From pages 28 and 29 of William Sargant's
Battle for the Mind - a physiology of conversion and brainwashing
ISBN 1-883536-06-5
Essential reading for all combatants

"In November, 1944, Swank still felt that an occasional soldier, "perhaps less than 2%", belonged to the group capable of withstanding combat stress for an inordinate length of time. But we find him reporting in 1946:"

"This seemed true...in November 1944. Since then we have concluded that all normal men eventually suffer combat exhaustion in continuous and severe combat. The exception to this rule are psychotic (insane) soldiers, and a number of examples of this have been observed."

( a curve, indicating combat efficiency that rises for 20 days, the first ten days allows the combatant to become "battle-wise", entering a period of peak performance described as "period of maximum efficiency", then combat efficiency starts to drop off as he enters a period of overconfidence, and then a hyper-reactive stage (where the slightest incident provokes and enormous response).. his efficiency starts to drop rapidly entering a period called emotional exhaustion, which bottoms out at zero combat efficiency -The vegetative phase )

(The description of the stages above, gives us many clues - it provides the 'why' for both scientology's PR/de-popularization/harassment AND baratrous litigation tactics, Hubbard knew that if enough pressure and stress was applied, constantly, that the target would p[ass through each of these stages. It would be when the target reached emotional exhaustion or vegetative state, that settlement talks would be started, for example..)

"Since certain techniques of religious and political conversion can be made quite as fearful and as exhausting to the brain as active combat experiences, the importance of Swank's findings must be very heavily stressed. His statistical clinical facts should be brought home especially to those who believe that the avoidance of breakdown in battle, or under brain-washing, is simply a matter of excercising sufficient will-power and courage. On the contrary, the continued excercise of will-power and courage may, in certain circumstances, exhaust the brain and hasten a final collapse. When dogs co-operate in testing their tolerance to stress they are all the easier to break down: the loyal efforts they make prove their own undoing."

"Normally it seems, the human nervous system, like the dog's, is in a state of dynamic equilibrium between excitation and inhibition. But if subjected to excessive stimulation it can pass into the same states of excessive excitation or excessive inhibition which Pavlov described in his dogs. the brain then becomes incapable, for the time being, of its usual intelligent functioning."

(it will be at this point that Scientology will want to make that video depostion, or record as evidence of character, something that the target said or did after being induced by Scientology's own tactics to reach this point, will be turned into an albatross, that the target will be forced to wear until the end of time.)

(Swanks findings provide combatants in the war to expose scientology with other valuable clues:

(1) providing us with the "why" scientology seems to like to recruit and encourage nutballs to partake in their efforts on their behalf .

(2) Provides us with the "why" some people get promoted in scientology. This is also the "WHY" for the terrific and constant internal stress levels inside this scam. For example, Hubbard's Statistics and management by condition formula, place a staff member in an impossible situation, an extraordinarily stressful situation. Did you ever wonder what the point of it was? Increasing "production" was his "shore story", Careful reading and understanding of the previous paragraphs leads me to conclude that Hubbard's management by statistics and harsh conditions and penalties, causes the real "2 percenters" to rise to the top of this organization like scum.

And that's where he wanted them, because he knew they could produce more without stopping, and he knew how to control them, because he knew Sargant, Swank and Pavlov's technologies and observations.

Hubbard also lived in constant fear, that his scam would all come crashing down someday, which was another reason he wanted everything done "NOW".

This is what we are dealing with.

Sincerely

Arnie Lerma

In psychology, Transmarginal inhibition, or TMI, is an organism's response to overwhelming stimuli.

Ivan Pavlov enumerated details of TMI on his work of conditioning animals to pain. He found that organisms responded had different levels of tolerance. He commented "that the most basic inherited difference among people was how soon they reached this shutdown point and that the quick-to-shut-down have a fundamentally different type of nervous system."

The sudden conversion methods of mental conditioning rely heavily on TMI. Of the ten elements of control (environment control, physical fatigue, mental fatigue, tension or uncertainty, confession, superstimulation, crisis, euphoria, proselytization, and restimulation), six can be seen as stimulation toward TMI. Organizations that practice sudden conversion, such as military boot camps, prisons, and extreme psychiatric treatments, often have individuals enter TMI states which may result in permanent psychological damage.

Patients who have reached this shutdown point often become socially dysfunctional or develop one of several personality disorders. Often patients who dissociate during and after the experience, will more easily dissociate or shut down during stressful or painful experiences, and may experience post traumatic stress disorder for the remainder of their lives.

There are three stages passed through for state of TMI to be reached. The first, equivalent phase, is when the response matches the stimuli, which is considered the normal baseline behavior. The paradoxical phase occurs when small stimuli receive major response and a major stimuli elicit small responses. Finally, the ultra-paradoxical stage where negative stimulation results in positive responses and vice versa. Additional research on these phases was done by William Sargant in his work on shell-shocked servicemen.

An organism can progress through these stages by increased stimulation, random negative stimulation, reversing positive and negative stimulation, or physically debilitating the organism.

How much can the human nervous system withstand, when dianetics/scientology also assimilates, "excessive excitation" with electricity from the E-Meter and "excessive inhibition" through the constant use of suggestion and hypnosis?

More on William Sargant:
Scientology and Communism

Sources of Scientology

"Communism is the death of the soul. It is the organization of total conformity--in short, of tyranny--and it is committed to making tyranny universal."

[Adlai E. Stevenson]

...as is Scientology