Shows that engineers in Silicon Valley aren't any more skeptical than Hollywood. We may consider ourselves smarter, but we're just as susceptible to bullshit as anyone.
I'd had an engineer recently fracture his foot running in a race.
He took a day off, went to a doctor and was told he need to wear a boot, stay off his foot for a while, etc. He proceeds to come into the office, proudly informing everyone how he knows better than the doctor, and that he only needs to rub peppermint oil and wear a compression sock. All while hobbling around the office, clearly in pain. Everyone pleaded with him to heed to the doctor's advice, and I even showed him how I have a messed up arm from a childhood incident that improperly healed and tried explaining the necessity of heeding basic medical guidance.
Didn't matter, this engineer "just knows" better than a doctor.
Its so common for engineers to have excessive confidence in their opinions about subjects far beyond their areas of competence that there's a term for it: engineer's disease (or engineer's syndrome).
This is true for the general population though. The only reason why the term exists is because other engineers expect it not to apply to engineers. Really the concept says more about us and our expectations of educated engineers rather than the engineers with bad opinions.
You could even go so far as to say those wielding the term also fall under the term: outside of your expertise, you're assuming engineers shouldn't have bad opinions. There's evidence abound that this is wrong - engineers can have bad opinions just like the general population. Yet some still insist on calling it out as "special" despite presenting no studies showing they're more likely to have these bad opinions.
Not really. Engineer's disease is specific to engineers, because at its core is the implicit belief that engineering (and science/math) is the ur-discipline whose mindset and techniques are universally applicable to all problems. That often comes with the attitude that other mindsets and techniques are inferior (e.g. those from the humanities in particular) and/or that engineers are more competent and can easily master needed parts of other disciplines when they choose (and thus the practitioners of those disciplines have little authority).
You might find this study interesting[1]. The paper sensationalizes it a bit IMO by classifying people as "bullshitters" when it seems to me more like "overconfidence" in their knowledge. Quality of the study/headline aside, I do wonder if there's a selection bias for knowledge overconfidence in engineering as parent comment suggests. I would imagine people who make good engineers are the type who aren't intimidated by "knowledge gaps" and they assume (rightly or wrongly) that they'll be able to figure out a solution even where they have little or no expertise.
I'd need to see some rigorous comparisons to other professions to conclude it's "so common".
The mere act of naming an "engineer's syndrome" could arise from the fact it's peculiarly remarkable against type, or satisfying to resentful observers - rather than actually common. And, once named, such a designation would tend to collect confirmation-bias-feeding anecdotal examples.
I've encountered cranks from every walk of life. I see more engineer cranks, too, but that's simply because professionally, I interact with more engineers than, say, hairstylists or bricklayers or actresses. And have you ever let a taxi/uber driver just expound on their confidently-expressed theories-of-the-world?
I've met a number of very smart engineers who believe that because they can think through engineering problems rationally and solve hard challenges, that they can apply that skill to biomedical / sociological / other complex problems (and that the experts in that field are less intelligent than they are). The problem is when they lack the academic background and rely on what they already believe to be true, regardless of whether it's factual.
But without a comparison to the base rate of "off their rockers when it comes to alt medicine" in the general population, that 'many' doesn't mean much. And alternative medicine is very very popular across many populations!
Sounds like this person confused advice for a sprain with his fracture. In case of a sprain (ligament injury), the standard of care has changed over the years: whereas the advice was to immobilize the injury and rest, now it is to start using it again as soon as possible. Of course, I’m not a doctor and there might be all sorts of exceptions to this.
A fracture is totally different and needs different care.
In the field of psychology, the Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which people mistakenly assess their cognitive ability as greater than it is. It is related to the cognitive bias of illusory superiority and comes from the inability of people to recognize their lack of ability.
Judging by HN comments, engineers in Silicon Valley seem to be the kind of people who need infinite amount of proof that meditation works, but readily believe in the Singularity. This is skepticism-as-a-brand, where your vocabulary and the sense of belonging to some intellectual elite outweigh all other considerations.
Selectively enforced skepticism is not real skepticism.
Is any one group particularly skeptical in the greater scheme of things? Even in various scientific fields you see people believing insane things about subjects they're not experts in. Like say, believing anti vax theories, creationism/intelligent design, etc.
Two of the smartest semiconductor process (physics) engineers I met in my 30 year career were both Evangelicals who were preparing for the rapture. Let that sink in.
Americans, especially young men, are looking for a leader. We see similar phenomena with politicians and social figures like Joe Rogan or Jordan Peterson, and Musk as mentioned. It's less about the bs and more about the leader, and maybe its just due to visibility but guys definitely tend to congregate around men with strong images or strict rules for living. I have to wonder what their home lives looked like.
Read the article and ask yourself which one of the things described would seem out of place in one of those sad gossip magazines targeting low-income housewives.
E.g. water mixed with Himalayan salt and lemon in the morning.
And since I'm mentioning it, Himalayan salt is not better than normal salt. It could also contain more contaminants and it has no iodine (that could not be desirable in some countries).
Himalayan salt contains iron, calcium, iron, and magnesium.
Lemons contain vitamin C, potassium, fiber, etc.
If you are fasting, it may be a good idea to get those electrolytes. Even if not, this seems like a healthy drink; certainly better what I people see drinking at my office.
People might not want to macro dose iodine, so that rules out table salt.
And as far as taste go, I can just taste the lack of iodine.
If I had to recommend an alternative, for those that are not doing IF, eat a kiwi (double the amount of vitamin c, way more fibres) and some nuts (magnesium and potassium).
“For 10 days a year, he sits in silence at a meditation retreat. Before getting dressed each morning, he experiments with using his home infrared sauna and then an ice bath, sometimes cycling through both several times before he leaves home.”
Salty lemon water? Why would that be lavaging? Perhaps if the concentration is extreme. Otherwise I doubt it would have more of that effect than coffee.
I dunno about this. Many medical professionals encourage heart and high blood pressure patient to drastically limit salt intake because salt causes you to retain water.
What does this mixture of himalayan salt and lemon do that causes the diuretic effect?
I don't think that there is disagreement on the existence of healthy routines. But we should be skeptical of the benefit of "Himalayan salt" and equivalents. Have you tried switching the salt to just common salt in a blind experiment? Have you tried only lemon water? Himalayan salt is a luxury, and there is not particular reason to believe that it does anything more than a placebo.
I drink just water in the morning and I am out to empty my bowels right after. I don't think that has much to do with Himalayan salt.
