# Anyone else notice the arrogance among engineers **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 17, 2006, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980 "2006-02-17T18:51:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Waverly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/57b2e6/32.png) [@Waverly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Waverly)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/121 "2006-02-18T12:43:14Z")
C’mon everyone, the OP is a dumb one, granted, but it’s true that engineers sometimes do possess a special kind of arrogance. It’s the type of arrogance that results from years of shaking at the mere sight of a dodge-ball, only to find yourself magically transported one day to a life where you are valued for your creative thinking and innovation. they show it off. Especially in front of people who remind them of those dodge-ball hurling neandertoads. This is usually combined with fairly rigorous training to be accurate, but not necessarily genial, especially when it comes to communicating. ---
**Author:** ![Stillwell\_Angel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/96bed5/32.png) [@Stillwell\_Angel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stillwell_Angel)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/122 "2006-02-18T13:11:06Z")
> [@LavenderBlue](#): > > Engineers are gorgeous, sexy, charming and very smart. > > At least the one I married certainly is. 😃 As is the one I am marrying next week! I do like to tease him with: What do engineers use for birth control? Their personalities 😃 ---
**Author:** ![pizzabrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e9c0ed/32.png) [@pizzabrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pizzabrat)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/123 "2006-02-18T13:14:43Z")
> [@Waverly](#): > > C’mon everyone, the OP is a dumb one, granted, but it’s true that engineers sometimes do possess a special kind of arrogance. Then what makes the OP dumb? Loyalty to the bandwagon? ---
**Author:** ![Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/96bed5/32.png) [@Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patty_O_Furniture)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/124 "2006-02-18T13:31:32Z")
Don’t worry **pizzabrat** , engineers lack _street smarts_ and their social engineering skills are downright abysmal. ---
**Author:** ![pizzabrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e9c0ed/32.png) [@pizzabrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pizzabrat)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/125 "2006-02-18T13:33:37Z")
> [@zoid](#): > > See, the thing is, if one person tells you you’re wrong, they just might not like you. > > If two people tell you you’re wrong they may both be out to get you. > > If more or less everyone tells you you’re wrong, you just can’t call that an anomaly, disregard the data points as outliers, recalculate the limits and pretend the process is statistically in control. > > But I’m stating the obvious… You forgot to factor in the tendency for pile-ons on this board. ---
**Author:** ![Waverly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/57b2e6/32.png) [@Waverly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Waverly)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/126 "2006-02-18T13:45:30Z")
> [@pizzabrat](#): > > Then what makes the OP dumb? Loyalty to the bandwagon? Is this the thanks I get for coming to the aid of the addled? Geez. ---
**Author:** ![sinjin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ebca7d/32.png) [@sinjin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sinjin)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/127 "2006-02-18T14:11:40Z")
> [@pizzabrat](#): > > To the point of going back to 1987 and publishing a book that ridicules non-engineers? Actually the book tweeks engineers as well. Did you read the subtitle? The Official Handbook of Engineers and Applied Scientists: Toolies or **Fun, Wealth, and Artsy-Craftsies: What They Are and How to Avoid Them** Note that Artsy-Craftsies are grouped with Fun and Wealth, not bad companions. But maybe you just don’t get Engineer Humor \<–oxymororn. ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/128 "2006-02-18T14:42:05Z")
> [@pizzabrat](#): > > You forgot to factor in the tendency for pile-ons on this board. Yes, the whole world is out to get you. That explains it much more clearly than the remote possibility that you might just be a tiny bit off base with your original assumption. But that would require you to take into account ideas which aren’t your own and possibly change your stance. Is the earth still flat in your world? :rolleyes: Or am I being arrogant again? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 3:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/129 "2006-02-18T15:12:10Z")
We work hard for our degrees. We can’t bullshit or pad our work with fancy wordsmithing to snow the instructor. We have to derive the equations and crunch the nimbers. If it’s wrong, there is no “alternate but equally valid opinion”, and we have to design and build things that work in the real world. Usually, it is something that was underbudgeted, under a ridiculously short schedule, , with inadequate staffing, and then have to explain the problems to people who don’t care enough to understand the thing just won’t happen - the very same ones who made all the impossible promises (for someone else to actually deliver on) to begin with. Then we get something that does work, and someone wants to change it - for no good technical reason. So, we tend to get short with people who show themselves to be willfully ignorant. We get disgusted with people who have the data, numbers and graphs right there, and then go out of their way to ignore the info and do the opposite. Then there are the assholes who change the data to suit their own “views” but leave our name on the false info. Finally, when it goes to shit because the dumb fuck changed the info and gets caught, we are expected to fix it and come up with their excuses - that’s when I always go into “hang the bastard” mode. We get tired of having to play nice with deliberately stupid people who don’t know or care about what we do. We get tired of people who dismiss everything presented, with endless bullshit “what abouts” and “what ifs”, when we know they are talking out their asses. We hate people who don’t do shit themselves, but harangue us with “paradigm” and “outside the box” bullshit talk. We hate bullshiters. It isn’t arrogance, it’s fatigue. Steve BSEE, NYIT. ---
**Author:** ![fluiddruid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c2a13f/32.png) [@fluiddruid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fluiddruid)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/130 "2006-02-18T15:21:09Z")
> [@SteveG1](#): > > We work hard for our degrees. We can’t bullshit or pad our work with fancy wordsmithing to snow the instructor. We have to derive the equations and crunch the nimbers. If it’s wrong, there is no “alternate but equally valid opinion”, and we have to design and build things that work in the real world. But, you’re ignoring the simple fact that bridges can be held up by marshmallows and hope. Hope is what’s most important to society! The children are our future, and we need bridges of hope. That’s my opinion, and _opinions can’t be wrong!_ ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/131 "2006-02-18T15:29:47Z")
**Steve** , I wouldn’t argue with you about what conditions are like for engineers, but you do realize that most professions could write a rant like yours about unfair/unpleasant working conditions, right? Working in an accounting department for a multinational oil and gas company, one of the biggest stumbling blocks to getting invoices approved and paid on time was engineers who like to collect invoices and build little forts with them on their desktops. Just saying that nobody’s completely wrong or completely right. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/132 "2006-02-18T16:00:07Z")
Hmm. I actually see a lot less anti-engineer sentiment than what people here are expressing, or else I mainly don’t notice it. Most of who I work with are people who desperately need engineers, and engineering, and as a result I don’t get the flack back that some would. But within the engineering world itself, there is a pecking order as well. When I moved into management many years back (I still do most all of my own engineering as a consultant), I started to notice the “pure” engineers (the ones that never wanted to see a client, contract, invoice, or anything other than a spec) distancing themselves from me a bit. You have to fight hard to maintain respect when you move into management. I hear engineering jokes occasionally, but it’s quite stunning to me, as they don’t apply to many I know at all. The average Engineer in my office is no different than most Americans, and that’s really sad in a parallel manner. They come to work from 8-5, eat a sack lunch or sometimes go out to the “all you can stuff in your gob” Mexican buffet, then go home at night and turn on the latest CSI _._ dreck and turn their brains off, and on the weekend they watch College football on Saturday and NFL football on Sunday. They always talk about their lawns, their kids, their dogs, and, of course, the ever-present opiate of the masses, football. There are a few that are different, but most are dreadfully boring, and not even interested in science and technology any more than our secretaries and marketing folk are. It should be noted that there are other pecking orders as well involving engineers. Some PE’s have a resentment towards non-PE’s being allowed to call themselves “engineers”. Engineering techs don’t like engineers, thinking that their 2-year degrees qualify them “better” than a 4-year one. And the reverse applies there as well. Lots of people attach “engineer” to their name for some reason and actually have no engineering degree at all, like CompSci majors (I’m excluding those who have a degree in “Computer Engineering”). And then you have titles which water down the profession of Engineering, such as “sheet metal engineer” (auto shop guy), “food products engineer” (grocer), “procedures engineer” (marketing person), and of course “sanitation engineer” (garbage truck driver), all which I’ve actually seen IRL as job titles. To poke at the OP, I’ll post my creds too out of arrogance: MS-ME, P.E. ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/133 "2006-02-18T16:14:22Z")
> [@featherlou](#): > > **Steve** , I wouldn’t argue with you about what conditions are like for engineers, but you do realize that most professions could write a rant like yours about unfair/unpleasant working conditions, right? Working in an accounting department for a multinational oil and gas company, one of the biggest stumbling blocks to getting invoices approved and paid on time was engineers who like to collect invoices and build little forts with them on their desktops. Just saying that nobody’s completely wrong or completely right. I didn’t mean to say everyone else had it easy. I was talking about me. You did know the world really does revolve around me, didn’t you? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9fc348/32.png) [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/134 "2006-02-18T16:21:16Z")
> [@SteveG1](#): > > We get tired of having to play nice with deliberately stupid people who don’t know or care about what we do. We get tired of people who dismiss everything presented, with endless bullshit “what abouts” and “what ifs”, when we know they are talking out their asses. We **hate people** who don’t do shit themselves, but harangue us with “paradigm” and “outside the box” bullshit talk. We hate bullshiters. It isn’t arrogance, it’s fatigue. bolding mine Ah ! It is all becoming clearer to me. [Osama bin Laden](http://lexicorient.com/e.o/osama_b_laden.htm) > [@](#): > > 1979: Finishes his education as civil engineer at King Abdul Aziz University of Jedda. Its fatigue is it? Pictures I’ve seen of bin Laden sure seem to convey fatigue. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/135 "2006-02-18T16:57:02Z")
> [@SteveG1](#): > > We get tired of having to play nice with deliberately stupid people who don’t know or care about what we do. We get tired of people who dismiss everything presented, with endless bullshit “what abouts” and “what ifs”, when we know they are talking out their asses. We hate people who don’t do shit themselves, but harangue us with “paradigm” and “outside the box” bullshit talk. We hate bullshiters. It isn’t arrogance, it’s fatigue. > > Steve BSEE, NYIT. Good point, but that’s just managerial bullshit. We get that in IT all the time, and I’m sure anyone else who deals with doing actual constructive work faces the same thing. Probably some of us are pretty arrogant too, but, it happens less because the field isn’t reguated the way engineering is and we come from broader backgrounds. ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/136 "2006-02-18T16:58:31Z")
> [@](#): > > **UnaPersson** said: > I’m excluding those who have a degree in “Computer Engineering” Why put Computer Engineering in quotes? Do you not consider it real engineering? ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/137 "2006-02-18T17:03:18Z")
> [@Spectre of Pithecanthropus](#): > > Probably some of us are pretty arrogant too, but, it happens less because the field isn’t reguated the way engineering is and we come from broader backgrounds. I should clarify this last point. By implying that engineers have narrow backgrounds, I’m referring to the fact that they all go through more or less similar training, which engenders esprit de corps, and that can lead to a great deal of pride in what and who they are. In most people, I think this is a good thing, but there are always some bad apples. With IT people it’s different, we come from a variety of academic backgrounds so we don’t have that. I’ve worked with extremely competent people who were business, history, and liberal arts majors, as well as CS majors. In short, we have so many different kinds of people in the field, academically speaking, that we don’t have the same kind of feeling about ourselves and our field. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/138 "2006-02-18T17:09:40Z")
I was going to post in this thread but then I noticed that there are many non-engineers contributing. I wouldn’t soil my hands by appearing in public with the likes of them.[sup]1[/sup] :rolleyes: 1 This should give the OP at least one cite of an arrogant (retired 24 years) engineer post. ---
**Author:** ![Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/96bed5/32.png) [@Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patty_O_Furniture)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/139 "2006-02-18T17:11:59Z")
> [@](#): > > Most of who I work with are people who desperately need engineers What’s the difference between needing an engineer and _desperately_ needing an engineer? I can just imagine the Sunday classifieds: “HELP WANTED: Engineers _desperately_ needed!” ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980/140 "2006-02-18T17:33:12Z")
> [@catsix](#): > > Why put Computer Engineering in quotes? Do you not consider it real engineering? I put it in quotes for emphasis as the “subject at hand” or under discussion, to call attention to it. I do in fact consider it a “real” engineering degree, even though I note there is a difference between it and many other engineering degrees, because there is not yet a PE license in any State that I know for Computer Engineering (which actually makes a significant difference to me, in that I can only hire people whose degree allows them to sit for the PE; thus all my engineering programmers are EE’s, ME’s, CE’s, etc.) . That doesn’t necessarily make it “lesser” or “greater”, just “different”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-else-notice-the-arrogance-among-engineers/344980.md?page=8)