<p>When I actually read the paper, as opposed to the media interpretations of it, it was far less ridiculous than the media interpretations. I still have some issues with it, but a lot fewer than I would have if I took the stories at face value (it addresses some of the causality issues that people are correctly bringing up, among other things). The media sucks at reporting on research. Sensationalism sells.</p>
<p>I don’t know about the engineering = conservative thing. I would be willing to believe that it is true in some areas, schools, cultures, or sectors of engineering. But the joke at MIT was that the real political divide was between the liberals and the libertarians. Not a conservative school at all. My coworkers, mostly computer scientists and software engineers, are overwhelmingly liberal (which amuses me, since it’s not exactly typical in the defense industry).</p>