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Build-a-Bomber: Why do so many terrorists have engineering degrees?

By Benjamin Popper
Posted: December 30, 2009.

Print: Slate

excerpt:

Earlier studies had shown that terrorists tend to be wealthier and better-educated than their countrymen, but Gambetta and Hertog found that engineers, in particular, were three to four times more likely to become violent terrorists than their peers in finance, medicine or the sciences. The next most radicalizing graduate degree, in a distant second, was Islamic Studies.

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Comments (2)

Does this mean I am destined to be a atheistic terrorist? haha (oxymoron?) This pattern is probably due to the fact that engineering is fucking hard and makes you a little crazy. That or these terrorists had a predisposition on destruction before choosing a major and engineering would allow for the knowledge to create the most damaging devices. Its seems like chemical engineering would be preferred.

posted on December 31, 2009
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See here a perfect joke:

One day in heaven, the Lord decided He would visit the earth and take a stroll. Walking down the road, He encountered a man who was crying.

The Lord asked the man, “Why are you crying, my son?” The man said that he was blind and had never seen a sunset. The Lord touched the man who could then see and was happy.

As the Lord walked further, He met another man crying and asked, “Why are you crying, my son?” The man was born a cripple and was never able to walk. The Lord touched him and he could walk and he was happy.

Farther down the road, the Lord met another man who was crying and asked, “Why are you crying, my son?” The man said, “Lord, I am an engineer.”

...and the Lord sat down and cried with him.

posted on December 31, 2009
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