We live in a highly engineered world. Everything that humans encounter and use throughout
our day-to-day lives are in some way designed, built, manufactured or distributed
by engineers. Yet, many people have a limited understanding of how engineers work,
think, decide and implement their work. By studying the history of engineering,
non-engineers learn how our modern world came into being, how engineers improve
the world in which we live today and how engineers use emerging technologies to
shape the future. It is important for non-engineers to have a realistic understanding
of both the potential and limitations of innovative technologies, as they are the
shapers of the capital, political and social expectations for tomorrow’s engineers.