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Why Are Terrorists Often Engineers?
An anonymous reader writes "As a follow up to their September 2008 article, IEEE Spectrum revisits the question of why a disproportionate number of terrorists have engineering degrees. According to their own summary of the interview with political scientist Steffen Hertog, 'nearly half of [individuals involved in political violence] with degrees have been engineers,' a rather ambiguous statement especially for a publication targeted at engineers. The interview makes some interesting points (lack of job opportunities for engineers despite a relatively high social status) and some suspect ones (e.g. framing Islamic culture into the western left vs. right politics). Above all, IEEE Spectrum tries really hard to associate engineers with terrorism for some reason."
Maybe a little mechanical or chemical aptitude is the reason. A bomber with an engineering degree might have the skills necessary to build a bomb and not blow themselves up in the process, whereas a non-engineer bomber might either fail to build a bomb or wind up blowing themselves to kingdom come.
Just look at Faisal Shazad, the guy from Connecticut who tried to blow up Times Square. He tried to build his bomb with a toy clock and M80 firecrackers. He had a business degree.
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Excellent. I can already see more guys being apprehended for using "white text on black screens."
http://miscellanea.wellingtongrey.net/2008/02/18/enginneers-vs-sociologists/
"The weirdest thing about a mind, is that every answer that you find, is the basis of a brand new cliche" -
Maybe is because Engineers have a more technical & logical mind and once they set their sights on a goal are more likely to finish it ?
I don't think any Politicians/Lawyers would be able to do the same. They will just stage a theatrical act out of which they can escape untouched or just switch sides.
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The only thing a humanities degree will teach you to blow up is your future.
There is a disconnect here. The engineers only appear to be the dominant profession of choice because they are the only ones who can actually build bombs. Actually, vast numbers of knitting enthusiasts are aspiring terrorists. Unfortunately, their background and skill set only allows them to create scratchy scarves and mittens.
Also, I have a theory that terrorists/bakers are responsible for all the Christmas fruitcakes....
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
I am sure you would find that an unusually high number of non-Terrorist Asians and Middle-easterners are engineers too (compared to the west). These people are often from wealthy families in Saudi Arabia and Yemen (and a few other parts of Asia and the Middle east)--and university students in those areas are known mostly for their interests in hard science, business, and engineering. You don't see a lot of history or literature majors in those areas (when's the last time you saw a Saudi come to the U.S. to study journalism or art?).
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
and smart people know that politicians are dangerous power-hungry individuals that, from time to time, must be exterminated (the assassination of Nero, Mussolini, Nicolae Ceauescu, etc). "The Tree of Liberty must be watered with the blood of patriots and tyrants - it is its natural fertilizer."
- Thomas Jefferson (an inventor/engineer but also a terrorist according to the 1700s British Parliament)
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
We could tell you, but then we'd have to kill you.
Beauty is in the eye of the beerholder.
Engineers are the people who get it done and understand that technology matters. I mean, you don't win a war by bravery or the capabilities of your leaders but because the rifles load faster. Engineers also believe in objective and observable truth. And honestly, politicians are an offense.
And the WTC attack master mind Muhammed Atta was a city planner, maybe impressed by what Operation Gomorrah contributed to the city he resided in.
I remember reading once that men were much less likely to engage in terrorism if they had a wife (or was it a girlfriend -- I'm too lazy to hunt down the reference). The real problem is that engineers can't get laid, so they become terrorists. So, ladies, for the sake of world peace, sleep with an engineer.
It's unfortunate for the world that most problems can't be solved that way. But that doesn't stop a lot of technically adept people from trying.
Surprised IEEE site is not able to handle the load.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
They started this anti-engineer jihad but we will finish it.
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The revolutionary mindset has something to do with it. Your average goat herder or basket weaver isn't all that interested in toppling whatever ideology he resents. That kind of stuff is generally a product of an angry, middle class; those who aren't as concerned with where their next meal comes from. Those coming from an emergent middle-class often follow fields that are more necessary. You need doctors and engineers before you need psychologists and art majors.
OS wars,
Distribution wars,
Browser wars,
Editor wars.
Let's face it, regardless whether you choose to engage in radical Islamism, engineering is a violent and dangerous discipline.
It would be interesting to compare engineers with liberal arts grads on the terrorist spectrum. Engineers are not usually required to take the wide variety of non-technical courses that are supposed to give lib arts majors a grounding in history, art, social sciences, languages, etc. My hypothesis is that this might make engineers a little more rigid in their critical thinking skills and less comprehension of just how complex the world really is. If you have a better understanding of where you and your culture fit into the larger sweep of human history, are you more or less likely to engage in throwing bombs? I don't know the answer to that, but would like to see some stats or papers if anyone else does.
FreeSpeech.org
As Bruce Salem notes those who support creationism and claim scientific credentials tend to be engineers - http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Salem_hypothesis
It would be that Middle Eastern culture seems to value engineering as a "real" degree and many others as not. So the bight students are forced in to engineering degrees, like it or not. My freshmen year I met a guy like that. Hated engineering but his government was sponsoring him to come to the US and learn it so he had no choice. In China you actually see this go further in that more or less everyone in the government is an "engineer" now I put that in quotes because they have lots of degrees that we wouldn't call engineering that they do. Basically the word is what matters. If you are an "engineer" you are good to go. However if you get the same kind of degree but are not an engineer, well then too bad for you.
Our engineering college sees more foreign grad students from a few places than any other place. It isn't like it is the only "hard science" college. Computer science, chemistry, optics, pharmacy, then are in different colleges. However only we award "engineering" degrees. Get a masters in Chemistry and it is just that, it is not Chemical Engineering. That title of "engineer" seems to be the only thing acceptable to many.
Perhaps engineers, trained to think logically, are less able to ignore the more violent verses of their chosen religious texts, or more prone to come to logical but extreme conclusions.
For example, if an engineer believes that there is an afterlife, he may see mortal life as of very little value. It's only a temporary waiting place en route to eternity - all that really matters is making sure people are believers in his religion when they make their exit. Thus there is no violence in dieing for the cause - it isn't really dieing. Nor is there a problem with killing the unbelievers: They were going to hell anyway, this just sends them there a little earlier and aids in expanding the True Faith.
A non-engineer, on the other hand, has the ability to believe in an afterlife and yet completly ignore that belief. This is why devout believers will still spend vast amounts of money on medical treatments to stay alive just a little longer - because they may say they believe heaven awaits, but they have compartmentalised their religion away from their everday actions.
Note this works just as well for either Christian or Islamic terrorists. Right now the Islamic types lead in the kill-rate derivitative, but they arn't really so different from medival Christianity - a religion just as willing to have it's members kill and die for the cause, and for the same reasons.
If my guess is right, then engineers will be less able to tolerate the contradictions of moderate religion - and so will either abandon religion entirely and become atheists (or at least agnostics), or will turn to the more self-consistant fundamentalist sects.
The rigors of engineering training discourage fundamental questions of why and how in favor of rote mastery of rules of thumb which are known to work. To engineers the question of why gravity works is unimportant, their concern is in dealing with the consequences of gravity (and so forth for other physical laws). The analogy to faith based belief systems, wherein you accept rules handed down by authority and are discouraged from questioning that faith. or from seeking justifications for those rules, and are forbidden to consider revisions of those rules, is quite direct.
The kind of person who thrives under one set of these conditions has met many of the criteria to thrive under the other set of conditions.
Engineering is about creating and realizing plans for getting things done, rather than just sitting there thinking, "What a shame that the world isn't the way I want it to be. If only there were a bridge over that river and a piece of software that does what I want with my spam. But there isnt. *sigh* Oh well, I'll just accept the world as it is."
An engineer with a political goal can vote for a representative, but that's more like hiring a political engineer than being one. Directly trying to personally cause a policy change is appealing, but most of the avenues for doing that, have high social barriers. Terrorism actually does too, but a stupid or naive engineer (i.e. a person who thinks terrorism is actually effective at persuading people to see things the terrorist's way) will see it as a way to personally get the job done, without having to rely on other people who will just drop the ball. "While you're all pointlessly talking, I can go shoot someone."
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
Perhaps we shouldn't be asking why engineers become [individuals involved in political violence] on their own accord. Rather, the engineers may be targets of recruitment by [organizations involved in political violence] because they possess desirable skills.
Part of the allure may be that carrying out such an attack is a challenging problem to solve. Engineers are all about solving problems, figuring out puzzles, coming up with elegant solutions.
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They're trying to show that engineers can get jobs even in this economy!
I bet a disproportionate number of software developers have Computer Science degrees.
I bet a disproportionate number of CEO's have MBAs.
I bet a disproportionate number of military personnel know how to properly handle an assault rifle.
An organization is composed of the people that it recruits and has the skills that it trains its members with. Terrorist organizations need engineers to build weapons. All the terrorists that majored in History, Art, or Econ are the ones wearing the vest or being sent back to school to learn something "useful".
I have noticed a disproportionate number of intellectuals are depressed. Probably because they are smart enough to know no matter what you do you are screwed. This in turn leads to acting out against the dumb/happy people. The dumb/happy people are generally unphased because they didn't even realized you just dissed them making the intellectual even more furious. Which in turn leads them to target the dumbest group of all...that's right...government officials which gets twisted to be a political statement instead of the "kill all dumb people" it was truly intended as.
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
I always knew Active Directory was part of some global terrorist plot.
The terrorists have actually recruited exactly the same number of liberal arts students as engineers. But it's only been nine years and the liberal arts students haven't got out of bed yet. They totally intend to attack something and have some really great ideas that'll totally change the neo facist world order but, well, Oprah was on. Plus, do you know how hard it is to hide explosives on your crotch when you're wearing your little sister's skinny jeans!
MacGruber could do it with a stick of guBOOOM!!!!!
Not this crap again
This post contains no rudeness or derision of any kind. All arguments are friendly. Terms and exclusions may apply.
What's ambiguous about that?
Watch this Heartland Institute video
why are engineers often terrorists? perhaps they see a flaw in the system that requires elimination.
Most people think in terms of emotions, the equality of individuals, rights, etc.
Engineers think about society as if it were a machine that needs fixing (and given our overpopulation, pollution, ugly modern lifestyles, boring architecture, slavish jobs, etc. they may have a point). They are thinking of the long term consequences of our actions.
Unfortunately, this kind of thinking terrifies 99% of the population who never want to be told what to do, or that what they're doing (buying SUVs, having 11 illiterate grubby children) is wrong. They want to think about their karmic pleasures, like who they're having sex with, what they're buying, who thinks they are pretty on myspace, etc.
If your ideas are demonized by 99% of a population, your only recourse is to be a terrorist or extreme ideologue.
* Ted Kaczynski (advanced mathematics)
* William Pierce (physics degree from Rice U)
* David Myatt (IT guru)
* Joseph Goebbels (PhD in philosophy)
And doubtless many more.
Futurist Traditionalism
The points already made about engineers being specifically recruited for their skills, being the ones most likely to be successful (or nearly so), and engineering being a very dominant field of study among educated middle-easterners are all well-taken, as are the jokes about antisocial engineers who can't get laid, but I wonder if there's not another element.
Engineers are, by aptitude and by training, problem solvers. We tend to look at the world as a series of problems to be solved, and to be fairly realistic about the materials and capabilities available to us. We also have a tendency to focus on approaches that involved hardware and technology rather than social processes. I think those factors may lead an intelligent young engineer who is extremely unhappy with perceived injustice and sufficiently fanatical about it to be willing to resort to violence to consider terrorism.
If, for example, you really felt you wanted to get the USA out of the middle east, you would immediately realize that economic forces are working against you. The US really wants middle-eastern oil. That makes political protests unlikely to succeed at anything, particularly protests of the scale and in the places you can manage. Conventional military options are clearly infeasible, even if you could manage to apply the full power of your nation's military, and even fully mobilize your country on a war footing, the US military is just too advanced, too powerful. You have to find something you can do to make the US want to leave. You can't make the oil go away, but maybe you can make it too costly to obtain.
In that situation, asymmetric warfare, AKA terrorism, is the logical choice. It requires little resources, is made vastly more effective with technical skill and detailed planning, and allows you to strike an actual blow against your perceived "oppressors". Of course, it's only one small blow, and won't by itself accomplish anything. Still, it's all you can do, and it's something substantial.
I can see that. Lack of actual experience with violence and the messy, complicated ways things go wrong may actually help as well.
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Having been in engineering majors before, I can testify that engineers receive little or no training in ethics. Antisocial attitudes are rife; they are trained to look down on other people, and think it's "funny" to install a virus on someone's computer or blow something up with a pipe bomb. I was a software engineer for 10 years, but I got fed up with these attitudes, so I moved into the health professions. I feel much happier here; it's all about caring for other people.
>I remember reading once that men were much less likely to engage in terrorism if they had a wife (or was it a girlfriend -- I'm too lazy to hunt down the reference).
You've been modded as "funny", but I think you should have been modded as "insightful".
Engineers are still, by and large, the nerds. There is probably more than a grain of truth to the observation that people who don't fit in very well socially find comfort in academic endeavors, as opposed to social or athletic endeavors.
If I was going to go find people to blow stuff up for me, social misfits would be a nice place to start. The fact that they are smart enough to design bombs is a bonus.
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Isn't it obvious? Engineers can't get laid in this life. They're only chance of getting laid is the 72 virgins.
Looking back at the events of 2008, how many financial terrorists who created the situation had business degrees? I bet pretty much all of them.
The overall damage done to society by terrorist in business suits exceeds any other terror damage by far.
Both have a worldview consisting of strict mathematical certainty, with no room for shades of gray.
Both place little value in opinions or interests that do not align with theirs.
Both are more likely to blame their problems on external factors rather than internal flaws.
Both grossly oversimplify interpersonal relationships.
Both have an innate sense of superiority.
Take a look at the way the OP blames the magazine publisher and at some of the highly rated comments here for examples.
There are a few reasons I suspect and not all of them are about how awesome and useful they are as most of the posts above would have you believe. If technical skill was all that was required, why are there not more chemists?
From personal experiences only, I would say it is the fundamental difference in mindset required to practice a science over engineering. Self doubt and questioning are par for the course in the physical sciences, indeed it would be extremely difficult to do the job without the question "Are you sure?" running through your head every 15 min. Engineers on the other hand tend to deal in absolutes, laws carved in stone, it works or it doesn't, black and white. This does appeal to those with a predisposition to ignore shades of gray and are exactly the same traits as those of a fundamentalist of any persuasion, making them the ideal recruiting target.
This can be summed up by saying engineers tend to have a "I'm right. I'm right. I'M FUCKING RIGHT!" attitude to their work and life in general and woe betide anybody who tells them otherwise.
Disclaimer.... I openly accept that there is variability in any population, I made sweeping generalizations etc. This was done to stop the post turning into a monty python sketch listing all the exemptions. But the very fact I'm writing this disclaimer is a dead give-away that I am not an engineer.
...the REAL reason terrorists tend to be engineers is because we get so damn frustrated with the way people outright REFUSE to give us the level of respect (and wealth) that our superior intelligence warrants.
You small-minded bastards deserve what you get!
Its a much broader degree than in the USA, including many business, science, and vocational majors. Parents pretty much expect their sons in college study engineering. Colleges comply by calling more subjects engineering.
A similar misconception arises when with the saying "China [or India] graduates many more engineers than the USA". When you normalize for the fact that engineering Asia covers things not considered engineering in the USA, then the difference is not that great.