I am a Scientist AND an Artist! My intent is to do Science (make tea) AND Art (comment on message boards)!
Damn, I am awesome.
[zoidberg]These fancy clothes do![/zb]
Research. A scientist is someone who (using the scientific method, obviously) does original research to expand knowledge. MDs are, generally, definitely NOT scientists. Engineers, too. They might be conversant in a given field of science, but that doesn’t make the scientists, themselves.
What Slee said.
Now, there is both the matter of having a degree in the sciences and the matter of having a scientific mindset. The second is an attitude of discovery, and an understanding that when your working hypothesis and reality do not match, Reality wins (she’s such a bossy bitch, man…). “But but but that can’t be!” is about as unscientific a response to experimental results as was ever pronounced, and sadly I’ve heard it from people with multiple degrees in the sciences.
A lab coat.
So people who do applied science are not considered scientists? Or is it you have to be a research scientist or you are not a scientist at all. Which would make the term “research scientist” redundant.
Well, it evidently depends on who you ask. By my own definitions, “researcher” and “scientist” are different things (you can be either, neither or both) and science isn’t worth much if it has no application at all (most if not all developments in math, the “purest” of sciences, came from needing them for some specific application), but by the definitions of other people in these boards I was only a scientist for the three years I was in grad school. I spent another year with a job title of “Research Chemist” but there were no publications.
Interesting question!
A toddler who notices that mud is dirtier than
Is a 10yr old kid who ‘does science’ with his $20 Kmart chemistry set a scientist? Why or why not?
Is the term reserved for those who publish papers in peer-reviewed publications? What then about ‘novel’ science that hasn’t yet reached the level of being deemed worthy of publication?
Docs, engineers, vets, economists and statisticians are all degree/multiple degree holders who (mostly) adhere to the scientific method in their studies and resulting essays/theses. Are they worthy of being deemed scientists? Why/why not?
Any time that you contribute to the understanding of any aspect of the physical world, you are “doing science”.
I don’t care if you’re a pole dancer comparing brands/formulations of lubricant. I don’t care if you’re a 100 year old person in a nursing home trying to perfect a recipe for corn mush. You might have a job loading trucks. But, if you ever try to figure out a better way of loading the trucks or a better route to drive… You are, in those moments, doing science. And, therefore, a scientist.
That’s why science education is so very, very important. We all do these things. We are all scientists.
Self-declared. But one variable is the credibility you have among your audience.
I know you’re joking (I hope), but I’ve spent a lot of time in university Science buildings and few people ever wore lab coats. I don’t recall ever seeing a Physicist wearing one. And it would be extremely weird to expect one of my fellow Computer Scientists to wear one.
OTOH, hospitals have a ton of people wearing lab coats and few of them are Scientists.
Anyway …
Clyde Tombaugh is a classic example of a well regarded Scientist without a college degree. So, degrees don’t make you a Scientist. It’s what you do.
One key aspect, I believe, is adding to Scientific knowledge. Studying Science isn’t enough. You have to be helping to expand knowledge. Not necessarily publishing papers and such. But just figuring out something new that someone else will use, confirming (or debunking) old stuff, etc.
The only time I ever wore one is when they did a photo op. More wet labs may want to wear coats or some protection, but I don’t know anyone who really did with any regularity.