Engineers Have a Terrorist Mindset?

An anonymous reader writes "Do engineers have a way of looking at the world not all that different from terrorists? According to an article in the EE Times, they do. The story cites 'Engineers of Jihad,' a paper (pdf download) by two Oxford University sociologists, who found that graduates in science, engineering, and medicine are strongly overrepresented among Islamist movements. The paper also found that engineers are 'over-represented' among graduates who gravitate to violent groups. Authors Diego Gambetta and Steffen Hertog chalk this all up to what they call the 'engineering mindset,' which they define as 'a mindset that inclines them to take more extreme conservative and religious positions.' Is this just pop psychology masquerading as science?"

Engineer's Syndrome

You could probably draw parallels to Engineer's Syndrome [google.com] here.

Why not?

Many of the engineers I've known in college were absolutely convinced of tehir superiority and absolute rightness in all things. Certainly not all, but a fair chunk. Same with Fundamentalism. To a certain extent its still trying to change the world instead of yourself.

Re:Why not?

I think there's a bit of a difference in "I'm always right" as opposed to "I'm going to kill those that don't think like me". Though IANATerrorist.

Re:Why not?

Many of the engineers I've known in college were absolutely convinced of tehir [sic] superiority and absolute rightness in all things.

I suspect that's part of the issue. I'm an EE with a long-standing history of blowing stuff up. That said, I now work primarily trying to keep stuff from blowing up (or at least blowing up in some controlled environment.) Engineers make good terrorist candidates. They tend to:
* Be intelligent and educated (Or if not intelligent, obsessive enough to make it through a tough school-path)
* Have superiority complexes ("I know what's right and all differing opinions are wrong and should be corrected")
* Be good problem solvers ("If I wanted to get around this security system, here's what I'd do...")
* Know everything necessary to make good bombs

Superiority Complex

I'm not sure it's a superiority complex, but the end result is awfully similar. Engineers are one of the few subsets of people that are in active control of changing the world around them. It's what they do for a living. They think about a problem, come up with a way to implement a solution, and then build it.

I don't think they believe they're superior-- but when an engineer decides one way or the other about an issue, he sets out to do something about it. A lot of people are content to hold a viewpoint but go on about their business, but it has always seemed to me that an engineer with a viewpoint on an issue that he won't back down from is simply doing what engineers do. He's thought about a problem, looked at his limited options, and is pursuing the solution his believes is correct.

This mindset, however, is not common. Most people, when confronted with an issue (even one they strongly feel needs to change) that is outside their ability to control, will simply go about their lives. The engineer, although similarly powerless to enact change in, say, global politics, will do the only things he can, like annoy everybody around him trying to convince them to see his viewpoint. They try to think rationally, and they believe when they've reached a conclusion that other people could be convinced rationally to see their viewpoint. Again, this is what they do day-in and day-out at work, convincing co-workers to choose a particular design path on purely rational merits. It just doesn't map to the messy grey-area that makes up normal life with irrational people.

(none of this is peer-reviewed, and was made up on the spot, and may or may not match your experiences.)

Engineer and Terrorist are slightly similar.

Engineer's mindset: "What makes this thing tick"

Terrorist's mindset: "I know why this thing is ticking"

Re:Engineer and Terrorist are slightly similar.

Sociologist's mindset: "What completely obvious statement can I make about this ticking thing?"

Re:Engineer and Terrorist are slightly similar.

Liberal Arts Mindset: "If they make me clean out the fry vats again, I'm gonna burn this fucking place down..."

Terrorist? No, I'm from Mars.

We engineers aren't the most proactive types, we tend to sit next to the flag, banging away on our defenses and designing new weapons in our heads. Oh, and watching out for those dog-gone spies.

That makes sense

It's all becoming clear now. A lot of Islamic terrorists are engineers. That explains why they have no infrastructure over there... The engineers are too busy killing themselves to build a society. Boy I'm glad my engineering degree will be put to better use than suicide.

That required Circuits course for ME's

It's that mandatory Circuits course that the mechanical engineers and others outside EE are required to take is what is breeding terrorists, I tell you. Requiring MEs to learn op amps is what is giving them that sour outlook on life.

Probably True

I'm from Pakistan and would be willing to guess that this is true. The issue primarily why these results would exist is the concept of fine arts etc aren't as common in most 3rd world countries. In pakistan for example the revered professions are Medicine and Engineering. The best and brightest always gravitate towards those (top 500 out of 50K candidates get into the main tech university in Karachi).
In any case, I'm willing to bet these are also the minds that go hmm there are problems with our society that need to be solved. One could probably divvy up these people into those that leave the country, those that stick behind and those that turn to religion for answers and eventually rise among the ranks of extremists etc.
Terrorism vs extremism isn't as finely delineated as Bush et. al would like to make it out to be. If one could fix the issue of social injustice and lack of opportunities / education I'm willing to bet most of these problems will go away as well.

Immigration restrictions

It should be noted that due to US immigration restrictions, 80% of muslims migrating to the US are highly educated. Engineers. This should somehow skew the results.

Were I live, in the Netherlands, only 30% of the muslim immigrants are highly educated (the rest is practically completely uneducated...); if you'd do the same test in the Nederlands, you might find morons have a terrorist mindset;-)

So what?

So what?

If the criminals and terrorists are either "uneducated hoards" or someone with some education, I'd expect someone in science to do a "better job" as a criminal than the "uneducated hoards" or someone with a fine arts degree. One of the tasks you learn in *real* science (what the pseudo-scientists here don't seem to grasp) is the ability to plan ahead. Yes, plan ahead. Therefore maybe criminals and terrorists with some science background will get further in their game than square 1.

Furthermore, maybe people that want to get "ahead" in their criminal organizations enter college to gain education in the material that they will find useful. You know, an engineer or a chemist may be a more useful profession for them than a poet.

But then what will these pseudo-scientists find next in their statistics? That some of the non-science terrorists/criminals like to play chess or other strategy games? Or that they are fanatics *before* starting their university education?

75% of people know these statistics are bogus 19 times out of 20.

Or maybe...

Or maybe it's that Engineers are recruited more aggressively than liberal arts majors because likely to bring useful skills and a concrete, analytical mindset to the mission.

The better question is

do terrorists have an ENGINEER mindset?

Terrorism requires the knowledge to bypass security and/or blow stuff up.

To do that, you need engineers. Otherwise all you get is a bunch of talkers, not doers, or at least doers who blow themselves up more often, and who fail to even reach their targets.

What this means is, your average engineer does not have a terrorist mindset, but terrorist groups must recruit engineers in order to Get Stuff Circumvented/Done[tm]. So they recruit engineers as often as they can, because otherwise they cannot Get Stuff Circumvented/Done[tm].

There you have it.

This clearly underlines why math, science and engineering must be eradicated from the US educational system.

Doesn't fit the profile

Many of the terrorists which have been part of the popular news media the last few years have had the eventual goal of creating a very structured and ordered society. While this may seem to fit the barest idea of what an engineer might approve of, it is a far stretch from matching the what I know of engineering types.

1. Engineers are just as interested in knowing how things work as they are in making sure they work orderly. This would lend itself to a desire for more openness in working systems. To easier be able to lift the hood and see what's going on. Most terrorists seem interested in extremely closed societies with no openness.

2. Terrorists main method of operation is to create fear and chaos in order to eventually gain control. Chaos is not an engineer's friend. While an engineer would be glad to have created order from chaos, he would not create disorder in an attempt to create a working system.

3. Engineering is generally a respected, fairly good paying career choice. What is the incentive to give up a promising future for a life of uncertainty and danger.

I just don't see it.

It's scientific management that's "monist"

"a disproportionate share of engineers seem to have a mindset that makes them open to the quintessential right-wing features of "monism" (why argue where there is one best solution)..."

Frederick W. Taylor, advocate of "scientific management," and who literally articulated as a principle that everything could and should be done in "the one best way." In my experience, it is managers, not engineers, who tend to have the "one best way" mindset. Recently, things that used to be called "recommendations" are now called "best practices," and as nearly as I can tell nobody ever has or thinks they need any data to back up the idea that the "best practices" are actually best.

Engineers, in my experience, are the very last people to claim there is "one best way." On the contrary... the more conservative engineers are constantly articulating tradeoffs (different ways presenting different combinations of good and bad features), while the bolder ones are constantly coming up with wild new ideas. Sometimes it is difficult for a group of engineers ever to stop brainstorming, because they are so intrigued by the challenge of finding new ways to do things... and, if nothing else, because they like the competitive one-upping of thinking of ways to do something that their colleagues didn't think of.

I find this paper very disturbing. I lived through the McCarthy years... There was no definition of the word "Communist." A communist meant anyone the government didn't like. If you pointed out that some reputed "Communist" was, simply, factually, not a Communist, not only did it not matter but it made you suspect yourself. (During the McCarthy era, for example, all homosexuals were automatically "Communists.")

These days, the word "terrist" seems to have the same sort of elusive meaning. It's only a matter of time before it becomes meaningless to point out that someone is, simply and factually, not a terrist. So what, if they were friends with terrists and didn't turn them in... or if they had a "terrist mind-set..." or if they were an engineer, because, just as all homosexuals were automatically Communists, all engineers automatically have "terrist mind-sets."

Re:Rejected yesterday, accepted today?

Great, a pissed of /.er. How long till he blows something up now?

Re:is it April 1?

"I'm not sure I can even think of a single example"

1. Ph.D. in science. Check.
2. Islamic fundamentalist (is it a movement?). Check.

Half of my mosque is of that type.

Supporting Shari'a, strict dressing, beards and stuff.

BOO!

Re:is it April 1? ( Not Yet...)

Submitted as Brain-Chow:
    I once was told in a Stats class that;

  " Among Lazy, Illiterate American Auto workers,
  that 40% of all sick time was taken on a Monday
  or a Friday". The class ( mostly) was dumbstruck.

    - Never stopping to think that 40% of every
American work week is a Monday or a Friday.

    The well had been poisoned, tho, and despite
the clarity of the punchline-like analysis, many
insisted on various faults, like unions, wage status,
etc.

    I feel pretty certain of two things -
    1. That we've been so conditioned by Big Media to
              the insidious Eevil of 'Terrorism' that it invokes
              a knee-jerk response of denial in any other view.

    2. Smart people make very good Engineers and very formidable
              enemies. You won't hear of Inept Terrorists in the news.
              Only the Smart Ones.

                                    - Just my $0.02

Re:is it April 1?

From reading the article, it seems to me Diego and Steve [yeah, sounds like a gay disco duo] have never met parents from the Middle East. Basically, a kids has one of two choices about higher education: medicine or engineering. This is so prevalent, it is a joke among the relevant demographic. Now, me, I'm shocked that theatre majors seem to be underrepresented in "Islamist groups."

Re:is it April 1?

About 1/4-1/3 of my EE graduate school was comprised of Indians/Pakistanis here in the US to study. They were great - Other than a strange obsession with Cricket, perfectly agreeable folks. However, there was another 1/4-1/3 here to study from China that were much harder to get along with. They refused to speak English except with the professors and had posters of Mao along with his poetry all over the half of the graduate-student office that they dominated. I don't want to sound xenophobic, but it was very strange.

Re:The Engineer

Ayyash's bombs were quite intentionally designed to kill as many people as possible (they were packed with nails and other shrapnel - and laced with rat poison - to ensure maximum lethality). The Irgun made it a point to minimize the casualties from their bombings - they called the King David hotel ahead and time and warned people to get out.