[FrankJ]

A lot of great inventions are a result of an accidents or observation of an unplanned events. Vulcanized rubber, post it notes, Penicillin are good examples of this. The intelligent, documented observation of the event is what distinguishes from the "hey watch this" type of randomness.

Since the people with the money don't like the term trial & error, you can always call it experimentation or research. Both calculation & experimentation are useful tools to solve a problem. Engineers are really just applied problem solvers.