I mean the board that licenses Civil Engineers, for example, should be very stringent. We don't live in buildings that aren't structurally sound or drive on half-assed bridges.
Professional Engineers hold themselves to an ethical standard that they're not even legally required to uphold, yet they still do because this organization keeps them in check.
https://ncees.org/engineering/fe/
So I could (but almost certainly won't) take the "Industrial Engineering" exam and focus mainly on IE topics:
https://ncees.org/wp-content/uploads/FE-Industrial-and-Syste...
> for me to call my self a "Professional Engineer", I have to pass a test almost wholly focused on Civil Engineering
isn't true. The FE exam has a number of discipline options, including Electrical and Computer[0] and the PE exam is then done be discipline.
[0] https://ncees.org/wp-content/uploads/FE-Electrical-and-Compu...
List of Engineering Disciplines that can take the PE exam:
- Agricultural and Biological Engineering - Architectural Engineering - Chemical - Civil - Control Systems - Electrical and Computer - Environmental - Fire Protection - Industrial and Systems - Mechanical - Metallurgical and Materials - Mining and Mineral Processing - Naval Architecture and Marine - Nuclear - Petroleum - Structural
Hydraulic engineers would probably be scratching their heads at this. The intersection between engineering and plumbing is well charted territory.
Just based on the number of idiotic major bridge designs we have had over the Mississippi river, I'm inclined to go with Marohn on this one. Kick all of the bozos more interested in politics than actual real engineering out.
That's convenient. The organizations assert that they can tell certified persons what's allowed and not, but if the certified person follows all the rules and something still goes sideways, the license ends up being worthless, because they can't say, "I did it this way because that's what the standards I'm required to adhere to say"?
As a programmer (who gets titled "software engineer" whether I liked it or not) this is terrible. What incentive would I have for getting a license if it doesn't protect me from liability?
When you give your stamp of approval on a project then you're legally liable for it.
You can be sued for incompetence. Then, you have to go to court and defend yourself. Or, more commonly, your company will send a lawyer but you still may be called to testify.
Most public works and building is template driven with standardized components. Highway bridges pretty much look the same if they were built at the same time. There’s probably 10-15 guys in the average state who periodically update the standards. 80% of the rest of the work is drudgery done by overworked, underpaid assistants and non-professional engineers, signed off on by a PE later.
What PEs do accomplish is making it outrageously expensive to perform basic public works that were accomplished successfully by a DPW guy with a paint roller 40 years ago. Painting a crosswalk and installing a traffic light costs nearly $1M, because you need to hire an engineering firm to duplicate a template, and sign off on placement of lines, etc.