The enthusiastic lover of some domain; hence, for practical purposes, the opposite of an expert (see EXPERTISE). The expert is responsible to the protocols of a DISCIPLINE, wherein objects of study exist to realize methods for knowing them. The amateur is responsible to the object of study itself, if he/she is responsible at all. Of particular interest to interdisciplinary studies is a middle category: inquiry by a trained mind in a field for which the mind is untrained. This is the amateurism of experts, informed by the possibility of method, respectful of the achievements of scholarship, but helpless to reproduce the expected forms of knowledge.