Everything you say is undoubtedly true. But the problem of the engineer is very different from that of the government regulator of private enterprise (which is what I suspect you are obliquely referring to).

The engineer is at war with nature, he is trying to find a solution to a problem caused by nature, or to get around some difficulty which is a result of nature. For example, he may be interested in designing a structure, or building a machine and he has to take into account how it will be used and in what environment.

The regulator is not faced with a harsh, but predictable natural environment. He is in a constant struggle with a conscious human adversary, one who may be counted on using all his intelligence and cunning to circumvent and frustrate every technical or administrative or legal tool used to combat or control him because of personal greed, or even malice. This is not to imply that all humans are natural criminals, and must be treated that way, they are not. Most try to avoid criminal or antisocial behavior. But as long as at least one human acts like that, fair and legal regulations, laws, and statutes must be designed as if they were all that way.

Does this mean regulations must be blindly accepted.? No, many may be unnecessary, or ineffective, or obsolete. Even the best of them can eventually be bypassed by clever crooks. That goes without saying. Regulation must be instituted with input from the regulated as well as the consumer, and constantly reviewed and updated. And there is no doubt that regulators can also get lazy, or become self-perpetuating bureacracies more interested in their own survival and growth than in protecting the public. But you can say the same thing about civil and even criminal law. Keeping regulation and law fair, honest and relevant is not easy, not a perfect process, and at best is complex and inefficient. But that is an administrative problem, not an ideological one. And the more complex a society gets, the larger a proportion of its resources must go into regulating its activities, just as in any complex system. This is not just a problem in government. In private industry, sometimes you really have to jump through hoops to institute a change that is obvious and straightforward to everyone.

The public is entitled to protection from unscrupulous businessmen who might feel they are entitled to selling dangerous, misrepresented or unsafe products, or to operate unsafe, dangerous or polluting industries.

We note that those who are most suspicious of regulation rarely object to statutes and ordinances that protect their property from thieves, the integrity and enforcement of their patents and contracts, their property rights, indeed, all the complex rules and regulations that protect them from what they perceive as threats.

The regulator, policeman, or legislator is faced with a very different problem than the engineer. The engineer can build a gate to keep the cows out of the garden, but it might not work against raccoons. And It certainly won't work against safecrackers.