in the era of AI should I choose design as career or civil engineer is a safe option?

Every generation faces a version of this question. The tools change, the anxiety doesn't. What I've heard consistently from people who built meaningful creative lives is that they didn't choose design because it was safe. They chose it because they couldn't not choose it.

AI will absorb the mechanical parts of both fields. What it cannot replicate is conscience. One architect I've learned from described listening to an inner voice that tells you what a project deserves, separate from what wins or pays. That quality, the willingness to stand by your work, is what makes a designer irreplaceable.

The real question isn't design versus engineering. It's whether you are willing to fail better in service of something you believe in.