he came for data, not fellowship
the Meeting is probably on the verge of coming around to talking explicitly about drugs and how to give up drugs for a certain period without feeling indescribably wretched and bereft, or maybe at least some data on how long one might expect the wretchedness of giving up drugs to continue before the old nervous system and salivary glands returned to normal.
Context
Hal's whole misreading of what recovery is, stated as an expectation: he has come for a timetable, a data-point on how long the wretchedness lasts before the nervous system resets — as if the Meeting were a clinic dispensing withdrawal schedules rather than a fellowship built on surrender. It is the quitting-for-consequences posture in its purest form; he wants to manage the symptom and leave, and cannot yet imagine the thing that actually saves people.