Therefore, if it were not for the indoctrination to the contrary you get from the educational system, those in engineering and science should be overwhelmingly beleivers in an Omnipitent Creator, whether from a Christian or a Jewish perspective, as the internal coherence of the Bible would also be impossible without the hand of God.

This might be pushing more would-be traffic engineers to ideas that challenge their previously mobility driven counterparts. Alt fuels and vehicles sure are sexy, but travel behavior research and reducing VMT are going to be part of any sustainable transportation future. What could be more “liberal” than changing transportation behavior?

While my personal politics do tend slightly to starboard, I don’t see a political monoculture in my field. My colleagues range from out & out socialists all the way to those who suspect Objectivism is a government plot.

Engineers can be excellent politicians, just like engineers can be excellent artists. It has more to do with cultivating a parallel skill set, and using good judgment in applying each approach (engineering or political) appropriately.

And as for libertarians working for government? I’ve seen it throughout my career - there are quite a few. It’s actually a good thing, in that they typically inject a bit of in-house skepticism to the latest grandiose plan of how the agency will Make Things Better.

rcm

The short version is: few engineer’s are in politics because they’d rather fix the problems. There is a good despair.com saying… if you aren’t part of the solution there is good money in prolonging the problem. It’s so true it’s not even funny.

The other is to look at the political regimes in the countries that are supporting the universities that oversee these curricula and the operating methodology. Engineers are useful, they build the physical aspects of the society and enable the lofty visions of the ruling order. They can be very effective and not challenge the regime. The flipside is if engineering is one of the few allowed or encouraged educational paths, you are going to find engineers who are both a part of the regime (Iran) and those opposed to it with equal fervor (al-Qaeda).

If we don’t produce more scientists and engineers, in 50 years they will be running a less democratic world and we’ll be writing about it on blog sites that don’t make any money.

Speaking from PA, civil engineering was sometimes referred to as a “redneck major”. Many of the disciplines share some particular aspect with a rural / farming lifestyle: damming a stream to provide a household reservoir, frequent work with concrete, laying out the land & its infrastructure, water collection & drainage, waste management, soil types and qualities, etc.

I’ll readily confirm that my class was more conservative as compared to other majors, but I’d say the class average was really more moderate; whereas other majors tended to be outright liberal. There were certainly outliers: we had some students & professors that leaned far left or far right. As for myself: I consider myself an extreme moderate… I’m passionate about my beliefs, but I believe in some right-wing issues as well as some left-wing issues (and also some stances that don’t fit in either wing).

I’ve had an infatuation with urban infrastructure planning. I’ve drawn up a slew of concepts in Google Earth of a network of transitways spanning cities, counties, states, and nations. …Yet I know none of it will get built unless I just so happen to take over the world. So if that ever happens: now you all know my reason.