Richard, I’m an admirer of Wilbur, who I’ve actually crossed paths with because we share another mutual interest. Perhaps I’m rather like you in that I like where he is going with his ideas, even though I don’t totally buy into his approach.

Just because I think Scientology is a dead end that has little if anything worthwhile to offer in terms of mental health or spiritual growth, doesn’t mean that I think that people are just meat and mechanics – that’s a false dichotomy that Scientology tries to exploit as a cheap rhetorical tool. If anything, I’m disappointed that Scientology, and worse yet the indies – who’ve had freedom, and should know better – not only failed to live up to their stated promise, but truly squandered any opportunities they might have had.

I don’t think that one has to be unscientific or give in to biases, to live life open to just the sort of of spiritual possibilities or even transcendence that the quote from Wilbur hints at. My experience is that if anything, questioning and being critical (in an analytical sense) allows one to separate out mundane things in life that might easily be false attributed, from the few that remain truly inexplicable and thus might point to some greater unknown.

My 2 Cents: You asked a very good question regarding Gerbode’s research. The words you used were “almost no”. That leaves open a wide door given the amount of research having been done. I got my grades back in the 60s. Much of it worked just fine. And I have no interest in convincing anyone else that those worked for me. Many others also got a lot from the lower grades. I saw many of the changes and certainly experienced them in my own life.

When Power Processing came in, I noted some spectacular changes in both Clears and OTs. (Power Processing seemed one of those add ons which – at least at first – could be done by anyone. One of the particular questions in PP, once answered, completely altered my life. I had a dial wide F/N for almost four months afterwards and could do no further auditing during that time. So “almost no” might have been correct, but actual results – for me and many others I knew – was a whole different story.

Science *still* knows very little about either the brain (physical) or the mind (ephermeral). Much has changed over the past 20 years. The quantum field, alone, has begun a whole new scientific ball game. We still KNOW very little about much of anything.

This does NOT in any way “forgive” the crimes of scn nor does it claim that everything Hubbard spouted was true. However, I’ve repeatedly stated here that no truly good con cam be effected unless there is *some* truth in it. I saw some of that truth and had it affect my life. My opinion.

Put up the evidence or admit your stupidity

As has been told to all Hubtard followers for decades. And of course none of those insane people could put up evidence

M2C, let’s turn a question around and ask: why aren’t the independents and freezoners booming and attracting people new to Scientology, if they actually have something to offer that works and is of value? Instead, they seem to rely almost entirely on people who’ve come out of the CofS but remain (at least initially) committed to continuing to try to get something out of Scientology, and even given that, they seem to be slowly fading and failing.

It’s a well known foible of human behavior, that people will keep doing something that has failed, expecting a different result – the popular definition of insanity. That some people persist at Scientology after leaving the CofS, patronizing outside auditors and orgs, tells us nothing useful – it’s readily explained as an error of judgement, by the cognitive bias known as sunk cost or escalation of commitment*. The fact that there is no supporting research, and not even any widely recognized or undeniable successful results, probably tells us more about the phenomenon really at work.

As for Gerbode, his TIR and Metapsychology (a term originating with Freud), from what I know of such work it has developed and evolved to be far removed from Dianetics and Scientology; it might be said to have roots more in the sort of sources that Hubbard himself borrowed from or plagiarized. I don’t think it’s at all accurate to characterize Metapsychology as delivering “lower grades” (of Scientology) unless you have specific and recent knowledge of just exactly what is being delivered.

I used to know quite a few of the old-timer indies, and had some appreciation for the movement in general. But their hapless inability to organize successfully (older efforts like IV have fallen apart) or do something professional such as actual research, and the ongoing failure to produce any objectively verifiable results, can no longer be ignored. The old-timers who are still around and who I do still keep tabs on, seem to me to be tending towards just the basics of “book one” auditing without a meter – like Gerbode, discarding Scientology, and really even Dianetics, for something more just like any form of Rogerian person-centered counseling, with perhaps a bit of Freudian-influenced traumatic event catharsis.

The only “confirmation bias” I have going on here, is that I want so see actual confirmation of results. Supposed anecdotal evidence (very limited, at that), doesn’t cut it in the 21st century, especially as modern research into how the mind actually works, reveals how prone we are to errors of subject judgment.

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escalation_of_commitment

If Gerbode’s research shows that almost no LRH tech works, then why does Gerbode’s organization sell and deliver lower grades and train therapists to do the same?

And why are there other auditors with sucessful field practices outside the Church?

Why have the Rons Orgs survived for 35 years without Church-type hype?

What confirmation bias do YOU have going on?

M2C, if the “tech” did work to any significant extent, then after more than 65 years, there’d been some proof of that – including outside of the “church,” where there have also been independents for more than 65 years, too. Small-scale low-budget research studies get done and published all the time, particularly in areas like psychology, so the fact that nothing has ever been produced out of Dianetics and Scientology – combined with corroborated accounts that the CofS arranged for research, specifically into the purif, and then suppressed it when results didn’t pan out – essentially establishes the ineffectiveness of the tech (plus there were the 2 early studies that disproved Hubbard’s theories, too).

Sarge Gerbode’s independent research, resulting in TIR (which has been published) actually shows that none of the “tech” works except for some basics of un-metered trauma counseling, and even then it’s not particularly more effective than other other modalities. I’ll grant that you’ve probably witnessed some of that effect – but anything else is placebo affect, and confirmation bias; that’s pretty well established and proven at this point.

Every peak, transcendental, extrasensory, paranormal and so on experience can be attributed to chemicals in the brain – if that’s what someone wants to do. I don’t follow or practice Ken Wilber’s Integral Theory but I like this quote from wiki:

Wilber: “Are the mystics and sages insane? Because they all tell variations on the same story, don’t they? The story of awakening one morning and discovering you are one with the All, in a timeless and eternal and infinite fashion. Yes, maybe they are crazy, these divine fools. Maybe they are mumbling idiots in the face of the Abyss. Maybe they need a nice, understanding therapist. Yes, I’m sure that would help. But then, I wonder. Maybe the evolutionary sequence really is from matter to body to mind to soul to spirit, each transcending and including, each with a greater depth and greater consciousness and wider embrace. And in the highest reaches of evolution, maybe, just maybe, an individual’s consciousness does indeed touch infinity—a total embrace of the entire Kosmos—a Kosmic consciousness that is Spirit awakened to its own true nature. It’s at least plausible. And tell me: is that story, sung by mystics and sages the world over, any crazier than the scientific materialism story, which is that the entire sequence is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying absolutely nothing? Listen very carefully: just which of those two stories actually sounds totally insane?”[18]

Confirmation bias enters the equation. I need to go cut the grass.

Placebo effect and confimation bias were sometimes a factor. But much of Scientology tech does work, even if not as well as LRH claimed. The problem is mainly that he left the tech incomplete and flawed while claiming the opposite. Outside of the Church that can be fixed.

Maybe in the next installment of the story Roxy will report Rick’s bad behavior and they’ll toss him into the Hubbard Alpha Wave Adjustment Booth. Once his theta/mass ratio is adjusted his behavior should improve.

You just hit the nail on the head, Peacemaker. Very astute comments.