Gentleman scientist
Encyclopedia
Private income
Private income is either:* any type of income received by a private individual or household, often derived from occupational activities, or* income of an individual that is not in the form of a salary ....
scientist
Scientist
A scientist in a broad sense is one engaging in a systematic activity to acquire knowledge. In a more restricted sense, a scientist is an individual who uses the scientific method. The person may be an expert in one or more areas of science. This article focuses on the more restricted use of the word...
who pursues scientific study
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
as a hobby. The term arose in post-Renaissance Europe but became less common in the 20th century as government and private funding increased.
History
Self-funding scientists were more common in the days before large-scale governmentGovernment
Government refers to the legislators, administrators, and arbitrators in the administrative bureaucracy who control a state at a given time, and to the system of government by which they are organized...
funding was available, up to and including the Victorian era
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
, especially in England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. Many early fellows of the Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...
in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
were gentleman scientists. The position significantly reduced during the 20th century as other forms of science funding increased.
Benefits and drawbacks
Self-funding has the disadvantage that funds may be more restricted, however it has the advantage of eliminating a number of inconveniences such as teaching obligations, administrative duties, and writing grant requests to funding bodies. It also permits the scientist to have greater control over research directions, as funding bodies direct grants towards interests that may not coincide with that of the scientist. Peer-review is sidestepped. Furthermore, intellectual propertyIntellectual property
Intellectual property is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized—and the corresponding fields of law...
of the inventions belongs to the inventor and not the employer.
Modern science requires competence and may require access to scientific equipment. However, gentleman scientists may have past careers as funded scientists, cooperate with funded colleagues, obtain partial equipment-only grants or choose directions where the most expensive resource required is the researcher's time. If the research succeeds, gentleman scientists publish results in the same peer-reviewed journals as funded scientists do.
Scientists may choose to work on unusual projects with high risk of failure also when the grant system does not fund them. A scientist could be attributed the status of a gentleman scientist if they work on such projects during a gap between two academic positions, for example.
Modern-day gentleman scientists
Modern-day equivalents are Stephen WolframStephen Wolfram
Stephen Wolfram is a British scientist and the chief designer of the Mathematica software application and the Wolfram Alpha computational knowledge engine.- Biography :...
who funds his own independent research through the sale of Mathematica
Mathematica
Mathematica is a computational software program used in scientific, engineering, and mathematical fields and other areas of technical computing...
software, Julian Barbour
Julian Barbour
Julian Barbour is a British physicist with research interests in quantum gravity and the history of science.Since receiving his Ph.D. degree on the foundations of Einstein's general theory of relativity at the University of Cologne in 1968, Barbour has supported himself and his family without an...
, Aubrey de Grey
Aubrey de Grey
Aubrey David Nicholas Jasper de Grey is an English author and theoretician in the field of gerontology, and the Chief Science Officer of the SENS Foundation. He is editor-in-chief of the academic journal Rejuvenation Research, author of The Mitochondrial Free Radical Theory of Aging and co-author...
, Barrington Moore, Robert Edgar
Robert Edgar
Robert Edgar may refer to:*Robert Allan Edgar , U.S. federal judge*Robert W. Edgar , former U.S. representative from Pennsylvania...
, Susan Blackmore
Susan Blackmore
Susan Jane Blackmore is an English freelance writer, lecturer, and broadcaster on psychology and the paranormal, perhaps best known for her book The Meme Machine.-Career:...
and James Lovelock
James Lovelock
James Lovelock, CH, CBE, FRS is an independent scientist, environmentalist and futurologist who lives in Devon, England. He is best known for proposing the Gaia hypothesis, which postulates that the biosphere is a self-regulating entity with the capacity to keep our planet healthy by controlling...
Peter Rich said of Peter D. Mitchell
Peter D. Mitchell
Peter Dennis Mitchell, FRS was a British biochemist who was awarded the 1978 Nobel Prize for Chemistry for his discovery of the chemiosmotic mechanism of ATP synthesis.Mitchell was born in Mitcham, Surrey, England....
: "I think he would have found it difficult to have gotten funding because his ideas were rather radical." Mitchell went on to win the Nobel prize for chemistry in 1978. Chemist Luis Leloir funded the research institute he headed, the Institute for Biochemical Research
Leloir Institute
The Leloir Institute is a non-profit research center in Buenos Aires specializing in biotechnology, including biochemistry, cellular biology, molecular biology, and related activities.-Overview:...
, in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He won the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 1970.
See also
Category:Gentleman scientists- Small ScienceSmall ScienceSmall Science refers to science performed in a smaller scale, such as by individuals, small teams or within community projects....
and Big ScienceBig ScienceBig Science is a term used by scientists and historians of science to describe a series of changes in science which occurred in industrial nations during and after World War II, as scientific progress increasingly came to rely on large-scale projects usually funded by national governments or groups...
Notable gentleman scientists
- Albert EinsteinAlbert EinsteinAlbert Einstein was a German-born theoretical physicist who developed the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. For this achievement, Einstein is often regarded as the father of modern physics and one of the most prolific intellects in human history...
- Robert BoyleRobert BoyleRobert Boyle FRS was a 17th century natural philosopher, chemist, physicist, and inventor, also noted for his writings in theology. He has been variously described as English, Irish, or Anglo-Irish, his father having come to Ireland from England during the time of the English plantations of...
- Henry CavendishHenry CavendishHenry Cavendish FRS was a British scientist noted for his discovery of hydrogen or what he called "inflammable air". He described the density of inflammable air, which formed water on combustion, in a 1766 paper "On Factitious Airs". Antoine Lavoisier later reproduced Cavendish's experiment and...
- Charles DarwinCharles DarwinCharles Robert Darwin FRS was an English naturalist. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed the scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection.He published his theory...
- Benjamin FranklinBenjamin FranklinDr. Benjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. A noted polymath, Franklin was a leading author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, musician, inventor, satirist, civic activist, statesman, and diplomat...
- Goldsworthy GurneyGoldsworthy GurneySir Goldsworthy Gurney was a surgeon, chemist, lecturer, consultant, architect, builder and prototypical British gentleman scientist and inventor of the Victorian period....
- George Frederick KunzGeorge Frederick KunzGeorge Frederick Kunz was an American mineralogist and mineral collector.- Overview :Kunz was born in New York City, USA, and began an interest in minerals at a very young age. By his teens, he had amassed a collection of over four thousand items, which he sold for four hundred dollars to the...
- Antoine LavoisierAntoine LavoisierAntoine-Laurent de Lavoisier , the "father of modern chemistry", was a French nobleman prominent in the histories of chemistry and biology...
- Alfred Lee LoomisAlfred Lee LoomisAlfred Lee Loomis was an American attorney, investment banker, philanthropist, scientist/physicist, pioneer in military radar usages, inventor of the LORAN or Long Range Navigation System, and lifelong patron of scientific research...
- David RittenhouseDavid RittenhouseDavid Rittenhouse was a renowned American astronomer, inventor, clockmaker, mathematician, surveyor, scientific instrument craftsman and public official...
- James LovelockJames LovelockJames Lovelock, CH, CBE, FRS is an independent scientist, environmentalist and futurologist who lives in Devon, England. He is best known for proposing the Gaia hypothesis, which postulates that the biosphere is a self-regulating entity with the capacity to keep our planet healthy by controlling...