Scienthrology

A portmanteau of “science” and “anthropology,” designating the anthropological study of scientific communities as cultures and as religious‑like systems. Scienthrology examines the rituals (lab meetings, poster sessions), totems (the microscope, the particle accelerator), kinship structures (advisor‑student lineages), and belief systems (progress, objectivity, reproducibility) that shape scientists’ lives. It treats science not as a pure method but as a human practice with its own myths, initiation rites, and sacred spaces. Scienthrology is part of the broader anthropology of science.

Example: “Her scienthrology fieldwork spent a year in a neuroscience lab, documenting how postdocs were initiated through late‑night experiments and how equipment failures were interpreted as ‘testing their devotion.’”

Scienthrology by Abzugal Nammugal Enkigal March 23, 2026

Scientology 

The one "religion" that Atheists and Christians can look at and just say to each other "Thats bullshit."

Christian: God is to real!
Atheist: The bible is a book a fairytails!
Scientologist: Hello have you heard about the church of Scientology?
Christian & Atheist: Thats a lode of bullshit!

Scientology by JerZeyCJ March 7, 2010

Scientology 

A cult founded by science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard. There core beliefs are as follows:

This area of the galaxy was once ruled by an alien warlord named Xenu. 65 million years ago his empire was overpopulated horribly, so to combat the overpopulation he had trillions of citizens called in for psychiatric evalutations and tax audits, where they were given paralytic drugs, loaded onto space planes, and flown to Planet Teegeeack. Once on this planet, their bodies were stacked in huge piles around volcanoes, while atom bombs were dropped into these volcanos, instantly killing trillions of galactic citizens.

To keep these people from reincarnating in the rest of the galaxy, Xenu set up a special trap. Powerful force-fields kept their souls (called "Thetans" in Scientology jargon) from escaping, and these thetans were then shown special holographic movies about the various lies they are supposed to believe, with characters like Jesus, Mohammed and Buddha. Over time, these thetans began to believe Xenu's lies about false gods, and began to reincarnate on Teegeeack (but the thetans called this world "Earth"). When intelligent life appeared on Teegeeack, thousands or millions of "Thetans" cling to every native soul (er, "thetan") and fill it's head with nonsensical thoughs and irrational beliefs.

The key idea of Scientology is to avoid tax officials and psychiatrists at all costs, while paying the church a large amount of money for special "counseling" (called "auditing" in their jargon) to help you reach a special enlightened state called "Clear" where you telepathically communicate with these "thetans" clinging to you and force them out of your body, and rid yourself of evil Xenu's influence.

(By the way, most Scientologists don't know this, like the Mystery Cults of the Greco-Roman world, Scientology doles it's doctrine out in tiny doses to it's new recruits, and tells the public next to nothing about what it believes. You don't hear that whole story until you reach a special rank in their group called "OT3" for "Operating Thetan 3". Their doctrine holds that if this got out, the Thetans in people would revolt at hearing the truth and people would get sick and die possibly just by hearing this story, which of course leads people who aren't Scientologists who hear this story to tell it to others and watch them not die or get ill from it.)

The Church of Scientology takes advantage of the gullibility of the American people to make a tidy profit.

Scientology by Student-Athlete December 10, 2004

Scientology, Church of 

A dangerous and large organization claiming to be devoted to the practice of the new age religion, Scientology. The church was founded by science fiction writer Lafayette Ronald Hubbard as a method of quickly attaining massive amounts of wealth through "self-help" book sales such as 'Dianetics', and fees for providing "auditing" courses to remove "engrams"-the thousands of restless alien spirits that cause all the strive on Earth. In reality, this auditing appears to be methods of indoctrinating sessions of hypnosis, often proclaimed brainwashing by critics(though not completely without justification as behavioral modification techniques are known to be present)

Currently the Church is headed by David Miscavige and keeps a headquarters, the Church of Scientology International, in Los Angeles, California.

It is infamous for it's controversial actions, some of which are:

•The Fair Game policy, a highly aggressive policy of the church which allows members to take whatever actions necessary to silence any and all critics(dubbed Suppressive Persons) of the church and its practices. This is commonly implemented utilizing the legal system to harass individuals into submission with barrages of frivolous lawsuits, false criminal charges, and any other means to demoralize the potential source of bad PR.

•Numerous deaths related to the Church and its practices;
Cases of suicidal depression, criminal neglect such as the case of Lisa McPherson, and countless mysterious deaths that point to the church have been recorded. A full list of Scientology related deaths can be seen at http://www.whyaretheydead.net/

•Disconnection, a type of religious shunning in which a scientologist is required to break all ties and communication with friends and family members that are possibly harmful to the PR of the church.

•The extreme opposition to psychiatry, sometimes to the point of denying members of gravely needed mental help.

So I talked to this guy that said he was member of scientology, he said that maybe my leukemia was all in my head. That Scientology could cure me of what is really just a psychosomatic disorder. How come doctors let people die when Scientology, Church of, is there to help?

Scientology, Church of by Arbiter117 April 28, 2009

scientology 

A new-age religion thought up by ex-sci-fi writer L. Ron Hubbard. They try to recruit new members by offering them 'personality tests' to determine the 'root cause' of the person's unhappiness. Interestingly, the solution to this 'root cause' is usually paying lots of money to the Church of Scientology. Scientologists have been rightly satirised in several TV programmes, films and computer games, for example the movementarian cult in The Simpsons or the hubologists in Fallout 2, but despite this Scientology is still attracting a steady stream of new converts. The main reason for this is that people are idiots.

"Hey, did you notice that the personality test on www.scientology.org almost always tells you that you're unstable and depressed?"

scientology by Underscore September 4, 2003

scientology 

A religous cult who's beliefs revolve around an intergalactic warlord named "Xenu" who nuked a bunch of aliens here on Earth billion of years ago. The souls of these aliens, called "Thetans", now inhabit our bodies and make us unhappy. The only way to get rid of these "Thetans" is to pay a bunch of money to these con men for the rest of your life.

Scientology is the biggest con of all time.

scientology by Xenu.net October 23, 2003

scientology 

One word. Bullshit

Scientology is the mother of all bullshits! I still can't believe people still believe in this crap!
bunch of dumb fucks

etc Tom Cruise

scientology by Craptology January 18, 2006