Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Unfortunately, our society has a Just World viewpoint. In short, "if engineers were really valuable, they'd be making millions per year," as if everyone is actually paid what they are worth. They are not - the engineering team that develops a new product that allows a company to continue to make money and grow *should* be valued... instead, they are lucky if they don't get laid off when the next bump in the road hits and some management or business weasel pockets all of the extra money made by their inventions. It is disgusting. Were it not for engineers, we'd still be hunter-gatherers trying to stay one step ahead of starvation... and yet our society heaps nothing but scorn on them while praising professional crooks, glad-handers, and ball-chasers.
It sure does tell you something when TV shows like "American Idol" or "America's got Talent" praise and worship singing, and parlor tricks as something to be proud of and aspire to. Same goes with athletic ability.
You can sing and catch a ball? Yours a star. Develop the cure for Polio or discover flight and nobody cares.
Try to see it from our perspective. As engineers, we understand the real world a little more than the common sense of laymen. I try to keep my mouth shut most of the time even when I hear or see common people make blatant mistakes. But when it comes to my job, I have to make sure people do things the correct way.
For example, most people don't understand that concrete cures. Most people think that the reason concrete hardens is because it "dries". So, when the concrete is stiff, laborers want to pour water in. To them, it makes no difference. What they don't understand is the strength of concrete depends on the water to cement ratio. Heck, even lower level engineers like QC and QA don't understand this. They add water very liberally, and then strength tests would fail.
Here's the easiest way to demonstrate how common sense of laymen often times fail to reflect reality. Take a look at the beam I drew quickly on MS paint. The 2 arrows show equal forces acting on the beam that is supported on either side. Without knowing anything else, can you or anyone else tell me where the beam will likely fail (if it is due to fail)? By fail, I mean crack or worse.
This is a very simple problem for any entry level structural engineer. And yet, I've been showing this picture to non-engineers for years and almost all either have no clue or have pointed to the wrong place.
It's not that us engineers have big or misplaced egos. We're just confident of how the real world works a little more than most people. But most people don't know the difference, so they think we have big or misplaced egos.
Simply supported beam with a pin and roller support with equidistant point/gravity loads.
I'm not a structural engineer, but I did have it in school.
Without knowing anything else, can you or anyone else tell me where the beam will likely fail (if it is due to fail)? By fail, I mean crack or worse.
It will fail in shear at the ends and moment in the middle.
The problem with engineering is that real life problems with all the variables of nature are rarely so simple. It's really more of an art than a science in that kind of sense.
It will fail in shear at the ends and moment in the middle.
The problem with engineering is that real life problems with all the variables of nature are rarely so simple. It's really more of an art than a science in that kind of sense.
You cant possibly answer that correctly not knowing the force of the two downward arrows.
If those arrows represent a force that will never induce failure, the answer is that it will not fail.
From my old textbooks, those arrows look too small to me to cause that big ole beam to fail...
I have always laughed at the PE's who tell the non-PE's that they cant actually call themselves engineers until they pass the PE Exam...technically (in Texas at least) they are correct, but common...
You cant possibly answer that correctly not knowing the force of the two downward arrows.
If those arrows represent a force that will never induce failure, the answer is that it will not fail.
From my old textbooks, those arrows look too small to me to cause that big ole beam to fail...
I have always laughed at the PE's who tell the non-PE's that they cant actually call themselves engineers until they pass the PE Exam...technically (in Texas at least) they are correct, but common...
And then there are those like yourself who have reading comprehension problem. I clearly stated in that post that wit is due to fail inside parentheses.
Try to see it from our perspective. As engineers, we understand the real world a little more than the common sense of laymen. I try to keep my mouth shut most of the time even when I hear or see common people make blatant mistakes. But when it comes to my job, I have to make sure people do things the correct way.
For example, most people don't understand that concrete cures. Most people think that the reason concrete hardens is because it "dries". So, when the concrete is stiff, laborers want to pour water in. To them, it makes no difference. What they don't understand is the strength of concrete depends on the water to cement ratio. Heck, even lower level engineers like QC and QA don't understand this. They add water very liberally, and then strength tests would fail.
Here's the easiest way to demonstrate how common sense of laymen often times fail to reflect reality. Take a look at the beam I drew quickly on MS paint. The 2 arrows show equal forces acting on the beam that is supported on either side. Without knowing anything else, can you or anyone else tell me where the beam will likely fail (if it is due to fail)? By fail, I mean crack or worse.
This is a very simple problem for any entry level structural engineer. And yet, I've been showing this picture to non-engineers for years and almost all either have no clue or have pointed to the wrong place.
It's not that us engineers have big or misplaced egos. We're just confident of how the real world works a little more than most people. But most people don't know the difference, so they think we have big or misplaced egos.
Non engineer here...but extremely mechanically inclined.
In that picture I think it will fail on the left. The triangle is a gusset plate of some type with a rod going through the beam (black dot). It would fail or crack there because it's too close to the end of the beam. That's how I view it.
That's what I get from this board and other forums as well. How many of you on here think that many engineers have a sense of entitlement and should absolutely grateful that their jobs are either being outsourced or being taken by people imported from the third-world? For those that do, would you rather American students stop studying STEM entirely and we import everyone to do all of our engineering/scientific/technical work in the country?
Never met an engineer with a sense of entitlement. I have met a lot of people who overuse the phrase sense of entitlement though. I'm not sure what you're trying to get at here.
Non engineer here...but extremely mechanically inclined.
In that picture I think it will fail on the left. The triangle is a gusset plate of some type with a rod going through the beam (black dot). It would fail or crack there because it's too close to the end of the beam. That's how I view it.
It's an idealized problem. The idea is to find the load at which the member will fail, so you can pick a piece. Connections are all done separately.
The funny thing about engineers (of which I am one) is that we all think we are in this big fraternity together, when in reality, few of the engineering disciplines have anything to do with each other.
Like, there's different kinds of lawyers and doctors, but they all have a pretty strong common ground I think.
Most of what engineers do has nothing to do with the next engineer. It's just an overly broad term for people who use science to create stuff.
See what I mean? The OP only posted to get a rise out of people. He or she has not even been back to comment on the responses.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
