Man fined for criticizing govt using science, without a license

[SiliconWizard]

But they may have considered that giving a technical opinion or advice while presenting themselves as an engineer equates to "practising as an engineer". Which opens a whole can of worms.

Yes, that is what the government WANTS us to think.  But as a cover-up for the REAL issue (mis-timing traffic lights to generate revenue) it is working great.  We are concentrating on licensing and titles while the real problem continues unacknowledged.

Absolutely right. A very common diversion technique.

[Tomorokoshi]

But they may have considered that giving a technical opinion or advice while presenting themselves as an engineer equates to "practising as an engineer". Which opens a whole can of worms.

Yes, that is what the government WANTS us to think.  But as a cover-up for the REAL issue (mis-timing traffic lights to generate revenue) it is working great.  We are concentrating on licensing and titles while the real problem continues unacknowledged.

Absolutely right. A very common diversion technique.

It's the administrative version of cops screaming "Stop resisting! Stop resisting!" while kicking someone on the ground in the head.

[MT]

Long live super hero "engineer" Järlström who kicked Oregeon board of "engineers" rear end! Järlström who btw has many fine lab instruments and a Weller without primary side fuse!

[Howardlong]

Long live super hero "engineer" Järlström who kicked Oregeon board of "engineers" rear end! Järlström who btw has many fine lab instruments and a Weller without primary side fuse!

Those Wellers have a fuse integrated into the IEC chassis connector. I have a dual and single version on the bench.

[MT]

Long live super hero "engineer" Järlström who kicked Oregeon board of "engineers" rear end and who has a Weller with primary fuse, a proper engineer alright!! ....(i was joking Howard  )

[Vtile]

Outcome seems to be good at the moment. Luckily I do not have to be "licensed" engineer to use term engineer, which I do have permission by education, though I do need to be "licensed engineer" to assign approval of some legal documents, but then the term is usually something else.

[6PTsocket]

It's clear that he broke the law and continued to do so after it was pointed out to him. It didn't help that he tried to sue the authorities (he lost), all so he could get his wife off of a traffic ticket.

When people buy electronics, they must be assured it is made by a licensed electronics engineer, and not just someone who happened to learn electronics at home and now calls themselves an electronics engineer. This sort of wanton lawlessness should be clamped down upon hard, in any free and open society. You simply cannot have people challenging unelected government officials, that is not democratic!

There is no such law. Anybody can manufacture and sell electronic equipment. There is a ton of questionable junk on the market. Companies that sell electronic equipment that want to protect themselves from liability only sell products that are certified by UL or a similar testing organization. Manufacturers pay to have their products tested. It is voluntary. It gets the seller off the hook because he sold tested product so he buys UL approved to cover himself but the manufacturer is still liable if the defective product causes injury.  Europe is worse. Any company can claim a product meets CE safety standards and it is taken on faith, without verification.

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[EEVblog]

Well done Mats Järlström!   

What a bunch of dickheads in Oregon.

[Inverted18650]

Another key phrase in the ruling is that, "he may continue to talk about traffic light timing publicly." We all hope you do and stick it those fools, brotha! Well done.

[Howardlong]

It's clear that he broke the law and continued to do so after it was pointed out to him. It didn't help that he tried to sue the authorities (he lost), all so he could get his wife off of a traffic ticket.

When people buy electronics, they must be assured it is made by a licensed electronics engineer, and not just someone who happened to learn electronics at home and now calls themselves an electronics engineer. This sort of wanton lawlessness should be clamped down upon hard, in any free and open society. You simply cannot have people challenging unelected government officials, that is not democratic!

There is no such law. Anybody can manufacture and sell electronic equipment. There is a ton of questionable junk on the market. Companies that sell electronic equipment that want to protect themselves from liability only sell products that are certified by UL or a similar testing organization. Manufacturers pay to have their products tested. It is voluntary. It gets the seller off the hook because he sold tested product so he buys UL approved to cover himself but the manufacturer is still liable if the defective product causes injury.  Europe is worse. Any company can claim a product meets CE safety standards and it is taken on faith, without verification.

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Furthermore, I’d have hoped that, retired or not, having an engineering degree would be enough for any court to be persuaded that your are, indeed, an engineer.

[T3sl4co1l]

Furthermore, I’d have hoped that, retired or not, having an engineering degree would be enough for any court to be persuaded that your are, indeed, an engineer.

That ignores the legal definition of "engineer", if any.

Most states do not have such, and therefore calling oneself an "engineer" (without further qualification) is free game, but equally so: legally meaningless.  A "professional engineer" however must be registered with the organization responsible for granting that title.

In this case, it seems the city was correct, under law, to make their case, as the law held a legal definition of the term "engineer".  The law however was found unconstitutional, and therefore any argument based upon it also fails.

Tim

[metrologist]

Tim, do you know what specifically is different about a state that "constitutionally" defines/qualifies a "professional engineer" and Oregon that "unconstitutionally" defines/qualifies "engineer"?

IOW, what if Mats mentioned he is a professional engineer in a state that defines such?

[T3sl4co1l]

No, I don't know what exactly applies.  I imagine the structure is different between states, so you'd have to know each state's laws in depth to know exactly how it works.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_and_licensure_in_engineering#United_States
This implies that it's legislative, at some point or another, in most or all states.

In this case, the difference seems to be they legislated (or the city thought this was the case) the unqualified term, without realizing such is unconstitutional.  Whereas the qualified term "professional engineer" is a constitutionally sound exception to the 1st Amendment, and is usually used everywhere else.

If he had mentioned he was a PE, and wasn't, he'd be liable for that, possibly a criminal misrepresentation (and a court would likely support such conclusion).  If he did, and was, who knows; they might've found some other excuse to shoot back with.  The worst possible outcome, for the city (in their eyes), would've been to have to admit that a citizen is right about their shitty behavior.

Tim

[Richard Crowley]

“In candid moments, the board even asserted that they could punish the hundreds of Intel employees who call themselves 'engineers' without having a board-issued license,” said a spokesperson for IJ.

https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2017/12/state_board_concedes_it_violat.html

Intel is the largest employer in the state of Oregon.  And Oregon is Intel's largest site.  Intel is likely one of the (or perhaps THE) major source of tax income to the state.  But the people on the board are apparently independent enough to discount such trivia.

You may want to examine your computer to see if it is powered by a CPU chip that was designed by engineers not licensed by Oregon.

[metrologist]

...the unqualified term...
Tim

If this is the distinction, then who is authorized to identify what is qualified and what isn't? I am an internet jockey, I am a professional internet jockey. I should use relevant terms, such as technician or professional technician. Where can I peruse the list of "qualified" terms? This must be on a federal level if we are talking constitutionality. Is there something in law that is more specific to generally stigmatize the use of such a qualifier? Silly me I am looking for logic and consistency in law.

[mfro]

... I believIe engineers should be afforded some sort of professional status and right to use the title, I have heard that they are in some countries, Germany and Switzerland perhaps?

In Germany, we indeed have a title for graduated engineers ("Diplomingeneur") and it is considered crime to claim you'd be that if you didn't earn the diploma (can yield you up to a year in jail in worst case).

But maybe it's also a language thing. "engineer" appears to have a much broader meaning than "Ingeneur" in German. Somebody (without a title) doing engineering  is not considered an engineer, but a mechanic ("Mechaniker"), steering a steam engine doesn't make you an "Ingeneur" as well but just a "Lokführer".

[T3sl4co1l]

If this is the distinction, then who is authorized to identify what is qualified and what isn't? I am an internet jockey, I am a professional internet jockey. I should use relevant terms, such as technician or professional technician. Where can I peruse the list of "qualified" terms? This must be on a federal level if we are talking constitutionality. Is there something in law that is more specific to generally stigmatize the use of such a qualifier? Silly me I am looking for logic and consistency in law.

No, not federal, state.  That's part of the problem, like I said, it doesn't need to be consistent between states and you need to read each one to find the basis and scope.

So, get reading.  Laws are publicly available!

Presumably, states with reciprocity in this matter are similar enough to be reconcilable, which probably means there are sets of states which are mutually incompatible (including sets of size 1).

Tim

[rrinker]

 That the US is not one big monolithic entity is, I think, one of the most commonly overlooked things by many Europeans.

The silliness of some states' PE certifications is one reasons I never bothered taking the PE exam here. At the time, not sure if still true, but the exam would be 50% on whatever your engineering specialization was, and 50% combination of all other engineering disciplines. Why in the world would someone wanting to practice as a professional electrical engineer need to demonstrate any competency in civil engineering, I'll never know. That combined with the fact that in the first year of my first post-graduate job, I did maybe 2 months of electrical engineering, and by the time I was in a position to prepare for and take the exam, I wasn't actually doing ANY electrical engineering made it pretty much pointless. With the path my career took, being able to add PE after my name wouldn't have benefited me too much. In this state, that's the only restriction - I can have a job title with 'engineer' in it - in fact my company calls me a "senior systems engineer" even right on the tax forms submitted to federal, state, and local agencies. But I can not call myself "john Smith, PE" without having passed the exam and being licensed by the state. There was a time when they tried to say you couldn't use "engineer" at all unless you were a registered PE, but at some point that changed. Maybe all the locomotive engineers complained.

[Richard Crowley]

Popular YouTube lawyer Steve Lehto just posted this video on the Beaverton red-light cameras and government bureaucracy gone mad:

[EEVblog]

I thought this issue was done and he won?
He's back in federal court? 

[soldar]

I thought this issue was done and he won?
He's back in federal court? 

The previous video explains it.

They fined him $500 "for "impersonating an engineer". He appealed and he won and they returned his money but they basically said they were just being nice and did not accept that the law or regulation was being interpreted wrong and so this ruling did not apply to others who had been fined in the past or others who could be fined in the future.  So the issue is being escalated not because he wants his $500 back because he already got the money, it is being appealed on the principle of the matter. They returned his fine money as a way to defuse the matter and maintain the principle that they are entitled to fine people who do such things. What is being debated now is whether a person can express an opinion regarding an engineering matter while not holding an engineering degree.

[ruffy91]

Ha! This will solve other problems as well.
"Can't critizise the president if you're not a president yourself."

[iMo]

"I am an engineer.." means nothing from legal point of view, imho.
It is like to write "I am a vocalist"..

He would violate laws almost anywhere in the world if he wrote "I am a master of science in electrical engineering" or "I am MSc. EE" or in Europe "I am an Ing. in EE" or "I am a Dipl.-Ing. in EE" etc.
He had to indicate a "legal" academic title.

Thus the whole Case is a joke..

[wilmer]

I did not read this before. If this is true, than probably he just did not register at the  Oregon State Board of Examiners for Engineering. In fact, I change my mind, Oregon can fuck off. So if I would go there, not register myself, I wouldn't be allowed to use my title?

I'd be extending the big middle finger too.
Most practicing EE's in oz are not members of the Institute of Engineers Australia for example, nor is it a requirement for practically any EE job in the country.
They have a fancy Chartered Professional Engineer title, but it's well known that only wankers have that 

But in Australia, if you do the crime of been  electrical engineer and connect a wire at your home. You can get a fine of 1 million.

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[soldar]

Ha! This will solve other problems as well.
"Can't critizise the president if you're not a president yourself."

As ridiculous as it sounds it is not a new argument. People in power lose touch with reality and believe they are the law. In Spain speech is being curtailed by the courts with the most ridiculous arguments.

Some years ago a professional actor, expressing disagreement with the actions of the mayor of a town said that the mayor was an idiot, that he had not read a book in his life and that he would drown in his own shit. The bad news is that the actor was sued and lost an he was condemned to pay a fine and the appeal to the Supreme Court confirmed the verdict. The good news is that the judicial process in Spain is so fucking slow that by the time the verdict was ratified the actor had been dead for over a year.

The verdict explicitly stated that the speech could not be considered to be protected political speech because the actor was not a politician himself. He was not in political competition with the mayor and therefore had no right to question his actions and much less to insult him.

I think most people are just not aware of the implications and the stupidity of these verdicts which are being handed down every other day in Spain.

Any expression which is in disagreement with the official line of thinking and you risk being sued for insulting somebody's "honor" (like we are still in the middle ages), for expressing "hate", for invading another person's privacy, or for any number of other invented imaginary crimes.

The case object of this thread is surprising because it happened in America because in Spain the law is whatever the guy in charge says it is.