The engineer does not believe in black magic, voodoo, or rain dances. The engineer believes in scientific truth, that is, truth that can be verified by experiment.
engineers turn out to be by far the most religious group of all academics – 66.5
per cent, followed again by 61.7 in economics, 49.9 in sciences, 48.8 per cent of
social scientists, 46.3 of doctors and 44.1 per cent of lawyers, the most sceptical of the
lot.
Heh, it could be—but no; this is about a few educated, professional engineer friends of mine who are into pagan, asatru, ceremonial magick, and voudoun. Quite literally, black magic and voodoo (although I have yet to meet any who are well versed in native american ceremonies).
In all fairness, paganism, voudoun and magick are more like shared ceremonial practices than “religions” in a conventional sense. And these ceremonies might well have instrumental value as mind-hacking devices: “worshiping” a voudun “form” probably primes your mind towards that form’s attributes (love, war etc.). This is especially useful in collective ceremonies, where it also acts as a screening/signaling device.
First off, it’s easy to cheer “yay science!” and rag on low status beliefs, but does this quote tell us that this person is good at determining truth value in cases of controversy? If an experiment returns a particular result, do they feel compelled to believe it? What would they think, for example, about the OPERA measurements?
Second, a cheer for the epistemic rationality of engineers is particular is likely to be unpopular because engineers are somewhat famous for standing on the frontiers of crank science, and have a reputation for being more likely than others with “scientific” backgrounds to overestimate their own understanding and throw their credentials behind bad science.
This is in fact, what the other person I mentioned commented, which I agree with, in retrospect. I had the advantage of context though—the author didn’t specifically mean to laud engineers—this statement was made in the context of an engineering ethics textbook (essay? It’s hard to remember, it was awhile ago).
Is he advocating rationality to people who want to be engineers, or is he just crowing about how much better engineers are than those stupid people in other fields who think they’re just as smart?
Might be a nitpick, but speaking at all in terms of what one “believes in” rather than what’s true is a bad habit.
It puts too much emphasis on conclusions rather than epistemology.
It sounds like “Believe what those cool people in lab coats say, not those freaks in robes”, or “Believe things that sound scientific and modern, not things that sounds weird and fantastical”.
It connotes that disbelieving in black magic is proof of a superior mind, rather than largely a fact about what culture one grew up in.
Interesting, thanks. And good points. Someone had already PMed me their reason for downvoting though (not mentioned in your list), but didn’t want to influence future votes.
Samuel Florman
Diego Gambetta and Steffen Hertog, Engineers of Jihad (p.51)
No vote, but I’ve known several engineers who believe in black magic, voodoo, and/or rain dances.
Is this a reference to Agile methodologies?
Heh, it could be—but no; this is about a few educated, professional engineer friends of mine who are into pagan, asatru, ceremonial magick, and voudoun. Quite literally, black magic and voodoo (although I have yet to meet any who are well versed in native american ceremonies).
In all fairness, paganism, voudoun and magick are more like shared ceremonial practices than “religions” in a conventional sense. And these ceremonies might well have instrumental value as mind-hacking devices: “worshiping” a voudun “form” probably primes your mind towards that form’s attributes (love, war etc.). This is especially useful in collective ceremonies, where it also acts as a screening/signaling device.
http://catb.org/jargon/html/B/black-magic.html
http://catb.org/jargon/html/V/voodoo-programming.html
http://catb.org/jargon/html/R/rain-dance.html
I’m very confused by the downvotes, could someone explain?
First off, it’s easy to cheer “yay science!” and rag on low status beliefs, but does this quote tell us that this person is good at determining truth value in cases of controversy? If an experiment returns a particular result, do they feel compelled to believe it? What would they think, for example, about the OPERA measurements?
Second, a cheer for the epistemic rationality of engineers is particular is likely to be unpopular because engineers are somewhat famous for standing on the frontiers of crank science, and have a reputation for being more likely than others with “scientific” backgrounds to overestimate their own understanding and throw their credentials behind bad science.
This is in fact, what the other person I mentioned commented, which I agree with, in retrospect. I had the advantage of context though—the author didn’t specifically mean to laud engineers—this statement was made in the context of an engineering ethics textbook (essay? It’s hard to remember, it was awhile ago).
Didn’t downvote, but:
Is he advocating rationality to people who want to be engineers, or is he just crowing about how much better engineers are than those stupid people in other fields who think they’re just as smart?
Might be a nitpick, but speaking at all in terms of what one “believes in” rather than what’s true is a bad habit.
It puts too much emphasis on conclusions rather than epistemology.
It sounds like “Believe what those cool people in lab coats say, not those freaks in robes”, or “Believe things that sound scientific and modern, not things that sounds weird and fantastical”.
It connotes that disbelieving in black magic is proof of a superior mind, rather than largely a fact about what culture one grew up in.
One should believe things that can’t be verified by experiment.
Interesting, thanks. And good points. Someone had already PMed me their reason for downvoting though (not mentioned in your list), but didn’t want to influence future votes.
I may have edited while you were reading; sorry if so.
(I thought I got the phrase “cool people in lab coats” from a LW comment, but now it’s joined the list of comments I can’t find with Google.)