I fear that it is, but I hope that it is not so.

I fear that it is, but I hope that it is not so.

I fully agree with both that this is the way it has been. All good and bad character traits of the society are present among the scientists in a sophisticated way.

I would say that not only scientists, but technologists as well.  As opposed to money or other types of class divisor, division of classes due to knowledge will be that much harder to eradicate

Unfortunately

I fully agree with Enzo, as wel as Ray. The sgoodh of ociety consists of good and bad.

Scientists do not constitute separate class within society because their research should ultimately benefit society. So, they should be a part of society.

I mean 

I fully agree with Enzo, as wels as Ray. The good of society consists of good and bad.

The term "Ivory Tower" does exist for a reason. However, few things in life are black and white. Scientists belong to a class that does have a certain degree of privilege over and above mere knowledge/education. Yet without the "insider" knowledge scientists possess society would suffer. In other words, there is a trade-off. I recall a short story of a society in which all were equalized: those with greater physical prowess were chained to weights adjusted to make their ability to perform physical feats equal to all others; those possessing greater intellect had a noise device implanted that would blare varying noises every few seconds so as to interrupt thought processes; the beautiful were forced to wear masks, etc. While there of course exist privileged classes that do not offer the kind of trade-off that scientists do (and indeed are detrimental to society in many cases), in many ways true equality means reducing everyone to the lowest common denominator (true, that which is lowest can be raised, but never sufficiently high). Every political system that was or is rests upon privilege. Nor are scientists much different from other specialists in fields like the humanities or mathematics (although some still count mathematics among the sciences, I believe a field can't be scientific if it doesn't involve empirical inquiry). I was lucky in that both of my parents had graduate degrees and took a keen interest in my intellectual development, as they did my siblings. Many whom sociologists might consider members of the same "class" (e.g., as sharing the same socioeconomic status, belonging to or being of the same race and gender, and so forth) did not have this luxury. Unfortunately, inequality is writ into nature itself, as despite the increasing recognition of synergistic mechanisms and the paradigm shift from genetics to epigenetics, competition remains a central and primary evolutionary force.

That said, I do think that the scientific community has not lived up to its responsibility regarding explication and education of the non-scientific public. The late, great J. B. Conant was, I believe, way ahead of his time in that he recognized not only the serious and growing gap between the layperson's concept of "science" vs. those of practicing scientists, but also in his several books sought to help remedy this. Various organizations devoted to scientific education and literacy, such as the AAAS, have long recognized the systematic mischaracterization of the nature of science (NOS) that makes up the entirety of classroom science indoctrination, where students learn the myth of The Scientific Method and are provided instead with misconceptions of key notions (particularly how theory informs hypothesis generation, experimental design, and the interpretation of outcomes as well as the ways in which theories in general are more akin to frameworks then some proposition confirmed by The Scientific Method).

This discourse, though, hasn't translated into practice and is itself part of the problem: the research and exchanges on this topic are among specialists. Meanwhile, popular science books, shows, articles, etc., typically do not just simplify technical matters but distort, sensationalize, and otherwise unnecessarily misrepresent scientific topics. And that's without getting into the ways in which scientists use their authority to promote ideologies and biases masquerading as objective "science". I've watched and attended seminars in which scientists present their view on the "right way" to mislead the public for the greater good and celebrate their ability to do so rather than rely on trusting the public to understand. While I sympathize with such views in the fields where they are expressed (such as climate science), I do not believe the matter to be as dichotomous as is represented. A central reason why, for example, I've heard multiple talks on the way to essentially distort the levels and nature of uncertainties in climate science to avoid the misuse of these as well as the misunderstanding is because the public is insufficiently familiar with the uncertainties ubiquitous in all scientific fields ("all models are wrong, but some are useful").

Rather than concentrate on the ways in which scientists and scientific organizations should serve as moderators more than mediators of research findings, I believe that more attention needs to be paid to producing the kind of popular works that Conant wrote. Additionally, while popular books on quantum physics or neuroscience abound, these at best present simplified accounts of subject matter rather than the nature of science an scientific research. Those that don't sensationalize or simplify to the point of distortion indirectly cement the inaccurate understanding of the sciences that pre-college education (and some college education) instilled in the first place.

While scientists will always and of necessity represent to some extent a privileged class, more can be done to equalize. The path to this goal is through an improvement in the quality of discourse between laypersons and scientists, and I believe this improvement must be qualitative. That is, we do not need more of the same, we need to change the nature of popular science as presented by scientists (alas, the media in general is far worse when it comes to misrepresenting the sciences and research). 

Science is for people

Let the Scientist be within in the same class as others, but  from other pressures that would affect their attention to work.

Hello!

I do not see myself belonging to any elite or special class of people from a socio-economical viewpoint. Science provides a precious scenario to exercise different 'ways of thinking' that make me useful and happy and facilitate my understanding of phenomena beyond science. People from other disciplines (e.g., Art) might say the same.

Cheers, Alexis

Hi All; Most of them may from middle class of society but as per their research work quality of course they constitute separate Class within Society. Hats off for them.

I agree with Alexis and also don't feel myself belonging to some privileged class. People from different areas of knowledge and disciplines has their networks and some of them contribute articles to different journals or write books...

On top of it,  in some countries (for example, Ukraine)  you need to be enthusiactic and to have a courage to do scientific work which is not adequately payed. Our young people don't want to enter post-graduate course, because they don't want to have a precarious leaving as a scientist.

Science and its practice is accessible to everyone (e.g. citizen science). Perhaps the main difference with a professional scientist is the extent of existing background knowledge concerning published literature and the tools used to practice science?

From my observation, most of us belong to the group of people that are privileged by performing their work to a large extent freely. We can choose which project to start and which idea to follow. So, I'd say we are privileged not in the socio-economic sense and, therefore, do not build a 'class in society' as the original question is suggesting. However, like artists and authors, we do only have to abide to the law and follow scientific reasoning. 

While In principle knowledge is available to anyone, the means of getting it are not. While geographical barriers are not as important today, it has been substituted by technology and it needs to be acquired by money. The matter in which we evaluate the students today as in a production line does not leave time to make access to knowledge to every one as easy as it might sound in principle. The universities are becoming business driven more and more. These are some of the factors which is driving the knowledge-able into a separate class and even within that class the scientific and technologically oriented are becoming more important and a class of their own.

I think this seggregation is already well established. For example,"A growing number of private coaches with blackened windows, upholstered seats and Wi-Fi that shuttle employees of Google, Apple Inc. (AAPL) and Facebook Inc. to Silicon Valley have fueled a debate about inequality in a city where software engineers just out of college can expect to make more than $100,000-a-year. Their drivers and other residents who make half that amount are paying $2-a-ride on public buses and struggling to keep up with fast-rising rents."(http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-01/san-francisco-sued-over-google-bus-project-by-community-group.html ).

Technology and science are both intertwined in this day and age and as such we are part of the driving force of the technocracy. It is up to us to acknowledge this divide and narrow it down.

Dear @Alexander, your question may have different answers regarding the part of the world, country where scientist live. It would be nice that scientists belong to " Society Middle Class, where scientists belong financially", as you say,but it is not true for my country! And Scientists do not constitute a privileged class, they should not! They are supposed to be a people of integrity, not elite!

I needed some time to find an answer. My possible responses are.

1. At no condition should scientist build an own class, because they serve society. And society is paying for his job

2. At no price should they always search for connection and primary understanding  in society because some times they have to do jobs, which eventually are not pleasured. They must build an own class.

3. In most conditions the scientist needs isolation from the daily surrounding to be able to do a scientific job.

4. Scientists who feel themselves as a better kind of humans are unbearably arrogant. Scientists are humans like all other humans.

To be true, each of these points has it´s truth but also some some question marks.

I think yes but personally tried my best to be more often with public. 

Professionally and in mission yes, it is a distinct subgroup. In a group there are several subgroups, a subgroup with greater cardinality or with more properties is better in purpose than others in the group.

As a subgroup of society, scientific group has more purposes than any other group: to function within the group to promote and expand its domain of discourse and to go out in to society and influence, apply results to benefit society: intellectual dimension and social purpose (application ) unlike the subgroup of business people for instance whose sole singular purpose is to get profit out of society however poor or destitute social members are.  

The scientific group is different in purpose, desire and satisfaction: intellectual growth, accomplishments and prominence and solving problems than in other materialistic satisfactions unlike other subgroups of society.

Right, same for me. I'm trying to involve more people in scientific stuff (by social media), I thought at the beginning it is an easy task, by the time I realized it is really a hard task..but I'm still optimistic.

Personally, I can't claim that I communicate a lot with people, but I communicate easy with people from any group of society. I haven't noticed that people from other groups feel uncomfortable when communicating with me. Even if you don't have much in common with somebody, you always can find something mutual.

I believe these open discussions on RG are going to be very helpful in changing the system for the better. In my long scientific career as membrane biologist I had the opportunity to interact with numerous well-known scientists in various societies. As expected they are very dedicated nice people, better than the average in society. However, there are too much power politics in the area of money and ideas which unfortunately go together sometimes in a wrong way in science. I had been a long term victim of this “Close-knit Society” handling the “money-idea” as a researcher in the field of Active-Ion-Transport. The RG has helped me to bring out those over three-decade old suppressed-ideas and present openly to the scientific community within a short span of about three months.

These are currently under discussion in my RG site. Briefly, this is what happened. During the early 1980’s I found that my new data do not fit then 30-year old hypothesis based on which thousands of papers were published each year. So, I searched for a new model that can explain my data. Using years of dedicated efforts we resolved the problem proposing a new model that not only accommodated our data but also many published information that did not fit the old Post-Albers scheme. We promptly published the data in Biochem J. in 1986. Subsequently we published numerous papers in reputed journal giving a detailed unified mechanism of action of the Na-pump, H-pump and Ca-pump. However, those critical publications remained hidden without getting any attention of the elites in the field. I saw the field virtually died in early 2000 for a lack of new ideas. Then I decided to revive the field with my published ideas. I started submitting my ideas in the form of commentary articles to Journals like Biochem J., JBC, Biochemistry, APS journals etc.  But were rejected based on editorial decision alone without sending to outside reviewers. At last Faculty 1000 agreed to publish my papers in their open access journal. Then I came to the RG site.  I invite you all to visit my RG site for the details.

Dear Alexander,

Dear All,

Your explanation seems to be logical but I must agree with Ierardi. In Hungary, I have not found that scientists would form a class or a cast. Majority of my friends are not scientists and I cannot find common subjects and matters with the so called scientists. The raison may be among a lot of others that scientists are very badly respected and paid and the really honest scientific interest is rare among common soldiers and officers of science. Simple university teachers and researchers are separated from small and big bosses. Bosses like to make their subordinates feel their power and they (bosses) are interested mainly in powerful assignments and money. It is a rarity to find ideas and originality – as I have experienced – in these people. As to scientific discussions, during a month at RG I could discuss more than for 20 years at my workplace.

I summary, Hungarian scientists do not form a community either in their spiritual or financial interests.

Considering that it is difficult to understand our environment and fellow-men, I may be wrong.

I do not know what is the situation in other countries?

Dear Henk,

I am waiting for your pragmatic opinion and the description of the Dutch situation.

Mit freundlichen Gruessen,

András Bozsik

Dear Hanno,

I cannot truly understand one of your phrases: “Scientists who feel themselves as a better kind of humans are unbearably arrogant. Scientists are humans like all other humans.”

Each man/woman thinks secretly s/he is a special being. Modesty is a real rarity but this is a human feature. I feel scientists should be aware of their responsibility as cultivated and thinking peoples. I remark: many “scientists” do not effort their brain performance.

Dear All,

I think Michael has had a point: scientists have time to think and some of them do really think.

Dear András.

My comments are pure satirics.

To give a serious answer. I think that scientists should not forget their origin, they are daughters or sons of "normal" parents. And of course we are special beeings, but no reasons to feel better, just feel your own identity.

Lawyers tend to form a "caste". Even the judges. And doctors. The fashion designers attend mostly other fashion designers. Musicians talk and dress like other musicians. Aside from trivial matters of friendship or other insignificant sentiments, architects use to stay the most part of their time close with other architects, and I know dozens of engineers who think that the world would be a better place if engineers had the power. Same for generals and colonels. Drunkards are alone just like the other drunkards; gays are forced to come together to declare their different prides, and madmen are still locked up in groups of 3 madmen per m2.

Perhaps, in someone's opinion — in Detroit, for instance — the only extinte "caste" is the workers' and proletarians' one; but, for everyone that dies up — all genetists say — 10 new ones are ceated.

—g

It is clear that  those scientists who have tenure (or similar) positions in the developed countries are in a privileged situation.

Dear Henk,

Probably it is that time of the season which does not require fire works. My point was a little bit different in description from the very question asked by dear Alexander (if it were merely financial). Purely looking at income point of view, scientists are definitely belong to middle class not separate or with special status but equally as any other middle income member of society that works anywhere. But it is worth to mention this particular group as distinct in profession, mission and purpose with different test of financial desires than other middle class members.  

I quote from 

" The state of the art of sociology at the end of the sixties was far more varied then summarized. First, there were different viewpoints concerning the relation between critical ambitions and scientific goals of social science. The risk of politicizing social science constituted the major topic in these debates. Second, in empiricist research traditions there was scepticism about the holistic ambitions of grand theories. Third, in qualitative sociology and anthropology the idea of combining a holistic approach with a predominant quantitative research-methodology was viewed as unfeasible. Nevertheless, the general mood in the sixties was dominated by the idea that the possibilities of new research methodologies could be used to study major social problems from a holistic viewpoint" (Johan Galtung.)

We all are human beings, regardless of social status, religion, economic status, or ethnic background. All people are different, and all our problems are in our heads. If you feel superior to other, they will move away from you.

I am fully agree with Marina, regardless of class, human being needs social life as well as economic development. ....!!!!

Scientist, scholars and artists belong indeed to a special class in an sociological sense. They are middel-class, but they have the most cultural capital one can imagine but not enough financla captial to match it. I have no data about the sociological background of scholars, but I guess that most of them came from academic, middle- to upper calss families. But the scholarly class is not homogenous: there are great differences between a professor and a PhD student or someone whose contact end after a couple of years regardless of his/her achievements. Are there any recent studies about this issue or is Bourdieu'S Homo Academicus still the best study about our "class"?

Dear Henk Smid,

Big or small nations - independently of their size – are interesting for me. Each crumb of information may enrich my experience and that of others too. By the way, I read some weeks ago Dutch folk tales which seemed to be really pragmatic however I found some motives similar to Hungarian tales. As to your terminating phrase differences and variability make our environment truly challenging.

Here at RG, discussions can be lead by any participant. The impression of democracy works some times.

Dear Cecilia,

Why should be the status and respect of scientists similar in countries with very different socio-economic state? I remark that there are countries where even the expression "middle class" is a joke.

In Hungary, scientists (= people dealing with science) traditionally have never been respected neither other intelligentsia.

Dear Alexander, I certainly agree that Scientists form a separate Class with:

• a rather incomprehensible for 'common people' technical language
• a set of rules that govern the enter and exit from the Class
• an above the mean self-confidence, based on equations and other math tools
• a probably higher level of arrogance, due to the above characteristics

The problem comes when that Class, starting from its over-estimated opinion about its value, force our societies to follow rules, that in most of the times, seem to be just in-efficient and destructive at the same time.

We should accept that our so called scientific view is not the top of the top, just because science is changing through the centuries and we are not sure that our currently accepted dogmas (an example: relativistic and quantum views) are finally the correct ones.

Of course I could write about Economics, where most of the crimes against humanity were done by just following the indisputable authority of some Economists (examples? Marx(old) and Friedman(current times)).

For  Physics the situation is also worse: Is anyone to believe that Manhattan Project was an ethical scientific act at the middle of 20th century?

So, let's be carefull.

Yes this thing is true in many parts of the world, but I am afraid it should not be.

Even if Scientists do form the sub-class within Middle Class, they do no damage to Society. Quite the opposite, Creativity of Scientist enrich society, do live better for everyone. Scientists receive modest compensation for their work, exploit no one, should not be ashamed to be a Class. 

Dear Alex,

thanks for your opinion. Indeed scientist are a special class of humans. Just imagine their minimal respect in society, their low salaries and very often no acknowledgements or long times without any measurable success. To withstand all these circumstances, they really need a special kind of mentality, they must be a very strange human "class" not to get crazy.

Sure, Dear Hanno, Scientists are tough people, often work against all odds, have to wisthand failures before getting success. Scientists are never overpaid, that is for sure, but we love what we do, while most of other employes hate their jobs. To do what we love to do and getting paid for that is a great privilege. I, personally, keep working for free, collecting retirement benefits, instead of sallary.  

There are not many other kind of people in human societies, to whom the pay for work amounts for the enormous pleasure that work and overwork brings to scientific researchers, instead of money.

(and we also spend less money on food, in account for the many times that we forget to eat, in our enthusiastic long hours of overwork! and this is a sort of secondary "increase" of the value of our wages...)

Dear Alexander, I'm not sure that scientist don't damage to the society. All modern technologies that pollute our atmosphere are invented by scientist. All chemicals in our food that endanger our health also invented by scientists. And we can enumerate a lot of things...

Dear Maria, I agree with you about pleasure that work brings to scientists. But I think that all people doing creative work experience such pleasure. For example, musicians, artists, dancers even more.

Dear Jerome BENOIT,

I agree with you. I just want to say that any discovery has its dark side. Of cause, scientists are not the first to blame here. All of them want to make our life more comfortable. But we have to pay for this comfort by the air we breath, the water we drink and bath in, the omnipresent noise which affect our nervous system...

I am very keen on Paper by Demetris Christopopulos, University of Athens, on SIMPLE DEFINITION of TIME. As Demetris does not participate in this discussion, I post his paper for him. Original is uploaded on his RG site.

Thanks Alex,

I already know this paper, it´s worth to be read. We already had some discussion about the content here in RG.

Yes, Hanno, discussion on the subject of TIME on RG inspired Demetris to write this paper. So, our discussions have some efficiency.

Dear friends, thank you for your appreciation. Personally I believe that I need a lot of time to run in order to be able answer such a question, that's the reason of my absence.

If we agree that scientists constitute a separate class, then the next question is how they are governed?

Government of any STATE governs all classes within Country Society. That was in the USSR, where Scientists were governed by Academy of Science, which was an independent body, not like a Ministry, but still responsible to the State. The President of the Academy of Science directly reported to the Head of State, and had the salary equal to the salary of Head of State. 

Dear Alexander,

You make a general statement but your example is very specific. In a democratic state how can be governed a person who has a tenure or similar position? Let me clarify that I am not in favor of government dictate. At the same time I don’t like mafia like groups who use state resources for their personal interests.

&KAZAROS. USSR was not a Democratic State, but Government understood that Scientists need freedom. So, they were geverned by the body, elected by Scientists themself. State provided the budget for Academy of Science on anual basis, then State did not interfere. 

Opposte to that, National Laboratories in US and Canada are governed directly by State. I worked for the Alberta Research Council, Edmontom, Canada starting 1988 and until retirement in 2009. We were governed by the Government of the Province of Alberta, who was our owner, we were just a Crown Corporation.  So, some time scientists could be under STATE control in a Democratic State.

Dear Alexander and Jerome,

I worked during several years in the academic system in the former Soviet Union and know closely how it was functioning. First Academies of Sciences have been created by kings and their equivalents as miniature kingdoms. I have no any doubt that such an organization should not exist in a democratic state. How one can explain existence in a democratic state of a ministry of science whose leadership is elected by themselves and forever. Authoritarian and totalitarian governments supervise the election system. For example in the SU it was supervised by the party and secret services. Even though  these elections frequently were converted into an open trade among members of the leadership. Who and how can supervise those elections in a democratic state? Countries which choose democratic path have abolished this system of organization of science.

&Kazaros. Sure, nothing is perfect. .

Dear @Alexander and friends, did you have a chance to read this article : Do scientists constitute separate class within society? As the author of the article does not follow the thread, it seams that it was an answer to the author of the thread @Alexander!

Conference Paper Do scientists constitute separate class within society?

Sure, Ljubomir, I thank Prof. Chavez for honoring my question by the article on the subject. 

Perspective on creative class

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/305684096_The_development_of_a_creative_class_A_national_imperative

Presentation The development of a creative class: A national imperative