científico

científico

(Spanish; “scientist”)

Member of a group of officials who served in the government of Porfirio Díaz (1877–80, 1884–1911) in Mexico. Influenced by positivism and rejecting metaphysics, theology, and idealism as inadequate to solve Mexico's problems, they advocated applying what they considered to be the scientific methods of the social sciences to the problems of finance, education, and industrialization. They had little influence on Díaz, but the movement took root in other parts of Latin America in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.