Engineers are all evil

Henry at Crooked Timber defends us liberal humanists against the charge that Al Queda's ideology comes from supposed anti-Western nihilism in the academy. Turns out that most of their members are professionals; engineers and architects to be precise. Interesting in light of Herf's study of support of National Socialism among engineers.

Not that Al Queda and the Nazis have anything to do with each other. Except I suppose they both hate freedom.

My senior year in college I shared a house with 13 smart people. I was the only one in the humanities. The rest were mostly scientists and engineers. None of them are either fascist or terrorist, as far as I know.