LH, this is very interesting. I think there is something more to be considered. Probability in a series of five 6 horse races is a given. There is going to be a winner in each. Thus there is a probability that Scn works a certain % of the time, witness the number of remaining winners in the CofS. You are talking about a far longer series of winning streaks for many of these individuals. Every process run could be considered a "race". This makes for quite a series!
The question is, why are there any winners? Is it because those "winners" are ultra suggestable beings, "the upper 10th of the upper tenth of suggestable beings on the planet"? Or is it in fact actually producing some real benefit? Is this the 22% that Hubbard so often talked about. Do anything for 22% of the population and you'll get some remediation of their situation. In the early days he spoke often of the percentages of cases on which a process "worked" - the workability quotient if you will.
It seems you would like to attribute hypnosis as the underlying factor to whatever success people have in Scn processing. An interesting theory. I don't see that it has been proven - at least not to me - yet.
Your survey of ex-scios I'm afraid was not likely to have been broad enough to be meaningful - so as others do regarding the "wins" people express in Scn - relegating them to being anecdotal, I think the losses you found must also be so relegated even if they are a much larger percentage. THis brings to mind the numbers the church quotes: 8 million vs what I estimate to be actual at somewhere between 100-200 thousand.
This does bring a couple questions to mind. I know you use The Sedona Method, I found it to be interesting as well. I have to say that what struck me immediately when I listened to Hale Dwoskin was how hypnotic his voice wasI'm not saying the method involves any hypnosis, but could'nt your same explanation be applied to it or any mental/spiritual practice in existence? That it is merely a matter of probability, some % will get something from doing anything and those will then carry on with it in the false belief it actually did something for them.
If this is the case then is man an immortal spirit or just a collection of chemical reactions? If the former then what are the capabilites of this spirit and is it possible to do anything for it? Per Hubbard these were the questions he was asking (amoung others like finding out how to make all men grovel at his feet and not know why). He seemed to find some, what seemed to me, plausible answers.
I think it is possible to test certain aspects of the tech. For example rudiments. Get 1000 people, upset each of them badly. Handle 500 of them with a rudiments session and leave the other half alone. Or if you wish add another 500 and have someone nice talk to them about the upset and compare the results from all 3 groups. It would have to be a fairly nasty upset I think but hey it's all in the name of science.
I was 1st introduced to this "100%" guru tech fraud in regards to stock-pickers, this has actually been done by some to get clients to invest large sums of money with said guru or to subscribe to his stock-picking service. Of course the scam becomes pretty clear at some point - the point were the scamee has endured enough losses/bad predictions to lose faith - (I'm sure the time required varied wildly individual to individual). While they may leave - they may never understand what has really been done to them. Your exact reason for this thread
Thank you for this most thought-provoking thread. I am learning a lot from many people here.
Good points. I won't bore you with taking them all up.
Not quite hypnosis, more suggestion and expectation. I think it is fairly well proved that suggest an expectation well enough and a percentage will experience what they have been told to expect or a close enough approximation so as to be identified as the expected outcome.
According to Brown suggestion is very subtle and one time he selected suggestible people by letting a public phone ring. The passers-by who picked up the phone were by selection the suggestible ones.
Have you seen the Derren Brown programme where he selected suggestible people (by the way Hubbard did this with Dianetics - he identified a target group, sci-fi fans, because obviously they are open to suggestion, otherwise they wouldn't read sci-fi would they? What's the OCA, except a selection of suggestible people?) Anyway Brown got these people and ran a "motivational" seminar with them. What he actually did was suggest that they go and steal some sweets from a shop. He watched which ones did and selected the best suggestees. The seminar then went on to implant the idea that they would rob a security van armed with a gun and he planted triggers in them. This was all done as a motivational seminar! No overt hypnotism.
Sure enough they filmed four people each holding up a security van using a gun!
There are lots of examples of how he selects people open to suggestion.
I'm proposing that that is what is happening with Hubbard's tech. I wrote about this as regards my experience with the expectation generated when the HRD first came out.
All you have to do is cream off the ones who experienced the expectation and in the end .... you get cheese!
I agree Hale Dwoskin does sound somewhat hypnotic. I've met him several times and have drawn my own conclusions as to what is happening. I've taken part in Sedona Method twinning training session and I must say it was terribly reminiscent of Scn courses.
There is one difference, in that the Sedona Method carries a "as best you can" to the commands. There is another guy who does a version of releasing who is much more insistant and forceful. I haven't looked at his version - I've already done the forceful personality route!
Nevertheless your doubt about Sedona Method or any self improvement thingy is valid and I'm sure there must be a creaming off the successes factor in all of them.
I watched and attended Sedona seminars and used my Scn experience as well as I could, to judge what was happening. I certainly observed a tendency in the releasee to sometimes say that what was happening was what they were led to believe would happen. It was sometimes like glib releasing. I was repelled by it!
I wanted to yell, "what's really happening to you?"Anyway I took what I thought were the best elements of Sedona, tweaked a bit and squirelled it with other metaphysical methodologies. What I do is not really pure Sedona Method and to be fair to Hale Dwoskin he doesn't seem to mind if people alter the method to their own preference and he encourages professional therapists to incorporate any of his ideas into their thereapies. One of the things I add is to tell the person there is no "right" answer or correct outcome. If I observe them appearing to give the answer they think is the one that I want to hear, I ask them to check and tell me what "their" answer is. That works quite well. But basically I get them to the point where they can do it themselves and no longer ask me for help, as quickly as possible! Plus, I don't charge them anything! :wink2:
Anyway that's a diversion.
I hope it hasn't taken you that long! 
