DISCUSSION

Moderator:

Paper 3: Mr Howie

The sort of approach engineers should take to politics is an intriguing subject. Engineers have tended on the whole to regard politics as somewhat uncouth—and rather untouchable. As engineers we have tended to keep away from politics, which is a pity, and this is not uncommon in the United States and other countries, as well as Britain.

In preparing for this paper I tried to find out what engineers, especially civil engineers, had been prominent in politics. Mr Talbot reminds us that the only engineering President of the United States was Herbert Hoover. He was a very distinguished man in many ways and had a dam named after him, but I think it would be fair to say that he was not one of the greatest of the American Presidents.