"Particular congratulations are due to aerospace engineers, who top the list, with a starting salary of just under sixty thousand dollars—a figure that, if it is not exactly stratospheric, is twenty-five thousand dollars higher than the average starting salary of a graduate in that other science of the heavens, theology."
The author doesn't mean "science" in the literal sense that implies the scientific method, he's using it in a far looser sense that only implies "the study of a subject". It is the New Yorker--there's some degree of poetic license involved here.
"The author doesn't mean 'science' in the literal sense that implies the scientific method, he's using it in a far looser sense that only implies 'the study of a subject'."
But theology isn't the study of the heavens, it's the study of religious doctrine. I get that the author is trying to use poetic license, but describing theology as a science of the heavens is kind of alarming. Maybe I'm just a little on edge because three different people tried to convert me to their religion tonight.
"Particular congratulations are due to aerospace engineers, who top the list, with a starting salary of just under sixty thousand dollars—a figure that, if it is not exactly stratospheric, is twenty-five thousand dollars higher than the average starting salary of a graduate in that other science of the heavens, theology."
The author doesn't mean "science" in the literal sense that implies the scientific method, he's using it in a far looser sense that only implies "the study of a subject". It is the New Yorker--there's some degree of poetic license involved here.