As I stated in the grandparent, the relevant distinction is whether or not you are paid to do the research, or whether you are forced to do it in your “spare time”.
I apologize, it appears I didn’t read the post in question carefully enough; the criterion of if you’re paid to research is a useful one.
But although Einstein is salient, I can’t think of too many other examples. The two that leap to mind are Green (working in the early 1800s) and Lavoisier (working in the late 1700s), but from that I would expect “household name scientist who was an outsider” to be something that shows up once or twice a century. (I’m counting Lavoisier because he was funded by his tax farming, but he was definitely part of the ‘establishment’ of the day.)
(And you do see contemporary outsider contributions if you know where to look, like Gary Cola or Jack Andraka, but not at the household name level- probably because there aren’t that many household name scientists!)
I apologize, it appears I didn’t read the post in question carefully enough; the criterion of if you’re paid to research is a useful one.
But although Einstein is salient, I can’t think of too many other examples. The two that leap to mind are Green (working in the early 1800s) and Lavoisier (working in the late 1700s), but from that I would expect “household name scientist who was an outsider” to be something that shows up once or twice a century. (I’m counting Lavoisier because he was funded by his tax farming, but he was definitely part of the ‘establishment’ of the day.)
(And you do see contemporary outsider contributions if you know where to look, like Gary Cola or Jack Andraka, but not at the household name level- probably because there aren’t that many household name scientists!)