Definition of "scientist"

As we cannot use physician for a cultivator of physics, I have called him a physicist. We need very much a name to describe a cultivator of science in general. I should incline to call him a Scientist. Thus we might say, that as an Artist is a Musician, Painter, or Poet, a Scientist is a Mathematician, Physicist, or Naturalist.

1840, William Whewell, “Aphorisms Concerning the Language of Science. Aphorism XVI. In the Composition and Inflexion of Technical Terms, Philological Analogies are to be Preserved if Possible, but Modified According to Scientific Convenience.”, in The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, Founded upon Their History. […], volume I, London: John W[illiam] Parker, […]; Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: J. and J. J. Deighton, paragraph 4(3), page cxiii

Becoming more aware of the progress that scientists have made on behavioral fronts can reduce the risk that other natural scientists will resort to mystical agential accounts when they exceed the limits of their own disciplinary training.

2012 January, Stephen Ledoux, “Behaviorism at 100”, in American Scientist, volume 100, number 1, United States: Sigma Xi, page 60

The US supreme court has ruled unanimously that natural human genes cannot be patented, a decision that scientists and civil rights campaigners said removed a major barrier to patient care and medical innovation.

2013 June 21, Karen McVeigh, “US Rules Human Genes Can’t Be Patented”, in The Guardian Weekly‎, volume 189, number 2, page 10