Between 1965 and 1983 the late Ron Hubbard (1911-1986) published a number of courses intended to rehabilitate extraordinary mental abilities and powers he claimed all human Beings basically have. These courses, put together, were the upper Levels of the so-called Bridge to Total Freedom™. Mr. Hubbard called the courses the Advanced Levels and sometimes "Pre-OT Levels". It consisted of the so-called Clearing Course and the Operating Thetan™ Levels (OT Levels).

In this report we seek to sort out the content and controversy that surround some of these Advanced Levels. The present report is limited the so-called original Clearing Course. It was researched in the early 1960s and the first graduates were produced in February 1966.

In 1978 the Clearing Course was largely taken out of use as the state of Clear, according to Mr. Hubbard, routinely was attained through other auditing, so-called New Era Dianetics™ Auditing (NED). The original Clearing Course do however still have its uses as persons that don't go Clear on NED auditing are given an alternative route to Clear consisting of Power Processes, Routine R6-EW and the present Clearing Course.   

That is why we do this examination of the notes and lectures Ron Hubbard published. Before we could do that we had however to do a little legal research as well.

Ron Hubbard's Advanced Levels have been printed, according to court documents, in at least 25,000 copies and distributed. Yet, it was sought to be held confidential by the copyright holder, L. Ron Hubbard's Library, as "unpublished works". In other words the copyright holder was trying to keep this publication and research secret.

The copyright holder, The L. Ron Hubbard Library, was trying to take a rather odd legal position. They were on the one hand publishing and distributing the materials on a large scale but were at the same time trying to claim these materials were unpublished works or trade secrets. This led to a string of law suits in the USA and also notoriously to a court case in Hague, Netherlands, home of the court for international affairs.

The outcome of all this was the ruling of the Court in Hague. In their sentence of June 9, 1999 it was clearly determined that the materials did not have trade secret status nor the status of unpublished works, but had normal protection for published works under Dutch and international copyright laws (see Hague ruling and details in appendix, especially paragraph 13 of the ruling).

In other words, in this present report we have to observe the normal academic rules concerning copyright. We cannot bring the course materials in full. But we can bring fair use quotes and refer in detail to what the course materials state. 

We are under copyright law allowed to bring exact procedures and processes as these explicitly cannot be protected under this law but have to be passed on as new knowledge to society. 

Note: Processes and procedures can only be protected under patent laws and only for a limited number of years. This is to make it financially attractive to do research and develop new technology. Under patent law protection it is possible to get a reasonable return on inventions. Inventions, processes and procedures cannot, however, be held secret or proprietary forever. But no such patents have ever been sought or existed for the present materials.

We are more at liberty when it comes to the other researchers covering the same subject. We have been able to obtain the works of three other researchers on the subject.

They are: Jeff Filbert. Publication: 'Excalibur Revisited' (1982).

L. Kin. Publication: 'From the Bottom to the Top - The Way Out' (1992).

The Pilot. Publication: 'Super Scio' (1997-99).

These three researchers have made their materials available on the Internet and in books and do not contest fair use quotes of extensive nature. 

Note: The Pilot's works is used in other Prometheus Reports. When it came to materials related to the Clearing Course we did not find a direct parallel but many mentions and comments throughout his book, Super Scio. Readers with special interest will have to read his full book to get these comments in context.

Most or all of Ron Hubbard's published papers on the Advanced Levels were also at some point in the public domain. This was as a result of the court case "Fishman/Geertz vs. Church of Scientology™ International". Steven Fishman introduced his own purchased copies of these materials as evidence as part of the so-called Fishman Affidavit. This was in 1993 in USA. This very extensive affidavit was later sealed by the courts, meaning it was no longer made available to the public but could only be used inside the court room. It did however result in that the original data for a number of years were circulated widely - and legally so. It started a debate at the time among experts in the subject that made it possible to check circulating non-copyrighted versions against the original data and put together a full report on the content and correct use of the original Advanced Levels. The present Prometheus Reports acknowledges the use of such verified materials.

The Editors

Trademark note: OT, Operating Thetan, Scientology, Dianetics, New Era Dianetics, L. Ron Hubbard, Hubbard, The Bridge to Total  Freedom, Purification RD, E-meter, Sunshine RD (and possibly more) are trademarks owned by 'Church of Spiritual Technology' located in California, USA. Any trademarks are in these reports only used for descriptive purposes.

The Prometheus Reports are copyrighted by Prometheus International, 2004. These reports can be reproduced, quoted and used for humanitarian and therapeutical purposes only. The reports should only be distributed to people who have obtained the state of Clear  or higher and have had these states verified by a qualified practitioner.  Prometheus Int is not affiliated with Church of Scientology™. It is headquartered in Eindhoven, Netherlands.