Why Engineers?

I doubt it onmyown.

If engineers are centered on projects, that would perhaps suggest an intensity, which could fit an extremist.
And I should imagine that there are certain countries where engineers are going to end up being frustrated.

This may be a difficult thread to debate, what with pompa being an engineer!

what on Earth have you been reading.

Rubbish!

I wondered if there is a sub-text here that may be horrific to some - but any response would be welcome.

I have been led to believe, perhaps wrongly, that "engineer" in gay sub-text dialogues may refer to "queer" (i.e. gay). Can this paper be read with this in mind? If so, does this alternative reading introduce another debate?

As a lifetime engineer, I doubt that many engineers become leaders. In my experience engineers are not good at interpersonal skills, they tend to be introverted and centered on their projects. I was a senior production engineer, I much prefered working either alone or in a team, not in any lead role.

Maybe those who go in for engineering are people who like things to be planned and joined-up, and these are the same types who become fundamentalists (in any ideology or religion) ? Maybe those who go for degrees in some other subjects are more liberal (arts faculty?) or more conventional (lawyers?) in their outlook?

It did say somewhere in the (long and full of possibly unconnected statistics) article that it was recommended that the recruits to go after most were the intelligent and highly educated and motivated ones, and those who were likely to become leaders. Are engineers more likely to become leaders? Medicine seems to contain a lot of Islamic activists too, are they more likely to be recruited?

I've only skip read bits of it, but it seems they're discounting the conclusion that everyone jumps to: engineers skills are useful. Instead they're putting it down to the combination of two factors:

Firstly, the overrepresentation of engineers occurs in North Africa and the Middle East, but not in the West, so they proposing that educated engineers become frustrated and disillusioned in economies that have fewer opportunities for their skills.

Secondly, they note that engineers (in America at least) are significantly more prone to extreme right wing views.

The second point strikes me as question-begging. "Why are engineers terrorists" and "why are engineers right wing extremists" seem to be two variations of the same unanswered question, but I haven't read the paper in detail to see if the authors offer an answer.

I opened it OK, but didn't find it fascinating enough to read all the way through.

Perhaps someone could summarise the conclusion the paper came to, if any.

I had to accept Adobe pdf or something to be able to download it.
I will give you the link and see if it works that way.

www.sociology.ox.ac.uk/materials/papers/2007-10.pdf

There seem to be some contradictory elements to this thread - - - and why not?

I could not open the link. But a bit of lazy Saturday afternoon lateral thinking led me to wonder also - why engineers? Is there a sub-text here?

I will try again to open the link, am prepared to read 80 pages if it grabs my attention - - - otherwise, well, I'd rather have a lazy Saturday evening stretching ahead lounging on the sofa and watching Strictly Come Dancing and Edwina in the Jungle, along with

The link has about 81 readable pages!
I dont intend to read the whole lot. Which pages are the important ones please?

www.sociology.ox.ac.uk/materials/papers/2007-10.pdf

Unable to open the link, MiceElf.