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FYI: neither of those three well known individuals were regarded as what we now call citizen scientists. They were a politician, inventor, and an academic. This

FYI: neither of those three well known individuals were regarded as what we now call citizen scientists. They were a politician, inventor, and an academic. This is very very different to citizen science.

fuzzfactor 6y ago
I would regard them as prominent gentlemen scientists of their time, to say the least. For every prominent man or woman of science, there have always been countless others having equal or better technology, whose recognition falls below an arbitrary media-determined threshold for eminence, whether or not eminence was on the agenda. That much of it is a popularity contest. There's rock stars and there's all the rest of the loud guitar players. I accept a citizen scientist as toward the lesser end of academic credentials and lacking widespread recognition of their leadership or capability, but no shortage of talent or potential. And perhaps leveraging lesser resources or overcoming the same common limitations that otherwise encumber their equally ambitious peers, who do not become scientists at all even if they wanted to. By good fortune or not. The citizen-scientist is an everyman of some kind. Well, you gotta draw the line somewhere. At the interface between citizen-scientists and citizen-not-quite-scientists, its a pretty fuzzy line and there's equal talent on both sides. Similar talent but the more rarefied community has the actual accomplishments. OTOH at the other end of the spectrum are the most prominent scientists and the fuzzy interface between the few of them and the next tier of equal talents having top credentials but insignificant recognition by comparison. Similar accomplishments but the more rarefied community has the actual recognition. It's much less common for the most prominent in the 21st century to be a gentleman scientist of our time anyway. In between the top credentials and the lesser ones there's got to be an even more fuzzy line where the gentleman scientist and the citizen scientist can't tell which side of the line they're on their dang self.

fuzzfactor 6y ago

I would regard them as prominent gentlemen scientists of their time, to say the least. For every prominent man or woman of science, there have always been countless others having equal or better technology, whose recognition falls below an arbitrary media-determined threshold for eminence, whether or not eminence was on the agenda. That much of it is a popularity contest. There's rock stars and there's all the rest of the loud guitar players. I accept a citizen scientist as toward the lesser end of academic credentials and lacking widespread recognition of their leadership or capability, but no shortage of talent or potential. And perhaps leveraging lesser resources or overcoming the same common limitations that otherwise encumber their equally ambitious peers, who do not become scientists at all even if they wanted to. By good fortune or not. The citizen-scientist is an everyman of some kind. Well, you gotta draw the line somewhere. At the interface between citizen-scientists and citizen-not-quite-scientists, its a pretty fuzzy line and there's equal talent on both sides. Similar talent but the more rarefied community has the actual accomplishments. OTOH at the other end of the spectrum are the most prominent scientists and the fuzzy interface between the few of them and the next tier of equal talents having top credentials but insignificant recognition by comparison. Similar accomplishments but the more rarefied community has the actual recognition. It's much less common for the most prominent in the 21st century to be a gentleman scientist of our time anyway. In between the top credentials and the lesser ones there's got to be an even more fuzzy line where the gentleman scientist and the citizen scientist can't tell which side of the line they're on their dang self.