Has the Engineer Done Too Much for the World?

I AM APPRECIATIVE of the honor you have done me in electing me to membership in your Society. I value the contacts with men of imagination and ideals which this implies. I am grateful for the recognition of such small contributions as I may have made, or helped to make, to the vast fund of scientific and engineering knowledge. We like to think, as we grow older, that our lives have not been purely parasitical, and that through our efforts some forward step, however small, has been taken toward improving conditions under which we live and do our work. In these days of industrial depression, we hear much criticism of our "machine age." Modern engineering, mass production, the complexity of our lives, all come in for some share of blame. The farmer is said to have been spoiled by the tractor and the gang plow, the factory worker has become a slave of the assembly conveyor, the scientific worker is no longer free but has sacrificed much of his individuality to the research organization of which he is a part. We wonder whether our work as engineers has been worth while and whether our striving after more efficient ways of doing things has been a curse to mankind rather than the boon we thought we were conferring.