Paul Cohen

“The history of engineering is really the history of breakages, and of learning from those breakages. I was taught at college 'the engineer learns most on the scrapheap”
― C. A. Claremont

“Engineering problems are under-defined, there are many solutions, good, bad and indifferent. The art is to arrive at a good solution. This is a creative activity, involving imagination, intuition and deliberate choice.”
― Ove Arup

“Engineers ... are not superhuman. They make mistakes in their assumptions, in their calculations, in their conclusions. That they make mistakes is forgivable; that they catch them is imperative. Thus it is the essence of modern engineering not only to be able to check one's own work but also to have one's work checked and to be able to check the work of others.”
― Henry Petroski, To Engineer Is Human: The Role of Failure in Successful Design

“Most American executives think they are in the business to make money, rather than products and services.”
― W. Edwards Deming, Out of the Crisis