WIXLIB

j& tounc/m oSCIENCE FICTIONReg. U. S. Pat. O ff.MAY, 1950NOVELETTECONTENTSVOL. XLV, NO. 3T H E H E L P I N G H A N D , by Foul A n d erso n .SHORT STORIEST H E a p p r e n t i c e , by Miles M. Acheson . . ' v . .T H E P O T T E R S OF F i E s k , by Jack V a n c e . iSERIALt h e w i z a r d *OF. . . 30, . 88L I N N , by A . E. van V o g t.( Part Two of Three P arts)ARTICLE. 6d i a n e t i c s : The Evolution of a Science, by L. Ron H ubbard . . .10643READERS’ DEPARTMENTST H E E D I T O R ’S PA GE .4I N T I M E S TO C O M E . . . . . . . . . 42T H E A N A L Y T I C A L L A BO RA T OR Y. . 8 7BOOK R E V I E W S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104EditorJ O H N W. CAMPBELL, JR.Assistant EditorC.TARRANTC O V E R B Y BRUSHIllu stratio n s b y B rush , C a r t ie r, M ille r, Rogers a n d W a r dThe editorial contents have not been published before, are protected by copyright an d cannpt be reprinted without publishers' perm ission. A ll stories in this m agazine a re fiction .No actual persofis are designated by name or character. Any sim ila rity is coincidental.Monthly publication issued by Street & Smith Publications, Incorporated a t 775 LidgerwoodA venue, Elizab eth , N ew Je rse y. Reentered as Second Class matter October 19, 1948 at thePost O ffice a t Elizab eth , N ew Je rse y, under Act of Congress of March 3, 1879. Copyright,1950, in U- S. A . and G reat Britain by Street & Smith Publications, Inc. G e rald H. Sm ith,President; Henry W . Ralston, Vice-President and Secretary; Ralph R. W h ittake r, J r ., VicePresident; Arthur P. La w le r, V ice-President;. Thomas H. K aiser, Treasurer. Subscriptions toCountries in Pan Am erican Union, 2.75 per ye a r; 3.00 per ye ar in C a n a d a , elsew here, 3.25per ye a r. A ll subscriptions should be addressed to P.O . Box 494, E lizab eth , N . J . W e cannotaccept responsibility fo r unsolicited manuscripts or a rtw o rk . Any m aterial submitted mustinclude return postage.General and Executive offices a t 122 East 42nd Street, N ew York 17, N ew Yo rk. 2.50 per Y e ar in U. S. A .Printed in16 the U . S. A .N E X T ISSU E ON SA LE M AY 19, 195025c per CopyA S T-1 U

CONCERNING DIANETICSThe long article on dianetics byL. Ron Hubbard, in this issue, is, Ifeel, a highly important publicationindeed. The article describes a tech nique of mental therapy of suchpower that it will, I know, seemfantastic. If so, it can also be saidthat the power of the human mindis, indeed, fantastic. I want to assureevery reader, most positively andunequivocally, that this article is nota hoax, joke, or anything but a di rect, clear statement of a totally newscientific thesis.Dr. Joseph A. Winter, M.D., wasasked to write the introductory note;he has studied the techniques in de tail, and learned the techniques him self. I have investigated the materialmyself. Dr. Winter can speak as amedical expert; I tan only say thatmy investigations have led me to theconviction that the phenomena Ihave observed definitely merit pub lication of this material for wideranalysis and testing.It would have been wholly unfairto publish such revolutionary ma terial until such time as Hubbard’stextbook on the technique was available. That book—“Dianetics: The4Modern Science of Mental Health”—is available now from HermitageHouse. It contains the exact descrip tion of the procedures used.Hubbard, as an engineer, hastackled the problem of the mind fromthe scientific method. Basically, thatmethod is :1. Gather all available data that is,or appears to be, relevant.2. From the data, form an hy pothesis.3. On the basis of the hypothesis,make a prediction.4. Experiment to check the validityof the prediction.5. Vary the experiments, and col lect more data.6. When the new theory breaksdown, take the now-collected dataand formulate a new hypothesis.7. Go back to .step 3.Most readers of this magazine arefully accustomed to that method; tothose who are not, the above de scribed process is not circular; it isspiral. Each turn of the spiral sweepsin more and more territory. It is theturning of precisely such a spiralprocess that led from Dalton’s earlyatomic hypothesis to Bohr’s originalASTOUNDING SC IE NC E -FIC T IO N

theory of atomic structure, to pres ent quantum-mechanical analysis ofnuclear forces. It has led to aircraftthat fly, automobiles that work, andradio that covers the planet. It is nota self-defeating circular process.It is also the logical process thatled to the present theories of dianetics.Now there is an interesting thingabout a scientific theory; the scien tist always rather vaguely hopes thetheory he is working with is true, butknows that it does not need to be. Ascientific theory is a useful tool; itneed not be true so long as it is use ful. Dalton’s theory implied atomswere hard little balls; it was incor rect, but it advanced chemistry.Therefore it was a good theory. Thepresent theories of dianetics may ormay not be true; that’s unimportant,provided the techniques describedactually work.In the scientific method, authorityis meaningless. That the new theorydisagrees with the Great Name, orwith previous theory, or with “aseverybody knows”, is a statementbest classified as a meaningless noise,so far as evidential value is con cerned. Proving that something is“theoretically impossible” is an ex cellent way of conclusively provingthe theory ft wrong. What “every body knows, of course” has been soconsistently wrong over the past onehundred thousand years it is surpris ing that the Ancient Authority,“everybody”, is still quoted. And sofar as Great Name arguments go,simply substitute the arbitrary nameCONCERNING D IAN ETICS“Joe Doakes” for the authority’sname; if the argument no longersounds so convincing—it never was.And that, basically, is why thepublication of Hubbard’s text wasnecessary before this article couldappear. There is one, and only onescientific argument with, for oragainst any scientific theory; experi mental evidence. I am most anxiousto publish articles confirming or dis proving Hubbard’s material; whetherright or wrong, it is important. Hehas got some provable, demonstrableresults; these must be explained. Theonly scientific method of examina tion is to have many scattered work ers repeat Hubbard’s experiments,using precisely the methods Hubbardspecifies, and record results. Then,following the scientific method, varythe experiments on logically deducedconsequences of the theories, and seewhat results occur.To save time and trouble: experi mental evidence cannot be denied byargument based on what Freud,Jung, Korzybski, or any other au thority said. I am most anxious topublish articles in the field of themind based on direct experiment.The high population of our mentalinstitutions constitutes experimentalevidence that something drastic inthe way of revision of psychotherapytechniques is in order. The revisionsproposed by dianetics may or maynot be the needed opes, but experi mental evidence; obtained by actu ally repeating Hubbard’s experi ments, is the one way to determine.T h e E d it o r .5

DIANETICSTHE EVOLUTIONO F A S C IE N C EBY L. RON HUBBARDA fact article of genuine im portance. See the Editor’s Page.Illustrated by M illerIN T R O D U C T IO NThe editor asked me to write this intro duction to one of the most important arti cles ever- to b published in AstoundingSC IEN CE FIC T IO N , for some ve/ygood reasons. First, he wanted to makecertain that you readers would not con fuse Dianetics with thiotimoline or withany other bit of scientific spoofing. Thisis too important to be misinterpreted. Sec ond, he wanted to demonstrate that themedical profession—or at least part of it—was not only aware of the science ofDianetics, but had tested its tenets andtechniques, and was willing to admit thatthere was something to it.There is something to i t ; there is somuch to it, in fact, that its potentialitiescannot yet be fully comprehended. Thoseof us who have worked with Dianetics—and that includes the Editor—have seenwhat it can do, and are convinced of itstremendous importance. I am not goingto try to persuade you of its importance toyou personally and to the human race; youmust determine that for yourself. Butwhile you are exercising your judicious,D IANETICSscientific skepticism, let me give you an other point to consider in the meantime.Dianetics is, in addition to all its otherattributes, a thrilling adventure. RonHubbard, long a member of the ExplorersClub, has gone exploring in the most ob scure terra incognita of all—the humanmind. He has explored a region whereinlies the mightiest power - in the knownUniverse.The mightiest power known in the Uni verse today is not the atomic bomb; thatpower was discovered, developed and con trolled by the greater power of humanthought. And human thought—our mostintimate possession—has been the leastknown of all powers. Hubbard, in under taking this research, undertook the great est adventure any man can imagine—astranger and more fantastic experiencethan any visit to the cities of the ArabianNights. To understand the human mind,he had to find a path into the seat of mad ness, find a way through that zone of dis tortion of thought—and on the other sidehe found the most marvelous mechanismimaginable. H e found a computing ma chine, whose -functional capacities tran43