2 ms·

I'd love to know where that 99% comes from. (Or maybe I wouldn't.) I'd say there's far more than anecdotal evidence, but not, obviously, not enough to draw nec

I'd love to know where that 99% comes from. (Or maybe I wouldn't.) I'd say there's far more than anecdotal evidence, but not, obviously, not enough to draw necessarily firm conclusions. So I would say there's enough question to sustain further scientific inquiry. That, interestingly enough, puts us in a position at odds with one of a common traits noted among engineers, in psychological terms: 'need for closure'; which would put the 'engineering mindset' in conflict with the 'scientific mindset', due to the open-ended nature of the science. (Of course, this is only my own speculation.) Which is why we get things like this: http://cosmicfingerprints.com/ee/ http://cosmicfingerprints.com/ee/ Harder numbers: http://www.nuff.ox.ac.uk/users/gambetta/Engineers%20of%20Jihad.pdf http://www.nuff.ox.ac.uk/users/gambetta/Engineers%20of%20Jih... (expanded book form) http://press.princeton.edu/titles/10656.html http://press.princeton.edu/titles/10656.html (less numbers, but foundational) http://www.sicotests.com/psyarticle.asp?id=212 http://www.sicotests.com/psyarticle.asp?id=212 http://www.sicotests.com/psyarticle.asp?id=235 http://www.sicotests.com/psyarticle.asp?id=235

danbruc 10y ago
I pulled the 99% out of thin air, I just wanted to emphasize how small I estimate the chances of this being true. I found one analysis [1] that found that creationist or only half as likely to be engineers as the general population, admittedly only using data from a preexisting survey as proxy for the question at hand. Maybe it is a naive view on my side but I expect that additional education will make it less likely that one believes religious claims to be true in general and this extends to becoming an engineer and being a creationist. But even if there was indeed a correlation of the form claimed by the Salem hypothesis, I would naturally want to look for traits that make it more likely for one to become an engineer and a creationist, not for something that causes engineers to become creationists. You did not explicitly spell it out this way and I am inclined to think you do not think this causation exists, but your response to a comment suggesting that it might be a good choice to become an engineer at least allows the interpretation that becoming an engineer causes becoming a creationist. And I obviously consider the idea of a causal relationship between being an engineer and being a creationist even more unlikely than that of certain traits increasing the likelihood of becoming an engineer as well as a creationist. Not that it is unlikely in the general case that learning about X makes one more likely to also believe Y, that is actually certainly pretty common, but in the concrete case I am really unable to see which things one learns when becoming an engineer are suitable to turn one into a creationist. Finally I am not sure what you wanted the express with the Evolution 2.0 article, but at least in the linked article the reasoning is heavily flawed. [1] https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/talk.origins/Xunl5SlJmZc https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/talk.origins/Xunl5Sl...

danbruc 10y ago

I pulled the 99% out of thin air, I just wanted to emphasize how small I estimate the chances of this being true. I found one analysis [1] that found that creationist or only half as likely to be engineers as the general population, admittedly only using data from a preexisting survey as proxy for the question at hand. Maybe it is a naive view on my side but I expect that additional education will make it less likely that one believes religious claims to be true in general and this extends to becoming an engineer and being a creationist. But even if there was indeed a correlation of the form claimed by the Salem hypothesis, I would naturally want to look for traits that make it more likely for one to become an engineer and a creationist, not for something that causes engineers to become creationists. You did not explicitly spell it out this way and I am inclined to think you do not think this causation exists, but your response to a comment suggesting that it might be a good choice to become an engineer at least allows the interpretation that becoming an engineer causes becoming a creationist. And I obviously consider the idea of a causal relationship between being an engineer and being a creationist even more unlikely than that of certain traits increasing the likelihood of becoming an engineer as well as a creationist. Not that it is unlikely in the general case that learning about X makes one more likely to also believe Y, that is actually certainly pretty common, but in the concrete case I am really unable to see which things one learns when becoming an engineer are suitable to turn one into a creationist. Finally I am not sure what you wanted the express with the Evolution 2.0 article, but at least in the linked article the reasoning is heavily flawed. [1] https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/talk.origins/Xunl5SlJmZc https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/talk.origins/Xunl5Sl...