In today’s world of algorithms and artificial intelligence, the role of the engineer seems to have transformed—or perhaps diminished. Once rooted in ingenuity and craftsmanship, engineering now feels synonymous with data analysis and repurposing machine learning frameworks. Is this still “engineering” in the original sense?
The word “engineer” comes from the Latin “ingenium”, meaning natural talent and cleverness. It originally referred to people who designed and built ‘engines’ in a broad sense, including war machines, infrastructure like aqueducts and bridges, and innovative mechanical systems. By the Industrial Revolution, it described those who mastered steam engines—still builders and innovators of transformative systems.
Today, however, engineering seems to have lost its creative edge. Many graduate theses and PhDs don’t invent new tools but adapt existing ones, like applying neural networks to niche problems or fine-tuning algorithms for specific datasets. This work, while valuable, resembles the tasks of a data analyst rather than a true engineer.
Where engineers once created the tools of progress, they now often act as operators of pre-built systems, with the craft of engineering—building, solving, and innovating—reduced to tweaking and optimising.
True engineering, in its original spirit, is about pioneering new methods, inventing systems, and solving problems in ways no one has imagined. While data-driven research is valuable, we must reignite the spirit of ingenuity and creation in modern engineering education and research, or risk losing the very essence of what it means to be an engineer.
Anders Hast 