IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - December 2022 - 24

Commentary
the COVID-19 pandemic), life expectancy in the
United States has been declining [6] and the United
States is one of only three countries whose social
progress index (a measure of citizen quality of life)
has fallen since 2011 [63]. If technology were giving
us benefits beyond the material, we would expect
improvements in happiness. However, United States
happiness has been trending down since 1973,
with recent declines being highly correlated with
the frequency of phone and digital media use [7].
Through technology, we have never been more connected
or had more ways of communicating with
each other. Despite this, we are also in the midst of
a " loneliness epidemic, " where associated detrimental
health effects are spreading throughout society,
especially in older and vulnerable populations [8].
If technology were making us more resilient, the
coronavirus response should have been swift and
effective. However, we have seen the opposite. In
fact, modern industrial engineering technologies
like just-in-time production limited the availability
of health resources during the crisis [9]. We are supposedly
living in a marvelous technological age with
capabilities previous generations could not have
imagined. But the stark reality is that very little of this
technology actually works well. Rather, most modern
technology is a nightmare of clicking, waiting,
getting into unexpected and confusing states, troubleshooting,
finding bugs, working around those
bugs, filling out tons of electronic " paperwork, "
manually transferring and converting information
between incompatible systems, and so on. This is
to say nothing of the threat of climate change (a
problem deeply tied to industrial technology) that,
despite scientific consensus since the 1970s, has yet
to receive an adequate response.
These are just some of the existential issues
we are currently facing. These problems are complex,
with critical political, economic, and cultural
dimensions. But engineering is undeniably complicit.
trends
soon, society will likely find itself in a very
dark place. However, technology is not inherently
opposed to human progress. Given its potential for
transformative change, technology can be used to
address the underlying problems. As the ones who
design technology, engineers control a critical point
in determining how technology will affect society
and thus have a unique opportunity to make the
change. This article explores how the current situation
has developed and proposes a reenvisioning
of engineering that could reverse these trends and
propel society to a better future.
Diagnosing the dysfunction
Several characteristics of engineering technology,
practice, and culture contribute to engineering's failure
to address the problems from above. We explore
them below.
Everything is too complex
It created the technology that has undermined
the value of labor, enabled the privatization
of public resources, funneled wealth and power
upward, and sacrificed human well-being for shortterm
profit.
The net effect is that engineering, often despite
the intentions of its practitioners, is contributing to
a society that is less fair, less just, less democratic,
disempowering, and more precarious. If we do
not confront this incoherence and reverse these
24
For some reason, engineers have decided that
everything should be really complex. Complexity
can be defined in a number of different ways, but
it ultimately describes a condition that is difficult
for humans to intellectually manage [11]. Complexity
may sometimes be necessitated by the
problem being solved or the application domain.
However, often it is introduced as part of the
design process due to overengineering, the trendiness
of current engineering paradigms [e.g., using
artificial intelligence (AI) and/or machine learning
wherever possible], cost ( " it's cheaper to do it
in software " ), feature creep, or the convenience of
" hacky " solutions.
The detrimental effect of complexity on system
safety and stability has been known for decades
[12], [13], [14]. Complexity is dangerous because
it makes it difficult to identify bugs or design flaws,
hard for any engineer to keep the entire system in
his or her head, and hard for humans to use the
system without making errors. As such, complexity
makes every part of the system life cycle (evaluation,
design, analysis, implementation, maintenance, and
decommission) more difficult. Not surprisingly, complexity
was a major factor in large-scale failures such
as the Three Mile Island nuclear meltdown and the
Bhopal India disaster (where a Union Carbide pesticide
plant poisoned roughly 500,000 people due
to a catastrophic gas leak). An active research area
(which includes much of my own work) attempts to
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IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - December 2022

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