Engineer or Lawyer?

[machman-2823]

Would you rather be an Engineer or a Lawyer?

[Ether]

Originally Posted by machman-2823

Would you rather be an Engineer or a Lawyer?

Both (killer combo).

[machman-2823]

that would b odd, and kinda cool, but don't lawyers create problems, and engineers fix them?
so you would have to fix your own problems, and not other issues.

[DonRotolo]

I once met a guy who got his first degree as a Mechanical Engineer. That got boring so he became a MD. Eventually he settled on being a lawyer, which was what he did until he stopped.

Like Ether said: Both.

[machman-2823]

Dang.

[Nate Laverdure]

http://careers.uspto.gov/Pages/WhyWork/Default.aspx

[Akash Rastogi]

Originally Posted by DonRotolo

I once met a guy who got his first degree as a Mechanical Engineer. That got boring so he became a MD. Eventually he settled on being a lawyer, which was what he did until he stopped.

Like Ether said: Both.

A lot of companies also like how engineers/mathematicians think. A cousin of mine did math at MIT, then law at Harvard. He's now somehow the managing principal of a hedge fund...

Who knows what else you can do with STEM!

[Tristan Lall]

Originally Posted by machman-2823

that would b odd, and kinda cool, but don't lawyers create problems, and engineers fix them?

Where did you learn that?

Surely you can think of counterexamples—a problem solved by a lawyer and a problem created by an engineer. Why don't you list a couple for us to discuss?

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Tristan Lall

Surely you can think of counterexamples—a problem solved by a lawyer and a problem created by an engineer. Why don't you list a couple for us to discuss?

Lawyers do tend to solve the problem of innocent people being convicted. Also the problem of deciphering legalese.

Engineers creating problems... Not gonna go there. Let's just say that engineers whose main undergrad work has minimal hands-on work tend to get some "What was that engineer THINKING?" (and worse) from folks that have to build/repair/otherwise interact with stuff said engineers designed.


To answer the initial question: I'll go with engineer, but reserve the right to try to understand the lawyers' thinking.

[cgmv123]

Our co-program director is both an engineer and a lawyer. He's also the most dangerous (not safety dangerous!) mentor on the team.

[Jacob Bendicksen]

I feel like this might be a semi-biased poll base.

One of our mentors has been both an engineer and a lawyer and is now our Physics teacher, and is one of the greatest men I know.

Just curious - what were your intentions in starting this thread?