What's your occupation: Engineer or Non-Engineer

Bachelor of Fine Arts (Graphic Design) degree here, did it for 13+ years. Now a methodist minister. As others have lamented, I too am essentially an "amateur engineer" who loves making things work!

Schlante,
Phillip

 

Engineer by degree, but will be a lawyer in a matter of months. Kind of looks like I might be following TexLaw into the patent field.

 

Ph.D. in Plant Physiology

 

I'm an Environmental Science grad currently working in retail.

 

Mechanical Engineer, Tri-State/Trine University 2001. most homebrewers i know are engineers or very technical people.

 

My job title is "Stationary Engineer" I work in a Hospital environment as well as a BioMedical Science Facility.

Salute!

 

I'm not an engineer, nor do I have a "college" degree.

Having said that, I am a great cook!

FWIW, I am a SVP for the optical company I work for.

 

BS in Computer Engineering from Kansas State in '06, 2 years in aeronautics area (defense) and now a bit over a year into my MS/PHd in EE and University of Kansas. Finally be back to a real job (making real money) in 4 more years! Can't wait...

 

Chemical Engineer
Graduated January of 2009 from NJIT - Still looking for work.

 

Haha. I have come to doubt any non-verifiable personal information that people post on forums. I swear every forum I participate is made up of 100% of people who claim to be engineers. Actually, no, its not just engineers but engineers with 1,000 years of experience and 45 doctorate degrees. I don't get it.

I think that's a joke? But no, I am not a structural engineer. And I despise Oregon State.

Maybe in Bizarro World.

Haha, not even close. Well, I did work in IT for three years in high school, and four years during college. But other than that I find your accusations insulting.

It is interesting that you thought it was rhetorical.

Actually, I just find the whole engineering phenomena strange. Engineers in general would be considered losers from a social perspective. So it is contrary to the norm to have it such a celebrated occupation. Perhaps the only way to feel pride and comfort in being an engineer is in an impersonal imaginary world on the interweb....

And specifically, in my experience, electrical engineers are the worst of the bunch. Now that I think about it, here is my engineering personality ranking from least worst to most worst:

1. Biomedical
2. Chemical
3. Mechanical
4. Civil
5. Computer
6. Electrical
7. Aerospace
...
99. Computer Science (although most people with degrees in CS do not end up working as engineers)
100. IT (even though this is sooo not engineering,but many people in IT have CS degrees)

Actually, the strange trend in that ranking is that it is consistent with the percentage of women in the field.

By the way, if you haven't figured it out, this ranking is purely for entertainment purposes only.

 

On what scale are you measuring personality when you say "Engineers in general would be considered losers from a social perspective".

In my experience just some of the aspects of engineers are that they:
are hard working
have a much better than average understanding of the world around them
are very good at problem solving
have higher earning potential than non-scientific careers


Aren't these all good things? Maybe you don't like to be around highly educated, technically minded people but that doesn't make them losers.

I'm proud to be an engineer because I worked very hard to attain my Chemical Engineering degree. I know what it took to get it.

 

Haha. Don't take my comments too seriously - as they were not intended to be. But since you bring it up...

There is a lot more to life than working hard and being smart. Like homebrew. So your right, I do not put a lot of exclusive value on those qualities.

And there are different types of "smartness". A lot of engineers I know are good at technical smarts but awful at real life smarts and common sense smarts, and I have about a million stories to back it up. That is the whole motivation behind the "You are an engineer if.." jokes.

Allow me to make a beer analogy. A person is like a recipe. A good recipe, no matter the flavor, provides good balance. You could say the same thing applies to people. In my experience engineers tend to be unbalanced. Yes, they can be smart and are sometimes hard working - but usually at the expense of other qualities.

And I am not referring to my opinion but popular conception. When I say losers I don't mean low life degenerates but rather people with less than average social skills and a propensity to "work hard" at the expense of so many other things in life.

But in contrast to the concept of hard working, in studies done of university level engineering students engineers consistently rank among the top cheaters.

As far as higher earning potential I think that is a misconception - made especially by recent graduates. Assuming the comparison is among college graduates, engineers start out higher than average but level off more dramatically with a lower ceiling for very high pay. Being an engineer is a safer bet to make a decent living, but your not going to be rich. And more often than not, those in engineering industries who make a lot of money often are engineers with MBA's.

 

Of course, you mean this is what you think. After your repeated attempts to offend this Engineer-related thread, I would guess no one cares about your thoughts on anything.

Troll. There are very few of your kind on this board. That is one of the things that makes HBT such a relaxing place.

 

Engineering student, few years from completion of my BEng, I may be switching to Ocean Engineering from Mechanical Engineering though... I love all of it.

 

B.S. Materials Engineering Iowa State 2002
Ph.D. Materials Science NC State 2006

Building stuff and doing chemistry in Homebrew is a natural fit....

 

Broadcast Engineer working in Television...

-Tripod

 

My tittle is Maintenance engineer but i'm not a "True engineer". I take systems and make them work better, safer, faster, cheaper etc... Its the Kaizen theory(If you work with the Japanese you'll get it).

 

If you work with 50% of companies in the US, you know about Kaizen....and all the other lovlies that Toyota brought us.

More importantly...making things work better, safer, faster, and cheaper is pretty much my exact definition of an engineer!

 

BSME Georgia Tech, MS IT UMUC.

 

well from poll results at the time I voted most are non-engineers...like me!

B.S. Molecular Biology
Ph.D. Neuroscience

I just like beer!

 

I voted not an engineer because my current job isn't engineering.

I do have dual degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering, an MBA, and love to cook.

 

sounds like you're denying your inner engineer. embrace it man.

 

Mechanical Engineer, but I mainly drive in the projects, help other companies expand, increase market share...

Cheers
Beer and Engineers

 

BS in Civil Engineering, Wyoming 89

 

Doesn't brewing make us ALL engineers? If so, boredatwork is officially a loser. Nice work, friend.

 

Chemical Engineer from West Point, '06

 

Manufacturing Engineer, BS in Mechanical Engineering

I am not suprised there is so many on here just because everyone I know who is, enjoys drinking beer. I took 1/4 of my batch to give to people at work.

 

BS in English. (Penn State)
Masters in Business Administration/Information Technology (Goldey Beacom, Delaware)

Quality Assurance Software Analyst by Day...........Recreational Chemist by night!

 

Firefighter and amateur artist ... Keeps me busy!

 

my inaugural post:

Civil Engineer - Texas A&M '00

 

BSEE '02 University at Buffalo

My girlfriend actually noticed the brewer/engineer connection before I did.

 

Non-engineer here. Got a BS in geography at Illinois State in 01. Suprised not to see any other geographers on here. My title now is GIS coordinator. I work for a municipality but most of my experience was in the defense/intelligence sectors.

 

Even though I'm a lawyer, can I call myself a legal engineer?

 

Nah, that's a congressman.

 

Domestic Engineer here. Always designing new ways to piss off my wife. She always says I am full of BS so, I guess I earned a degree in it somewhere.

I get paid to be a desk trained Code Monkey.

 

Used to be construction superintendent, now just waiting for that change to start.
Supers find engineers mistakes and correct them.

 

What are you talking about? Anyway...

I was thinking about this a little bit more. I guess I never thought of home brew as an engineer magnet. Right now the poll is at 40%/60% engineer/non-engineer. I wonder what the percentage is for things like star trek fans or comic books or other engineer magnets?

I wish I was a sociologist.

I couldn't find a real percentage for the generic percentage of the workforce and college graduates that are engineers, but I would estimate something like 10% or less. And, it's not even the high percentage of engineers in homebrew that I find so interesting but rather the excitement over it.

What is the connection? I am guessing a lot of it has to do with the scientific nature of it. But at the same time I think the percentage of homebrewers that get scientific in their homebrew is pretty small, so I am don't think that is it. And there isn't much science in engineering. I can definitely see the connection between engineers and DIY - and maybe that is the answer. The idea of constructing something and making up your own design - for something that to the average person is quite elusive? I don't know...

 

MSME from University of Idaho. Someone has to do it, otherwise all those cubicle manufacturers would go out of business.

 

Chemical Engineer, UC Davis, 1990.

However, I'm a Registered Civil Engineer in California.

 

college drop-out. was working on my BA in Philosophy.

worked as a story and dialogue writer for a video game company, now studying brewing with Siebel and hoping to go pro