Derek, Lile, Electrical Engineering Professor
Engineering writing has a specific style. Open any publication and you'll see that style: never use personal pronouns, use the passive voice, etc. It's very impersonal. This is the accepted style, and I honestly don't know the history of it. In a technical paper we can't write, "I bought a bunson burner, I did this with it, and I made these measurements." This type of writing would get thrown out by any journal.