Defining Data Science: Beyond the Study of the Rules of the Natural World as Reflected by Data

INTRODUCTION

Data science has received widespread attention in academic and industrial circles. New data science research institutes and organizations have continued to emerge on the scene, such as the Columbia University Institute for Data Sciences and Engineering and New York University Center for Data Science. The University of California at Berkeley, Columbia University, Fudan University, and other universities have launched data science courses and degree programs. Cleveland and Smith proposed that data science should be considered an independent discipline2, 8 . Facebook, Google, EMC, IBM, and other companies have established employment positions for data scientists. According to Harvard Business Review, the data scientist is “the sexiest job of the 21st century.” Currently, there are several viewpoints regarding the definition of data science (see page 2). However, there is no consensus definition. We believe that, as a new science, the research objectives of data science are different from those of other, more established branches of science. In addition, the scientific issues that data science addresses are not studied by natural or social sciences.