That’s a common stereotype, as a scientist, you certainly have some knowledge about science (of course! 
), computers etc… So in people’s mind, a physicist is often considered as the ultimate evolution of the geek. I guess it’s not totally wrong, if you consider that a geek is a person who loves computers, science-fiction and complicated role-play games, they will certainly choose a carrier in science or computers.
Before I started my PhD I also though that many of the physicists were geeks, but I realized that it concerns only a small fraction of them.
The Big Bang Theory
Quite recently, a well known TV-show called “the big bang theory”, shows an extreme image of the physicists as geeks with no life and almost antisocial. The TV-show is very funny, and the references to our work makes me laugh often, but is it really the image we want to give? I’m pretty curious to read the comments about it. So, do you think that physicists are geeks? Do you think it could be bad for us to be seen as geeks?
Definitely geeks. and definitely seen as geeks. And probably not a good thing, but it is empirical reality.
Maybe the explanation can be found in the fact that physics is very impersonal. Maxwell’s equations don’t really care if you’re having a bad day. Atoms don’t have personalities, they don’t fall in love.
There’s also the obsessive nature needed to pursue physics to an advanced level. You need to spend a lot of time studying a large impersonal body of equations and results. It’s hard to bullshit. You can often prove that you are right about something and being right has an objective standard.
The male/female ratio in most physics classes doesn’t help either. A lot of physicists spend their formative sexual years largely on their own.
Is there something wrong with being a geek?
As a life long academic, I see way more of the CS crowd being geeky than anyone else, since most people do not work with scientists proper but almost all have IT departments, they tend to associate the CS persona on all people who pursue science or tech careers.
So blame the CS folk, as an EE its what I do all day long. Shakes fist.
there is a fundamental difference between physicist and others. physicist is analytical and not at all spontaneous. in contrast others are more spontaneous. analysis are boring and in contrast “not thinking” is fun! i think this is the main difference. this is also the paradigm of this TV show by little exaggeration, but to be fair, exaggeration is a fundamental factor for comedy. also i think what has been represented as physicist is kind of cool. some times this TV show makes me be grateful to choose physics.