[matthewmacleod]

This gives the impression that the woman is not excited about the 'engineering' work, but instead about the social aspects of the workplace.

That's a weak objection at best. Talking about how smart and creative your team is is obviously praising their engineering capabilities.

[bshimmin]

You say that, but "hilarious" isn't normally a word I associate positively with engineering. "Isambard Kingdom Brunel's bridges were hilarious!"

[freehunter]

No one is saying their engineering work is hilarious. The idea is that they themselves, the human, is hilarious. We don't judge a person solely based on their technical skills but based on the quality of their character as well. You can work with a genius and hate the job because he's mean. Or you can work with someone who is quite average but a good person to be around and you might love the job.

No one gets called out when they say Elon Musk is charismatic, and you can't argue the man isn't good at what he does. Having a sense of humor says nothing about your technical ability but says a lot about how enjoyable you are to work with. Just based on your comments here, I would guess that I would not enjoy working beside you. If you don't associate the character description of "hilarious" with anything positive, you and I would not get along. See how that works?

[bshimmin]

I was responding more to the grandparent's comment that the woman's quote suggests she is more interested in the social aspects of the workplace than the engineering work (versus the quote from the male engineer, which seems more obviously about technical aspects of the job). Smartness and creativity certainly are traits I would appreciate in an engineer, but hilarity is not. All three, however, are traits I would appreciate in a human. Condescension and snap character assessments aren't normally traits I appreciate in anyone, so you're right, we probably wouldn't get along.