Good engineering requires good bean-counting. Figuring out what you can do with infinite resources is not good engineering (except perhaps when funded by DARPA).

As any good civil engineer knows... “Any idiot can build a bridge that stands, but it takes an engineer to build a bridge that barely stands.”

The essential characteristic of engineering is making mindful, appropriate tradeoffs between various costs and benefits, including features, risks, externalities, financial costs, etc.