SCIENTOLOGY is a spiritual movement that grew out of the ideas and practices advocated by Layfayette Ronald (L. Ron) Hubbard (1911–1986), a writer and former U.S. naval officer. After his discharge from the navy, Hubbard became a writer of popular fiction, but even before he left the service he dedicated himself to determining both the cause of the human situation and the means of correcting it. His efforts led him to author several book-length manuscripts in the late 1940s and to publish several articles. Then in 1950 his book Dianetics, released by a small publishing house, jumped onto the New York Times best-seller lists.

Dianetics was the name Hubbard gave to the system of thought and practice that grew out of his concentrated exploration of the human mind. He believed humanity's problems were caused by mental aberrations (called engrams); he proposed a form of counseling termed auditing as the...