History of Man - ROTFL

I just picked up a copy of "Scientology: History of Man" in my local used bookstore. It also has two copies of "All About Radiation" for sale. The latter is by "A Medical Doctor and a Nuclear Physicist", but you look inside and it turns out to be by "Medicus" and L. Ron Hubbard! Yeah, sure, Elron was a nuclear physicist and I'm Dennis' grandmother.

Well, I left "All About Radiation" for some other student of the absurd, and shelled out a dollar and a half for "History of Man". What an amazing conglomeration of nonsense. The book does not even keep its story straight from one page to the next. On page four there is a disclaimer that says the book is not a statement of claims made by the church or the author, and that the church does not accept people who want to be treated for physical illness or insanity. Then by page five we are told that the book contains useful knowledge, by which the blind will see, the lame walk, the ill recover, and the insane become sane.

However, by the next page Hubbard finds that some auditors will not use the results in this book, in particular auditing based on past lives. He deems them to be insane, and states that the insane are not capable of accepting evidence. So much for making the insane sane!

A few paragraphs later, someone called "Eleanor" is cured of arthritis in a single day of auditing. (That must be why the Co$ does not spend money on social services for older Scientologists - all their problems get audited away instead!)

Then there's FAC 1. Oh, my. The auditor gives the preclear a black box on a tripod. The preclear will attempt to set it on a throne and have a large number of people bow to it, or pretend to have it chase him. This all dates back about a million years and was caused by a device that Hubbard calls a "Coffee-grinder". It was probably made by the 'Fourth Invader", in order to produce a nice, non-combative, religiously insane community. Hmm....

And of course, there's all that wonderful stuff about Piltdown Man, the Clams, the Boohoo or "Grim Weeper", and Being Eaten.

For me, this book is a far better argument against Scientology than "Bare Faced Messiah" of "Piece of Blue Sky".

Andrew conway@bdt.com My home page is now at <a href="http://www.bdt.com/home/conway/">http://www.bdt.com/home/conway/</a>