reactive mind

{{short description|Concept in Scientology}}

{{use mdy dates|date=April 2023}}

The reactive mind is a concept in Scientology formulated by L. Ron Hubbard, referring to that portion of the human mind that is unconscious and operates on stimulus-response,L. Ron Hubbard Science of Survival, p. 418, Bridge Publications Inc., 2007 (1st ed. 1951). {{ISBN|978-1-4031-4485-0}}. to which Hubbard attributed most mental, emotional, and psychosomatic ailments:

What can it do? It can give a man arthritis, bursitis, asthma, allergies, sinusitis, coronary trouble, high blood pressure and so on, down the whole catalog of psychosomatic ills, adding a few more which were never specifically classified as psychosomatic, such as the common cold.

: — L. Ron Hubbard (Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health, 1999 paperback edition, p. 69)

Despite the lack of scientific basis for his claims,Martin Gardner, Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science, ch. 22, Dover Publications Inc., I957 {{ISBN|0-486-20394-8}}. Hubbard's book Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health claimed that the reactive mind is composed of impressions of past events of pain and unconsciousness, which he called engrams.

In Scientology, an auditor uses an E-meter (a galvanic skin response detector)[http://www.trans4mind.com/transformation/gsr.htm The Biofeedback Monitor], {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080915112040/http://www.trans4mind.com/transformation/gsr.htm |date=2008-09-15 }} to locate engrams in the parishioner{{Cite book|title = World Religions in America, Fourth Edition: An Introduction|last1 = deChant|first1 = Dell|publisher = Presbyterian Publishing Corporation|year = 2009|isbn = 9781611640472|last2 = Jorgensen|first2 = Danny|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=34vGv_HDGG8C&q=world+religions+in+america+jacob+neusner+engrams&pg=PA302|editor-last = Neusner|editor-first = Jacob|pages = 229–230}} which are then erased, using Dianetics.{{cite book |title=L. Ron Hubbard, Messiah or Madman? |title-link=L. Ron Hubbard, Messiah or Madman? |first=Bent |last=Corydon |author-link=Bent Corydon |year=1987 |publisher=Lyle Stuart |isbn=0818404442 |page=269 |quote=The idea in Dianetics is to gain access to the postulates or "think" (immature evaluations) buried in moments of pain, unconsciousness, and shock, and "erase" them from the "reactive mind," thus refiling them in the conscious mind where they can be intelligently evaluated, used or discarded, at the individual's discretion.}} Scientology promotes such treatments to clear engrams believed to limit the individual's spiritual ability, to halt the decline of their spiritual awareness, and to increase their survival potential.{{Cite book|title = World Religions in America, Fourth Edition: An Introduction|last1 = deChant|first1 = Dell|publisher = Presbyterian Publishing Corporation|year = 2009|isbn = 9781611640472|last2 = Jorgensen|first2 = Danny|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=34vGv_HDGG8C&q=world+religions+in+america+jacob+neusner+engrams&pg=PA302|editor-last = Neusner|editor-first = Jacob|page = 301}}

From the end of the 1950s until the early 1970s, author William S. Burroughs used Hubbard's reactive mind theory as the basis of his cut-up method, which was applied to novels such as The Soft Machine.Wills, David S., Scientologist! William S. Burroughs and the 'Weird Cult{{'}}