scientist

noun

sci·​en·​tist ˈsī-ən-tist How to pronounce scientist (audio)
1
: a person learned in science and especially natural science : a scientific investigator
2
Scientist : christian scientist

Examples of scientist in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Scientists are curious about the sun's inner workings to better track massive bursts of energy called coronal mass ejections that can hurl toward Earth. — CBS News, 6 Aug. 2026 Outside climate and fire scientists said the flash study made sense and reflects a world where hotter and drier conditions are making fires burn more often and more intensely. — ABC News, 6 Aug. 2026 That’s because mRNA vaccines can be manufactured much faster than traditional vaccines, allowing scientists to better match circulating influenza strains. — Berkeley Lovelace Jr, NBC news, 6 Aug. 2026 Using mechanisms scientists are still trying to understand, the cilia wave around to generate fast-moving vortices of water that circulate oxygen to the coral’s outer tissues, in addition to helping keep the colonies free of sediment. — Marlowe Starling, Quanta Magazine, 5 Aug. 2026 See All Example Sentences for scientist

Word History

Etymology

scient- (in Latin scientia "knowledge, science" or in scientific) + -ist entry 1

Note: The word scientist was apparently first introduced by the English polymath William Whewell (1794-1866). The coinage is referred to in an unsigned book review authored by Whewell in The Quarterly Review, vol. 51 (March & June, 1834), pp. 58-59: "The tendency of the sciences has long been an increasing proclivity to separation and dismemberment … The mathematician turns away from the chemist; the chemist from the naturalist; the mathematician, left to himself, divides himself into a pure mathematician and a mixed mathematician, who soon part company; the chemist is perhaps a chemist of electro-chemistry; if so, he leaves common chemical analysis to others; between the mathematician and the chemist is to be interpolated a 'physicien' (we have no English name for him), who studies heat, moisture, and the like. And thus science, even mere physical science, loses all traces of unity. A curious illustration of this result may be observed in the want of any name by which we can designate the students of the knowledge of the material world collectively. We are informed that this difficulty was felt very oppresively by the members of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, in their meetings at York, Oxford, and Cambridge, in the last three summers. There was no general term by which these gentlemen could describe themselves with reference to their pursuits. Philosophers was felt to be too wide and too lofty a term, and was very properly forbidden them by Mr. [Samuel Taylor] Coleridge, both in his capacity of philologer [philologist] and metaphysician; savans was rather assuming, besides being French instead of English; some ingenious gentleman [apparently William Whewell himself] proposed that, by analogy with artist, they might form scientist, and added that there could be no scruple in making free with this termination when we have such words as sciolist, economist and atheist—but this was not generally palatable … ." As Whewell indicates, his coinage was not a success, though, undeterred, he reintroduced it in 1840, and the word seems to have been produced independently of Whewell in the following two decades in both Britain and the United States (where it was more readily accepted). For documentation and details, see Sydney Ross, "Scientist: the story of a word," Annals of Science, vol. 18, no. 2 (June, 1962), pp. 65-85.

First Known Use

1834, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Time Traveler
The first known use of scientist was in 1834

Phrases Containing scientist

Browse Nearby Words

scientism
scientist
scientistic
See all Nearby Words

Cite this Entry

“Scientist.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/scientist. Accessed 6 Aug. 2026.

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Kids Definition

scientist

noun
sci·​en·​tist ˈsī-ənt-əst How to pronounce scientist (audio)
: a person skilled in science and especially natural science : a scientific investigator

Medical Definition

scientist

noun
sci·​en·​tist ˈsī-ənt-əst How to pronounce scientist (audio)
: a person learned in science and especially natural science : a scientific investigator

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