super-scientist n.

a person who studies, or creates inventions using, superscience n.

  • 1928 A. C. Doyle When the World Screamed in Lost World & Other Stories (1995) 461 Arthur Conan Doyle bibliography

    Challenger the super scientist, Challenger the arch pioneer, Challenger the first man of all men whom Mother Earth had been compelled to recognize.

  • 1929 P. Nowlan & R. Calkins Great Classic Comic Newspaper Strips, No. 1, Buck Rogers Issue (1964) Oct. 4

    Absolute masters of America and the world. Cruel, inhuman super scientists.

  • 1934 D. Wandrei Scientist Divides in Astounding Stories Sept. 54/2 page image Donald Wandrei bibliography

    Why may not man himself now be only a similar basic cell out of which even vaster and more complex organisms will evolve in the course of ages? Imagine what would happen if a superscientist treated man as such a cell and then, in the laboratory, constructed from one or dozens of men a creature of the year one billion!

  • 1940 O. J. Friend Impossible Highway in Thrilling Wonder Stories Aug. 84/2 page image Oscar J. Friend bibliography

    Almost fearfully Nelson looked up at the sky as though he half expected the head and shoulders of some super[-]scientist to materialize from behind a cloud. But nothing happened.

  • 1953 L. S. de Camp Science Fiction Handbook 69 L. Sprague de Camp

    The plus-sign at the end of the hero’s surname (a pun to begin with) indicates that he is a super-scientist.

  • 1975 J. Varley Black Hole Passes in Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction June 27/1 page image John Varley bibliography

    ‘What would Maryjane Peters, superscientist, have done?’ He could hear the pleased note in her voice, though she tried not to show it.

  • 1991 H. Rheingold Virtual Reality iii. x. 238

    The Japanese are not superscientists; they can’t go any faster than anyone else can.

  • 2011 R. Vajra Tower of Worlds in Analog Science Fiction & Fact May 37/1 Rajnar Vajra bibliography

    ‘Interesting results. Liana and I become exactly what’s needed to save the day. Example? Without my new body, the sky’s gravity would’ve pinned me down.’ ‘Take more than a year, I bet, for even super-scientists to develop such specific mutagens for people whose DNA’s already shifting.’ ‘Quite possibly.’ ‘But the lottery picked us a year ago. So you rigged it somehow. Should I go on?’


Research requirements

antedating 1928

Earliest cite

Arthur Conan Doyle

Research History
Mike Christie submitted a cite from the letter column of the December 1940 Astounding.
Fred Galvin submitted a 1939 cite from editorial material in Science Fiction.
Fred Galvin submitted a 1934 cite from Donald Wandrei's "A Scientist Divides".
Fred Galvin submitted a 1953 cite from L. Sprague de Camp's "Science-Fiction Handbook".
Fred Galvin submitted a 1941 cite from editorial material in Uncanny Stories.
Fred Galvin submitted a cite from a 1964 reprint of Philip Francis Nowlan's comic strip "Buck Rogers--in the Year 2429"; we would like to verify it in the original newspaper strip in January 1929 (it does not appear in the magazine version which appeared in Amazing Stories in August 1928 (as "Armageddon -- 2419 A.D.")).
Bee Ostrowsky submitted a 2011 cite.
We have a 1928 example from Arthur Conan Doyle's "When the World Screamed", from a later collection; we would like to verify it in the original publication, in Liberty Magazine, 25 February – 3 March 1928.

Last modified 2023-11-02 12:15:39
In the compilation of some entries, HDSF has drawn extensively on corresponding entries in OED.