|
Editorial by Albert H. Miller,
P.E., P.L.S, NSPE
President, National Society of
Professional Engineers
2001 Chair, National Engineers Week
So its National Engineers Week.
Well, who the heck cares? Ill be the first to admit, these special commemorative
weeks get listed on some secret calendar nobody except the insiders even know where to
find, and then a guy like me pops up and asks you to believe its important. A tall
order! Face it, Ive seen special weeks that I wont even mention because
somebody will take offense that Im cutting them down. Ive asked myself, Who
in the world would want to celebrate that? Since youre probably asking yourself
the same thing, hold on for just a few more paragraphs!
I sell engineering services, so my
first instinct is to make you a client of my firm. But let me turn that on its head. Let
me take some things away. Ill be your genie for a week, and when I wave my
hand, everything you own and use and visit thats been created by an engineer will
disappear.
Let me start small. Forget about that
little light switch by your bed. Giving it a flick will leave you in the darkI just
took your electricity. Electric power engineers bring the juice to your house and design
the equipment that produces it in the first place. Brushing your teeth also got nixed.
Chemical engineers had their hands in the plastic for that nice little handle and those
tough, prickly bristles. So youre already foul-mouthed to start off the day.
Youre thirsty and dirty too, because the engineers dont exist to purify your
tap water and keep your bathtub full. And dont think you can get away with your
battery-powered radio. Electronics engineers put those circuits together, so youre
either going to be depressed because youve got no music, or ignorant because
youve got no news. Your milk and cereal also went out the window (even if you dream
of an emergency generator)mechanical and electronics engineers cooked up
refrigerators to keep your milk fresh, and agricultural engineers figured out how to
process the grains.
So now youre on your way to work,
depressed and dirty, sucking a mint, and driving on that nice banked curve on your usual
highway, but now its not banked and youre flying off the edge, and besides
that, its full of cracks because the civil engineers werent around to design
something safe that would last. But time out. Im actually using kid gloves. You
shouldnt even have the highway, and youd be on foot (freezing if
youre somewhere up north) because Ive taken your car. That beloved possession
happens to be designed by mechanical and automotive engineers, and when it comes down to
it, about every other kind of engineer you might think of, from materials to software to
audio to . . . (should I throw in the kitchen sink?).
I might mention, youve got no
cell phone to call for help, and if you really want me to keep to my word, you probably
dont have a winter coat or shoes or even clothes, because engineers have a hand in a
lot of those materials and designed the machines and the fasteners to make it all fit.
(Shall I mention the zipper?)
So now you get to that big, handsome
office building where you workstill hungry, dog tired, and about as naked as a
dogand youve got no computer to even start your job, because the computer and
software engineers have been deep-sixed for the week. Of course, Ive strung you
along again, because youve got no place to even workthat tall office building
stands up thanks to the design of a structural engineer.
Youre pretty much facing a
wasteland! Sure, a few people might like this return to nothing, but if youre like
me, youll probably miss all these comforts and innovations and economic prosperity.
Id say that without engineers, youve had a bad day!
I once heard the story of a young girl
who had spotted a National Engineers Week poster on the side of a bus in Washington, D.C.
She said something like this, (and Im not making this up!), "I guess engineers
make everything that the Good Lord doesnt." Well, maybe thats putting
engineers in too good a company! (And obviously excluding professions that shouldnt
be left out.) But this week, Ill take it! Weve been celebrating National
Engineers Week since it was founded in 1951 by the National Society of Professional
Engineers, so its fiftieth-anniversary time, and we feel pretty golden, without
showing the years one bit. Were a broad and varied profession thats just
getting stronger and more exciting, and were raring to make your day-to-day life
smell sweeter than ever.
Now take all your stuff back. Engineers
designed it for you. And have a good day! |