What is engineering??  (Page 3/3)

Engineering is the creation, maintenance, and development of things that have not existed in the natural worldand that satisfy some human desire or need. A television set does not grow on a tree. It is the creation of human ingenuity thatfirst fulfilled a fantasy of a human need and then went on to change the very society that created it. I use the term "things"because one should include computer programs, organizational paradigms, and mathematical algorithms in addition to cars, radios,plastics, and bridges.

Science is the study of what is and engineering is the creation of can be. Only recently hasengineering developed the set of characteristics that make it a legitimate academic discipline. Earlier, engineering often wasviewed only as the application of natural science. Now, engineering has developed its own engineering science for the study of humanmade things to supplement natural science which was developed to study natural phenomena. Parts of computer science are wonderfulexamples of that. Engineering has its own philosophy and methodology and its own economics. It even has its own NationalAcademy.

We differentiate science and engineering, not because their difference is great, but because, in many ways, it issmall. Science could not progress without technology, and engineering certainly could not flourish without science andmathematics.

A more illuminating comparison might be between the humanities and engineering. One might find moresimilarity in style (not content) between English literature and engineering than between science and engineering. Both literatureand engineering are the study of human created artifacts. Both teach creation in the form of creative writing and engineeringdesign. Both teach analysis in the form of literary criticism and engineering analysis. Both are intimately connected with the needsand desires of individuals and society. A similar analogy could be made between art and engineering looking at studio art, artcriticism, and art history.

Most scientists (but not all) feel there is some unique objective truth behind the physical phenomena they arestudying. Their goal is to find it and describe and explain it, and this truth is unique although the approaches and approximations toit are certainly not. In literature and engineering, the designed entity is not unique to the situation, but it is a creation of theparticular writer or designer and perhaps unique to the creator.

The distinctions of this section are not as clean or clear as have been presented here. The boundary betweenscience and engineering can be and often is murky. Many items of study in science are influenced if not literally created by people.This is obviously true in biology and the life sciences but also true in physics where certain elements in the periodic table do notexist in nature. Perhaps, therefore, the areas of pure science are very limited. On the other hand, since people are members of ournatural system, an argument can be made that their products are as natural as anything else and, therefore, the areas of purescientific study are very broad. Clearly engineering is constrained in what it can create by the laws of science as everything is.Nevertheless, there is a difference in spirit in the two disciplines worth trying to delineate.

Engineering yesterday, today, and tomorrow

In early times, the practice of engineering was that of a trade or craft with training occurring through someform of apprenticeship. As it developed into a profession and more recently as an academic discipline, it took on the shape of otheracademic disciplines, with preparation being an education rather than a training. An important turning point in the Unites Stateswas the land grant college act (Morrill act) of 1862 which established an institution for the teaching of agriculture and themechanical arts (engineering) in each state. This officially legitimated engineering in higher education although it still hadthe form of training. Interestingly, this act came into being during the American Civil War and was signed by AbrahamLincoln.

World-War II was the second turning point when it was discovered that many of the technical innovationsnecessary for that effort came from scientists, mathematicians, and theoretically educated engineers rather than traditionally trainedengineers. Most engineers prior to that time had been trained to develop and apply ideas already in existence, not to create newsolutions to new problems. After WWII, the university curricula in engineering became much more scientific and mathematical. It tookon more elements of an education rather than a training. It slowly became a real academic discipline in its own right rather than onlyan application of other disciplines. However, it retains the integrating role of applying the physical and life sciences usingsome of the tools of the social sciences, law, and policy and the values derived from the humanities, letters, arts, andbusiness.

We are now going through a third transition in engineering in response to many factors in society and intechnology itself. In the larger picture, society went through the agricultural phase, the industrial phase, and now the informationphase. These three phases of civilization created and were created by the most powerful and applicable technologies of the time.Engineering is and will be the creative element in the information age as it has been in preceding ages.

References

A list of references can be found the Reference module.