I have this odd feeling of inadequacy lately. I feel like I don’t measure up in the church plant team, at my job, as a husband, or much anything else I do, even stuff I used to be good at like being a friend.
It’s odd, but I think it comes from not knowing where I fit in the big picture. I have dreams, a big picture of what I want our church to be like someday, and I can plan down to now about how the details look of getting there in my head, but the problem is I don’t see myself in that big picture in a huge church, and subsequently don’t know where I fit now, or what I should be doing for that matter. Especially since my job isn’t to dream about how we go from here to being a big church…thats Jeffs job. I talked to him about this a little yesterday (and got in trouble for comming home 2 hours late), but I didn’t tell him I didn’t see myself in this picture.
It’s frustrating for me to be like this. Usually I’m a great puzzle solver and can piece things together in a great way, and make everything fit. But for some reason I’m feeling blocked from seeing myself in this.
I was excited to realize that God gave me the ability to dream big, and the ability to connect theory (or my dreams) with reality, and I don’t really look at the two as seperate (and I haven’t since I learned Diff-eq and ECE 210). I believe that God showed me that for a reason. I don’t know what that reason is anymore since I haven’t been able to use it to find my nitch, and instead am slowly winding my way through everyone elses in my head.
I also am disturbed at the lack of spiritual gifts I posses, sometimes this bothers me a lot, others just a little. I mean, a finger is a finger, but sometimes it wants to be an eye, and I don’t think that is unreasonable considering Paul says we should strive for the gift or prophecy since it is edifying to the whole body. I’m still confused some about all this, and it is getting frustrating. I suspose I’ll email Jeff a little later at work and ask him who is looking to start a mini-group and get prayer about all this.
Well, that is my depressing bit for today. Other than that, the MIN-INATOR visited me this weekend. That was totally sweet. And I got into an arguement with Jeff where he told me that I’m a guy with a bachelors in engineering, and because I don’t have a science degree and didn’t take any philosphy of science classes I have no grounds to challenge other scientist methodology. I thought that was like telling a guy who spent five years learning how to weld that he didn’t have any grounds to challenge someone elses welding because he hasn’t read 3 books on it and taken a few classes. What do the scientists and engineers think about that. Is the philosphy of science built into engineering? Seems to me you couldn’t seperate the two, but I’m willing to entertain opinions. My plan is to try to learn about what Jeff was talking about, read the books or what not, but I’m wondering if it would be really worth it since I’ve done more science than anyone with a major in some kind of philosophy could ever hope to do.
honey_mustard says
bigcat2k says
tehuatzi says
dreum says
From my perspective I would have to agree with you, but of course I’m biased because I’m also an engineer. As I see it, scientists (and mathematicians) develop fundamental concepts on the way the universe works, while engineers use those ideas in practical applications. Jeff has an interesting idea, but it is only interesting in that it is an interesting question, not that he is right. The question is: who is qualified to make philosophical decisions about methodology in research? My answer would be any one who works in that particular scientific field. and I do mean everyone. Taking my own major for example, that would include those material scientists, design engineers, manufacturing engineers, equipment dealers, and even farmers. Why is it so important to include everyone from top to bottom? Because even though the scientific knowledge goes down as you go down the ladder, the practical knowledge and application goes up. In my view, if the scientists invent something new that has no application, then there wasn’t any point to inventing it in the first place.
When I finally get a job, I want to be an engineer that listens to farmers. If I simply blow them off because I don’t think they’re “qualified” to give me suggestions then I’m being arrogant and prideful. Not everything they suggest will be a good idea or even possible, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t try to understand where they are coming from.
Okay that’s the end of my rant 🙂
kelglitter says
As a person who comes from a long line of stellar engineers, but is not an engineer herself, I am not qualified to have an opinion on this. But I will pass on a line that I have heard my dad and my grandpa and at least one of my dad’s brothers say before, and that is “I am not qualified to have an opinion on that.” They also make statements something like “Based on what I know about *thisX*, I suspect that *thisY* is *thisZ*.” Bob’s phrase for the same is the slightly different “I don’t have an opinion on that,” or sometimes “I don’t know much about that,” to which he sometimes adds “…but from what I do know, blah blah blah.” I have much to learn about humility from the folks listed above.
dk_siberian says
You don’t possess spiritual gifts. That’s a load of crap. We operate in spiritual gifts, and we get used to one or another after awhile, but that doesn’t mean we possess it. Every time we reach into the toolbox of the Spirit, we don’t know what we’re going to get… We just get what is needed.
The primary reasons we don’t get something are because (a) we think we know what we need already (religion), and we don’t particularly need to bank on God, or (b) we don’t want to take that kind of risk – we’re not open to it.
Now you’re using language which leads me to the conclusion you’re falling into trap A. That’s easier to get you out of than trap B. When you sense God’s presence, take a risk. If you can’t sense God’s presence, but others see him present on you, take a risk. Listen. Let your mind wander. Dream. Dream really fucking big. And throw it out there.
Not all who wander are lost.
L8r, bro.
tehuatzi says
Without context (what kind of “science” and “methodology” we are talking about), I can’t respond directly to your specific tussle with Jeff, but here are a few comments.
– Engineering and science are different endeavors. Engineering is about solving problems; science is about developing understanding. Obviously the two overlap, but there are real differences in intent, approach, method, culture, etc. For example, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is done in mech/aero engineering depts, as well as my own TAM department. Mech/aero eng CFD work often involves artificial dissipation to stabilize numerics, because “it works”; TAM profs look on that with horror, because it obscures the underlying physics, it’s cheating. You can use it to help design the 7E7 fuselage, as long as your simulation results are checked against later prototype testing, etc.; but if you don’t have such intellectual safety nets, if you’re trying to use simulation to understand better the actual physics of airflows, artificial dissipation is shooting yourself in the foot. It’s making the problem go away (getting around it), instead of understanding it.
– I think BS-level engineering is mostly about using existing tools to solve basic problems. MS-level engineering is about mastery of basic tools, and using advanced tools to solve more sophisticated, less tractable problems. There is more of a sense of the playing field, enabling more creative application of tools. There may be minor tweaking of tools at this level. PhD-level engineering, which is science, involves application of sophisticated tools and/or development of new tools to solve new problems. “New problems” is the key here. The jump from MS to PhD is much larger than the jump from BS to MS, because it’s not just about harder problem-solving; the hardest aspect of work at the PhD level (not getting the PhD, but the kind of work you do once you have it), as I understand it, is not primarily about solving problems: it’s about framing the problems, defining them so you or others can begin to work on them. It’s about wading out into Huxley’s ocean of inexplicability and, by sheer creative brilliance, force of will, and size of gonads, imposing mental order on the chaos and nothingness, saying “this is a question that is worth asking, neither trivial nor hopelessly inaccessible.” It requires all the technical sophistication and facility of the problem-solvers, but also vision, boldness, insight, tolerance of ambiguity, and insane self-confidence that you would associate more with, say, church planters.
– My advisor told me once, during my first year here when I was glumly lamenting my lack of progress on our project, that I shouldn’t feel bad, because “first year grad students are, without exception, useless.” In other words, they are completely unable to contribute meaningfully to the work; at that point it’s all about the advisor investing in the student. The aggregate productivity of my first nine months of research work, my advisor could have done in about half an hour.
– Dirk’s comment reminds me of “A Little Exercise For Young Theologians,” by Helmut Thielecke, where he encourages seminarians to listen to the “sanctified common sense” of uneducated little old ladies in church pews when they say, “Thank you for your sermon, pastor… there was this one part, though, that I just didn’t quite get.” He says to listen up at that point, because while they may not know Greek or Hebrew or Barth or Bultmann, they know Jesus; and if theologizing is a community activity… give that little old lady a mic. Amen to that. Same goes for the farmers. But I would say, while they’re in a position to critique the end result (grain yields or whatnot), which should send the engineers/scientists back to the drawing board/lab/etc., they’re not in a position to critique the scientific methodology. They’re just not able to participate in that conversation. They needn’t feel bad about that; first yr grad students are hardly able to either. Maybe it’s different in AgE, where things are more closely tied to practicals all along the way; I don’t know. But a farmer’s common sense isn’t going to help in quantum physics.
rockyrockstar says
1. The test that lots of people use to try to understand their spiritual gifts is the Wagner-modified Houts questionnaire. Peter Wagner wrote about that test that no one under the age of 25 should even take it, because there’s no way someone under 25 even knows what their gifts are. All that to say, don’t worry about not being able to figure out your place. You have a long time, and God is more worried about loving you and knowing you than he is about you finding your exact place in ministry.
2. On the science thing, let me clarify precisely what I was trying to say. With exceptions made only for savants and the occasional rebellious genius (IE, Einstein) no one with a bachelors degree has the right to claim to belong to any scholar’s guild. I have a BA in history and another in the Teachign of Social Studies. I have no business ever starting a sentence with “As a historian, I think…”. I have a third of a masters in theology done. I still have no business saying, “As a theologian, I think…” Nor does a philosophy major have the right to say “As a philosopher, I…”. Nor does anyone with an engineering degree, biology degree, or whatever, have right to say “As a scientist, I…” They simply are not scientists. So I didn’t mean it as a personal affront to you.
3. This is a helpful picture Bill Jackson gave me about life. Life is like driving at night in the fog. You can’t put up your high beams to see way down the road cause you’ll get blinded by the glare. You just keep you low beams on and look at the road right in front of you and follow God as best you can in the moment. Occasionally, when he wants to, GOd will clear the fog and let you turn on the high bemas for a second to see down the road and make any changes necessary. Then the fog comes back and you just keep trying to follow God in the moment.
j
kelglitter says
BTW, I was more trying to say something about the necessity of humility in sort of the manner Jeff was talking about in his point 2 (only he was perhaps framing it differently) than trying to contradict anything that Dirk said above me. Dirk’s definitely right. Please let me try to clarify what I was getting at.
Nobody ever tells Bob (or my dad, or anybody else I really really admire and ought to learn something about humility from) he’s not qualified to have an opinion about something because he (1) Openly admits when he’s not qualified to have an opinion about certain things, (2) Doesn’t start sentences or arguments with “As an engineer,” “As a chemist,” “As a scientist” or even mention any of the above in a conversation, and (3) Doesn’t think of himself as right all the time and that openness to the possibility of error is reflected in the way he responds to all sorts of questions like that.
I mean, I have no idea what you were talking about specifically with Jeff, and I don’t want to know, but if Bob were to present the same views to Jeff, Jeff would never dare to tell him that he wasn’t qualified to have an opinion on something, probably because at the end, Jeff would respond less in response to Bob’s mannerism than in response to the actual topic at hand. In the same conversation between Jeff and I, Jeff would tell me that I was full of shit though, because nobody is as right as I sound about anything, and thus it should be, until I learn more how to be like Bob.
Yeah, I don’t think I made much sense that time either. I agree with James about toolboxes (I think I first heard of a spiritual gift toolbox in Wimber’s Power Healing), but I disagree in that when you reach in and pull out a screwdriver, you do need to know how to use it or it is pretty useless to you. I suspect you have every spiritual gift in existence, but you’ve only learned how to use a few of them. I’ve never felt that you were particularly lacking in giftings – in fact, I’ve often thought that you were particularly gifted in several ways.
bigcat2k says
Very cool…I was actually hoping you would respond, cuz I wanted to know what you specifically thought.
It seems that a BS is more of an excercise in practicum, and the higher levels is a lot of head stuff…a lot of mental exercise. All my friends in upper level stuff say that.
dreum says
I guess my thinking went along these lines.
If a farmer can help an engineer with his ideas, why can’t an engineer help out a scientist with his physics. (though most of the people in AgE hate impractical things and stay far away from the scientists).
tehuatzi says
Hey, thanks. Happy to oblige.
It seems that a BS is more of an excercise in practicum, and the higher levels is a lot of head stuff…a lot of mental exercise.
Yes. And to underscore the point, it’s the “higher level mental exercise head stuff” that I would call science. To take your diff-eq example, at the BS engrg level you learn basic soln methods like 1st and 2nd order linear theory, probably some series expansion stuff and basic Fourier/Laplace transform methods, maybe similarity solns; and in the PDE dept just the basics like separation of variables. At the MS engrg level you learn harder core stuff like asymptotic expansions, Greens functions, Sturm-Liouville theory. But even there, you’re just learning how to do stuff someone else figured out. Some of it is pretty hard, and I remember often thinking, “how in the world did guys ever come up with stuff like this?” And that’s what PhD level engrg work – what I would call science – involves: developing new methods of solution. In other words, just learning how to use existing solution methods, even retracing proofs and stuff, isn’t science; it’s going to school. Proving something new, on your own: that’s science.
Of course this example is from math and not engineering, but it translates easily.
tehuatzi says
I couldn’t agree more with your #2.
tehuatzi says
The farmer helps the engineer with his ideas, directly, in terms of establishing motivation (practical application, desired product/outcome), and only by doing so can he speak, indirectly, to engineering process or methodology, because he is not competent to speak directly on those terms.
The engineer is probably closer to the scientist than the farmer is to the engineer (depending on context), but I think a similar statement applies. Even the piss-poor, watered down physics that I do (fluid mechanics/CFD) is beyond the reach of most engineers. They just don’t know enough about fluid mechanics / applied math / numerical analysis / computational science to speak intelligently about it.
bigcat2k says
I can question methodolgy though, I know more about methodolgy of science than many people, because I spend time using it. Including someone who took classes in the philosophy of science (how many labs were there for that?). I never attacked the biology, I attacked the methodology.
Scientist and engineering overlaps (I don’t think you have a healthy definition of scientist, in fact, I don’t think you’ve ever concretely definied it, instead you are operating on what you see is a scientist, because a BS in any science or engineering feild is completely qualified in many cases to refer to themselves as scientist). The real problem stems from you, under your own criteria, having no place to judge where that overlap is and where that it isn’t. In your mind you devalue an engineering degree because you are largely ignorant of what one is, much of how I am ignornat of biology. That you are willing to pigeon-hole an electrical engineering degree as a “glorified math degree” is why I get very nervous of how you qualify “experts” outside of anything having to do with spirituality. Also, this is why you are upset in the first place at what you percieve as my arrogance.
So I ask you, have you used the tools of science how I have, do your three philosophy of science classes stack up against my 50-some plus hours of practical EE courses and my other 40 of science and math?
You do have the right to say “as a pastor I see a problem with x’s spiritual ….” based on your knowledge and experience, I wouldn’t challenge that because you don’t have a seminary degree.
Engineering is a science as well as a methodical approach to the practical application of science, so I have the right to say “As an Engineer I see a problem with x’s method of approaching ….insert sciency thing” and you don’t have the right to say “as a person who took 3 whopping classes in the philosophy of science (south of green) I know engineers can’t say x” I’m trying to be a little mean, but my point is you can not accuse me of speaking ignorantly and arrogantly, when you yourself have little knowledge of and no experience in my field. (You can repeate that bit to me when I criticise one of your sermons)
I figured something out today about all this…and it ties together. I feel pigeon-holed in general, by life, by the team, by my friends, my job, and I don’t know if that is rational or not. Given your willingness to speak knowledgably of my degree from a place of ignorance I would say I have evidence to back that up my feeling as rational. I want to get better about not feeling that way irrationally (like about my giftings and such) and would like to be given a little more of a chance in a bunch of areas that might be more rationally causing that feeling. So to do that, I will attempt to be more humble in approaching things, and be more open-minded about not knowing everything, especially outside my feild, I would appreciate the same, including a little more time learning about what engineering is and isn’t instead of assuming.
Unfortunately since I realize I am tying these feelings to statements you made (as well as my own internal problems), I should probably not be even brining the arguement back up. I thought it would be fun to discuss, but upon realizing that I had more emotional ties I should probably let it die, so I’ll make this comment, answer a few others, and decide to be done. Maybe I can talk more privately about myself and my issues with my self-image being tied to my degree, which I think I’ll shoot you an email on.
The rest of that stuff is great, I’ll look more into it. I’m glad you do know a lot about that stuff, cuz it is good to take from you and use. (not me saying I already knew it ) 🙂
tehuatzi says
That’s hilarious. And made perfect sense. And I agree that Bob is an excellent example of this competent humility, if you want to call it that. Bears on Ben’s earlier post about honesty and humility.
Yes, Dirk was definitely right. Although I would distinguish “scientists” from “inventors.” If an inventor comes up with some gizmo that has no application, then it was likely a waste of time. But scientists are always coming up with things without any application all the time, and God bless em for it; if we only worked on problems of obvious utility, we would give up a lot of technological advancement. Roger Hamming in a talk at Bell Labs (I think) in the 80s said that the Nobel Prize, or acceptance into Princeton’s Institute for Advanced Studies or somesuch, often contributes to the ending of a great career, because now the scientist thinks he or she has to work on only “great problems.” But great science doesn’t get done by trying to work only on great problems; you have to be constantly sowing widely, working on (seemingly) relatively piddly problems as well as huge ones, because you don’t know which are the ones that are going to pan out. It’s the same with theoretical sciences, which are nicely postmodern in the sense that they embrace a chastened view of our ability to know which problems are “worth pursuing,” unlike science-despising applicationists.
tehuatzi says
That was Richard Hamming, not Roger Hamming. Ok, so all the CS/EE’s now know I’m not one of them. 😛
Here’s a link to the talk. It’s called You And Your Research. A link to a prettier .pdf of the talk is here .
The talk is really about how to do great science, like Nobel-quality science. It’s a great read, and applies to lots of areas besides science. The guy’s not a Christian, but he has a lot of wisdom.
dreum says
I feel that the comments in this reply should be stated in a more private manner and not in a public journal.
dreum says
I have to disagree with on this one. I feel that almost all scientific research comes from some standpoint of application. Though most scientists do their research from the standpoint of curiosity, their research does have application of some sort or they’re not going to get funding for their research. Though there probably some good examples of people who didn’t do it for the application, what they probably did it for was to understand our enviornment better, which is always useful when it comes to building applications.
I think the overall reason why I responded to this line of thinking is that I despise it when people disqualify people’s opinion because of their status (which includes their education level). In my opinion, we need to be able accept comments from others (no matter their status) with humility even if they don’t say their comments with humility. Even considering dismissing someone’s comments because they’re not educated enough seems to me to be pride. If you’re going to refute somebody, do it from the knowledge and logic you have with humility.
bigcat2k says
Isn’t that what I said?
But none-the less, I appreciate what you are getting at here.
BTW, call me, I need to talk to you about travis and planning this bachelor party.
bigcat2k says
I think I do both a and b, except I’m open to risk, just part of me doesn’t want to take it.
Plus if feel weird, so everything good seems small right now, and everything bad seems big.
I like what you wrote though, thanks for taking the time to think about me.
missdrummond says
I don’t have a lot to offer regarding a discussion on methodology that I did not witness, but as far as the weird feelings, etc. You have been in my prayers all day. I think it is healthy that you are open and honest with the body about where you are, so nothing eats at you in darkness. Honestly, I have been praying for your connection and relationship with God as He is the one who sets us into place and equips us.
This could be a good thing to not be able to figure it out by yourself. I will keep praying…
bigcat2k says
Here is what I think.
If at any point in or after your degree you are capable of arriving at a solution, or an idea, that you have never heard of before than you are a scientist.
Just because you are walking the path someone else has walked before doesn’t mean you aren’t as good as them. And I think you become the same kind of thing (in this case scientist, or engineer) the minute someone lets go of your hand lets you find a path by yourself.
Lots of times I started proving stuff that wasn’t bein taught in class, or thinking about big ideas using the stuff from class, only to later find that someone else has already done that, does that not make me a scientist? Or should we not look back at the greats, newton, gauss, maxwell, laplace, fourier, etc…and say that they were not scientist, they were just people who arrived at obvious conclusions givin their circumstances and positition.
Inventors are scientist, some of them push the thinking of science. I kinda think the engineer is really just an inventor or sorts. You get a mathmatical toolbox, a physically tuned mathmatical toolbox actually, and you go at any problem you want. Sometimes to fix something broken, which usually entails thinking outside of typical approaches, and sometimes you create something new. Either way, it doesn’t matter if someone has thought of it before, if it is new to you, than you are thinking like a good engineer or scientist, and subsequently are one.
That is all my opinion, but in my major they try desperately to get us to prove things and arrive at our own conclusions ourselves…which was terribly annoying sometimes when I wnated to be lazy.
tehuatzi says
Well, you’re obviously right, and I overspoke; esp. in the contemporary climate, no application = no funding.
I was still keying off the farmers, though; and thinking in terms of “practical application.” Much of what constitutes “application” in research bears no resemblance to what ordinary people would call practical application. In my Brownian fiber suspension work at UCI, the “application” of our deformation tensor model was a superior prediction the behavior of flows of suspensions of orientable particles – potentially of interest to anyone who deals with such flows, incl. paper mills, plastics manufacturers, and LCD developers. That’s what the proposals said. But the actual work we did was not remotely of value to anyone in industry, and I don’t actually think it ever will be, though I wish it would.
So, yes, research has a point; some of it is curiosity, but (most) of it these days is application. But I submit that the more brutally we chain research to what we can see today as practical application, the more we will shoot ourselves in the foot.
tehuatzi says
And I agree with your 2nd paragraph as well.
tehuatzi says
Not to drag this out unnecessarily, but just wanted to point out that I’m thinking of “scientist” as “member of the scientific community,” and “doing science” as “participating in the collaborative effort of that community,” basically the same as Jeff’s “scholars’ guild.” And I think there are vast differences between that work and the work that is done, or can be done, by people with undergraduate training.
divisionbyzero1 says
I think the problem with the issue of someone being a “scientist” or some other title is that there is a qualitative difference that makes direct comparison difficult. This is particularly difficult when discussing the matter with people who are alternatively “in” the field and people who are “out” of it.
I think a lot of the difficulty in this thread could probably be worked out by a good sit down to come to an agreement on basic vocabulary to determine what a “scientist” really is as opposed to “engineers” and what assumptions people have been bringing to the thread without actually letting anyone else know what they are.
bigcat2k says
Yes this is a good point.
But I can’t help but think about my good friend saying to me “Dude! You could totally do grad-school, all you have to do is find something you really like and read a whole shit-ton about it, then you get to do fun stuff with it.” That makes me generally think someone who has the mental capacity and knowledge toolset to advance science and technology is a scientist, while maybe not a person committed to do research in an acedemic institution, they still have the ability to move on and if they desire to do as such focus in, intensely, on a single area and advance general knowledge in that area.
But for reference, here is a good list of dictionary.com references.
1. A person having expert knowledge of one or more sciences, especially a natural or physical science.
2. a person learned in science and especially natural science : a scientific investigator
3. a person with advanced knowledge of one of more sciences [syn: man of science]
Now, I think Dave is saying a person w/ a BS doesn’t fit #1, while I’m talking more about 2 and 3. I’m just going to make the point that in some fields, graduates from higher level (or more highly ranked schools) are trained as if they are susposed to do what Dave is talking about. I don’t know if that is true since I never applied to any graduate programs, but Alex definitely echos that the two grad programs he has been to outside ECE at the U of I have been much different, and a good bit easier to perform.
So my question is how do we take factors like that into play? Different expectations at different schools for undergrads and grads, and how that plays into the jobs that they do inside and outside the acedemic community.
I guess I can’t help but think I know guys doing fairly decent research, esepcially in computer architecture, with just their BS in ECE, so shouldn’t they be included in the domain of “scientist” because they are contributing to the general improvement of knowledge in their area. It seems like there is a fair bit of bias (and understandably so for you and Dave) with both Jeff’s and Dave’s definitions of “scientist” IMO. While I, the lowly guy with a BS in ECE, is looking at all the other fields of science and liberal arts knowing I could have done a MS and possibly even a PhD in those fields, so I don’t really look at people who couldn’t have hacked my BS as scientists. Relative? I know, biased? probably. Wrong Assumptions? perhaps, but I know some of those people personally, and I slept through most the classes they TAed while getting A’s and B’s, so I doubt it.
So there…those are my assumptions, and my experiences that contribute to how I see the “scientific community.” Now, more meaningful discussion could probably persist.
sspain says
So, Benyameen asked me to pop in here, and say what I think.
I’m going to stay off the spiritual stuff, cuz, well, I’m sure there are better sources of with and wisdom than me around here for that; suffice it to say, you know how to get ahold of me.
Now, for the difference in science and engineering. Everybody here is looking at the difference from a problem-solving standpoint. That’s all well and good, but it doesn’t get at the differences. I’m going to go at this with a laundry list which will lead up to my big point.
Training is different. If you get a BS in EE, you can go out and get a job doing engineering, and rightly claim to be an engineer. If you get a BS in Biology, you’re probably going to at best be working for a company, and you’re not a biologist, you’re a technician. If you get a BS in Psychology, welcome to entry level human resources.
This flows back into the problem-solving arena. Engineers are trained far more in the sort of problem-solving they’ll need on the job than most other degree programs, even scientists. And the employment prospects get worse and worse the fewer required laboratory classes you have to take.
Now, the difference goes beyond problem-solving, and that’s where the fundamental difference between science and engineering lies. Scientists have an epistemic responsibility that engineers simply do not have. I’ll define! Epistemology is that branch of philosophy that deals with knowledge, and is concerned with how it is that one can make the claim to “know” something. Science is an epistemological framework, based in part around Cartesian skepticism and Popperian falsifiability.
This is just a fancy way of saying that scientists are required to doubt there assumptions, and seek the truth in the evidence provided to their senses by the environment. Falsifiability is the structure by which scientists arrive at truth. Posit hypothesis A. Conduct an experiment. Review the evidence. If the evidence does not support A, your hypothesis must be revised or tossed away in favor of a hypothesis that accomodates the data (which must also be tested again). In short, this is the logico-deductive backbone of the scientific method.
Scientists are bound by the search for truth in nature. Engineers are, by and large, bound by what works. In my field, we follow what is called the “scientist-practitioner” model. This is a neat dichotomization of this very problem. Scientists are those that do basic research, practitioners are the psychological engineers that apply research to specific industrial problems. We’re somewhat unique in that most scientists are also practitioners, and some practitioners are also scientists.
There was a great debate in the Industrial/Organizational Psychology literature around the millenium (about 2000-2002) about whether we should do basic research that may be inapplicable for 20 years, if ever. The resounding decision was, “You do your thing, and I’ll do mine.” Chuck Hulin summed up the science side of the debate eloquently. To his mind, we must be scholars, and do the work that we must do to be scholars. If that involves eye-tracking studies of reading (immensely basic) to creating a staffing system that will only work in the specific company it is designed for (immensely applied), so be it. We have an obligation to working men and women everywhere to comport ourselves in accord with ethics and values of science, regardless of whether our results may be applied to them or not. If we do not, if we simply go through the motions and create snake-oil kits for people, we’re not scholars, nor are we scientists. And if we only go through the motions of doing what we do, solving problems simply by applying what we know, but not putting our assumptions aside or our hypotheses to the test, we’re not scientists, we’re technicians; and it doesn’t matter whether the solution works or not.
Wow…it STILL all came back down to problem-solving, just with a new perspective to it. Anyway, that was kind of rambling, but we’ll see.
tehuatzi says
Bravo. Although I confess the end of your last paragraph left me kind of scratching my head.
Regardless, the difference in epistemic responsibility is essentially what I was referring to by engineering is about solving problems; science is about developing understanding.
bigcat2k says
So I’m thinking of Bardeen and Schockley (sp?) specifically in asking what about the person who does both? Everything at Bell Labs that is important seems to have both ideas in mind. The first Bardeen transistor sticks out in it’s lack of elegance that the BJT had when Schockley developed it later. But both were crucial for forming the understanding of how electrons and holes move in P-N junctions, but both were designed specifically to make switching telephone lines easier and electronically automated.
Sure you can say Bardeen was a physicist so he was a scientist, but he was largely responsible for propelling the physics and EE to what they are today in notariety. He trained Kilby who one the nobel prize for creating the integrated circuit while working at TI (I think it was TI anyway). Schockley helped establish the founders of Intel by hiring them directly from school, Intel is probably the industrial leader in developing and creating computer architecture.
I’m not disagreeing, I’m just wondering when the two so closely relate, and advancements that win nobel prizes aren’t created all the time in Universities, aren’t we talking more about shades of grey than actual distingushing features? It is hard for me to see the difference between a good engineer and a good scientist in terms of foundational knowledge (not advance knowledge…cuz I do see a difference there) and abilities when so much great science comes off of the back of necessity within an application.
So I will remain confused, and stand on the side of my belief that an engineers ability to know and apply scientific method is as good w/ a BS (from the U of I or other top ranked Universities) as most people’s who are considered scientists. That is, until I can become unconfused, and the process of unconfusing convinces me solidly more in my direction, or away from it.
1x says
I guess this is as good a place to jump into this thread as any…
Isn’t solving problems just a special case of developing understanding? Maybe that’s what you’re saying, and in that case it would still be likely that engineers don’t have to understand the larger picture that scientists work with. But maybe an engineer IS a scientist, albeit a specialized one.
I don’t know… I’m just throwing out some random thoughts here. You guys have done far better at picking this apart than I ever could.
My hunch is that all this isn’t the real issue anyway. The reality is that us ECE majors tend to end up somewhat elitist, and while we’re happy to admit that LAS types are better at many things, if you question our qualifications in an area that feels close to home for us (particularly when we know you were out partying while we were in the lab working all night) we can get offended pretty easily. I’m just as guilty of this as anyone, though my personality is generally more laid-back than.