Review Detail

At the end of 2007 I did a word-by-word, page-by-page comparison of the 2007 edition of Scn 8-8008 and the 1989/90 edition. People were assuming that DM had screwed up Hubbard's works and the reissue was purely a money grab, but no-one had presented any actual evidence. So I eyeballed a new book for myself and meticulously started to go through it, recording my findings.

The presentation in the 2007 edition is much flashier, although the white paper it too bright for easy studying. Because of the weird spacing and borders, trying to OCR (optical character recognition) that edition is impossible, although one shouldn't be doing that anyway. :). The chapter headings and sub-headings are a dog's breakfast in the earlier edition, and look fine in the 2007 edition.

There are a few minor changes, where the newer version makes *less* sense than the older. For example:

(Old edition): (p.34) "The higher the frequency, the shorter the wavelength is considered to be on the gradient scale of wavelengths. The lower the frequency, the longer the wavelength is considered to be on a gradient scale."

New edition: (p.32) "The larger the number, the lower the wavelength is considered to be on the gradient scale of wavelengths. The smaller the number, the higher the wavelength is considered to be on the gradient scale."

After three chapters of microscopic examination, I wrote: "OK, I think I've compared enough in these three chapters to make some general comments. If you are a serious Scientologist, who uses this book for reference, whether a churchie or not, my opinion is that you should get this new book. Buy it on eBay or something if you don't want to pay the CofS directly. The earlier copy is very different in places, with different meanings, not just different words. The omitted passages may appear later in the book, or they may not, but I am not talking about those passages particularly.

What I find very interesting seems to be exemplified by that quote about wavelengths/frequencies. The prior edition is much more clear than the revised edition, where Hubbard garbles the terms. No way would diehard SO members [actually DM personally, I later heard] revise it like that unless it is genuinely true to the original dictation!

Overall, there are many minute changes with regard to punctuation, but (in my opinion), all for the better in regard to making the text more comprehensible. If DM had wanted to worsen the text throughout, he wouldn't have done all that. So, counter-intuitively, generalizing from the actual hands-on examination I did do, I will assume that the 2007 books are actually closer to what Hubbard dictated than earlier editions.