Engram (Dianetics)

This article is about the concept of the engram in Dianetics and Scientology. For other uses, see Engram.

In Dianetics and Scientology, an engram is defined as "a mental image picture which is a recording of an experience containing pain, unconsciousness and a real or fancied threat to survival. It is a recording in the reactive mind of something which actually happened to an individual in the past and which contained pain and unconsciousness ... It must, by definition, have impact or injury as part of its content. These engrams are a complete recording, down to the last accurate detail, of every perception present in a moment of partial or full unconsciousness."[1]

The term engram was coined in 1904 by the German scholar Richard Semon,[2] who defined it as a "stimulus impression" which could be reactivated by the recurrence of "the energetic conditions which ruled at the generation of the engram."[3]

Semon's concept was re-used by L. Ron Hubbard when he published Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health in 1950. He conceived of the engram as a form of "memory trace", an idea which had long existed in medicine. According to Dr. Joseph Winter, a physician who collaborated in the development of Dianetics, Hubbard had taken the term "engram" from the 1936 edition of Dorland's Medical Dictionary, where it was defined as "a lasting mark or trace .... In psychology it is the lasting trace left in the psyche by anything that has been experienced psychically; a latent memory picture."[4] He had originally used the terms "Norn", "comanome" and "impediment" before alighting on "engram" following a suggestion from Winter.[5]

Hubbard's concept of the engram evolved over time. In Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health, he wrote that "The word engram, in dianetics is used in its severely accurate sense as a 'definite and permanent trace left by a stimulus on the protoplasm of a tissue'",[6]p.82fn which followed fairly closely the original definition in Dorland's. He later repudiated the idea that an engram was a physical cellular trace, redefining his concept as being "a mental image picture of a moment of pain and unconsciousness".[7]

According to Hubbard whenever an engram is stimulated it increases in power.[6]pp. 74-75

Jeff Jacobsen has drawn an analogy between Dianetics auditing and abreaction therapy, equating engrams to the painful subconscious memories that abreaction therapy brings up to the conscious mind. He quotes Dr. Nathaniel Thornton, who compares abreaction therapy in turn to confession.[8]

After the New Jersey Board of Medical Examiners began proceedings against the Hubbard Dianetic Research Foundation in January 1951 for teaching medicine without a license, which eventually led to that foundation's bankruptcy,[9][10][11] Hubbard lost control of the Dianetics trademark and copyrights to financier Don Purcell.[12] Hubbard subsequently published a new set of teachings as Scientology, a religious philosophy.[13] The concept of clearing Engrams was carried over into this new religion and remains a central part of the practices of the Church of Scientology.[14]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "The Official Scientology and Dianetics Glossary". Church of Scientology International. Accessed 2004-06-17.
  2. ↑ Dudai, Yadin (2002). Memory from A to Z: Keywords, Concepts, and Beyond. Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-852087-5.
  3. ↑ Corydon, Bent; L. Ron Hubbard, Jr. (1987). L. Ron Hubbard: Messiah or Madman?. Secaucus, New Jersey: Lyle Stuart. ISBN 0-8184-0444-2. Convenience link at http://www.clambake.org/archive/books/mom/Messiah_or_Madman.txt .
  4. ↑ Winter, Joseph A. (1951). A Doctor's Report on Dianetics. New York, NY: Hermitage House.
  5. ↑ Atack, Jon (1990). A Piece of Blue Sky. New York, NY: Carol Publishing Group. p. 109. ISBN 0-8184-0499-X.
  6. 1 2 Hubbard, L. Ron (1988). Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. East Grinstead, United Kingdom: New Era Publications UK Ltd. ISBN 1-870451-22-8.
  7. ↑ L. Ron Hubbard Ability: the Magazine of Dianetics and Scientology, Issue 36, Washington D. C., mid-October 1956
  8. ↑ Jeff Jacobsen. "Dianetics: From Out of the Blue?" Reprinted from The Arizona Skeptic, vol. 5, no. 2, September/October 1991, pp. 1-5. Accessed on 2010-06-15.
  9. ↑ Flowers 1984, pp. 96–97
  10. ↑ Thomas Streissguth Charismatic Cult Leaders, p. 70, The Oliver Press Inc., 1996 ISBN 978-1-881508-18-2
  11. ↑ George Malko Scientology: the now religion, p. 58, Delacorte Press, 1970 ASIN B0006CAHJ6
  12. ↑ "Jon Atack: The games L. Ron Hubbard played". tonyortega.org.
  13. ↑ Christian D. Von Dehsen-Scott L. Harris Philosophers and Religious Leaders, p. 90, Greenwood Publishing Group, 1999 ISBN 978-1-57356-152-5
  14. ↑ Urban, Hugh B. (2011). The church of scientology : a history of a new religion. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN 9780691146089. Retrieved 5 December 2015.

External links

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