Aptitudes and Engineering Careers

THREE case histories from professions other than engineering will serve to introduce ideas basic to this discussion. Case (1) Date, about 1900. A young man, B. D. from a three-year graduate course in a prominent divinity school, was for two years a successful pastor of a small church; then friction over theological matters arose with a fundamentalist deacon of the "Bible belt" type. He resigned, returned to his university for a four-year medical course, interned for two more, and thereafter was successful and apparently happy as a physician. We may assume that he was converted in early adolescence and vowed himself to service as a minister. Acceptance of his announced career by parents, friends, and teachers plus his own determination confirmed his choice until illiberal criticism threatened his usefulness and he awoke to the fact that his inner needs were not along the direction in which inertia and his conscience had constrained him.