Review Detail

This book appeared a month before Handbook for Preclears, and its advanced procedure covers the same ground as that self-processing book but considering a case from the outside, from the viewpoint of an auditor. Here are L. Ron Hubbard's research advances from the time he spent in Wichita during 1951, very clearly and concisely summarised from his lectures to give auditors an instruction manual. Service facsimiles, the emotional curve, effort processing, and sympathy exciters are all defined for the first time in a book.

There are two amazing chapters on responsibility and full responsibility; these are essential reading for anyone who wants to be OT but thinks he doesn't need responsibility! Just look at the definition of responsibility that LRH gives here, and the later Grades Chart definition of OT.

Unlike the later axioms of Scientology, the 194 axioms of Dianetics are still about the matter, effort, emotion and thought of physical organisms. LRH had yet to make the breakthrough of Scientology, separating out the thetan as senior to the organism. For example, axiom 121 here stated that every thought has been preceded by a physical action - whereas we now know that that should read 'every aberrated thought'.

In his early books LRH made it plain that the therapy of Dianetics for individuals was just a first step toward a much broader body of knowledge that could be applied to all the sciences and other areas of human activity. This would be the bridge to a new civilization. The axioms of Dianetics are interesting in this context, and I'm sure many other people have seen their applicability to their professions. My own area is in the biological sciences, and many of these axioms stand out for me as general principles that we know in biology by more specific examples. Axiom 70 explains why every plant has a resting stage in its life cycle. The idea that viruses as well as cells can contribute to building an organism (Axiom 41) was radical in 1951, but now it's well accepted. It would be quite possible to teach a university course in biology, ecology and evolution organized on many of LRH's axioms of Dianetics as the stable data for each topic.