For industrial controller software, esp distributed systems, there is a precedent of the standard IEC 61499.

One of the key components is the concept of an "Executable Specification", which may sound like unachievable BS, but if you are mainly doing state based systems, can be achieved by using state machines and working within a certain methodology/Activity framework.

I even wrote my own desktop application in PyQt specifically to satisfy requirements of 61508/61511 and the local burner code AS3814. The combustion and process engineers used this to specify (and verify by simulation, all within the tool) the exact exhaustive and unambiguous behavior for the machines (burner systems). As well for every state and transition condition attach a narrative about why it was like it was, with references, diagrams, attachments of manuals and datasheets etc.

Once all was decided, press the button, makes code, makes a documentation specification and compendium, and gives a level of traceability that is suitable for SIL 3, better accuracy, the systems guy (programmer) did not have to be a combustion engineer as well, because usually the crappy narrative type spec is always inadequate.

For certain types of code, this is the way of the future, and for things like rail and other super critical safety functionality, allows easy translation for application of formal methods to verify no unreachable conditions etc etc etc.

I had many colleagues that were initially in disbelief of the complexity but certainty of arbitrary functionality that was able to be specified with various hierarchal structures of state machines, as an executable specification

And I am well aware of the placebo effect.

But just because something is not provable or falsifiable under current scientific knowledge, it does not mean it is neccesarily quackery, there's a Venn diagram there where some things may be effective.

Automatically discarding something that even occasionally gets results, because it doesn't fit current "knowledge" is the height of arrogance.

Do you mean unproven instead of "not provable or falsifiable"?

Something not being falsifiable would mean that we can't detect if it's doing anything even if we tried, which doesn't bode well for its effectiveness.

By this time most people I knew were working, serious work (with serious pay), so it was heavy on for the weekend, but then an enforced 5 days/nights off to work (gotta pay for your habits).

I never really had suicide Tuesdays, or the various variants of it, usually managed to get some food or calories into me during the weekend, probably the worst of it was just the sleep deficit.

It started to taper off when children started arriving, as the double hit on sleep deficit, even if all the other problems and responsibilities could be managed, was just a killer.

I would argue that no noticeable cognitive decline occurred, I have worked 30 odd years in a highly demanding profession demanding abstract thought and the ability to deal with lots of details and join dots others may not see. So I think I would notice if I was fried.

One thing was, pretty early on, I got on to the concept that most drugs are buy now, pay later. And that if you were going to do something that was going to vastly increase the rate of consumption of certain precursor chemicals in the mind and body, to preload heavily to avoid depletion burn out.

So I had a standard stack of supplements we almost always would take first. Maybe why I never really had the Monday/Tuesday crashes many seemed to, as well.

SAME is interesting, when US was handing out prozac the EU was doing SAME, for similar efficacy and way less side effects. Most countries it is OTC.

Probably about half time in the city at clubs and parties, and half time out in the forests and remote beaches.

Strawberry double dips were prevalent, a few other designs, microdots etc.

I'm pretty sure it gave me a perspective still today, that I would not otherwise have.

I don't think it caused any "damage". I still graduated with one of the hardest 4 year degrees and went on to use the degree in a career. I don't have any regrets about it all and the events that unfolded.

There were, however, many, many notable incidents and events, most of them more than little bit funny, even today.

I don't really remember expressly how, why it ended, it was like organic decay. I think it just ran it's course with availability of LSD, us having the time and places to do it, and eventually I think life just took over.

But, definitely, there were some regular repeat customers.

Hey there buddy! Have you tried brushing with Sensodyne now available at your nearest CVS only for $9.99!

Less than an hour shaping with a plane and a knife used as a scraper I had a pretty good longbow.

Seemed that laminated bamboo is fairly forgiving, and capable of some serious deflection making a powerful bow.

Next, a crossbow, though I am wary of that much stored energy with a trivial trigger.

1) Why did you decide to become an engineer? Did you have some hobby or other background that you had a passion for, or was it because you thought you could do this degree and make good dollars?

2) If you became an engineer for the right reasons, can you maybe leverage that interest and start an enterprise of some kind? And I don't mean a start-up, I mean a business offering services and/or products to a market that needs them.

I don't see a single reply here at this stage that does not seem to take for granted that upon graduating you must work for someone else.

The idea that "I went to MIT/Stanford/Berkley/whatever, I deserve a job, and a good one that pays fuckloads" seems to permeate the whole thread.

Well I will tell you that College/University for engineering is just a very elaborate hazing ritual, it doesn't get you shit in reality, apart from a possible entry ticket into somewhere where the real learning and work start.

There is potentially fuckloads to learn that you would have never been taught, big differences between academia and industry.

I am in another country, but not that different, and 30 years out the engineers that I studied with that really made bank all basically went straight into starting their own business upon graduating.

As one example, the guy started a business designing mineral processing plant electrical and control systems, started out delivering very small parts of projects, just kept grinding and building capabilities, and now he owns breweries and wineries for fun and is delivering projects all over the world worth hundreds of millions of dollars. There are other examples from my cohort.

If you can't find employment otherwise, what have you to lose? And tbh, if you don't do something like this now, next thing you will look up and you will want to buy a house, or will have a pregnant wife and you just can't risk your job with the man, because the baby, etc etc etc.

So your situation isn't the engineers equivalent of Pretty Lady, or whatever fantasy script society peddles, maybe that could turn out to be a good thing, you never know.

Footnote: I have a four year degree in Electrical and Control Systems Engineering from a University in another country, in the top 100 of the world for Electrical but virtually no one would have ever heard of it outside my state. I graduated in early 90's and only 2 engineers had good "company" jobs to go to, they were both trades who had left their trade to study engineering and were preferred.

I had been working part time my last year and then went full time, after graduating, with the small local electronics design and manufacture company for crap cash. But significant parts of what I learned there in the 2.5 years, I still use today. But, in retrospect I regret not taking my own advice I gave you above, and I am not prone to regrets.