[gaius]

Probably referring to this article: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20227127.200-can-unive...

It's behind a paywall, but the gist is, the engineering mentality of "there is a right answer" correlates to a certain extent with the religious mentality of "there is a right belief".

A lot of piecemeal evidence suggests that characteristics such as greater intolerance of ambiguity, a belief that society can be made to work like clockwork, and dislike of democratic politics which involves compromise, are more common among engineers

Note that technical ability is nothing to do with it; no terrorist organization worth its salt sends skilled bombmakers on suicide missions, they're too valuable.

Why engineers? Everybody's first reaction is that they are recruited for their technical proficiency in bomb-making and communications technology, but there is no evidence for this. A tiny elite tends to do the technical work in these groups, and jihadist recruitment manuals focus on a personality profile rather than technical skills.