Theory of Objectification and Engineering Education

Abstract

This article identifies the contributions of the forums held in 2026 on the Theory of Objectification (TO) to consider options in engineering education in the face of the Fourth Industrial Revolution or Industry 4.0. The study evaluates the applicability of this historical-cultural framework in the training of engineers proposing an alternative to traditional, transmissive, and individualistic educational models. Through an ontological approach, the transition from data and information toward the construction of real knowledge is analyzed through the pedagogical concept of joint labour. The document integrates Aldert Kamp's perspectives on interdisciplinary curricular design toward the year 2030, Klaus Schwab's views regarding stakeholder capitalism, and Nagib Callaos' concepts surrounding cybernetic humanism. Likewise, it examines the impact of technological infrastructure and Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI), conceived here as a semiotic mediator and thinking partner capable of activating metacognitive processes in the student. In the context of developing countries like Venezuela, the need to transform the teaching of basic sciences through real problem-situations linked to the local socio-political reality is raised. Potential findings evidence the demand to migrate from an individual and punitive evaluation toward a formative and communal model. Finally, it concludes that true digital transformation in higher education does not lie in the acquisition of hardware, but rather in adopting an epistemological stance that recovers the protagonism of human activity and promotes self-regulation, solidarity, and social responsibility.