I have included this thread from Larry's blog here without permission and removed any URLs trying to perserve the text and formating from table entries to present here as a test of a two column style in HTML5, only There is a link to the original blog below.
Monday, October 11, 2010
The Salem
Conjecture was popularized by Bruce Salem on the newsgroup
talk.origins. It dates to before my time on that newsgroup (1990) and
I haven't been able to find archives to research the exact origin. The
conjecture was explained by Bruce on numerous occasions, here's a
statement from Sept, 5, 1996.
My position is not that most
creationists are engineers or even that engineering predisposes one to
Creationism. In fact, most engineers are not Creationists and more
well-educated people are less predisposed to Creationism, the points
the statistics in the study bear out. My position was that of those
Creationists who presented themselves with professional credentials,
or with training that they wished to represent as giving them
competence to be critics of Evolution while offering Creationism as
the alternative, a significant number turned out to be
engineers. This is the so-called "soft" version of the
conjecture. The "hard" version is that there is something about being
an engineer that leads one to become a creationist. That's not what
Bruce said,
For a long the so-called "soft" hypothesis is the
one I have been putting forth, not the one earlier attributed to me. I
have also further qualified it by saying numerous times that religious
belief was the most significant factor. The reason I prefer to call my
idea a "conjecture" is that I have had only anecdotal data to support
it. The Salem Hypothesis has its own entry on Wikipedia
[Salem
Hypothesis]. Both versions of the Salem Conjecture are
listed there. The
talk.origins Jargon
File is incorrect because it only lists the hard version and
attributes it to Bruce Salem.
We all know that scientists
overwhelmingly reject creationism so it doesn't come as a surprise
that there are so few scientists in the creationists
movement. Ironically, the creationists long for scientific validity
while, at the same time, they attack all the basic principles of
science. The few so-called scientists who subscribe to superstition
get very prominent play among the creationists.
Engineers are
not scientists and they did not have much scientific training in
school. They are technologists (i.e., engineers) and that's not the
same thing. I don't think engineers spend much time studying
evolutionary theory in university. (It's probably too difficult for
them.)
Among the general public the distinction between
scientists and technologists is lost so whenever an engineer comes out
in favor of superstition (s)he is counted as a scientist. This is what
the Salem Conjecture says. Whenever you see a common run-of-the-mill
creationist who claims to have scientific knowledge, chances are
they're an engineer and not a scientist.
Here's how Bruce
explained it on talk.origins on May 10, 1996 in response to an
engineer who was objecting to the conjecture.
By your own
admission you are running the risk of becoming yet another data point
for something called the "Salem Hypothesis" or "Salem Conjecture" in
which I noticed some time ago the number of people publically
supporting Creationism whether in Creationist publications or this
group claiming to be "scientists" were mostly engineers. Most of them
had little knowledge of the scientific disciplines that relate to the
scientific acceptance of evolution and an old earth. Many people have
noticed subsequently that while engineers as a group seem more
inclined as a majority to believe Darwin, those with a background in
certain religions and those concerned with intelligent design seemed
predisposed to accept
Creationism or the arguments that support
it. This morning Larry Faraman, the author of the blog I'm From
Missouri, posted this message
[The
Salem Hypothesis].
I have been aware for a long time that
engineers have an especially strong tendency to be skeptical of
Darwinism, but I just now learned that this tendency has a name: the
"Salem hypothesis." I am especially interested in this tendency
because I am an engineer myself ....
I feel that the reason why
we engineers tend to be skeptical of Darwinism is that we are a
logical, practical, no bullshit, cut the malarkey, "I'm from
Missouri," "show me" kind of people.The irony is
palpable. Mr. Faraman, an engineer, is skeptical of evolutionary
biology and, by implication, most of the rest of science. On the other
hand, he's not the least bit skeptical of creationism. Another solid
data point for the Salem Conjecture. In this case, it's the "hard"
version that Mr. Faraman is supporting. He claims that training in
technology predisposes one to believe in superstitious nonsense. Maybe
he's right. I look forward to hearing from other engineers on this
point.
BTW, Missouri must be a very strange state. These days
when someone begins a conversation with "I'm from Missouri" it's
usually following by something irrational.
posted by Larry Moran at Link to Larry's Blog on Mar 25, 2007
I feel I should repost this
COEN 432 Applied Genetic
and
Evolutionary Systems (3 credits)
Prerequisite: COEN 352 or
COMP 352. Motivation
for the use of Genetic Algorithms
(GAs). Theory:
the Schema Theorem, the K‑armed Bandit,
the
Building Block Hypothesis, the Idealized GA and
comparison
of GAs. Methodology: representation,
fitness and selection,
crossover and mutation,
parameterization and constraints,
implementation.
Applications: function optimization, evolving
computer
programs, optimizing a pattern recognizer,
system
modelling. Identification of classes of
problems suitable for the
use of GAs. Lectures:
three hours per week.
COEN means
computer engineering, personaly I think the reason there are more
creationist engineers then scientists is because there are more
engineers then scientists.
Sunday, March 25, 2007 9:35:00 AM
I don't think engineers spend much time studying
evolutionary theory in university. (It's probably too difficult for
them.)
Gratuitous insults aside, as Pascal points out,
there are in fact engineering courses in the *application* of
evolution/genetics to engineering. Engineering is, of course, all
about application.
My personal theory (hem, hem) about why
there appear to be more creationist engineers than scientists is (hem,
hem):
1) If one is religious while being inclined towards science
and/or technology, engineering is a safe place to express that
inclination without being threatened by incovenient facts.
2)
The general public can't tell science from engineering. Creationist
organizations can take advantage of this by citing the academic and
professional credentials of their engineer spokespersons* as if they
were qualifications in science.
*has anyone heard of female
engineer creationists?
Sunday, March 25, 2007 11:02:00 AM
Long before I saw anything in writing about the "Salem
Conjecture", I had arrived at a similar but more limited conclusion
about my own field, computer software engineering. My own conjecture
was that computer programmers have a strong psychological preference
for things that have clear discrete values (binary being the extreme
case) and can be processed by deterministic algorithms. By comparison,
biology seems messy, probabilistic, and full of exceptions and
oddities.
My own biology education consisted of a worthless and
boring high school class taught by a Catholic nun, and a computer
science degree which I obtained without having to take any biology
whatsoever. Following an encounter with a computer programmer and
rabid young earth creationist, I embarked on a 10+ year self-study
program of intensive reading. Gradually I came to see the beautifully
intricate structure that evolution brought to the messiness of
biology. I also came to see how the oddities and quirkiness exhibited
by many species made perfect sense in light of evolution, and made no
sense whatsoever in the intelligent design / creationist
model.
I wonder if others would think that some of the reasons
I have cited for computer engineers' attraction to creationism are
applicable to engineers in general?
Sunday, March 25, 2007 1:27:00 PM
As a former engineer (now a geoscientist-in-training) and the
spouse of an engineer, I want to point out that engineers tend to
assume they're right until compelling contrary evidence comes
along. It usually doesn't matter if their default position is
well-thought-out or not. And the more attached to the default
position, the more compelling the evidence required to make the
engineer re-think that position.
Scientists, on the other hand,
tend to know we're living in a world of hypotheses. (I don't mean to
imply that evolution, or plate tectonics, or what have you are
hypotheses, just that the details of the most current research are by
their nature playing with hypotheses.) Those of us with large egos may
have trouble admitting publicly that new evidence trashes our
hypothesis, at least initially. But we're generally aware that the
possibility exists. Our engineering colleagues are often not.
Sunday, March 25, 2007 2:54:00 PM
I did mean to sign that last comment about engineer-think
vs. scientist-think. Sorry.
Karen
Just out of interest, engineers make up 8.27% of the DI's Darwin dissenters list.
I think there is an important distinction that has to be made.
The issue is "relative to what?" Engineers are statistically much less
likely to be creationists than the national average (at least in the
U.S.), but more likely to be creationists than true scientists are.
I
think something important to keep in mind is that the whole of
engineering education is taught from a design standpoint. All problems
engineers solve in their education are based on the assumption the
whatever it is they are working with was designed. The problems are
unsolvable if you don't make that assumption. If you are trying to
analyze something, it was obviously designed. If you are trying to
solve a something the problem you are trying to solve was designed to
be solvable. The entire engineering problem-solving strategy in the
coursework is based on that assumption. Everything they work with has a
purpose, everything they work with has a goal. Circuits do not evolve.
Trusses do not mutate. Engineers are taught the tools necessary to
solve engineering problems, but they are never taught to limit those
tools to those problems.
Now I am not saying that engineers are
better able to detect design. It is more of a "if all you have is a
hammer, everything looks like a nail" sort of thing. They are just
trained to operate that way. And I can tell you it is an
extraordinarily difficult mindset to break out of. It is not something
explicitly taught, it is the fundamental basis on which the thinking in
the field is built. That means it is ingrained in people without them
even realizing it. It is sort of like the way everything that is done
in science education is based on the premise that nature always follows
invariable rules. It is necessary for the field to operate. Unlike that
assumption, however, engineering's assumption cannot be relied on
outside of engineering itself. But since it is not something explicitly
dealt with it is not something that engineers, in my experience,
consciously realize they are doing. In fact, from what I have seen it
seems to be something that engineers making the transition to biology
have to be actively trained not to do.
As for evolution being
too difficult, don't count on it. Engineers aren't taught it because it
really is not useful for most engineers (although that is changing I
hear). Engineerings deal with extremely difficult courses. But the
courses are limited to those that it is perceived engineers will be
required to use. That means physics, math, and engineering, primarily.
Basic chemistry and basic biology maybe, but otherwise it is mostly
physics, math, and engineering.
I don't for one moment think that engineers couldn't understand evolutionary theory: they are trained to take in huge masses of detail and see the big picture as well. In fact, if exposed to it without bias, I think they'd love it--the way the happenstances of individual lives add up statistically; the way DNA codes tRNA codes peptide chains, which fold in a certain way, which bring certain stretches of protein together, which form chemically active sites; the way cane toads that have slightly longer legs are more likely to push into new territory; they way; the way one winter storm can raise the average mass of birds in a a flock by 50%.... The trouble is that they emerge from university without having been exposed to evolution's principles and mechanism. Instead they come out thinking that they know everything that matters and used to looking at everything as design.
This tells me that the perfect gift for an engineering student who is at all interested in science is the complete popular works of Stephen Jay Gould--not the textbooks but The Panda's Thumb, Bully for Brontosaurus, An Urchin in the Storm, The Flamingo's Smile, Dinosaur in a Haystack, and so on. And then throw in Carl Zimmer's "Evolution," the one with the eyes on the cover, because it's extremely breezy and readable. That will get them on the side of logic and mechanism if anything will.
My own conjecture was that computer programmers have a strong
psychological preference for things that have clear discrete values
(binary being the extreme case) and can be processed by deterministic
algorithms. By comparison, biology seems messy, probabilistic, and full
of exceptions and oddities.
I think this is too broad a
generalization. There are many areas of both theoretical and applied
computer science that are incredibly messy and probabilistic. Quantum
computing computing is an extreme example, more mundane ones are
optimization theory, adaptive computing and most areas of artificial
intelligence.
I would also take issue with the hard and fast
distinction assumed in this thread. I don't think you can effectively
decouple science from technology in any meaningful way. Many PhD. level
research scientists (a career I'm aiming for) in fields like physics
and computer science end up in industry researching topics that are
effectively technology, such as semiconductor fabrication and fiber
optic communications. The same thing is true of biology, where you have
applied genomics, medicine and other biotech areas.
Understanding
science is required for technology, and our technological achievements
can often inform our scientific understanding in return. I don't think
strict demarcation between the two is really as necessary as would seem
in the current academic discourse.
An understanding of science facts is required for technology,
but an understanding of the practice of science is not. That is they
key distinction. A mechanical engineer has to know the physics behind
the movement of fluids, for instance, but he or she does not need to
know how the principles were determined. It would contribute little or
nothing to their ability to apply those principles to whatever they are
working on. Similarly an electrical engineer needs to know the physics
behind the flow of current, but it would not help him to know how those
principles were originally discovered. It may even be
counterproductive. An engineering education is already extremely
time-consuming and difficult even at the undergraduate level, there
simply is not time for a lot of additional coursework that will not
help them solve engineering problems. No matter how much it may be nice
for engineers to learn biology, for instance, it simply takes too much
time if they are not going to be working on biological problems.
The
problem is not that engineers are not trained in biology. Neither are
physicists. The problem is that some engineers seem to feel that their
engineering training makes them experts on topics they know absolutely
nothing about. By speaking out on these topics they are violating the
National Society of Professional Engineers Code of
Ethics that all engineers are supposed to abide by. Rules they
break include:
I.2. Perform services only in areas of their
competence.
I.3. Issue public statements only in an objective
and truthful manner.
II.2. Engineers shall perform services
only in the areas of their competence.
II.2.a. Engineers shall
undertake assignments only when qualified by education or experience
in the specific technical fields involved.
II.2.b. Engineers
shall not affix their signatures to any plans or documents dealing
with subject matter in which they lack competence, nor to any plan or
document not prepared under their direction and
control.
II.5.a. Engineers shall not falsify their
qualifications or permit misrepresentation of their or their
associates’ qualifications. They shall not misrepresent or exaggerate
their responsibility in or for the subject matter of prior
assignments. Brochures or other presentations incident to the
solicitation of employment shall not misrepresent pertinent facts
concerning employers, employees, associates, joint venturers, or past
accomplishments.
III.3. Engineers shall avoid all conduct or
practice that deceives the public.
III.3.a Engineers shall
avoid the use of statements containing a material misrepresentation of
fact or omitting a material fact.
III.3.c. Consistent with the
foregoing, engineers may prepare articles for the lay or technical
press, but such articles shall not imply credit to the author for work
performed by others.
There are more creationists among engineers than among
scientists because scientists are more knowledgable about science than
engineers. Duh! I'll also bet there are more creationists among lawyers
than among scientists. Duh again!
But engineers are definitely
more creative than scientists (since scientists are more constrained by
the physical world). And artists are the most creative of all.
I've been both a biology student and an engineering student
(and work as a civil engineer-in-training now), and I did feel like
there were slightly more hardcore religious people in engineering,
though I didn't take a survey or anything.
Echoing Todd, part
of the problem may be that we engineers aren't scientists per se. We
start with the science that's given to us and then figure out ways to
use it. We tend not to think about how the science works (we have
design codes so we don't need to think that much) nor do we deal with
the type of problems that interfere with religious thinking (with the
possible exception of mining engineers who get to see all that geology
stuff). Another difference between engineering and scientific
thinking is that when faced with a very complicated problem, the
scientist will try to understand the workings of the system in minute
detail, whereas the engineer will make a bold simplifying assumption
then build in a safety factor.
"Engineers are not scientists
and they did not have much scientific training in school. They are
technologists (i.e., engineers) and that's not the same thing. I don't
think engineers spend much time studying evolutionary theory in
university. (It's probably too difficult for them.)"
You
are way off base here, Dr. Moran. We're not scientists, but engineers
are far more than technologists. We have technologists where I work -
they do the CAD, run materials tests, do surveys etc. Engineers on the
other hand have the body of knowledge that enables them to understand
and design whatever it is they work with, and most of the time, that
includes some significant understanding of the underlying
science.
In university, you study what's important to your
discipline. Hell, my wife's an electrical engineer and I don't have
the slightest clue what she does, and that's still considered
engineering. There's no way I'd study evolutionary biology (except
that I did when I was a biology student, but I'm an exception). Let me
tell you, as someone who's done both, engineering courses are
ridiculously more difficult than biology courses. I don't think
biologists spend much time studying structural dynamics in
university. (It's probably too difficult for them.)
"has
anyone heard of female engineer creationists? "
Sadly, there
are not enough female engineers to be that much of a problem. It's
one of the blemishes on our profession that we've been relatively
unsuccessful in increasing the number of women in engineering, though
not for lack of trying.
Monday, March 26, 2007 4:14:00 PM
Aside from the unearned insults and provocations, I think the
answer to the question if "training in technology predisposes one to
believe in superstitious nonsense" is negative. But the practices may
support such a conflation between superstition and woo which I think
this is about.
First, a direly needed disclosure. My training
is first in engineering and then science, so I'm not neutral but also
feel for both sides. I was also early interested in nature, up to the
point that I received a token stipend as best student in biology at my
high school, but I steered away from it because it was too easy, too
small a challenge. ;-) (I'm not sure I would say so today though,
seeing some of the messy modeling problems that biologists may want to
attack.)
"Engineers are not scientists and they did not have
much scientific training in school. They are technologists (i.e.,
engineers) and that's not the same thing. I don't think engineers spend
much time studying evolutionary theory in university. (It's probably
too difficult for them.)"
Most of my basic points have been
made already. As Aardvark I see a lack of understanding of the
diversity of engineers, ranging from technologists (short course
alternatives in some countries) to doing 1-2 preparatory years of much
the same studies and laboratory work as physicists, sharing courses.
And as Tyler I see unmotivated distinctions between science and
technology. I think modeling and the axiomatic methods of science are
well known among engineers with longer educations. And for myself I
don't think I fully appreciated the usefulness of the predictive parts
of science until well after my PhD. I have met engineers that are
consistently working experimentally and theoretically when elaborating
new systems and designs, albeit in the small scale that immediate need
necessitate.
The point that remains for me to make is that
besides the numbers statistics of engineers vs scientists, IMHO the
characterization of engineers as figuring in woo and crankery was well
established before the internet and ID. The design speculations seems
unjustified. A convenient "just so model", perhaps? ;-)
Some
engineers have been introvert or extrovert market opportunists and
pushed the most elaborate Rube Goldberg inventions, scams and grand
failures in later history. (Though to come back to technologists, there
is a lot of conflation here too.)
And the need for engineers to
often rapidly survey and come up with solutions in new situations makes
the then useful habit of ad hocs easily spill over into other areas, at
least as far as I can observe. It is just that ad hocs seldom luck out
to be generalizable knowledge, and especially without real feedback
from observations and tests mostly not working at all.
It can
become woo galore in some cases, especially when some engineers want to
mess further with the science they have become acquainted with and
interested in. It isn't just evolution and creationism.
Perhaps
the useful question is instead how to try to channel and meaningfully
put to work some (realistically not all :-( of the creative energies
shown?
Monday, March 26, 2007 8:33:00 PM
Torbjorn,
I can't find a private message function on
blogger, so I hope Larry doesn't mind this. I'd like you to drop me a
line when you have a sec, my email address is in my profile (link
embedded in name, of course).
Tuesday, March 27, 2007 5:57:00 PM
I am Bruce Salem, who originated the so-called Salem Conjecture
on talk.origins in 1988. The Wikipedia page on this had been
probationary until someone found a published paper I had seen some
years ago lending support to the "soft" version. The page has been
veted with that citation, when I looked recently.
This issue
comes up again for me when I hear engineers who don't seem to practice
the art of suspending judgement, which seems to be the one of the prime
skills of scientists. Several of the postings here make the useful
distinctions about the focus of an engineer's training and the mental
stance of being in problem solving mode. What I think the idea I
brought up back in 1988 is cautionary, not a condemnation of
engineering, but of the tendancy of a type of personality that "fixes"
things and sticks too strongly to the solution. So, the
individual
who inspired the conjecture was an EE who worked for Tecktronix and
said he had the expertise to judge evolutionary beliefs, when in fact
he was a theist with a bias that he wanted to conceal and misrepresent
himself.
I live in Silicon Valley where there are per capita as
many engineers as almost anywhere else in the world. Where I am seeing
the Salem Conjecture at work here is not in the Creationism arena but
in the political arena, which is all about solutions to problems,
analysis and problem solving, and I see the same pattern mistakes in
areas beyond a narrow expertise, of being arrogant and holding a strong
if poorly constructed opinion.
Thursday, August 20, 2009 8:08:00 PM
Sorry, I meant to say that there are MORE engineers in Silicon
Valley per capita than almost anywhere else. I
didn't see the
review button; I need the wheelchair icon :-)
Thursday, August 20, 2009 8:10:00 PM
