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Project: A Course on Hubbard’s Factors

This paper presents Factor # 3 from the book SCIENTOLOGY 8-8008 by L. RON HUBBARD. The contents are from the original publication of this book by The Church of Scientology (1952).

The paragraphs of the original material (in black) are accompanied by brief comments (in color) based on the present understanding.  Feedback on these comments is appreciated.

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FACTOR # 3. The first action of beingness is to assume a viewpoint.

Viewpoint is a frame of reference. It is a natural aspect of beingness. For example, there is a universal viewpoint associated with beingness that is the universe.

The universal viewpoint may be narrowed in order to focus it on a part of the universal beingness. This narrowed viewpoint may be broadened back to view the universal beingness. There is this flexibility to the viewpoint.

When viewpoint is narrowed to focus on a part of beingness and becomes fixed at that point, then it loses its flexibility. It perceives everything from that narrow perspective. Now there is a unique perspective from which to advance opinions. This defines subjectivity.

The natural viewpoint of universal beingness sees thing as they are without the uniqueness of any perspective. This defines objectivity.

KHTK FACTOR # 3: The natural aspect of beingness is its viewpoint. The universal viewpoint sees things as they are. This is objectivity.

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The concept that comes closest to the “universal viewpoint” is God. But God is not a human like being. God is the whole universe.

We may say that Emptiness and God are two opposite ends of the scale of viewpoint. This makes “Emptiness – God” a dichotomy.

To fully understand a point on this scale the reference point of Emptiness is required. Therefore, God may be understood fully only from the reference point of Emptiness.

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Project: A Course on Hubbard’s Factors

This paper presents Factor #1 from the book SCIENTOLOGY 8-8008 by L. RON HUBBARD. The contents are from the original publication of this book by The Church of Scientology (1952).

The excerpts from the original material (in black) are accompanied by comments and analysis (in color) based on the present understanding.  Feedback is appreciated.

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FACTOR # 1. Before the beginning was a Cause and the entire purpose of the Cause was the creation of effect.

This Factor anchors the whole phenomena of existence on an absolute Cause. This is similar to the idea of God in the Abrahamic religions. But cause gets its meaning from effect. The dichotomy of “cause-effect” is a universal principle underlying all phenomenon. It describes the nature of phenomena.

The Scientology Cause or the Semitic God are arbitrary reference points. They are assumed to resolve the confusion of physical reality. But they cannot resolve the reality they themselves represent. To understand the reality of Cause and/or God a more basic reference point is needed.

Hubbard acknowledges Vedas to be the earliest ancestor of Scientology. The Vedas delve into the basis of the phenomenal universe through the process of Neti-neti (neither this, nor that). It is best expressed in The Creation Hymn of Rig Veda. None of the dichotomies including “cause-effect” were present at the moment of creation.

Buddhism expands upon the Vedas. The Heart Sutra in Buddhism defines EMPTINESS as no Birth no Death, no Being no Non-being, no Defilement no Purity, no Increasing no Decreasing.  In other words, in emptiness there is complete absence of any phenomena.

The viewpoint of emptiness is a totally fresh reference point. It is completely clean. There are no preconceived notions, no fixed ideas, no bias, etc. In short, the concept of emptiness is not viewed through any filters. It is simply what it is.

A reference point aligns everything that follows, into order. In the absence of a reference point things devolve into confusion. It is common to assume an arbitrary reference point just to avoid the immediate confusion, even when it can’t resolve everything.

From a scientific viewpoint, emptiness is the ultimate reference point from which all phenomena are perceived objectively. No other reference point is required to understand emptiness. This is like the zero of a scale from which all values on that scale are measured.

Thus, emptiness is a reference point more fundamental than Cause (God). It has the property of being inherently understood because it denotes the absence of all phenomena. From this reference point it is possible to give an objective meaning to any phenomena. Emptiness itself is not a phenomenon, just like zero is not a value.

Factor # 1 may be expressed more accurately as follows:

KHTK FACTOR # 1: The universe is simply there. Its beginning, or basis, cannot be ascertained with certainty. So, we start with the unbiased basis of Emptiness.

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For this universe, the reference point of EMPTINESS is much more basic than the reference point of GOD or CAUSE.

From the reference point of EMPTINESS all phenomena of this universe, including Cause or God can be understood objectively without any preconceived notion.

The basic phenomena of this universe are SUBSTANCE, TIME and SPACE. The scale of substance extends from ENERGY to MASS.

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Reference: The Book of Scientology

The Importance of Havingness

Please see the original section at the link above.

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Summary

Hubbard says, “A preclear will not progress when his havingness is impaired… A technique which as-ises energy, if used without a repair or remedy of havingness, will bring about a worsening of the case of a preclear.” When a person starts to become dopey, slightly nervous, agitated, etc., there is a loss of havingness. He has burned up mental energy without replacing it. He is no longer feeling oneness with his body and the environment, and is out of sorts.  Whenever one notices a loss of havingness during a process, the process should be interrupted, and havingness should be repaired or remedied.  With havingness in, any process runs more effectively. 

There is a difference between a repair of havingness and a remedy of havingness. Repair of Havingness means mocking up anything one can mock up, and shoving that mock up into the body in any way it can be done. it is an inflow. It is a stop-gap measure. Remedy of Havingness is mocking up and shoving into the body enough masses to a point where the person can eventually throw one away. It should be done in considerable quantity until one is quite relaxed about that particular type of mock up. It is more thorough.

Sometimes, while remedying havingness a person may find that his body has disappeared as his attention is no longer fixated on it. He doesn’t quite know where to put the mass he has mocked up. In this case, one may ask, “What is there around this room (area) which the body could have,” and then pick out specific objects in the environment, which he feels that the body could have. This question may also be asked when the person cannot get mock ups. There are other tips in this section’s text that may be helpful.

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Comments

The running of earlier processes had the liability that they were forced on a preclear by an auditor quite mechanically for hours, which threw him out of equilibrium. Free association allowed by Havingness process repaired such auditing and it even lead to realizations. This situation does not arise in Subject Clearing where a person is running the process on himself under a discipline that allows free association at all times. 

Hubbard worried about getting the command for a process just right; and tried different commands for the same process. In Subject Clearing, as a person understands the process better as he applies it, he can customize the command to some degree. The data of Unknowable, the fact that he postulates to know, and the principle of oneness provide a stable direction in processing.

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