Scientist: The story of a word

The appellation scientist is considered a title of honor, hotly contended for by economists, engineers, physicians, psychologists, and others. The word itself is widely believed to have been classical for centuries; yet it is actually of recent origin and had a hard fight to establish itself against a number of competitors. The argument, which is now an old and forgotten controversy, was chiefly about its etymology; but the history of a word is never solely a matter of etymology: the need for a new word is socially determined, right at the start, and any subsequent changes of denotation, as well as the cluster of connotations surrounding it, are also in response to demands from society. The word cannot be isolated from its historical background; indeed some key words offer a concise and suggestive clue to the historian or sociologist