Specialization can be seen as a response to the problem of an increasing
accumulation of scientific knowledge.
By splitting up the subject matter into smaller units, one man could continue
to handle the information and use it as the basis for further research.
But specialization was only one of a series of related developments in science
affecting the process of communication.
Another was the growing professionalization of scientific activity.
No clear-cut distinction can be drawn between professionals and amateurs in
science: exceptions can be found to any rule.
Nevertheless, the word 'amateur' does carry a connotation that the person
concerned is not fully integrated into the scientific community and, in
particular, may not fully share its values.
The growth of specialization in the nineteenth century, with its consequent
requirement of a longer, more complex training, implied greater problems for
amateur participation in science.
The trend was naturally most obvious in those areas of science
based especially on a mathematical or laboratory training, and can be
illustrated in terms of the development of geology in the United Kingdom.
A comparison of British geological publications over the last century and a
half reveals not simply an increasing emphasis on the primacy of research,
but also a changing definition of what constitutes an acceptable
research paper.
Thus, in the nineteenth century, local geological studies represented worth
while research in their own right; but, in the twentieth century, local studies
have increasingly become acceptable to professionals only if they
incorporate, and reflect on, the wider geological picture.
Amateurs, on the other hand, have continued to pursue local studies in the old
way.
The overall result has been to make entrance to professional
geological journals harder for amateurs, a result that has been reinforced by
the widespread introduction of refereeing, first by national journals in the
nineteenth century and then by several local geological journals in the
twentieth century.
As a logical consequence of this development, separate journals have now
appeared aimed mainly towards either professional or amateur readership.
A rather similar process of differentiation has led to professional geologists
coming together nationally within one or two specific societies, whereas the
amateurs have tended either to remain in local societies or to come together
nationally in a different way.