&gt;  If you&#x27;re hiring an engineer and he&#x27;s not familiar with the Bernoulli equation<p>What discipline are you hiring, and what do you define as &quot;familiar with&quot;?  If I am hiring an electrical engineer, I expect them all to know what Maxwell&#x27;s equations are and what they represent.  I would only expect an analog, mixed-signal, or power systems engineer to know how to apply them.  Even then I would expect them to look up the equations.<p>Engineering has been standing on a foundation of reference books for as long as the discipline has existed.  Engineers are expected to know what the principles are and how to apply them.  They aren&#x27;t expected to do all this from memory.  The PE exam is a mostly open book test for that reason.