[akiselev]

> Not a mature engineering discipline.

The concept of standardized parts and assembly lines is less than a century old. How accurate do you think their estimates were before they figured out the basic principles of repeatability?

The "mature" engineering disciplines literally just punted on the problem for several centuries, only giving birth to systems engineering [1] in the mid 20th century because they were so bad at it and everyone's back was against the wall in WWII. Before it became its own recognized field, project management in engineering was worse than it is in software now.

Not coincidentally Bell Labs - the company that basically kick started the computing industry - was also the biggest player in the formalization of systems engineering. Since then its been adapted as the methodology for managing engineering projects by everyone from civil engineers to NASA [2]. Any estimate you see for a nontrivial project from the past half century isn't the result of mechanical, civil, or electrical engineers but the product of systems engineers.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_engineering

[2] https://www.nasa.gov/connect/ebooks/nasa-systems-engineering...