I've just obtained a (nearly?) complete set of Narconon student manuals (although not, alas, the supervisor manuals, which would be even more revealing). They are as follows:

1. Therapeutic TR course

3. Learning Improvement Course

4a. Communication & Perception Course (part a)

4b. Communication & Perception Course (part b)

5. Ups & Downs in Life Course

6. Personal Values and Integrity Course

7. Changing Conditions in Life Course

8. Way to Happiness Course

New Life Detoxification Program manual

Basic Study Manual

This is basically the set listed at http://www.able.org/book_nnset.html. Volume 2 doesn't seem to be in there, and I would guess from the (low res) picture on the ABLE website that it's the one on the middle left with the turquoise cover. I don't know what it covers, though. Anyone know?

I've only had a cursory look at the manuals so far, but a few things have already cropped up. For a start, they are *huge* - some are over 500 pages long! - and they are radically different to the manuals produced in the mid-1970s which they replace. The reason for their great size is that they are very heavily illustrated, with cartoons on virtually every page, and text in large type. Maybe the theory is that drug addicts have poor literacy and have to be shown everything in picture format? The text seems to be very similar to the Scientology originals and it certainly seems to include a lot of the "tech" and jargon - "very good indicators", "flat points", "end phenomena" etc. There are is also the same trend of relabelling some Scientology terms - the CCH processes are renamed "Objective Exercises", for instance.

It's going to take me some weeks to get through them in detail but it looks like it should finally be possible to nail down the exact degree to which Narconon copies (or diverges from) Scientology. I will probably require a bit of help in tracing the links, so I'll be posting requests for clarification every now and then. If you can help, that would be great.

     |        Chris Owen - ronthewarhero@OISPAMNOyahoo.co.uk         |
     |---------------------------------------------------------------|
     |  NARCONON EXPOSED: The full facts about the Narconon program  |
     |               http://www.narconon-exposed.org                 |