Is being a scientist something you do, or something you are?

Over at Neurotopia, SciCurious has a fabulous post on the question of who is a scientist. Her discussion really teases out a lot of important nuances, and I think her analysis is spot on.

I'm going to add my two cents simply to connect Sci's discussion with an issue I've pondered before: the boundaries (or lack thereof) between who we are and what we do.

When someone says, "I'm a scientist," at least in common usage, there is some ambiguity about what precisely he or she is asserting:

• I'm employed as a scientist (or am qualified to be and am seeking such employment).
• I've studied science.
• I know a lot about science.
• I do scientific research.
• I apply scientific approaches to solving problems/understanding my world.
• I dig science.

In her post, SciCurious argues against the idea that the only people who count as scientists are employed as scientists. (Read her post, because I'm not recapping her argument here.) To check our intuitions about what's tied up in the claim, "I'm a scientist," it's probably useful to examine other kinds of claims of the form "I'm an X" people make.

There are some instances in which we can identify ourselves as having a role that pretty much depends on official employment status or something like it:

• I'm a waiter at Perry's.
• I'm a board certified plastic surgeon.
• I'm the Representative elected by the 13th Congressional District.
• I'm an interim Associate Dean for the College of Engineering.

But there are other instances in which we seem to be identifying something that isn't dependent on employment or an official role:

• I'm a violinist." (Maybe I play professionally, maybe I just play for fun.)
• I'm a Cubs fan.
• I'm a lefty.
• I'm a BSG fan.

We can separate the question of what I do (as part of a paying job, as part of a family or community or other organization, for my own entertainment, out of habit or compulsion, etc.) from the question of who I am. Sometimes how I understand who I am ends up being pretty tightly linked to my experiences (e.g., a war refugee, a parent, a product of the public schools). My understanding of myself may also be tied to the perspective I bring to the world and my attempts to navigate through it.

Being educated in science, trained to perform scientific research, involved in performing research -- these experiences can be formative. It doesn't mean that they are for everyone. But for some people, these experiences feel like they hit one of the resonant frequencies that define who we are.

Approaching the world as basically intelligible, being committed to the idea that we can learn more by posing questions carefully and then making observations or performing experiments to gather relevant data -- this mindset makes the world feel like a very different place. Those with this perspective will have an easier time communicating and coordinating efforts with each other than they will with folks whose take on reality is different.

Working scientists have the "what I do" element. It's likely that the vast majority of working scientists also have the formative scientist experiences, and the scientific perspective on the world, that make them feel that the right answer to "who I am" includes "scientist" or something like it -- even if their scientific employment were to cease for one reason or another.

But not everyone who has had scientific education and training -- even through Ph.D.s and postdocs -- ends up employed as a scientist, or even wishing to be employed or otherwise involved in scientific research. Nor, for that matter, is everyone who sees the world through a scientific lens a working scientist.

Do formative experiences and guiding perspectives count here? Are the people whose identities are tied up with scientific education and experiences, with affinity for the knowledge-building project of science, just wrong to see science as a crucial part of who they are?

This isn't a question about who to call to culture your sore throat or to fix your supercollider. On questions of that sort, professional status and experience is totally relevant. Rather, I think there's an important question here about how broadly we ought to define the extended family of scientists. Working scientists are dealing, in the trenches, with particular sorts of problems, but they can find succor, understanding, and maybe even a community that feels like home in their interactions with people who aren't working scientists but whose identities are tied up in science.

To the extent that scientist want non-scientists to be scientifically literate and informed about the value of scientific approaches to problems, there must be some recognition of the value of a broader community with some attachment to the scientific perspective. Just as we don't expect every English major to become an English professor (instead, looking on a mastery of the language and an appreciation for the literature as worthwhile components of an individual's human flourishing), we shouldn't expect that every person who studies science must ultimate do science else that study be wasted.

Scientific jobs may be scarce, but there's no reason to think that scientific education, experiences, and perspective on the world couldn't be shared more widely. Indeed, that seems like just the sort of thing scientifically minded folks would encourage.