of several different individuals undergoing basic "lower level" auditing procedures. Such basic procedures as arc-sw, objectives, & life repair might be suitable candidates.

For any results to be truly meaningful initially the auditing would have to be done by competent & experienced auditors using basic & standard processes with the pcs monitored at least until a full completion on that level has been attained. A "partial study" would be useless. Figuring on average 25 hours per pc (a common estimate), and approximately 10 pcs (for some attempt at a general "sample size"), that is an estimated 250 hours of auditing. Admittedly, that may be "excessive" but the true number is easily apt to lie between 150-250 hours, and could possibly exceed the 250 hour estimate depending on circumstances.

A more modest approach might be attempted with sporadic testing of individuals doing "Self-Analysis" or some other simple basics. But such would not be indicative of the possible physical concomitant effects of auditing generally.

Attempts to measure "exterior with full perception" in clinical conditions are unrealistic at this time. There is simply not enough data present to suggest that this is a reliably repeatable phenomenon resulting from auditing. At this time it would be analogous to Democritus attempting to "smash the uranium atom". It requires some preparatory work first.


Mark A. Baker

 

[yon8008]

Mark! !!

...
With regard to the clinical study of the effects of auditing, an experiment I'd like to see run, given access to adequate resources, is the observation of any effects on the brain function of several different individuals undergoing basic "lower level" auditing procedures. Such basic procedures as arc-sw, objectives, & life repair might be suitable candidates.

For any results to be truly meaningful initially the auditing would have to be done by competent & experienced auditors using basic & standard processes with the pcs monitored at least until a full completion on that level has been attained. A "partial study" would be useless. Figuring on average 25 hours per pc (a common estimate), and approximately 10 pcs (for some attempt at a general "sample size"), that is an estimated 250 hours of auditing. Admittedly, that may be "excessive" but the true number is easily apt to lie between 150-250 hours, and could possibly exceed the 250 hour estimate depending on circumstances.

A more modest approach might be attempted with sporadic testing of individuals doing "Self-Analysis" or some other simple basics. But such would not be indicative of the possible physical concomitant effects of auditing generally.
...
Mark A. Baker

I have a few connections to the U of MN
http://www.brain.umn.edu/facilities/BESA_BV.htm

I would love to see what auditing would look like with the BESA system!
It might make for a great Thesis for some curious Grad Student.

 

[Smilla]

Mark! !!



I have a few connections to the U of MN
http://www.brain.umn.edu/facilities/BESA_BV.htm

I would love to see what auditing would look like with the BESA system!
It might make for a great Thesis for some curious Grad Student.

You like excuses then?

 

[Smilla]

Well, traditionally "enlightened persons" have'nt shown much interest in history apart from a general desire to encourage their fellow humans from continuing their more destructive & generally less beneficial traditional forms of endeavor.

Those who do tend to be interested in such things, such as myself, tend also to be a bit overly pedantic in personal habits & interests. As such, they are "out of touch" with the mainstream.

The one unifying theme on this board & the ex-scientology community more generally is the need to end the abusive practices of the Co$. Broadly speaking this entails getting Co$ compliance with local laws. Although even here the "libertarians" among us occasionally raise objection to the presumption of the supremacy of law. Though, for the purposes of ending church abuses, even they mostly keep such mutterings to themselves.

However, once the field is opened beyond simply "ending the abuses", unifying themes are often hard to come by among critics & former members of the Co$.

The physical questions you pose are interesting in themselves, but for reasons previously stated they do not address the underlying metaphysical questions of interest to the many scientologists & ex-scientologists who are drawn to matters of spirituality. It really seeks to address what is at most a subset of metaphysics or scientology and that is the science of the physical manifestations of aspects of underlying metaphysical realities.

IMO, such questions are too subtle for broad popular discourse. Too high a standard of education as to methods & means is required before a general discussion can be expected to unfold reasonably. Some among us are apt to usurp such questions & discussions as somehow "disproving" the reality of spiritual experience. Others would seek to interpret such things precisely to the contrary, i.e. in support of such realities. Both attitudes are logically presumptuous.

It's not that your questions are not worth posing. It is simply that given the "hot button" nature of things associated with the subject of scientology & the Co$, human passions are involved which don't respond well to the clinical dissection & analysis of physical data which you are interested in raising for discussion.

Mostly what gets generated is a great deal of "heat" & very little "light".


With regard to the clinical study of the effects of auditing, an experiment I'd like to see run, given access to adequate resources, is the observation of any effects on the brain function of several different individuals undergoing basic "lower level" auditing procedures. Such basic procedures as arc-sw, objectives, & life repair might be suitable candidates.

For any results to be truly meaningful initially the auditing would have to be done by competent & experienced auditors using basic & standard processes with the pcs monitored at least until a full completion on that level has been attained. A "partial study" would be useless. Figuring on average 25 hours per pc (a common estimate), and approximately 10 pcs (for some attempt at a general "sample size"), that is an estimated 250 hours of auditing. Admittedly, that may be "excessive" but the true number is easily apt to lie between 150-250 hours, and could possibly exceed the 250 hour estimate depending on circumstances.

A more modest approach might be attempted with sporadic testing of individuals doing "Self-Analysis" or some other simple basics. But such would not be indicative of the possible physical concomitant effects of auditing generally.

Attempts to measure "exterior with full perception" in clinical conditions are unrealistic at this time. There is simply not enough data present to suggest that this is a reliably repeatable phenomenon resulting from auditing. At this time it would be analogous to Democritus attempting to "smash the uranium atom". It requires some preparatory work first.


Mark A. Baker

Do you mean that it is not a realistic proposition because not one of you can do it? Not one - not ever. Show me one. Just one.

You know you can't, so it's tits or GTFO

 

[Thrak]

I'm not particularly trying to defend soft Scientology. I just think it's sensible to prioritize: the first Principle of War is, Selection and Maintenance of the Aim. Soft Scientology may have its problems, but I don't think it's really any worse than a zillion other more or less moonbatty movements, and fighting human moonbattery is like fighting the sea.

Insisting that any and all forms of Scientology are bad and all bad means having to waste time on side issues, and this has an opportunity cost. I think it's better to draw a line and sign a truce with everything to one side of it, in order to focus attention on the real enemies on the other side. To me it seems that this soft/hard distinction is a good line to draw, but even if that's not the right line, drawing some kind of line just seems practical.

I want to distinguish soft Scientology from hard, not in order to discuss soft Scientology, but to make it easier to avoid discussing it. I'd like to be able to cut off derailments of discussions into defenses of soft Scientology, by quickly throwing a 'soft is okay' sop to soft Scientology, and getting it off the table. I'm personally not really quite as cynical as this may sound, and when I have time for it I may be willing to listen to a soft Scientologist with genuine respect. But as a practical matter, when I only have so much time to spare, what I want from the hard/soft distinction is a formulaic tool for quick re-focusing of discussions. It's, um, a piece of tech.

I think "hard" and "soft" works as a distinction of how people apply it or how it is presented but not that much else. Celebrities for instance are shown the soft side and basically have little idea all this hard nasty stuff is going on, or think that it's not as extreme as it is. Or some are probably used to having slaves and so are unconcerned.

You could say Free Zoners apply "soft" scio but what they are really doing is applying what appeals to them and discarding what they don't like. That is an alteration but scn should be altered if it is practiced at all as hubbard was insane and created a nightmare.

The thing that makes it all difficult to see all this when you are in is that different periods seemed to have different vibes. For instance almost every lecture that a person listens to is from the 50's - the mid 60's. Things weren't so serious at that point so you form your ideas as to what hubbard was like largely from listening to these lectures. The latest lecture that I think I listened to was from 67 which was when he had come up with ot3 and the sea org and he sounded markedly different. This was the era where hubbard probably lost all ability to put on a show like the early days and where things became really nasty.

I'm not trying to say it was all that great in the early days, I don't think that at all but I'm just saying how the bait and switch works. They lure you in and show a scientology that doesn't seem that bad and is actually kind of fun but the longer you stay the farther you head up the river to meet Col. Kurtz. And you can't even get the full picture until you get out and see all the things they don't want you to know.

So the whole thing is a big "gradient scale" as hubbard was so fond and any person can be at any point of that and think that that is what scientology really is. But in the end whatever good stuff there is is really just bait to a trap as the scientology bridge is really a bridge to slavery and insanity.

 

[Smilla]

I think "hard" and "soft" works as a distinction of how people apply it or how it is presented but not that much else. Celebrities for instance are shown the soft side and basically have little idea all this hard nasty stuff is going on, or think that it's not as extreme as it is. Or some are probably used to having slaves and so are unconcerned.

You could say Free Zoners apply "soft" scio but what they are really doing is applying what appeals to them and discarding what they don't like. That is an alteration but scn should be altered if it is practiced at all as hubbard was insane and created a nightmare.

The thing that makes it all difficult to see all this when you are in is that different periods seemed to have different vibes. For instance almost every lecture that a person listens to is from the 50's - the mid 60's. Things weren't so serious at that point so you form your ideas as to what hubbard was like largely from listening to these lectures. The latest lecture that I think I listened to was from 67 which was when he had come up with ot3 and the sea org and he sounded markedly different. This was the era where hubbard probably lost all ability to put on a show like the early days and where things became really nasty.

I'm not trying to say it was all that great in the early days, I don't think that at all but I'm just saying how the bait and switch works. They lure you in and show a scientology that doesn't seem that bad and is actually kind of fun but the longer you stay the farther you head up the river to meet Col. Kurtz. And you can't even get the full picture until you get out and see all the things they don't want you to know.

So the whole thing is a big "gradient scale" as hubbard was so fond and any person can be at any point of that and think that that is what scientology really is. But in the end whatever good stuff there is is really just bait to a trap as the scientology bridge is really a bridge to slavery and insanity.

You said it all.

 

[Veda]

For purposes of focus, it might be useful to revisit Student of Trinity's opening post for this thread.

I was impressed by its clarity, insight, and honesty.

Many ESMB members were kind enough to make a lot of very reasonable comments in this introduction thread. The discussion there led me to make a distinction which I hope is not offensive, between 'hard Scientology' and 'soft Scientology'. By 'hard Scientology' I mean any version that considers L. Ron Hubbard to be infallible, or practically so, and thus makes strong claims for paranormal powers and/or the literal truth of Hubbard's space opera scenarios. 'Soft Scientology' for me basically seems to cover a lot of the Freezone, and though it's not my cup of tea, I have no real beef with it. I do have a beef with hard Scientology, and a question I'd like to pursue in this forum concerns how much mileage it gets from sometimes pretending to be soft.

Without meaning to disparage the much looser and more eclectic religious views of Freezoners, my opinion at this point is that the doctrinaire Hubbardism of hard Scientology is actually quite unattractive and unimpressive as a religion, and that hard Scientology only gets traction as a religion because of its 'hard' claims for paranormal powers. I'm thinking that nobody actually joins Scientology for Hubbard's rambling and incoherent metaphysics, let alone for Xenu and body thetans; rather, I think people are willing to swallow those things, for the hope of gaining genius IQ, eidetic memory, permanently perfect health, telepathy and telekinesis, stable exteriorization with full perception, and so on.

But then if anyone takes the hard stuff really seriously, and asks for it to demonstrably happen as promised, hard Scientology puts on its soft face, and says, 'We're a religion, dealing only in spiritual propositions.'

Proponents of 'soft Scientology' don't make the hard claims, and can honestly say that (their) Scientology really is purely spiritual or therapeutic. I wonder, though, whether they are not still managing to have their cake and eat it, too, even if only unconsciously. Because of the strong claims made by hard Scientology, the name 'Scientology' carries some connotation of superhuman abilities, and perhaps soft Scientology gains some appeal from this, even when it doesn't actually make those claims. Kind of like taking the cocaine out of your product but keeping the name 'Coca-Cola'.

Be that as it may, the hard/soft shell game played by hard Scientology seems to me to be full blown doublethink, as well as clear cut bait-and-switch. While soft Scientologists may be perfectly right in claiming that their form of Scientology does not do this, that doesn't change the fact that a lot of Scientology is hard Scientology, and it does do this. It does it a lot, and I think it's very important in keeping hard Scientology alive.

My views, and accompanying links, have been touched upon in various places. One recommended analysis is the 'Layers of the Scientological Onion' (soft on the outside, hard on the inside) http://exscn.net/content/view/178/105 and its accompanying links.

I've also attempted an explanation as to why studying Scientology can be problematic - aside from the secretive nature of its materials (and I don't just mean the OT levels), and the ever present few PR types seeking to dishonestly 'handle."

The human nervous system itself may contribute to the problem. http://www.forum.exscn.net/showpost.php?p=65167&postcount=11

 

[me myself & i]

The promise of "stably exterior with full perception" made Hubbard millions, justified deception, justified fair game and justified slave labor.

Now, what's left? A bunch of PR types trying to convince people that it really meant something else.

The great disease of Scientology is that it cannot be honest 'about' itself.

And 'with' itself. Indeed.

Thus we have humans to demonstrate the distinction between being blind and seeing. At every level of being (i.e. physical mental emotional and spiritual). Individual and collective.

It seems to me until we eradicate the inability to see our own individual blindness, collective expressions of scientology like madness will necessarily continue to appear in the world. Ad infinitum. So to speak.

And to those whom would/will scoff at such philosophical ponderings as having no practical relevance whatsoever regarding the dismantling of the scientological madness in the world today, I will simply say: [insert the silence & stillness and emptiness of your individual/collective being _____ here]. And come from there.

Silence & Stillness & Emptiness of Being being the Antithesis of All-Scientology (soft and hard).

(Along with Not-Being-God).

mm&i

P.S. as a footnote: the 'spiritual/psychological aspiration' of man (of a certain type or sort) to experience being 'one with god' is quite nicely handled by scientology. Simply erase the distinction. Go OT.

 

[Student of Trinity]

Figuring on average 25 hours per pc (a common estimate), and approximately 10 pcs (for some attempt at a general "sample size"), that is an estimated 250 hours of auditing. Admittedly, that may be "excessive" but the true number is easily apt to lie between 150-250 hours, and could possibly exceed the 250 hour estimate depending on circumstances.

Hmm; that sounds to me like a feasible psychology study, actually. It could be a Master's thesis or part of a PhD. It would probably need to run in a fair-sized center for Scientology, in order to find competent auditors who could reliably make the time for the study, and it would probably need some grant money to compensate people for their time. But grant money on the necessary scale is not that hard to come by.

What isn't so clear is what kind of tests to make. IQ tests would be an obvious thing to try, but I'm pretty sure there is a huge training effect on IQ tests in general — people get better just because they get more familiar with the kind of test. So you'd need a control group of people who were doing something other than Scientology auditing, and you'd need at least two different tests (for before and after), and you'd need to randomly give half the people test A before and test B after, and the other half test B before test A, just in case B is easier than A. And now to get a reasonable sample size for each subgroup you're looking at 20 to 40 subjects instead of 10.

You could randomly assign people to either auditing or control activity groups, but it would be a bit hard to make it double blind. Probably not essential for a first run, though. It likely would be important to ensure that the control activity had comparable placebo potential to auditing — it should be something that takes as much time, promises comparable gains, and involves a comparably impressive prop to the e-meter or whatever. Though maybe just a course in meditation or something would do.

I guess it might also be good to have another control group that did nothing at all between tests, or that did some boring or ordinary, just to gauge the effect of placebo or attention in general. This makes the study grow bigger still.

Still, something at this sort of level strikes me as realistic enough that it might well be worthwhile for anyone who can corral enough willing auditors to contact psychology professors with the proposal. It's probably not going to lie in the mainstream of anyone's research interests, but on the other hand it would have some public interest appeal, and professors are as motivated by publicity as anyone else. Somebody might well be willing to take it up.

 

[Mark A. Baker]

What isn't so clear is what kind of tests to make.

Well, since you are a physicist, I was thinking of actual physical data resulting from biomonitoring of brain activity during the process of auditing up to the point a "release" state has been achieved.

How distractive an environment the equipment would pose could be an adverse factor, and time with that sort of equipment could be a bit pricey, but the results would certainly be interesting and informative.


Mark A. Baker

 

[AnonKat]

Well, since you are a physicist, I was thinking of actual physical data resulting from biomonitoring of brain activity during the process of auditing up to the point a "release" state has been achieved.

How distractive an environment the equipment would pose could be an adverse factor, and time with that sort of equipment could be a bit pricey, but the results would certainly be interesting and informative.


Mark A. Baker

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

Brain mapping is a set of neuroscience techniques predicated on the mapping of (biological) quantities or properties onto spatial representations of the (human or non-human) brain resulting in maps.

You do know that you are entering soft-tech now *wink*

 

[Smilla]

Well, since you are a physicist, I was thinking of actual physical data resulting from biomonitoring of brain activity during the process of auditing up to the point a "release" state has been achieved.

How distractive an environment the equipment would pose could be an adverse factor, and time with that sort of equipment could be a bit pricey, but the results would certainly be interesting and informative.


Mark A. Baker

It might be 'interesting' but it wouldn't tell you anything of value, no more than wiring you up before and after you have a bath or a game of table tennis. Things are different before and after, therefore........ What?