[erroneousfunk]

They built bridges, sure, but they were usually over-engineered stone behemoths over relatively small rivers that didn't exactly require a structural engineer to calculate loads on. Pile on some rocks, arrange them in non-stupid way that won't fall apart under stress, throw some mud in the cracks between the rocks -- it's a bridge!

Anyone can build a bridge that stands. The trick is in building a bridge that barely stands, or suspension bridge that spans over a mile on strands of steel, with known tolerances to earthquakes and storms. You can't build the Golden Gate bridge without physics.

Anyone can throw together some software, put it on the Internet, and keep throwing more AWS money at it as needed. But software engineering is about constantly finding better ways, running simulations to model loads, using clever properties of math and information theory to reduce required resources and building code to do what's required of it as efficiently as possible.