The “Compleat Physicist” seen through the lens of experiments

In 1653, thirty-four years before the appearance of Newton’s ‘Principia’, Isaak Walton published “The Compleat Angler”…a book that is still in print! Now in the 21st Century, how might we view the activities of the Compleat Physicist in the context of physics experiments and laboratory skills? If we look at what physicists ultimately do in life, many work in basic research but a far greater number apply physics to a wide range of human needs. How do the knowledge and skills of physics experimentation manifest themselves in these applications? Circling back to fundamental physics, what sort of versatile foundation does a broad experience in the physics laboratory provide so that an emerging professional physicist has a rich conceptual repertoire with which to approach real-world problems? And finally, how can this conceptual repertoire be matched with the nuts-and-bolts technical and computational skills needed to create actual prototypes of new devices and processes?