OT: The superiority of engineers

[Jack M]

heh...

[skatha]

My dad would love this....

Of course, he spent most of his career wearing white athletic socks with suits and sporting a pocket protector....

[Neil Gendzwill]

The optimist thinks the glass is half-full. The pessimist thinks its half-empty. The engineer thinks the glass is overdesigned.

[CarvCanada]

from an engineering professor:

Definition of an Engineer

"An ENGINEER is one who passes as an exacting expert on the strength of being able to turn out, with prolific fortitude, strings of incomprehensible formulae calculated with micrometric precision from extremely vague assumptions which are based on debatable figures acquired from inconclusive tests and quite incomplete experiments, carried out with instruments of problematic accuracy by persons of doubtful reliability and rather dubious mentality. "

[Neil Gendzwill]

Which is why you always multiply the result by 10, just to be sure. At least, if you're a civil.

[gdboytyler]

Engineers hate risk. They try to eliminate it whenever they can. This is understandable, given that when an engineer makes one little mistake, the media will treat it like it's a big deal or something.

Examples of bad press for engineers;

1. Hindenberg

2. Space Shuttle Challenger

3. SPANet ©

4. Hubble space telescope

5. Apollo 13

6. Titanic

7. Ford Pinto

8. Tacoma Narrows Bridge

9. Corvair

10. Chernobyl

The risk/reward calculation for engineers looks something like this:

RISK: Public humiliation and the death of thousands of innocent people.

REWARD: A certificate of appreciation in a handsome plastic frame.

[Guest Jared Q]

Why is it that there are never any television shows featuring engineers? There are plently of doctor, lawyer, and cop shows. The media seems to love to make movies about engineering blunders.

[C5 Golfer]

Vewry seldom if ever do you or will you see an engineer on a jury. True fact. Also you will not see an engineer drive a Pontiac Astek (sp?).

[skatha]

Originally posted by Jared Q

Why is it that there are never any television shows featuring engineers? There are plently of doctor, lawyer, and cop shows. The media seems to love to make movies about engineering blunders.

And what do the doctor shows show? Docs sleeping with their patients and other unethical and immoral stuff...

I'd much rather watch a show on Discovery channel about building the Hoover Dam or the Golden Gate bridge

[Aracan]

A Pontiac Aztec (?) was pretty much the first thing I saw when I last visited the US. I hold that there are in fact NO people who drive one. The ones who do drive them are all cleverly masked aliens who have almost managed to blend in, but not quite - which is why they drive Aztecs.

[Jack M]

Ugliest car ever.

[Neil Gendzwill]

Originally posted by Jared Q

Why is it that there are never any television shows featuring engineers? There are plently of doctor, lawyer, and cop shows. The media seems to love to make movies about engineering blunders.

Because engineering is pretty boring TV? Let's watch Neil type all day... hey, he's attending a meeting!

Anyways, there's at least one engineer on TV - Joe on Medium (the main character's husband). He's an aerospace engineer and every once in a while they actually show him at work.

[Hagen]

...Dilbert was on TV for a while.

[Gtanner]

Since I am an engineer, I couldn't resist not jumping in on this one.

An engineer can take the derivative of air and the integral of water and will surely assume that a horse is a sphere to make the math easier.

[CarvCanada]

A farmer can't explain why his chickens aren't producing eggs, so he enlists a biologist, an engineer and a businessman to investigate the problem. The biologist and businessman go to the barn to check out the problem, while the engineer starts scribbling away.

Two months later, the engineer appears at the door of the farmer and claims "I have found the problem! I'm afraid it only works for frictionless chickens in a vacuum though... "

[lonerider]

Originally posted by Hagen

...Dilbert was on TV for a while.

Real engineers do very little "exciting" work in terms of life changing events. We don't see TV shows about librarians, truck drivers, or security guards for the same reason.

We have some TV shows with "atypical" engineers. In the '80s, we used to have engineer-action heros along the lines of MacGyver and the A-Team, who built stuff to beat the bad guys. Now we have like engineering reality shows like Junkyard Wars, Robot Wars, American Chopper, and BIG! were real engineers build stuff. That seems to count to me.

Or are you really looking for a network television show that shows four, young, attractive engineers "learning the ropes" in the office world as they bed each other in increasingly random combinations?

<img src=http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive/phd042605s.gif>

[Neil Gendzwill]

Originally posted by lonerider

Or are you really looking for a network television show that shows four, young, attractive engineers "learning the ropes" in the office world as they bed each other in increasingly random combinations?

Man, if I'd known that situation was available when I was starting my career...

[gdboytyler]

Originally posted by lonerider

Or are you really looking for a network television show that shows four, young, attractive engineers "learning the ropes" in the office world as they bed each other in increasingly random combinations?

Well, I'm an attractive male engineer, and I haven't met an attractive female engineer since college. I've met one good-looking saleswoman that was selling pumps.

That could be a nice plot for a sitcom (or maybe a porno). Engineer beds superhot female vendors by enticing them with large contracts.

Of course, I'm too ethical to try anything like that.

[lonerider]

Looks like engineers aren't the only ones looking for a TV show

<img src=http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive/phd042905s.gif>

[NateW]

How do you know when you're talking to an extroverted engineer?

When he's talking to you, he stares at your shoes.

[Jim]

Hey Steve,

Hey Steve, wade into the fray amigo. Engineers must commune at every opportunity. nyck, nyck

Sorry my clavicle hasn't healed faster.

[skatha]

Here's a memory-I'm in 8th grade taking algebra-remember "FOIL" for figuring out those equations? I asked my dad for help. He looks at the worksheet-he's an aerospace engineer-then says"this would really work better if you added an extra variable"

3 pages later he comes up with the answer.

I say "great, Dad...I have 30 more problems just like the first one!"

Last time I asked him for math help....

[Neil Gendzwill]

I'll always remember my dad trying to help my sisters with grade school math. He's a geophysics prof who specializes in seismic analysis. Everything from simple addition through basic trig is all lumped under "learning to crawl" in his head, so trying to adjust the level of help he was providing proved... difficult.

[Aracan]

I am not an engineer, but my wife is. She keeps regaling me with stories from the office, and honestly, there's material for at least two TV shows in there (provided you don't have a problem with making fun of engineers).

[joecarve]

Originally posted by C5 Golfer

Vewry seldom if ever do you or will you see an engineer on a jury. True fact.

Well, there weren't any mirrors in the courtroom, so technically, I can't disagree with you.

Originally posted by lonerider

Now we have like engineering reality shows like Junkyard Wars, Robot Wars, American Chopper, and BIG! were real engineers build stuff. That seems to count to me.

If only these shows would scrap the "drama" side of it and have non-stop gearhead-related content. The absolute worse offender is OverHauling...really outstanding work going on in those projects, but you see so little of it due to the "pranks".