Technology and the Practice of Engineering

Abstract

The relationship between business and engineering is dominated by two features. One is the need for business to provide opportunities for generating a return on the increasing amount of capital resulting from the capitalist economic system. The other is that engineering, in the form of applying technology to meet expressed needs, automatically generates new technology, which presents business with new possibilities. It is this (vicious?) circle that determines the dynamics of the engineering-business nexus and is one of its core features. After first defining the various concepts involved in the form of a consistent practical ontology, this chapter examines the relationships between industry, society, and engineering, as a precursor to focusing on the relationship between engineering and technology in some detail. In particular, it is the dynamics of the relationship and the extent to which it is affected by the environment in which engineering is embedded – the engineering paradigm – that are often not appreciated. The conclusion is that engineering, as a profession, has not responded adequately to the changes in its environment over the last 50 years or so, and that the practice of engineering is due for a paradigm shift. This shift will have a significant effect on both the manner in which engineers are employed in industry and the education of engineers, and it is suggested that it is education that will have to take the lead in effecting the shift.