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I've always complained that engineering relies on a lot of stolen valor from its adjacency to science. There is nothing scientific about treating everything in life as an optimization problem. And yet engineers often act like they are noble pursuers of truth in the same vein as scientists.

For example, take the Tesla vs. Edison dichotomy that became popular on the internet in the mid 2000s. The narrative was that Edison was an idea stealing hack, while Tesla was a brilliant visionary scientist and engineer.

The reality was that Edison was a brilliant inventor and a shrewd businessman, while Tesla was only the former and he made brilliant inventions that made other men like George Westinghouse very rich. But a scientist? Tesla was a crank who doubted the existence of electrons and distrusted Albert Einstein.

Tesla makes a good patron saint of modern engineers, but not of engineering's self image. He had a victim complex, he constantly commented on topics outside his area of expertise, and his lack of business acumen was seen as proof that he was a true outsider genius whose ideas were actually too good.