naturalist
/ˈnatʃ(ə)rəlɪst
/noun
1An expert in or student of natural history.Ornithologists and naturalists, including the renowned nineteenth-century illustrator John Gould, originally classified male and female huias as two different species....
- To help do this, the event organizers have recruited naturalists and scientists with expertise in various animal and plant groups to lead teams of volunteers through the park and identify what is there.
- On this year's Antarctic cruises, for example, the onboard team includes scientists, naturalists and explorers, led by respected naturalist Nigel Sitwell.
Synonyms
natural historian, life scientist, wildlife expert;
biologist, botanist, zoologist, ornithologist, entomologist, ecologist, conservationist, environmentalist, preservationist;
birdwatcher;
North American birder
informal twitcher
2A person who practises naturalism in art or literature.The novel received wide critical acclaim and Motley's harsh, unrelenting realism invited comparisons with Richard Wright and the revered naturalists Theodore Dreiser and Frank Norris....
- In other words, Caravaggio died because of his artistic success as a naturalist.
- Even a naturalist like Zola cannot help giving his characters insight (of joy or despair) into the sweep of human meaning even as he feeds them to the grinder of biological determinism.
2.1A person who adopts philosophical naturalism.A methodological naturalist would insist on explaining all phenomena, however strange, in natural terms....
- But as Johnson himself notes, many people think that they can be methodological naturalists and theists.
- The naturalist on the contrary simply points out that, whatever the mind is, our continuing existence is proof that it has done its job of keeping us around.
adjective
another term for naturalistic.But that, again, is a triumph of naturalist ideology over common sense....
- Nevertheless, such a logic fully brings out the absurd implications of the feminist and naturalist accounts.
- This was a challenge to the dominant, naturalist conventions of his day, where characters in drama represented specific social types without contradiction, predetermined and easily recognisable.