<p>Why yes, I have, in fact, graduated from a top school and held engineering positions, and I am now working on a PhD doing research. The goal of our research is to advance the understanding of the fundamental physics behind hypersonic fluid dynamics. I will say that again. Our goal is to advance our understanding of the fundamental physics behind hypersonics. In other words, we don’t really know right now what governs such phenomena. We are working to come up with the physics that govern it.</p>
<p>You are incredibly closed-minded in terms of what engineering actually is. It is a very broad discipline. For the majority of engineers with a BS, then sure, there isn’t going to be much working outside that box of known science. There are exceptions, but for a BS level engineer working at a company, they are usually applying old science to new problems. However, that is only a subset of engineering, and the broad field of engineering is much wider than that.</p>
<p>First you said it was impossible, then you said it was possible. then not possible and then it is possible, where the last two were in this post. You really need to clear your mind, you are all over the place. </p>
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This is the dilemma. Each position has its own tasks. If you are a so called engineers doing the work of a Physicist your role is that of a Physicist. I also dont get what you mean by nuts and bolts.</p>
<p>Having an engineering degree does not make you an engineer. It makes you a guy with an engineering degree.</p>
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Then your research is no longer in the realm of engineering.</p>
<p>I assure you it is. It is handled by our Aerospace Engineering department, sponsored by NASA, a company full of engineers, and has various engineers working on it. The difference is that engineering at the graduate level is much more theoretical than at the undergraduate level.</p>
<p>Engineering is defined as “the application of science to the needs of humanity.”, which is not what you are doing. There can be overlap, but your research even if carried out by engineers is scientifically physics.</p>
<p>Im not going to respond anymore, because the back and forth comments are utterly useless. I gave the op my opinion from my experience. Whether he chooses to believe it is up to him.</p>
<p>No my friend you are the one that is all over the place. Where did I ever say it was impossible then possible? Show me where I used the word impossible. Before you lecture me you might want to read what I said. I said if someone asked for my advice and said that they wanted to be an engineer, I would recommend an engineering degree. I don’t know what is so difficult about that. I said there are veterans that might work as engineers without a degree. However, in this day and age if you want to get an engineering job, you will have a very, very difficult time without a college degree. I can’t believe you would dispute this. I know this from experience, something you obviously do not have. Just because you know a machinist that claims to be an engineer now, does not mean that it is a good idea to not go to college with the hope of becoming an engineer.</p>
<p>I stand by the assertion that a college degree is necessary 99% of the time to become an engineer today.</p>
<p>But that is only one part of the definition in Merriam-Webster. One of the others is “The activities and function of an engineer.” Of course, if you go to engineer, it refers back to engineering. It is a circular definition. In other words, there really is no black and white definition for engineering, because engineers can and do go beyond the realm of just applying science, and this circularity allows for some stretching in the definition.</p>
<p>Additionally, while the purpose of a lot of engineering research is to create new science/expand the horizons of science, it is almost always motivated towards being later applied to a practical concept. Perhaps that is the distinction you are trying to draw. A physicist often researches solely to understand, while an engineer often researches to understand in order that it might be applied. For that reason, a physicist will often have a more abstract and less “useful” are of study, but it doesn’t necessarily make him any more or less of a scientist than a PhD engineer in general. They are both expanding science and human knowledge, just with slightly different goals.</p>
<p>Wow, way to completely hijack this poor guy’s thread.</p>
<p>Anyway, I think there is a difference between science and engineering, and I think that when engineers do science and when scientists do engineering, it’s best not to call one thing the other. I don’t see why engineers can’t make scientific discoveries, since advanced engineering requires advanced knowledge of science. Likewise, scientists can invent spectacular contraptions which utilize advanced scientific concepts for the good of humanity, or their wallets, etc.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t call the systems engineers investigate closed, any more than I would call the systems scientists investigate closed. I would call all such systems closed when compared to the systems investigated by, say, liberal arts majors. Even math is closed in comparison, although we’ll never know everything there is to know about mathematics. This goes back to the point I was making earlier… that technical subjects ask questions that have answers in principle. Questions need not necessarily have answers, however.</p>
<p>I think there is trouble when people talk about the difference between science and engineering because each person will talk about one or the other in such a way as to emphasize the relative merits or nobility of the one, according to his or her preference, to the detriment of the the other. For instance, I might argue that science is better than engineering because it seeks to gain “knowledge” (noble, huh?) while engineering is “just” for applying known solutions to make version 2.2.3 of item #445 (lame, huh?). In reality the two (distinct) disciplines cannot be compared meaningfully in terms of usefulness or importance. Both are necessary. Which one a given individual prefers is a matter of tase, and de gustibus…</p>
<p>There are many highly paid CE and CS engineers that do not hold any kind of engineering degree. And many of these talented and highly paid engineers do not have any kind of college degree. Why is this? Most engineering positions do not require a state license or an insurance mandated degree to practice the profession.</p>
<p>it’s funny we had another thread claiming 40% of engineers graduating can’t get jobs and now here all of a sudden we’re saying welp’ you don’t really even need an engineering degree to get a job as an engineer…lmao</p>
<p>“Engineering is defined as “the application of science to the needs of humanity.”, which is not what you are doing. There can be overlap, but your research even if carried out by engineers is scientifically physics.” -booted</p>
<p>you know, i took a WHOLE class on the distinction of science and engineering from a world-class techno-sociologist that has spent much of her career studying the human aspects of JPL/Caltech. believe me, brother, that after a whole 4 months of this class we could not arrive at such a simple definition.</p>