physicist

noun

Etymology: From physics + -ist. Coined by the English polymath William Whewell (1794–1866) in his book The Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences (1840): see the quotation.

1. A person whose occupation specializes in the science of physics, especially at a professional level.

   “Thus we may say, that while the Naturalist employs principally the ideas of resemblance and life, the Physicist proceeds upon the ideas of force, matter, and the properties of matter.”

   “Physicists find themselves called in to deal with such varied problems as the reduction of noise in diesel railcars, investigation of the Hertzian stresses set up by wheel-rail contact and improvement of the insulation of fish and banana vans.”

2. A believer in the theory that the fundamental phenomena of life are to be explained upon purely chemical and physical principles (opposed to vitalist).