WHAT IS A SCIENTIST? ___________________________ For a start, science, in my view, is the study (by anyone) of the world in which we live. It is a gathering of data obtained through our senses, such as they are, and formulated into  hypotheses which are constantly changed or modified to reflect new data which can be assimilated into an understanding of our world. The world is not linear. Linearity reflects a stagnation. The world is not a stagnant entity, any more, of course than the universe-as-a-whole. A scientist, therefore, is a person who studies science. A scientist does not have to be 'qualified' by anyone. Science is a product of reasoning. It therefore follows that anyone who can reason, is a scientist. The problem with science today, especially, is that it has been forced (often by some necessity) to be split into 'disciplines' which have become esoteric 'clubs' that a few self-appointed persons have deemed unfit for those who are not inculcated into their club, by their own rules. Science and scientists have degenerated into those who have control of a discipline and the 'knowledge' that comes from that discipline and a special language ensues to protect such discipline. Thus, a great deal of science and scientists have stagnated science and it is often science no longer. If one collects all the data from the various disciplines, we may attempt at a better overall understanding, which is what most of us want. It is all very well to have a large number of disciplines but if they cannot talk to each other, they are of little use in the universe-as-a-whole. The universe is totally interconnected. There are no disparate bodies. The universe is an electrical phenomena; nothing else makes much sense because the data from mathematics is not (always) observable. If you start out with a premise, then it needs to be observed, recorded, modified with new data, tested and repeated. If these basis rules of (all) science are observed, then we are at least on the way to understanding. Nothing is stand-alone. Everything works with everything else. Mathematics is a wonderful science. However, it does have its limitations. These are mainly because there are few shades of grey in any particular answer. The data fit or they don't fit. There is also a problem with manipulation. Mathematics can be made to say anything. However, mathematics cannot explain a great deal of the universe-as-awhole. It cannot explain a leaf or a human person. That is because it uses a higher level language than that of purely sensual observation. The further you try to explain something beyond this first level of actual bodily sense data, the further away a complete explanation gets. Imagine a table. You sense it as far as you can by touch, smell and so forth. That is what a table is. As soon as you try to describe it to some-one else, the table is replaced by something else; your words about the table. It is therefore not the table. We assume that others are hearing what we say and that there is general agreement about what your words mean, but they are not the table you smelt and touched. To be a scientist, one needs to explore. Constantly explore. Never stop exploring, otherwise you cease to be a scientist and merely a spectator without a particular world-view. One of the major dilemmas of science and scientists is that they often produce a theory that most agree with and nothing else matters. This theory then becomes sacrosanct, for example, Einstein's Theory of Relativity. Although not really totally his theory (he plagiarised many mathematicians before him), it does not explain the universe-as-a-whole in terms of very much observational data but data steeped in mathematics, a great deal of which is a bone of contention. The more data we learn the more the static, sacrosanct theories come into grief. They become dogmas of a religion for the chosen few. They are therefore no longer scientific as they do not move forward with new data. This is a sad reflection on science as a subject. I won't even bother to go into the vested interests of modern scientists; the sentence itself says it all.

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