The established discipline of engineering as a set of well-defined principles and practices has remained a steadfast tradition for thousands of years. While the roots of modern engineering stem from Athens during the classical period of antiquity, evidence of human ingenuity and resourcefulness can be traced back over three-million years.1 The Acropolis in Athens and the Colosseum in Rome remain incredible wonders to behold. The rigor required to create these incredible monstrosities remains as relevant today as it was more than two-thousand years ago. The established traditions of engineering have withstood the test of time: they outlasted every major cultural revolution humanity has experienced. This includes the renaissance, the reformation, the scientific revolution, colonialism, and the first three industrial revolutions. Over the past several hundred years, the engineering community has fueled the progression of our society through the iterative development of technology.2

Modern Engineering

The advancement of computing machines has accelerated our ability to learn, commit, and get things done. Modern engineering thrives in this rapid learning–feedback loop. The curiosity-fueled excitement of discovery outlasts the debilitating fear of uncertainty. There is a fundamental secret shared by the engineering community: they figured out how to thrive in uncertainty. The fundamental principles of engineering have not changed in thousands of years. The premise is simple: we must apply disciplined thought and disciplined action to understand the nature of our world. We must confront our problems, identify the underlying causes, and perform iterative experiments to learn from. This is how we achieve incremental progress.3

ABET, the global accreditation board for engineering and technology, uses the following definition4:

Engineering Design
is a process of devising a system, component, or process to meet desired needs and specifications within constraints. It is an iterative, creative, decision-making process in which the basic sciences, mathematics, and engineering sciences are applied to convert resources into solutions. Engineering design involves identifying opportunities, developing requirements, performing analysis and synthesis, generating multiple solutions, evaluating solutions against requirements, considering risks, and making trade-offs, for the purpose of obtaining a high-quality solution under the given circumstances.

Engineering is an iterative, creative process grounded in the philosophies of mathematics and natural sciences. Engineers rely on this paradigm and mindset as an approach to solve problems. In general, engineering design projects follow a common lifecycle pattern, as demonstrated by the following table.

Engineering Design Process5
Problem identification and analysis Design Implementation System and acceptance testing Final delivery

The Enduring Values of Rigorous Engineering

Abiding by these time-tested methods of engineering will ensure we sustain our ability to produce robust, maintainable, and scalable products, software, and systems. We apply these methods to all aspects of the product and platform design engineering lifecycle:

  • Focus on optimizing real human experiences over processes, tools, and automation;6
  • Create distributed self-organizing teams with clear ownership and autonomy to make engineering decisions;7
  • Solve problems rather than create solutions;
  • Collect empirical evidence from trusted sources or experiments, and conduct evidence-based arguments, so the group makes better decisions and predictions;3
  • Ask open-ended questions to reality-check assumptions and invite creativity;
  • Establish and enforce boundaries by declaring a shared purpose, with a clear intent, and a concrete problem to solve;
  • Treasure elegant simplicity: maximize the amount of work not done;6
  • Choose courage over comfort8: embrace mutual trust, use good judgement, act with discipline, and practice critical thinking.

The Prospect of Artificial Intelligence

A new world order is emerging, and the artificial intelligence revolution is upon us. We can neither predict nor fathom how exactly the advancement and adoption of this technology will impact our society. As a case study, the computer engineering industry acts as a bellwether to signal both the short-term and lasting effects of using AI technology. As a community, computer engineers tend to act as early-adopters of new technology. There is a simple reason: the digital revolution is powered by advancing computing technology.

A dichotomy is emerging: there are now many cases where the use of AI can either improve or hinder productivity and product quality.9,10 As AI-technology becomes more reliable, the differentiating factor will fallback onto how people operate and influence AI-powered systems. Age-old questions become even more relevant: Are we working in service to others? Are we living into our shared values? Are we grounded by integrity? Do we have a clear mission and alignment on our goals? We must hold ourselves and each other accountable for our actions and our commitments.

At some point soon, the threshold for making new things will become negligible, which will feed the looming intelligence explosion. AI will allow us to design, implement, create, and explore anything we desire! However, we should not fall into the temptation and trap of trying to make everything we can. If everything becomes a priority, then nothing is.7

As Brené Brown says, “we are all physically, emotionally, cognitively, and spiritually hardwired for connection, love, and belonging.”8 This is a hard-fought lesson we must keep relearning. It’s a fact many scientists, engineers, and business leaders either ignored, forgot, or rejected repeatedly in the late 20th century. We need more empathy and compassion, not less. We must rely on good judgement to design our systems that optimize our real-world human experiences. We must foster mutual trust and meaningful connections. If we do this, then we will prevail; in spite of any looming uncertainty:

We will thrive.



Works cited

  1. The Archaeologist, “Lomekwi Stone Tools: the Oldest Artifact in the World”, Aug. 11, 2023.
  2. NSPE, “The History of the Professional Engineer”.
  3. A. McAfee, The Geek Way: The Radical Mindset that Drives Extraordinary Results, Little, Brown and Company, Nov. 14, 2023.
  4. ABET, “Criteria for Accrediting Engineering Programs, 2026 – 2027”, 2026.
  5. IEEE 12207-2008, “ISO/IEC/IEEE International Standard - Systems and software engineering – Software life cycle processes”, 2008.
  6. K. Beck, et. al., “Manifesto for Agile Software Development”, The Agile Alliance, 2001.
  7. J. Collins, W. Lazier, B.E. 2.0, Penguin Random House, 2020.
  8. B. Brown, dare to lead, Penguin Random House, 2018.
  9. J. Becker, et. al., “Measuring the Impact of Early-2025 AI on Experienced Open-Source Developer Productivity”, METR, Jul. 10, 2025.
  10. D. Li, “Generative AI at Work”,MIT Institute for Work and Employment Research (IWER), 25 Sep. 2025.