It is common for STEM folks to have a reductive world view. I think part of this is due to capitalist alienation. Whereas great thinkers of the past were polymaths dabbling in many different studies, today there is an intense drive to specialize into a particular trade or study, and therefore to identify strongly with it, due to the capitalist division of labor. We don't think of ourselves principally as humans or thinkers, but as doctors or attorneys or physicists — and increasingly, even these broad vocations are insufficient as an identity, and one must further qualify that they are a pediatric opthalmologist or a family law attorney or a condensed matter physicist.
Just as it is flawed for STEM folks to reduce everyone else to their own simple categories, we too must reject simple categorization, viewing this group as a monolith. To do so is to tacitly accept their own worldview. Don't appeal to their identity as a developer, or a gamer, or a scientist. Talk to them as humans with their own distinct experiences. They will constantly fall back on the fact that they "are" a Windows loyalist, or a gamer, or a Democrat, and invoke these things as explanations for their opinions and behaviors. Don't let it stop there, ask more questions and make them explain themselves as a human and not some illusory identity.
I was talking to someone with a coding/econ background and he was telling me how the ending of this one movie was very deep. I asked him how? And he asked what did I mean, it was just deep.
The optimistic interpretation is not that they are essentially shallow, but that they lack the ability to communicate or even understand their own thoughts clearly. It takes practice to think, and even more practice to think in a self-aware manner. These are prerequisites for the kind of deep conversation you might have wanted from them.
It is common for STEM folks to have a reductive world view. I think part of this is due to capitalist alienation. Whereas great thinkers of the past were polymaths dabbling in many different studies, today there is an intense drive to specialize into a particular trade or study, and therefore to identify strongly with it, due to the capitalist division of labor. We don't think of ourselves principally as humans or thinkers, but as doctors or attorneys or physicists — and increasingly, even these broad vocations are insufficient as an identity, and one must further qualify that they are a pediatric opthalmologist or a family law attorney or a condensed matter physicist.
Just as it is flawed for STEM folks to reduce everyone else to their own simple categories, we too must reject simple categorization, viewing this group as a monolith. To do so is to tacitly accept their own worldview. Don't appeal to their identity as a developer, or a gamer, or a scientist. Talk to them as humans with their own distinct experiences. They will constantly fall back on the fact that they "are" a Windows loyalist, or a gamer, or a Democrat, and invoke these things as explanations for their opinions and behaviors. Don't let it stop there, ask more questions and make them explain themselves as a human and not some illusory identity.
The optimistic interpretation is not that they are essentially shallow, but that they lack the ability to communicate or even understand their own thoughts clearly. It takes practice to think, and even more practice to think in a self-aware manner. These are prerequisites for the kind of deep conversation you might have wanted from them.