A physical scientist is a seeker of harmonies and constancies in the jungle of experience. He aims at knowledge and prediction, particularly through discovery of mathematical laws.

Science has two aspects: one is the speculative, creative element, the continual flow of contributions by many individuals, each working on his own task by his own usually unexamined methods, motivated in his own way, and generally uninterested in attending to long-range philosophical problems. The second aspect is science as the evolving compromise, science as a growing network synthesized from these individual contributions by accepting or adopting those ideas which do indeed prove meaningful and useful to generation after generation of scientists.

Excerpt from the Encyclopedia Britannica without permission.