"The tech" works only because hypnosis works. It's far cheaper to visit a hypnotist, pay a couple hundred, solve your problem if you are succecptible to hypnosis (see quote below), and be on your way. Imagine if your hypnotist cured your pain and then sucked you in for a lifetime of work and/or money extraction, with Ponzi schemes to extract the last nickel. Scientologists cling to the "miracle" of their improved eyesight or pain relief - and somehow feel they owe a lifetime of devotion to Hubbard's re-packaging of standard hypnotic techniques and old-fashioned hard-selling.

This also explains why Scientology expects many new people to "flunk out" or quit Scientology right away. They're just not susceptible to hypnosis!

I wish somebody would take some Scientologists and ex-Scientologists who "really had some gains from auditing" and test them on the Stanford scales described in the article.

QUOTE: To study any phenomenon properly, researchers must first have a way to measure it. In the case of hypnosis, that yardstick is the Stanford Hypnotic Susceptibility Scales. The Stanford scales, as they are often called, were devised in the late 1950s by Stanford University psychologists André M. Weitzenhoffer and Ernest R. Hilgard and are still used today to determine the extent to which a subject responds to hypnosis. One version of the Stanford scales, for instance, consists of a series of 12 activities--such as holding one's arm outstretched or sniffing the contents of a bottle--that test the depth of the hypnotic state. In the first instance, individuals are told that they are holding a very heavy ball, and they are scored as "passing" that suggestion if their arm sags under the imagined weight. In the second case, subjects are told that they have no sense of smell, and then a vial of ammonia is waved under their nose. If they have no reaction, they are deemed very responsive to hypnosis; if they grimace and recoil, they are not.

Scoring on the Stanford scales ranges from 0, for individuals who do not respond to any of the hypnotic suggestions, to 12, for those who pass all of them. Most people score in the middle range (between 5 and 7); 95 percent of the population receives a score of at least 1.

What Hypnosis Is
Based on studies using the Stanford scales, researchers with very different theoretical perspectives now agree on several fundamental principles of hypnosis. The first is that a person's ability to respond to hypnosis is remarkably stable during adulthood. In perhaps the most compelling illustration of this tenet, a study showed that when retested, Hilgard's original subjects had roughly the same scores on the Stanford scales as they did 10, 15 or 25 years earlier. END QUOTE from
http://www.sciam.com/2001/0701issue/0701nash.html

Thanks, Don Carlo. Another interesting quote from the article, when viewed in context of Scn auditing:

"Perhaps nowhere has hypnosis engendered more controversy than over the issue of "recovered" memory. Cognitive science has established that people are fairly adept at discerning whether an event actually occurred or whether they only imagined it. But under some circumstances, we falter. We can come to believe (or can be led to believe) that something happened to us when, in fact, it did not. One of the key cues humans appear to use in making the distinction between reality and imagination is the experience of effort. Apparently, at the time of encoding a memory, a "tag" cues us as to the amount of effort we expended: if the event is tagged as having involved a good deal of mental effort on our part, we tend to interpret it as something we imagined. If it is tagged as having involved relatively little mental effort, we tend to interpret it as something that actually happened to us. Given that the calling card of hypnosis is precisely the feeling of effortlessness, we can see why hypnotized people can so easily mistake an imagined past event for something that happened long ago. Hence, something that is merely imagined can become ingrained as an episode in our life story."

The article sidebars are also recommended.

Catarina and Don Carlo: Thank you SO MUCH for this interesting information about hypnosis. I should think that, when someone first gets out, one of the heaviest burdens would be the realization that they fell for something idiotic, not realizing that they were under hypnosis. (The shopping malls are full of people about whom that could be said!)

Valuable information for anyone! Thanks for bringing it to our attention. It also explains why $cientology "works" for some people. With the constant reinforcement of the hypnotic suggestions, required of a "good $cientologist", it is easy to see, how the cult maintains it's grip on it's victims.

It is my hope that as more research is done on hypnosis and altered states of mind, people in general will come to understand how it is possible for them to be manipulated. Once you know how the trick is done, it's not magic any more.

E-Meter DOES tie to Hypnosis. The same article says that putting a hypnotized person on a lie detector can reveal if they are "Faking" the state of hypnosis. This may be proof that the e-meter's "floating needle" reveals that the person being audited is genuinely experiencing his babyhood or past life "memories" as vividly as a real experience.

QUOTE: But couldn't people merely be faking that they had been hypnotized? Two key studies have put such suspicions to rest.

In a cunning 1971 experiment dubbed The Disappearing Hypnotist, Frederick Evans and Martin T. Orne of the University of Pennsylvania compared the reactions of two groups of subjects: one made up of people they knew to be truly hypnotizable and another of individuals they told to pretend to be hypnotized. An experimenter who did not know which group was which conducted a routine hypnotic procedure that was suddenly interrupted by a bogus power failure. When the experimenter left the room to investigate the situation, the pretending subjects immediately stopped faking: they opened their eyes, looked around the room and in all respects dropped the pretense. The real hypnotic subjects, however, slowly and with some difficulty terminated hypnosis by themselves.

Fakers also tend to overplay their role. When subjects are given suggestions to forget certain aspects of the hypnosis session, their claims not to remember are sometimes suspiciously pervasive and absolute, for instance, or they report odd experiences that are rarely, if ever, recounted by real subjects. Taru Kinnunen, Harold S. Zamansky and their co-workers at Northeastern University have exposed fakers using traditional lie-detector tests. They have found that when real hypnotic subjects answer questions under hypnosis, their physiological reactions generally meet the criteria for truthfulness, whereas those of simulators do not. END QUOTE.

Hypnotic virtuosos = OT 7's??
The Scientific American article has a great link that further explores hypnosis.
QUOTE: Hypnosis has little to do with the hypnotist's technique, and very much to do with the individual's capacity, or talent, for experiencing hypnosis. Most people are at least moderately hypnotizable. However, while relatively few people absolutely cannot be hypnotized, by the same token, relatively few people fall within the highest level of responsiveness (so-called hypnotic virtuosos). END QUOTE

My comment # 1: People with succesful auditing experiences, what do you think? Could the early praise you got for progressing so well be a sign that you were a "hypnotic virtuoso?" Could that shared fellowship of being in the "elite of suggestibility" make Scientology's cultic "love-bombing" even more powerful?

ANOTHER QUOTE: In 1974, Auke Tellegen and Gilbert Atkinson developed a scale of absorption to measure the tendency to have subjective experiences characterized by the full engagement of attention (narrowed or expanded),and blurred boundaries between self and object. Absorption is the most reliable personality correlate of hypnotizability. By contrast, vividness of mental imagery is essentially unrelated to hypnosis. So far as the measurement of hypnotizability itself is concerned, there is no substitute for performance-based measures such as the Stanford and Harvard scales. END QUOTE from
http://www.institute-shot.com/hypnosis_and_health.htm

My comment # 2:
To "have subjective experiences characterized by the full engagement of attention (narrowed or expanded)"..."is the most reliable correlate of hypnotizability." I think this means that people who easily get godlike feelings of either laser-beam focus or vast expansiveness, are more succeptible to hypnosis (and to Scientology). Comments welcome from experienced auditees!

My comment #3: "blurred boundaries between self and object" - This means that people who naturally have blurred boundaries are more succeptible to hypnosis and Scientology. So they probably can more easily accept orders, discomfort, crowding, and stress. The perfect personality for a slave.
I wonder if Scientology 's emphasis on "exteriorization" (roughly, hallucinations about floating away from the body) would further blur the distinction between self and the rest of the world. Add to that the conceit that you can overcome the laws of physics with your little thoughts, and it's no wonder people have psychotic breaks during intense Scientology training.

Fascinating! This is one more nail in the coffin, as to the "e-meter locating mental masses".... sounds to me like it is locating hypnotized victims. No wonder they rush you to the "registrar" when you have a "win" in "auditing". That must be when you are euphoric about being hypnotized! Just like taking candy from a baby...

And maybe it "blurs the boundary" between your finances and CO$ finances, so it's like giving money to yourself when you sign up for a new course!

You're spot on Don Carlo! $cientology is presented and viewed by it's brainwashed victims, as a special club of which they are a member. The further you progress down the bridge of total entrapment, the bigger your piece of the action. You begin to feel you "own" various orgs and the ship, etc. Illusions lead to disillusionment.

Don Carlo,

While I feel it's quite impossible to make objective observations about oneself re something like this, I find the questions you raise intriguing. I don't know, but it would not surprise me at all if it is the case that I'm a good hypnotic subject (a true 1.1 ). I can easily "disconnect" from surroundings into a floating state of timelessness while for example listening to music or painting - or just looking out the window while travelling, or staring at sea waves for a minute. It's certainly not like sleeping, but also not quite like normal awareness. There is also often a change in the subjective quality of perception, where colours feel stronger and I can get a tactile sensation from just looking at a thing from a distance.

Why I think it's interesting here is that I did very quickly get strong experiences from doing Scn TRs. "Remembered" - very realistically - a past life in my first auditing session. The auditor, a student, was clearly happy afterwards about getting such a dramatic session. And it gave me some cool "big wins" to share with the crowd - yes, I do think that contributed to the warm fuzzy feeling.

However, I was not a good preclear for long. That is, I didn't proceed orderly through the levels. Could be that the real emotional issues that I did carry with me got stirred up in a not very constructive way in the intensity of the auditing situation. In that state, which I do think is a hypnotized state, you kind of lack some normal filters and things get to you, for good as well as bad. A very good reason to not allow ignorant quacks, no matter how well-meaning, fool around with your mind.

Perhaps the real successful preclears are better adaptors (sticking closely to what they are supposed to do/feel/think in auditing) and/or more emotionally stable to begin with. Just speculating.

5th Element,

Oh yes, a big part of the game is to make you feel like an integral part of Scientology, and vice versa. Thus, the sheer horror some scientologists feel at the mere thought of being kicked out.

Don Carlo

From personal experience w auditing and the hypnotic state, I would agree with your post, it is an integral part of the scheme to rope such people in to $cientology. They are the core constituency.

I know some things about myself. I am highly suggestible. I can conjure up from my own observations more sympathy to the hardship or success of others than they themselves are feeling. I can be demoralized by rejection from a group that may not even be aware of my existence. I am unable to spend a lot of time with sales people. I have no sense of urgency for the passage of time.

Auditing and the community feeling produced by $cientology worked well on me. The death of the master hypnotist Ron Hubbard saved me from Final Assimilation into the Ultimate Cluster of Body Thetans. The practiced concentration of his Minions faltered in their moment of distraction, they looked away, and I woke up, dazed, but horrified. I escaped!

In going back over the events in my life preceding that moment I am reminded of the survivor who revisits the crash site, to trace the skid marks, the broken guard rail, the spot where they broke free and jumped aside before the fatal track down the cliff, the rusty imprint on the rocks where they might have died.

Hans Hansen

There is some hypnosis tech that does not involve the consent of the victims. One is where you reach out to take a persons hand and then break out just before he/she takes yours.

This apparently sets a stage where you can "change subject" without the victims notice it - or something like that...

non-member

Don: My comment #3: "blurred boundaries between self and object" - This means that people who naturally have blurred boundaries are more succeptible to hypnosis and Scientology. So they probably can more easily accept orders, discomfort, crowding, and stress. The perfect personality for a slave.

This "blurred boundaries between self and object" sounds an avfull lot like non-id to me. Am I the only one that see ã connection?

Is is as such possible to confuse people so much that hynosis can be done through a book?

non-member

Thanks and welcome, non-member. Very intereting.

Is this "change subject" trick part of Scientology?

What is non-id?