This is a well laid out, calm and informative comment that responded to a response from Aviv Bershadsky about my posting What Do Scientologists Believe about COVID-19? I also note she has some interesting thoughts about “othering” at the end which are not directed to Aviv but I kept them because I think her views on things are worth looking at.
I felt it was valuable and too important to be lost as a comment to an older post.
I asked the author for permission to print it and for a little information about her.
Her name is Valerie Feria-Isacks and this is the short bio she sent me:
Valerie is a musician, educator, computer coder, emerging medical anthropologist studying the effects of art based therapy on traumatized youth, Ex Sea Org member, and a former officer of the National Association of Student Anthropologists a section of the American Anthropological Association.
Question from Aviv: “I have a question. Except of studying the spirit in the ways you mentioned, what do scientists do currently to help a spirit?”
For this there’s a bit of some “step 0’s” as it were:
The first would be how Non-scientologists, especially scientists define belief vs. fact; and how it differs from Scientology/ist use of those terms.
I’m also using the term “Scientologists” here to include independents, other “squirrel”-types, and those in “corporate scientology.” With the caveat that like Mike Rinder I think that “Squirrels” and/or “Indies” for lack of a better term aren’t any more variant/odd philosophically to mainstream society than say anyone practicing a rarer spirituality, ex. Odinism.
Please don’t take this as an insult, it’s not intended as such and unfortunately until there’s a term for both people who Miscavige would call “squirrels” but follow Hubbard’s teachings + those in his “corporate scientology” group as a bigger group (sort of like Catholics +Protestants+Orthodox are all together called Christians) then we kind of have no choice but to use the term “Scientologists” for all of you. Even if we really only take major issue with Miscavige’s people and the related abuses.
The thing with “religious schisms” (the term which Historians call what you’re going through) are tough and a lot of things have no names until later as people create them. I might suggest “Hubbardist’s” since you all follow his teachings in your own ways, but it’s also not my place as someone who no longer follows them in any way shape or form to decide the term. Good luck with that …
Back to the OG topic’s step O’s.
So from a scientific point of view, though again most non-scientologist’s agree:
A “Belief” is something that is true for an individual or group, but either cannot be proved historically/scientifically or through similar academic means; and is often derived from a spiritual construct and/or non-independently verified anecdotal experiences.
To paraphrase a Hubbard quote “if it’s true for you it’s true” and to science and in general that type of truth is a considered a “belief.”
For example, with auditing we cannot also say strap a person experiencing it to an EEG/MRI/etc. to see what’s going on with their brainwaves. I mean we could do some of this technologically, but doubt a single auditor would allow what say Buddhist monks/advanced practitioners allowed here https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-12661646. Though someone could do before/after/baseline. There have been a few studies on auditing as a practice and there’s no conclusive evidence of engrams as Hubbard defines them. This is not the same as conclusive evidence they don’t exist either.
Ergo = belief.
However it’s also interesting to note that Richard Semon’s (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Semon) definition of the word and similar concept pre-dates Hubbard’s by many years (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engram_%28neuropsychology%29) though at least it’s testable & potentially falsifiable. As an aside increasing evidence from genetic theory as well as advances in neuroimaging (various machines that can see brain activity + structure) make the theory less likely.
Which leads me to my next point, even if there is a “spirit” this is also considered a belief due to its non-Falsifiability/non-testability (cannot conclusively be proven true or false). Excerpt from https://think.taylorandfrancis.com/aa-ghosts-and-spirits/ a publication in my field.
“For anthropologists, the reality of ghosts and spirits is in the cultural realm; if people grow up hearing tales of malevolent ghosts, they are likely to “see” and feel the presence of ghosts around them. These spirits are real because they affect people’s thought and behavior. ”
The existence of being a spirit, having a spirit or their being spirits isn’t provable in the scientific sense and is thus a belief.
In contrast a “fact” is true regardless of if a person/group believes it or not. Like gravity or the salinity of certain oceans or the earth being round. Did you know there are still people who believe the earth’s flat? Their belief doesn’t make the world less round though.
The second step O is the concept here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-overlapping_magisteria
This means scientists ‘as scientists’ only really study what people believe, why they believe it, a belief’s or it’s related practices measurable effects, how that belief evolved, such like. Also, even social scientists who do engage in the practice of “participant observation” are engaging in those spiritual practices to understand the process of a particular ritual (ex. Confession) in order to feel the effects themselves vs. believing a belief themselves. They might or might not belief the belief(s) behind the process, it matters not.
Again as seen here https://www.pewforum.org/2009/11/05/scientists-and-belief/ many scientists don’t have any religious/spiritual beliefs or practices themselves. Those who don’t have them fall into two groups “strict materialists”: those who “believe” everything has a material explanation) and “non-materialists”: those with who believe in some spiritual concepts but generally don’t believe in God(s/esses) or believe such beings and/or religion has very little effect or importance on overall quality of life.
In the end scientists, like indeed most people, engage in or with whatever spirit or spirits, as part of themselves or others might exist within the context of whatever faith they have. Scientist learn to bifurcate (split) what they belief as “faith X” from what they know as scientists.
Scientists ‘as scientists’ don’t engage thusly, they’re looking for the effects – positive, negative or placebo or nocebo (https://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/NEJMra1907805) etc.
Other related references:
https://www.jospt.org/doi/full/10.2519/jospt.2013.0105
https://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/NEJMra1907805
https://www.health.harvard.edu/heart-health/mindfulness-can-improve-heart-health
As a Taoist I do *believe* many things (myself included) have a spiritual component.
However as a Scientist I *know* that this belief is not a testable hypothesis and therefore not “fact,” nor scientific.
Hopefully this clarifies things. Please feel free to dig into some basic science texts, or shows like @StarTalkRadio or those on @Discovery should be a good gradient.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Wynski you’re right in that what Aviv is proposing isn’t science, but you’re dead wrong in your approach. My fellow social scientist’s term this “othering” and it does the exact opposite of the intention of science as a body as well the general tone of this site.
http://www.otheringandbelonging.org/the-problem-of-othering/
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/darwins-subterranean-world/201904/the-psychology-othering
https://www.echotraining.org/survivorempowerment/
Science is a method of studying and engaging in the world; it’s primary uses are to increase understanding through discovery of how things work, create new things, enlighten and educate.
Trying to make people feel shitty because they don’t know/understand something is antithetical to that.
“Trying to make people feel shitty because they don’t know/understand something is antithetical to that.”
As a well-known orthodox Jew once said: “facts don’t care about feelings.”
When all is said and done, an argument stands or falls on its logical merits.
And “tone policing” is an ad hominem.
One can only assume the “acceptance level” of a complete stranger behind a keyboard.
What one may perceive as “making someone feel shitty” may actually be entirely appropriate. It may even “impinge” far more than anything warm and fluffy. That’s for the intended receiver of the comm to determine, not a spectator.
Advancement in Scientology demands the rejection of logic. Each EP, from Life Repair to OTVIII, is an unsupported proposition that requires agreement – not from any reasoned evaluation (that would expose serious logical fallacies in Hubbard’s output and diminish its value) but from a momentary feeling, susceptible to biases, conditioning and the placebo effect.
One could therefore argue that scientologists, by the very nature of their spiritual path, lack critical thinking skills and logical acumen.
If that’s “othering”, so be it.
I only care if it’s true or not.
Valerie , There is no such thing as “othering”in REAL science. What I did was challenge evidence presented or not presented. Opinions aren’t mentioned nor considered in REAL science. “Social science” is NOT actually a science. That is why you are confused about real science. Real science does not take into account feelings or opinions. It isn’t an opinion that the acceleration you feel on Earth is ~32 feet sec/sec.
Stick to sociology and get a real science degree if you want to learn actual science.
I know you mean well but you are out of your field of knowledge.
Medical anthropology requires one to study advanced chemistry, biology (particularly bone morphology & genetics) etc. additionally one of my minor’s is in astrophysics but was not pertinent to the topic at hand (COVID19) nor how I ended up in scientology, therefore left off the bio.
If your belief is that only the physical or “hard” are sciences are science, then you’re welcome to that belief.
However it’s not what’s currently held by actual scientific bodies:
http://www.nasonline.org/about-nas/organization/
https://www.aaas.org/sections/anthropology
https://royalsociety.org/search/?query=anthropology
Anyways, if getting mad or being condescending worked a lot more of us would still be scientologists.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Irrelevant Valerie. Taking some science classes is NOT the same as getting a real science degree. Medical Anthro is NOT a science. You need to GET a real science degree to understand science. As evidenced by your post about what I wrote. You DON’T understand science otherwise you wouldn’t have talked about opinion when opinion wasn’t part of my argument.
If spirits are the whole world trapped inside a body spirits can’t die only experience the death of a body, of planets,of galaxies and of universes. Scientology got OT tr 0 and Buddah got the zero as a guidance as Tao to the spirits nature.
‘Question from Aviv: “I have a question. Except of studying the spirit in the ways you mentioned, what do scientists do currently to help a spirit?”’
As a scientist I find this question to be irrelevant to the extreme. You might as well replace the word scientists with the word shoemakers or the word electricians. It is not the job of the Scientist to help a spirit. His job is to understand the world better, and consequently make it better. The fact that Aviv can post his question is because there is Internet. There is Internet because of the Scientists. Hence, to that degree Aviv; the Scientists help you personally to lift the spirit.
Prof. Friedman,
It was an odd question and working on the more physical end you are lucky in that generally you don’t get those. My subjects are mostly children so get a lot of such, though to be honest despite that I was momentarily perplexed at what he was trying to get at. It was an interesting challenge to re-examine how previously held scientology beliefs would lead to such a question.
Your answer is brilliant! Though I tend to think if the internet was as critical towards scientology then as it is now I’d have never joined in the first place 😉
Side note: I read an IOP article by a colleague of yours that gave me an idea that saved a LOT of time/cost in relation to 3D printing of a device prototype. Thank you all very much for your hard work!
Prof. it was also a Straw-man. A scamologists go to tool when asked questions that if honestly answered would cause enough cognitive dissonance to explode their head.
I think Bershadsky’s question is a bit of a false dilemma.
It’s not the job of science to address the spirit. Scientology doesn’t address applied science like engineering, geology or aerodynamics, either.
Ironically, even within the context of Hubbard’s “work,” Dianetics doesn’t address the spirit – further making the point that a lack of crossover is not necessarily an invalidation, even by the standards of Hubbard or Scientology.
More importantly, Scientology doesn’t actually address anything scientifically. The basic functions of the e-meter in supposedly measuring thoughts should be testable – they are, and attempts have been made, but when Scientology’s theories have failed to be proven, further consent for research has conveniently been withdrawn (see the work of HDRF and FASE). A bit more in the realm of spirit, supposed past life recollections are testable by means such as checking accounts against historical records – research so easily done, and that would be such powerful evidence (and marketing leverage) if successful, that it speaks volumes that in over half a century it hasn’t been accomplished. Either those advanced in Scientology’s organizations know that such research would fail if tried, or are so blunderingly incompetent for never having tried the very thing that might cement their place in history and set Scientology on the path to wide acceptance, that the inability to do actual science is proven de facto.
I did not leave because I had personal disagreements (though I certainly did). I was kicked out because I was all but dead and apparently they did not want to have to explain why there were corpses on the Freewinds. Of course, had they simply given me medical care as covered in LRH Flag Orders there would have been nothing to explain. Now they have to explain why I am still alive 18 years after they said that my death was imminent. I have no idea how they can do that. They cannot claim that my miraculous recovery was due to anything they did. If anything, their actions were calculated to ensure my demise. I could lay out the facts again which brought me to this conclusion but I do not wish to bore the reader with repetitious statements. My guess is they have other things to worry about.
Outside of a pseudo-science like Scientology which masquerades as a religion , “Faith” is not a bad word; instead, “Faith” is seen as a virtue. In Christianity, if you believe that Jesus died on the cross for your sins, you have been “saved” and are going to heaven. Having “faith” means you firmly believe in it – there’s no “tech” involved, and no registrar breathing done your neck trying to pry the last dollar out of your hands.
You can’t be BOTH a religion and a science at the same time, and Scientology certainly likes to play both angles when it suits their needs. A religion doesn’t have to “prove” its beliefs, but a science has that obligation. Scientology hides behind the cloak of religion when they do questionable things and break the law, but they’re a “science” when they are trying to sell you something like “study tech” and drug rehab.
Scientology is only a religion for PR, Legal and Tax reasons – no real religion would have a “FREE SERVICE EQUALS FREE FALL” slogan. They’re really just a franchise business and Ponzi scheme, managed by cult leader David Miscavige.
As someone once told me, if a practice is a “science” then it works every time, or very very nearly always. But if this practice, be it medicine, prayer, faith, religious rituals and practices, etc., work “sometimes” but not always or not very nearly always, then its not science, its an art form. Look, I have no idea; I’m just sharing what someone long ago told me.
Truth Aqua. Hence the currently used term, Medical Arts. Much of medicine is science, much is an art with trial and error being the daily practice. Diagnosis is largely an art as we have only primitive equipment.
Today’s post is particularly interesting to me as I feel that the distinction or intersection of faith and science is often poorly understood or misrepresented.
The article offers a reasonably workable definition of science: “Science is a method of studying and engaging in the world; it’s primary uses are to increase understanding through discovery of how things work, create new things, enlighten and educate.” Well said.
I would emphasize the smallest word in this definition: “A.” Science is “a” method, a set of tools. Meaning one of “several if not many” methods of interacting with phenomena and making at least some degree of sense of them. However, it needs to be pointed out that the idea of science being a preferable, superior or even normative way of “knowing” is a claim that in itself is unscientific, i.e. not supportable by the scientific method.
This is important to keep in mind as “science” is often offered as a claim that should somehow offer the last word in a discussion. Of course, in scientific matters that is absolutely true. For example, Hubbard claims to offer a “science” while it is abundantly clear to anyone familiar with the scientific method that this is a wholly dishonest claim as he does not even attempt to use science to create his “science.” Also, in order for Hubbard’s “science” to produce any results–let alone the glorious ones he claims–both the subject of the “scientific” procedure as well as the practitioner of the “science” (the auditor and the auditing subject) have to be previously indoctrinated into the glory of Hubbard’s all-knowing genius.
Trying to offer “science” as the last word in a discussion that does not pertain to science, however, is like trying to apply, say, physics in order to quantify the enjoyment of music. While physics obviously covers an aspect of music it does little to explain its phenomenon.
This article seems to recognize this: “However as a Scientist I *know* that this belief is not a testable hypothesis and therefore not “fact,” nor scientific.” What I find difficult here is the seeming equivalency between “fact” and science as this suggests that “facts” may only exist–be “real”–if they can be explained with scientific tools.
In any event, I find today’s discussion very stimulating and am not offering my thoughts to express agreement of disagreement with this article. I simply find the intersection of “science” and other methods of “knowing” extremely interesting.
From the perspective in which she approached her reply, as a scientist…
Anything taken out of context of the source is easily debated and this was not a discussion as to abstract definition of “fact.”
She answered a question regarding how the average scientist approaches the spirit. It is safe to say that when discussing the perspective of the average scientist, they view hypotheses proven via the scientific method as fact.
“However, it needs to be pointed out that the idea of science being a preferable, superior or even normative way of “knowing” is a claim that in itself is unscientific, i.e. not supportable by the scientific method.”
Because subjective reality is so susceptible to conditioning and delusion, it is incredibly important to search for answers beyond mere intuition and dogma. It is why one can easily (and reasonably) argue that science is indeed superior to anything else we currently have in our epistemological toolbox – with controls to minimise biases and the probability of error, and to account for the placebo effect.
“This is important to keep in mind as “science” is often offered as a claim that should somehow offer the last word in a discussion.”
If a proposition strays from mythos into logos, the rules of the game must change and the burden of proof applies. Objective claims require objective evidence.
“What I find difficult here is the seeming equivalency between “fact” and science as this suggests that “facts” may only exist–be “real”–if they can be explained with scientific tools.”
A fact is something that can be objectively verified. What other tools would you propose that can establish facts as effectively?
Thank you.
Yes, Physics/Engineering indeed can get you a better sound system but would make a poor tool for understanding enjoyment.
If you did want to check out the intersection of science & music though Musicophilia by Dr. Oliver Sacks, https://www.daniellevitin.com/ works as well as the newish (started in 90’s) field of biomusicology might be interesting to you.
“A fact is something that can be objectively verified. What other tools would you propose that can establish facts as effectively?”
Outside of science + scientific processes, history & mathematics are also commonly used in academic circles to verify if something is factual. It is an opinion I share, but other academics think only science or science/maths-based methods should count and history is too subject to interpretation. It is definitely a hot topic of debate at conferences!
I’m curious as to what you think?
Facts: during the 2017-2018 flu season in the USA ~80,000 people died from the flu. Florida being one of the most populous AND biggest retirement age states had many thousands. So far, 839 people in Florida have died from Covid-19.
Hmm.
Wynski, what’s with the off-topic posts that sound as if they echo fringe politics and conspiracy theories?
To begin with, you’re making what should be blatantly obvious – and erroneous – apples-and-oranges by comparing a year-long flu season to a month, and deaths in a country to those in a state.
And where are you getting your numbers from? The CDC estimates deaths during the particularly bad 2017-2018 flu season deaths at 61,000:
> https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html?CDC_AA_refVal=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cdc.gov%2Fflu%2Fabout%2Fdisease%2Fus_flu-related_deaths.htm
COVID-19 has killed over 45,000 Americans in the last month, according to the latest counts. And health data that is an ultimate judge of pandemic fatalities, indicates there may actually be around a third more deaths than that:
Excess mortality data suggests as many as 25,000 uncounted coronavirus deaths [across several countries]
> https://theweek.com/speedreads/910226/excess-mortality-data-suggests-many-25000-uncounted-coronavirus-deaths
That would put total COVID-19 deaths in the US closer to 60,000. Not even taking into account that data, at current trends fatalities will still exceed those of the worst-in-a-generation 2017-18 flu season in the next 2 to 3 weeks – with the toll continuing to mount across a full-season and a likely second wave in the fall, even given ongoing restrictions until a vaccine is developed.
Peace, I was stating an interesting fact I ran across vis-a-vis this situation we find ourselves in when viewed from a situation 2 years ago that killed MANY more people; yet not a mention at the time. ANY sane person would do a double take.
What are you blathering on about “fringe politics and conspiracy theories”? How is a pertinent FACT a conspiracy theory or politics? Please explain what you are going on about and how it pertains to the fact I wrote of about?
Otheringness will always happen when people notice their differences. The severity of othering depends on how the people involved think the differences are important.
Scientologists and non-Scientologists. Scientologists and ex-Scientologists. Scientologists and indies. Scientologists and NOI. Yo schisms are real.
I really like it and agree with Valerie’s post.
One must have the ability to understand the difference between faith and tangible real facts.
The important thing (even if it seems a contradiction) is not to identify ourselves in it and worse to become one thing or another.
A final note if I am allowed. In today’s post Wynski is mentioned by Valerie in conclusion. I know it’s the copy of the original post from a few days ago. J
In my opinion, perhaps it was not necessary to include it again as re-reading the various comments between Wynski and Aviv I do not think Wynski was so wrong and tried to deny the opinion of Aviv.
Rather, he insisted only on having a vision of tangible “evidence” as well as speaking only of mere spirit. But this is my opinion.
Excellent post. I need to track down each of the links in order to study it in more depth. Personally, I really like Blavatsky as a foundation as compared to Hubbard. Blavatsky simply said that the natural world was being overtaken by an incomplete science. Science has advanced greatly since she wrote and many of her arguments are weak. But we still see Blavatsky even in today’s world where the naturalists hold a view on the virus while scientists hold a different view. I think Blavatsky would enjoy analyzing current trends.
“Trying to make people feel shitty because they don’t know/understand something is antithetical to that.” Seems to sum up why Scientology is failing. Calling non-Scientologists “Wogs” and heaping scorn and ridicule on non believers is not helping Scientology to expand. All the mental and financial abuse that Scientology has dished out over the decades is there to see, on the internet, forever. As Mike Rinder has shown in the “Thursday Funnies,” more and more Scientology promo pieces show pictures of old and fading hardcore adherents, with few young people in sight. “Make people feel shitty to extract dollars” seems to be the operating basis of today’s “Church.” If you have an internet connection, you can set aside belief and see for yourself.
This may not be la popular comment, but I’ve noticed, just my opinion only,, but I’ve noticed that Ex Scns and Indies also make each other “feel shitty” like the author describes. Instead of trying to prove each group wrong and make them feel bad, I’d like to see us band together as a group who have escaped or left corporate Scn and are no longer under the corporate Scn thrall. To go through what we all did in the church, and the background we have in the words of LRH, mean we have so much reality with other Ex Scns and even with Indies because an Indie was an Ex before he/she was an Indie. I’m not promoting Indies per se. I’m just saying that the Exes and Indies should stop trying to make each other wrong and should have the common bond of “thank goodness we escaped.”
Cindy. I understand perfectly what you mean. I know what I say could put me in the pillory. But I say it anyway.
Most of the independents I met or who contacted me had in common that they had left the SO more for personal disagreements than for an ideal. And being trained they decided to do “field auditing” to earn money.
To me indipendents or corporate scientology is the same. Scientologists. Objective or grade 4 or clear’s Hcobs are the same.
I have never been a tech terminal. I was management and is there where you see if scn really works.
OK I put my helmet on.
I’m ready.
Good comment, Loosing My Religion. Thank you. I agree with you that some people who leave the church are pretty much Scns except they are now on the outside, but are still Scns.
I live and let live and I don’t care if someone wants to practice Scn or Catholicism or whatever it is. I just don’t want to be made wrong for whatever choice I make and I don’t want to make them wrong for their choice. We all have in common that we were able to finally see the truth and leave. Some left for personal reasons, some left for ideological reasons. Whatever it is, thank God we’re out here and not in there!
Cindy, I agree. And thank you. I don’t like to judge (or at least I try) anyone.
Of course saying “scn is not a religion but a scam” is not judging, these are facts.
I am more on a zen view (I do meditation but now the house is full of daughters and granddaughters all in quaranteene so I need to meditate while doing), thus anything is just to be seen in a present form and not making a story that keeps living and growing in the mind. No judgements, acceptance of the now as it is and no resistance. Yeah something like this in short. Laughing.
Sorry. Yes let’s thanks ourself first, to have been enough awake to get out.
Thanks Losing My Religion and Bill
LMR, Being outnumbered with all the females in your house during lockdown, I feel for you. Your meditation idea sounds good! Good luck getting through the CV crisis, and to all of us here. Thank you, Mike for still putting up a site for us to come to to see what the Cof$ is up to on a daily basis. Stay safe!
Cindy the 5 girls here make the place alive!! Laughing. We have also a garden and the small ones can run. Do well.
Absolutely right. Cindy.
I like this comment 🙂
Well if you like it, I like it too. Why? Because I don’t have a clue what we’re talking about.
OSD, thank you, my friend. You crack me up. Without even trying. You just do 🙂
I crack myself up, Aquamarine! In this world, you really can’t take yourself seriously.