I understand what you mean, but I'd have to disagree with that. I've been working on a very large engineering project with a large-ish team (~50 members) for over two years. All of our communication is via an established methodology of engineering diagrams, design documents, position papers, etc all of which are in a structured format that follows common rules/regulations/conventions.

As a result, all the companies we work with for e.g. understand our P&ID diagrams, electrical schematics, mechanical design docs, system layout diagrams, etc. There is no reason why such a methodology can't be brought to code. I don't view code as anything special - having now worked on on both sides. I think there really is a lot of value in the engineering methodologies that can be adapted and applied to the software world.