<p>
[quote]
It can be argued that the goods and services provided by engineers are qualitatively different from those provided by medical professionals.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Such a point can be argued, but has not convincingly been done so by anybody yet. I would be particularly interested in hearing how the goods and services provided by engineers are really that different from those provided by, say, architects. </p>
<p>
[quote]
I believe that these qualitative differences do in fact lead to the difference. I don't see law and medicine as being anywhere near what engineering is. Don't get me wrong, they're not easy. But they are different socially, economically, etc. Just because it was done with them doesn't mean it should be done with engineers. You need a better reason than "why not?" to change something that works fine as it is.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>But that's not the point you raised previously. You stated that there would have been market forces that would have implemented change. I question that. Specifically, I question exactly what market forces impelled other professions to upgrade their educational standards. </p>
<p>
[quote]
And I think that examinations are fundamentally flawed, conceptually. I say, hire anybody who looks like they might do alright, and start them off with minimal responsibility. Then, after they demonstrate that they're competent, give them bigger and more far-reaching responsibilities. Fortunately, this is already how it is done, since the world is a sane place and this is the sane thing to do.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Well, I don't know about that. Is that how things are really done in the real world? Let's be honest. Most new law graduates have minimal experience with real-world law. Yet the fact of the matter is that the most elite law firm positions, the most prestigious and powerful judicial clerkships, and the most desirable nonprofit law jobs are going to be given to the guys who graduated at the top of their class from the top law schools, not to the guys with many years of practicing experience. Let's face it. Even if you've been out there practicing law for 30 years, you're still not going to get a judicial clerkship at the Supreme Court. That sort of job is likely to instead go to the guy who graduated at the top of his class from Harvard Law. To be a Supreme Court judicial clerk is to be in a position of tremendous responsibility, as what you do can potentially affect legal outcomes throughout the country. </p>
<p>Similarly, I can think of some engineering grads from MIT and Stanford who were immediately placed in positions of tremendous responsibility, more so than some other engineers who have decades of experience (but who had graduated from low-ranked schools and ended up working in companies that are not highly meritocratic and don't offer many opportunities for advancement). </p>
<p>Perhaps the best examples of all can be found in the professorial ranks. Let's face it. Even in the professional disciplines, many, probably most, newly-hired professors don't have significant real-world work experience. In fact, many of them have none at all. For example, consider Erik Demaine, who was hired to be a professor of EECS at MIT at the age of 20, the youngest professor in the history of MIT. He's never actually held a full-time job as an actual engineer in industry a day in his life. Yet he's now teaching engineering students. In short, Demaine has been put in a position of tremendous responsibility despite never having actually worked as an engineer in the real world. </p>
<p><a href="http://erikdemaine.org/cv.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://erikdemaine.org/cv.pdf</a></p>
<p>Nor is Demaine a peculiar case. Many (probably most) of the engineering professors at MIT, Stanford, Caltech, Berkeley, and the other top engineering schools have never actually worked as real-world engineers. Granted, these profs are all brilliant researchers and academics. Yet the fact remains that they have little real-world engineering experience but are still responsible for teaching undergrads, most of whom will end up as real-world engineers. </p>
<p>
[quote]
On a side note, getting a degree does not demonstrate competence or knowledge, either. A degree is just a bunch of examinations.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>See above. The upshot is that it seems to me that some people out there do indeed land positions of high responsibility despite having minimal practical experience. </p>
<p>
[quote]
I dislike the idea of making a master's education the minimum requirement for engineering. I believe the general requirement should remain a bachelor's. Does this mean I think master's degrees are worthless? No. Does it mean I deny that some associate's degree holders would make better engineers than bachelor's holders? No. But if one must generalize, I feel that a bachelor's degree is what the standard entry-level requirement should be, now, in the US.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I would still argue that for your position to be consistent, you should then also believe that a bachelor's degree should be sufficient for medicine or law, or at least, that a prior undergrad education should not be necessary before commencing studies in medicine or law. Why not? That's what happens in numerous European countries. For example, many people in the UK go to medical school straight after completing high school, without ever having attended any undergraduate program. Yet I am not aware of information that would lead me to believe that British doctors are conspicuously incompetent or undereducated. Are the health care challenges so different between the US and the UK that US doctors need a prior undergraduate education, but British doctors do not? I think that would be hard to argue. </p>
<p>That gets to my original point, which is that I am not aware of any market forces that would drive one nation to implement one sort of professional training system, but another to implement a different system. Whatever forces that would drive such differences would more likely be organizational and political, not market.</p>