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Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

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Re: Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

#221

Post by chrisseaton »

naasking wrote: post #207
grecy wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I studied a degree called "Software Engineering" and am acredited by the Australian Institute of Engineers (the first, and AFAIK, only, Software degree that is certified). Working in Canada where my degree was not certified, all the PEng people would get seriously uptight if I even said "I studied Engineering" or "I have a bachelor of Engineering".

> Working in Canada where my degree was not certified, all the PEng people would get seriously uptight if I even said "I studied Engineering" or "I have a bachelor of Engineering". As a Canadian engineering graduate myself, I don't think that's true. Saying you studied engineering is fine, that's literally what the degree is. Calling yourself an engineer is a different story, and that requires more work. It's like ca…

> It's like calling yourself a doctor without a doctorate

In some countries most medical doctors don't have any kind of doctoral degree. In the UK for example doctors have a bachelor's degree.

Re: Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

#222

Post by deogeo »

rightbyte wrote: post #212
village-idiot wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like clear cut retaliation.

Heh, yeah. It's not like he have made calculation of bridge steel welds or something without proper legal papers. He complained over the yellow light timing ...

> It's not like he have made calculation of bridge steel welds or something without proper legal papers.

Suppose he had. Suppose he found a bridge suspicious, did some calculations, and told a newspaper/transport safety agency about it. Should that be illegal, because the state of Oregon didn't give him permission? Is it okay to very literally fine someone for 'unlicensed use of math'?

Thankfully the ruling very strongly implies 'no'. It's important to be precise, or regulation of engineering can become regulation of speech.

Re: Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

#223

Post by ovao »

garmaine wrote: post #220
ken wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you think anyone should be able to call themselves "physicians" or "lawyers" or "police", as those are English words that predate their professional associations?

Is a mall cop a cop?

"Cop" is colloquial. A mall cop is a "security guard"; a cop is typically a "police officer" or "law enforcement officer".

Re: Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

#224

Post by sgc »

wazanator wrote: post #182
ggcdn wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you propose municipal planning departments process, audit, and test the thousands of building permit drawings they receive every year? Have a staff of hundreds of engineers of their own? The professional reliance model seems to work well enough, but that isn't to say it is the optimal model out there.

I feel like that's something that could be at least in part be automated by a computer. If everyone is following a standard you should be able to feed the data in and start doing pass/fail tests on requirements. I assume that's what people who sign off on plans kind of already do anyway.

The engineer's work is largely edge cases that don't fit into prescriptive code. Ie, that is substantially the system in place: We have a set of things that can be done without an engineer because they were already designed and approved by a group of engineers, and for everything else it is bespoke engineering.

Re: Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

#225

Post by sgc »

criddell wrote: post #215
milkthefat wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire reason for this was scummy to begin with. Järlström had presented clear evidence that the system was flawed. The state or county he presented it to used his “public” title(engineer) to try and obscure the wide spread incompetence of the matter while taking nearly a year to resolve the maths in question.

You make it sound like a simple ad hominem attack on the guy. Was it?

From what I have read of the case, yes.

Re: Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

#226

Post by ghaff »

wl wrote: post #211
abduhl wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's not oversell the PE or the FE: I took both drunk and completed them in under 3 hours each. The true point of being a professional engineer is that you've satisfied the MINIMUM requirements to be licensed and, therefore, you are licensed by the state to sign off on documents within what you consider your expertise. It relies on you to make that determination with the understanding that you should know better, re…

If he were holding himself out as a "professional engineer," I'd absolutely agree with you. However, there are entire fields of engineering that have largely ignored the PE. Good luck finding a PE, for example, to work under if you're an electrical engineer to even be eligible to sit for the PE exam. I don't think such engineers are any less engineers because they lack a PE.

Yeah. In the US, I believe the software engineering PE is actually being discontinued after this year.

I got an Engineer-in-Training certificate out of school (basically taking a GRE-type exam) because, in the field I was working in at the time, senior engineers got PEs so they could sign off on blueprints for regulatory agencies. And, in due course, I would have gotten one.

But anyone who thinks there's something special about working for a few years in the industry and then taking a few hours of tests... I'm not violently against these types of certifications but they tend to become artificial barriers (degree requirements, specific work experience, and the certification itself) and don't really indicate a lot.

Re: Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

#227

Post by ghaff »

wonthegame wrote: post #173
abduhl wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's not oversell the PE or the FE: I took both drunk and completed them in under 3 hours each. The true point of being a professional engineer is that you've satisfied the MINIMUM requirements to be licensed and, therefore, you are licensed by the state to sign off on documents within what you consider your expertise. It relies on you to make that determination with the understanding that you should know better, re…

Don’t undersell it either. The minimum, as you pointed out, is safe. Your capitalization implies “it’s barely acceptable” and any engineer that has passed those tests would know this.

It indicates they're not some random. (Or someone without conventional engineering education.) I guess an undergrad degree, a few years of experience, and the ability to pass an academic test does indicate at least some basic background but probably not a whole lot more.

Re: Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

#228

Post by ghaff »

caseysoftware wrote: post #176
chaseha wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Completely disagree. It says he can call himself an engineer in a non-professional context. Having a ChBE BS, I am an engineer (although no longer working as one). I am not a Professional Engineer (not a licensed PE). There’s a difference - doesn’t mean I should not be able to call myself an engineer, and I’m sure others w engineering degrees would agree

BS EE here. I am also an engineer and approach the world with an engineering mindset. And I would never use "Engineer" as part of my title. For me, once it becomes a title/capitalized, it's no longer an adjective but a designation. My first initial is D and I use that instead of my first name. When people address me as "Dr Casey" I correct them on that too.

Engineer is an incredibly widely-used term as part of titles. In addition to SWEs etc., you've got sales engineers, systems engineers, field engineers, etc. When I was in the oil business there were titles like mud engineer (which people joked should have been called mud salesmen). The majority of these people don't have engineering degrees and have never worked in what most would consider an engineering role.

Re: Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

#229

Post by ghaff »

stochastic_monk wrote: post #94
ghaff wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two of the three fields you mention are not paid especially well on average.

All three have median salaries of 6 figures.

Senior pilots for the major carriers are reasonably well compensated though not usually at levels that the typical FAANG developer would get out of bed for (likely $100-200K). Many regional pilots earn less than $50K and first officers less.

Partners at big city law firms are obviously very well-compensated. But the glut of lawyers has been something of a story in recent years and employment difficulties/low salaries for graduates of second and third tier schools are the norm.

Neither of these professions are examples of highly constrained supply except to the degree that there are only so many ex-military pilots and Ivy League law review grads.

Re: Federal judge finds state law governing who is an engineer violates free speech

#230

Post by Shivetya »

eigenvector wrote: post #32

As a licensed professional engineer, I find the effort exerted by various state and provincial licensing bodies to regulate the use of the term 'engineer' a bit tiresome. Yes, it's important to regulate the practice of engineering, but unlike some other types of professionals engineers rarely if ever offer their services to Joe Public. It's not like we have guys putting up billboards on the side of the highway advert…

occupational licensing and the laws around them are what keep many people who go to prison without a good means to obtain a well paying job. it also keeps many in lower income strata because even simple jobs are overly regulated protecting entrenched concerns; read : hair and nail care and even interior decorating in some jurisdictions.

yet there are defenders who will pop up with any threat to the licensing by citing extreme examples but most of this is to protect the businesses who both "train" to meet the licensing requirements as well as those who hire because it becomes an expensive business to compete in

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