Talk:Scientology

Notes

I'm wondering why the scientology beliefs aren't mentioned in the article other than vague references? I think the article would be better if it explained the church's thoughts on Xenu and how the theatens cause humans problems. Maybe mention the similarities to Hubbard's sci-fi writings.

It just doesn't seem like a very thorough review. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dmm2259 (talk • contribs) 23:19, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

I also think the origins of the History of scientology should be explained, the histroty including Ximu and all that. did Hubbard claim to have arevelation or what? I do not understand where he got these idea's from. According to this article it seems feasible to think hubbard made it all up. If you could help me that would be great. (207.199.205.212 (talk) 14:09, 1 June 2009 (UTC))

The use of self-published sources

I just want to point out that self published sources can be used!!! WP:SPS states:

Using self-published and questionable sources as sources on themselves

Self-published or questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves, especially in articles about themselves, without the requirement that they be published experts in the field, so long as:

the material used is relevant to the notability of the subject of the article;

1. it is not unduly self-serving;
2. it does not involve claims about third parties;
3. it does not involve claims about events not directly related to the subject;
4. there is no reason to doubt its authenticity;
5. the article is not based primarily on such sources;
6. the source in question has been mentioned specifically in relation to the article's subject by an independent, reliable source.

WABOB! Self-published sources are not reliable nor trustworthy nor in a way peer-reviewed. Everyone can publish his own thesis in a book, and there is no reason for taking that crap into wikipedia. --Yikrazuul (talk) 11:47, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Are we now saying that wiki is peer reviewed? It can't be used for anything academic. Am I missing something here? dmm2259

some common sense people. Firstly self published here means stuff that's been published by the topic of the article, not the random ramblings of some nut from the internet. Clearly some stuff people write about themselves is reasonable, I imagine the official website of the UN would for example be a reasonable source from which to cite UN membership, the name of the Secretary General, official languages etc. 84.172.205.129 (talk) 08:23, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

What is your purpose here? Are you trying to compare Scientology with the UN (or an official website with a self-published book)? if the information in question is really worth reporting, someone else is likely to have done so. (WP:SPS) If you are not providing any usefull argument or specific issue I will delete this section according to WP:TPG. We are trying to write an encyclopedia, hence this discussion site is not a platform for personal opinions! Cheers, --Yikrazuul (talk) 10:45, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

I wasn't aware I had a purpose (the above is me not signed in by the way). My point as it relates to this article is that in some instances it is reasonable to reference the subject of the article. For instance I really can't think of any reason why not to reference the Church of scientology on say 'Beliefs of the Church of Scientology' If they aren't a reliable source on their own beliefs then who is? That's seperate from establishing notability or quoting the church of scientology on say their history, where they may not be entirely reliable (or they may be, I'm not getting into an argument about that). Billsmith453 (talk) 19:53, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Can you heip me?

Dear sir.

First at all. I 'm patty . and I interest scientology. but i 'm can read and listen english not very good. but i would like to know about scientolg too much. Can you have thai language.? I would like to speak and listen english.but I cannot do it well. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.24.191.85 (talk) 03:33, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

There are Scientology books in Thai, I just purchased a couple for my GF Waraporn. Just visit the Scientology official web site. Look for the basic books and select your prefered language. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 110.1.122.63 (talk) 23:19, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

WP:NOT#FORUM  Aar  ►  03:30, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Membership edit reverted

An edit of mine was reverted. I took the US figures on membership and put them in Scientology in the United States. Even though Scientology started in the US this article should not be about info specific to the US (or other countries for that matter) especially since a suitable article exists for such information. There are two reasons for this: to avoid systemic bias and to keep articles to a reasonable length. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 19:47, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Hiya, I disagree. The US as the country of origin of Scientology has the largest membership figure; I think this info is worth having in this generic overview. Also note that if you chop that single sentence out, the following paragraph about Scientologists disparaging general surveys, and the inflated membership statistics, loses its reference. There won't have been a prior mention of surveys then. JN466 21:23, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

I mean, if you do insist on taking that sentence, then you have to take the following sentence along with it. Then we can lose this as a separate section here (because only two sentences will be left), and integrate the remaining sentences in the preceding section. JN466 21:32, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Project Chanology

Shouldnt there be a seperate heading for Project Chanology under "Scientology and the internet"? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.145.205.119 (talk) 01:12, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

It links to the main article under the main heading, so I don't think it's necessary. Such a heading would require restructuring of the material. If people want a summary of the project they can just click on the main article. The Sartorialist (talk) 17:44, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia ban

I propose a link is added to the section that leads to WP:ARBSCI.

That is, a link directly to the source material, not merely links to newspaper articles about the decision. As it is, I found it by WP-searching for "arbitration committee" and then clicking "For Wikipedia Arbitration" onwards... Now that I turn to the talk page to write this, I see a section in the top of the page, however, this does not link me to the source page. And regardless, I do not believe a user should have to flip to the talk page to get relevant links in a comfortable manner. CapnZapp (talk) 10:52, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

 Done for the moment; long-term it is not necessary I think. JN466 11:00, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

re scientology being recognised as tax exempt religion in countries outside the US

Twice in the article it is stated that other countries recognise scientology as being recognised as a tax-exempt religion. Can anyone name some of these countries please? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Celticspring (talk • contribs) 18:04, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Some of the countries are listed in the Scientology#Scientology as a state-recognized religion section. Examples include Australia [1], New Zealand [2], Spain [3], Sweden [4], and Portugal [5]; more countries and sources can be found in Scientology as a state-recognized religion. Most of these recognitions have come quite recently (i.e. during the last ten years). JN466 19:22, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Dispute of religion status

Scientology as a commercial venture

Add to the list of noted science fiction authors to whom L. Ron Hubbard proclaimed that the way to make a million dollars was to start a religion my former neighbor the late Dr. Isaac Asimov. I believe I read his quoting of LRH in his memoir I. Asimov. Dick Kimball (talk) 16:07, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Banned users

This should and could be added to the article. I need time for sources, but is it true that Scientologist have been banned from the artcile??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.234.151.56 (talk) 07:50, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

::No, just IP addreeses from the CoS, mostly because the user could not be distinguished from one another. There is need to ad this to the article. This is an internal wikipedia affair. Bravehartbear (talk) 09:07, 1 June 2009 (UTC)

Nice work, and suggestions for edits

I'm afraid I don't have anything of substance to add, but this article has really come a long way towards adhering to the NPOV policies. I might even go so far as to suggest that it might be time to further edit some of the other articles in the Scientology family. In particular, I noticed that Scientology and the Legal System is a particularly nasty example of biased POV, and there doesn't seem to be anyone working on it, or at least discussing it. As for this page, I think what it most needs now is some significant cutting and summarizing. In particular:

• The introduction is four paragraphs long and includes a significant amount of information. I think it would be possible to include far more of this in the body, with the first paragraph expanded somewhat to include more basic descriptive information.
• Each of the sections go into a great deal of detail that might be best included in subarticles. History, for example, might be better served by expanding the Timeline article, which is rather poor, and merging it with that information; it could then be briefly summarized with key events. The section titled Beliefs and Practices is also fairly broad and could do with better summary, especially the Space Opera section, which is rather poorly organized.
• I think the top of the page might also better differentiate between Scientology and the Church of Scientology. It is not obvious in the article that the two have a meaningful separation. It might also behoove the editors of this article to summarize information about the Church of Scientology on this page, although that may prove difficult.
• If any meaningful difference exists between Scientology and the Church of Scientology, Free Zone might deserve more information in this article.

In general, I think this article simply needs to be more summarized, moving much of the information to subarticles which need far more work than this one at this point. I'm sorry that I'm unable to participate in these edits myself; Wikipedia doesn't play nice with satellite internet, and I can't keep a user name logged in long enough to do any serious editing. I hope my comments were helpful; nice work, and good luck. Cheers, 97.73.64.167 (talk) 04:35, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Hi! Could you sujest more specific changes in the talk page? It would be more helpfull if you do. :-) Bravehartbear (talk) 10:33, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

WHAT?

wait, so the church of scientology has been banned from editing this article? why? is not a form of discrimination? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Qazxswedccdewsxzaq (talk • contribs) 15:06, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

No, discrimination would be if Scientologists were banned from editing the article because they’re Scientologists, or if the decision to do so was heavily influenced by some dislike for the Church Of Scientology.

Here, the Church Of Scientology and some of its members were banned for their behaviour. See [6] and [7]. — NRen2k5^(TALK), 21:11, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Making things clear.

Ok, so, I made an edit to remove several information covered in a main article and was reverted because I removed a lot of information. I also believed that when I saw it amounted to about 13K, so, I try to edit again, step by step as requested, not to delete that much information, but to make a shorter article which still covers the topics while linking to other articles for people who want a deeper insight, and now I am branded as a vandal. Is it vandalism to try to make shorter, more reader-friendly articles? Because I don't think I am a vandal myself... RUL3R (talk) 00:42, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Not vandalism, perhaps, but I've already set out the position; if you take it step by step and explain where the information you delete is replicated, then we disinterested observers have a reasonable chance of being able to follow your edits. A 37K deletion of text is too much for most to grasp at one take. Rodhullandemu 00:45, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

My problem is not making step by step edits, the problem came on my second edit, I removed a couple of paragraphs on the body and spirit section so the article is shorter, since this article is not about Scientology beliefs and practices, nor is it about thetans, or many of the topics covered too deeply in this article, that also have articles of their own that are not listed or linked where they should be. I just believe that, since all this information has independent, standalone articles, then the topic should not be as profoundly covered here, but rather be mentioned in a brief description so readers have a general idea, and whoever wants more information, can visit the conviently linked article. I am a Scientologist myself, but I have tried to remain NPOV about the topic. RUL3R (talk) 00:56, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Then it is all the more important that you (a) do things in manageable chunks for the rest of us to follow your reasoning and (b) explain fully in an edit summary what you are doing. Managing large articles such as this is difficult at the best of times, and more so when the topic in general has been subject to recent top-level and external scrutiny. It's in your best interests to do so, to avoid accusations of conflict of interest. Hope that helps, but mass-edits raise red flags at present. Rodhullandemu 01:12, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

• RUL3R (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Changes by this user seem to have removed huge chunks of sourced material with no discussion whatsoever about it. This type of drastic change should be significantly discussed before it is made against consensus. Cirt (talk) 05:57, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Ok, here I am to discuss my point. I, and many will agree with me, find this article to be EXTREMELY long.

• Why do we cover in such great detail the History section, when we already have a Timeline of Scientology article?

This is the Scientology Main and everything here is covered somewhere else. The Scientology Main is like a intro to Scientology and for more info you go to the subpages. The page was built for a very long time by agreement of all the editors and even arbitration... What we don't like is that you just come here and take ownership of the page and you try to dictate what should there or not. Bravehartbear (talk) 08:27, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

It's still a huge history introduction for a 60 year old organization. RUL3R (talk) 16:13, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

• Why do we expand for over 15K information on the Beliefs and practices section when we already have a Scientology beliefs and practices article?

Only the basic principles are in the Main, the subpage is there for greater info. Bravehartbear (talk) 08:27, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

And I agree with a basic coverage. In a reverted edit I removed 13K of information, and it was not half of it. 13K is a lot for such a young organization that has an independent article covering the same topic. RUL3R (talk) 16:13, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

• Why do we have an extensively covered Organization section, when we already wrote independent articles on the Church of Scientology and pretty much every single Scientology organization?

See the above awnser.Bravehartbear (talk) 08:27, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

• Why shall we carry such a long Dispute of religion status section, when we have an article for Scientology as a state-recognized religion and an article for each and every country where Scientolgy's status a religion has caused any sort of controversy?

Same awnser.Bravehartbear (talk) 08:27, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

• My screen resolution is at 1280x1024. Yet, I have to scroll down two full screens to read the Controversies section, when we already covered in other articles Scientology controversies, Scientology and the Internet, Scientology and the legal system, and if you look at the Scientology template box you will find articles for every single controversy Scientology has ever arised.

So, my edits are in the interest of making smaller articles, easier to read and manage. I am now ready to discuss. RUL3R (talk) 07:20, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Scientology is a big subject. I expect the main page to introduce all the main aspect of Scientology including the controversy. Maybe some things could be stream down. You could present sujestions to do this, but removing entire chunks just because the info is in a diferent page, nope. Bravehartbear (talk) 08:27, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

RUL3R, being bold is generally a good idea, but with such a controversial article you should make a case based on a stated WP policy or by analogy with Featured Articles. (Choosing one at random) Australia is a big article about a complex subject, with lots of sub-articles. That includes an amount of content from sub-articles in the main article, and the fact that it's an FA suggests that it embodies what's thought of as WP best practice. These sorts of comparison may or may not help your point. MartinPoulter (talk) 15:19, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

I believe that the Australia example is misleading and can't be compared. Australia has over 400 years of recorded history, Scientoloy has about 60, and both are covered in almost the same detail. Also, you will find that the article could be improved with what I suggest. Both the CoS and it's detractors brought mayhem upon Scientology-related articles, and the mess has to be fixed. RUL3R (talk) 16:09, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Expanding comment. Perhaphs I am wrong to just delete it. But I am not suggesting to remove information. I am suggesting to order information. RUL3R (talk) 16:23, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

How about conforming to Summary Style, while migrating the detailed information to their respective articles? This way we preserve a sufficient outline of the content, with further details given elsewhere. We definitely need to find a healthy balance, because admittedly this article is too long. ←Spidern→ 16:47, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

External sources

Hello, I am proposing more references in the wiki-articles on Scientology. The ones I have added below are impartial, qualified, professional treatises on the subject. I feel that it must be possible for people using an encyclopedia and for all people using wikipedia, that when reading an article, they must be able to consult the available expertises on any subject and to be able to access them as easily and directly as possible in order to evaluate their information and attain the hightest possible level of truth by doing so. That is just as important to their own continuation of existence as to everybody elses. The analyses below have been undertaken from a plain research viewpoint, by learned people in related fields, who have no vested interests in the results. These qualities make these sources highly valuable to the public. In that perspective I would like to know if they can be added: 1) Scientology, Social Science and the Definition of Religion, by James A. Beckford. Ph.D, Prof Sociology 2) Scientology, Comparison with Religions of the East and West, by Per-Arne Berglie, Prof History and Religion 3) Is Scientology a Religion?, by Allan W Black, Associate Prof of Sociology 4) Scientology, a New Religion, by M Darrol Bryant Ph.D, Prof Religion and Culture 5) Scientology, by Régis Dericquebourg, Prof of Sociology and Religion 6) Scientology and Contemporary Definitions of Religion in the Social Sciences, by Frank K Flinn Ph.D, Associate Prof of Sociology 7) Scientology and Contemporary Definitions of Religion in the Social Sciences, by Alejandro Frigerio, Ph.D, Associate Prof of Sociology 8) Scientology a True Religion, by Urbano Alonso Galan, Doctor of Phylosophy and Licenciate in Theology, Gregorian University and Saint Bonaventure Pontifical Faculty Rome 9) Scientology, its True Nature, by Harri Heino, Prof of Theology 10) Is Scientology a Religion?, by Dean M Kelley, Counsellor on Religious Liberty 11) The Reliability of Apostate Testimony about New Religious Movements, by Lonnie D Kliever, Dr.Phil, Prof of Religious Studies 12) Religious Philosophy, Religion and Church, by G C Oosthuizen, Th.D, Prof (retired) Dept of Science and Religion 13) The Religious Nature of Scientology, by Geoffrey Parrinder, Ph.D, Prof Emeritus 14) The Church of Scientology, by J Pentikainen, Ph.D 15) Scientology, its Historical and Morphological Frame, by Dario Sabbattuci, Prof of History and Religion 16) The Relationship between Scientology and other Religions, by Fumio Sawada, Eighth Holder of the Secrets of Yu-itsu Shinto 17) Scientology and Religion, by Christiaan Vonck, Ph.D, Rector Faculty for Comparative Study of Religions 18) Apostates and New Religious Movements and Social Change and New Religious Movements, by Bryan Ronald Wilson, Ph.D 19) Scientology, An Analysis and Comparison of its Religious Systems and Doctrines, by Bryan R. Wilson, Ph.D. Awaiting reply, Taodeptus (talk) 13:34, 5 June 2009 (UTC)Taopeptus

It depends where they were published. This above list seems to at least overlap with a list of testimonies published by the Church of Scientology again and again on Usenet. Are they submissions to a court case that the experts were paid for? Have any undergone peer review? More details, please. MartinPoulter (talk) 14:39, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Martin, many of these works were done by highly acclaimed schoolars and can be found in google book. The fact that the CoS provides courtesy links to them doesn’t retract of their value. A courtesy link is not a self published source. I have never seen such scrutinity for works done by schoolars critical of Scientology. For your information Stephen Kent has recieved good money for his work in many court cases, he has also recieved terrible peer reviews and he is still used in this page.[8]

Per WP:RS # Scholarship

• The scholarly acceptance of a source can be verified by confirming that the source has entered mainstream academic discourse, for example by checking the number of scholarly citations it has received in citation indexes. A corollary is that journals not included in such indexes should be used with caution.

Bravehartbear (talk) 16:03, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Scholarly views on Scientology's status as a religion

This section looks more like a collection of quotes than a real Wikipedia article. It says this professor says this but that other one disagrees and says that. Instead of having so many quotes what if we just write:

Although "most scholars have concluded that Scientology falls within the category of religion for the purposes of academic study", there is disagreement on whether or not the Church of Scientology should be considered a church with religious status or not.

There in one sentence I just sumarized the entire 3 paragraph. Bravehartbear (talk) 14:58, 5 June 2009 (UTC)