Scientist: Have you heard about the word?
In 1834, the Scottish science writer and polymath Mary Somerville published her renowned work On the Connection of the Physical Sciences. This book showed how all of the physical sciences adhere to a primary form of science. In March 1834, an anonymous critic wrote a review about Somerville’s work in Quarterly Review. The critic was inspired by Somerville’s work and wrote about a critical topic that changed the landscape of science.
In this review, the author proposed that we use the word “scientist” to define chemists, mathematicians, philologists, zoologists, geologists, and any other natural philosopher. However, no one took the author seriously. Six years later, the author outed himself. The anonymous author was William Whewell (pronounced Hew-well), and he again called for the use of the word “scientist” in his work, The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences.
Public Domain https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=849696
My podcast goes into the story and debate over the term “scientist” and how the science community eventually came to use the word in Britain after America had already adhered to it. The debate that ensued was entertaining, as many were angry over the word “scientist,” as well as the name “physicist.” Blackwood Magazine wrote that the word “physicist” “is for sibilant consonants that fizz like squib…” Michael Faraday even said that he could never use the word “physicist” because it had “three separate syllables with I in it.” Oh, the horror!!
If you are interested in the details, you can read this fantastic story Scientist: The story of a word by Dr. Sydney Ross that he published in Annals of Science in 1962. You can find it online at Taylor and Francis Online at https://doi.org/10.1080/00033796200202722.
There is also a great podcast on NPR’s Talk of the Nation with host Ira Flatow and historian Dr. Howard Markel. The podcast also goes into the origination of the word “scientist,” which you can find here:
https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=127037417
Finally, there is a fun video created by Dr. Johanna Howes that briefly goes into the etymology of “scientist,” which you can watch here:
Thank you for listening and for reading! Until next time, carpe diem!
- Gabrielle