Engineering Ethics Workshop

Nadine Afari

Engineering Writing ProgramENGR 102 • Nov 22-23, 2010

Ethics Workshop

The goal of this workshop is to:

• Create dialogue among engineering students about ethics

• Discuss and practice new thinking skills

• Develop ethical reasoning skills and an increased ability to discern and make appropriate judgments

Ethics

• Greek word "ethos", which means "way of living.“

• Ethics is a branch of philosophy that is concerned with human conduct.

• Concerned with the behavior of individuals in society.

• Ethics examines the rational justification for our moral judgments.

• Studies what is believed to be morally right or wrong, just or unjust.

• Ethics and their underlying values are core beliefs which develop a person’s character and shape their actions.

• Most often these underlying beliefs are unconscious, unseen and unknown by the individual but make themselves known through their actions.

• An individual’s ethics and underlying beliefs come from their upbringing and are influenced significantly by their socialization (school, work, church, community, nation, etc.).

Ethics for Engineers

• Engineers are expected to exhibit the highest standards of honesty and integrity.

• Engineering has a direct and vital impact on the quality of life for all.

• Services provided by engineers require honesty, impartiality, fairness, and equality.

• Dedicated to the protection of the public health, safety, and welfare.

• Engineering Ethics is preventative – Solutions thinkers.

• Anticipating ethical problems that left, unattended, become an ethical crises.

• Responsible engineering practice requires familiarity with the kinds of circumstances that call for ethical sensitivity & reflection.

Why are Ethics important to Engineers?

• Disclosure of conflicts of interests

• It’s about making sure that our beliefs are grounded not knee-jerk reactions

• Improvement of the legal climate for the engineering profession

• Leadership, education, improve safety and minimize risks

• Advancement of humans and technology

A BP engineer admitted making a “fundamental mistake” by not taking precautions when supervisors on the rig saw that dangerous amounts of high-pressure gas were entering the well, according to a preliminary report from the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations. That gas ultimately shot out of the well and blew up.

Engineers will certainly use BP’s modus operandi as case study on how not to manage a crisis.

BP organizational culture appears to have been one which sanctioned risk taking, ignored expert advice and overlooked safety and risk warnings.

Ethics in Product Development

• human dignity and integrity

• solidarity and social justice

• Legislative activity

• Concepts of risk consent

• Consumption

• Issues in sustainability

• Resource dependence

Ethical Theories

• Virtue theory 

• Deontological theory

• Consequentialist Theory

• Utilitarianism

• Situational Ethics

• Altruism

• Ethical egoism

• Categorical Imperative

Utilitarianism: The greatest good for the greatest number

Strengths • Encourages efficiency and productivity. • Parallels profit maximization. • Encourages looking beyond the individual to assess

impact of decisions on all.

Weaknesses• Virtually impossible to quantify all important

variables. • Can result in unjust allocation of resources.• Can result in abridging some people’s rights to

achieve the utilitarian outcome.

Questions?

"Results from present studies on use of mobile phones for >10 years give a consistent pattern of increased risk for acoustic neuroma and glioma (brain tumors)". This study of Lennart Hardell & Co investigated two cohort studies

and 16 case control studies.

How responsible should people and companies be who invent the latest mobile devices and wireless networks in regard to ethics?

• What if these devices and wireless networks are like cigarettes: after prolonged use some people get seriously ill?

History of Engineering Ethics

• Archimedes (287-212 BC) refusing to write a treatise on certain of his mathematical discoveries because of the dangers of the engineering applications it could have.

• Leonardo Da Vinci (1452-1519) not wanting to publish his design for a submarine because of the evil nature of human that could use it as a means of destruction at the bottom of the sea.

• Galileo (1564-1642), who did not see the pursuit of science or new product development as subject to any prudential limitations.

• Galileo argued that scientists have the right to publish the scientific truth without concern for its possible unsettling social consequences.

• Some argue that engineers can launch any innovation they create, then moral consequences of the usage of the product then lies in the hands of the consumer.

• Some argued that scientists and engineers are responsible for the technology that they create that changes the world. ie – the atomic bomb.

Evaluation Challenges in Innovation

• Impact:  How much difference will the innovation make to improve health?

• Appropriateness: Will the intervention be affordable, robust and adjustable to health care settings in developing countries, and will it be socially, culturally and politically acceptable?

• Burden: Will the innovation address the most pressing health needs?

• Feasibility: Can it realistically be developed and deployed in a time frame of 5–10 years?

• Knowledge gap: Does the innovation advance health by creating new knowledge?

• Indirect benefits: Does it address issues such as environmental improvement and income generation that have indirect, positive effects on health?

• Does the innovation foresee unintended impacts and consequences?

• Does the innovation involve local community members?

• Is there a way to evaluate the success of the innovation?

Global Engineers

• Was it ethical for outsiders to decide that villagers should get information from the world at large?

• If we bring radio broadcasts, television, etc, into the lives of people, are there responsibilities that come along with this, for example to teach critical thinking about media?

Ethics in Process

• Fraud, misrepresentation, and misappropriation of assets

• Conflicts of interest, inadequate accountability and transparency

• Moral awareness: recognition that a situation raises ethical issues

• Moral decision making: determining what course of action is ethically sound

• Moral intent: identifying which values should take priority in the decision

• Moral action: following through on ethical decisions

Ethical Policies

• YES: Monitors the differences between chosen principles and actual practices

• NO: Determines the legal fate of an individual or group after making improper choices

• YES: A set of collectively chosen values that guide the actions of a company

• NO: A list of corporate declarations that determine the direction of the company

Technological Disasters

• In 2005 when Dell and their line of laptops featured faulty batteries, which had the unfortunate yet delightful habit of spontaneous combustion: because of a fire risk.”

• “The Sony lithium-ion batteries were placed in laptops shipped between April 2004 and July 2006. They were included in some models of Dell’s Latitude, Inspiron, XPS and Precision mobile workstation notebooks.”

Technological Disasters

• The Bhopal facility - India's Green Revolution aimed to increase the productivity of crops.

• On the night of December 23, 1984, a dangerous chemical reaction occurred in the Union Carbide factory when a large amount of water got into the MIC storage tank # 610.

• The leak was first detected by workers about 11:30 p.m. when their eyes began to tear and burn. They informed their supervisor who failed to take action until it was too late.

• In that time, a large amount, about 40 tons of Methyl Isocyanate (MIC), poured out of the tank for nearly two hours and escaped into the air, spreading within eight kilometers downwind, over the city of nearly 900,000.

Bhopal Disaster, 1984• Safety standards and maintenance procedures at the plant had been deteriorating and ignored for months.

• Gauges measuring temperature and pressure in the various parts of the unit, including the crucial MIC storage tanks, were so notoriously unreliable that workers ignored early signs of trouble (Weir, pp.41-42).

• The refrigeration unit for keeping MIC at low temperatures (and therefore less likely to undergo overheating and expansion should a contaminant enter the tank) had been shut off for some time (Weir, pp.41-42).

• The gas scrubber, designed to neutralize any escaping MIC, had been shut off for maintenance. Even had it been operative, post-disaster inquiries revealed, the maximum pressure it could handle was only one-quarter that which was actually reached in the accident (Weir, pp.41-42).

• The flare tower, designed to burn off MIC escaping from the scrubber, was also turned off, waiting for replacement of a corroded piece of pipe. The tower, however, was inadequately designed for its task, as it was capable of handling only a quarter of the volume of gas released (Weir, pp.41-42).

• The water curtain, designed to neutralize any remaining gas, was too short to reach the top of the flare tower, from where the MIC was billowing (Weir, pp.41-42).

• The lack of effective warning systems; the alarm on the storage tank failed to signal the increase in temperature on the night of the disaster (Cassels, p.19).

• MIC storage tank number 610 was filled beyond recommended capacity; and -a storage tank which was supposed to be held in reserve for excess MIC already contained the MIC (Cassels, p.19).

The Kansas City Hyatt Regency Walkways Collapse , 1981

• During January and February, 1979, the design of the hanger rod connections was changed in a series of events and disputed communications between the fabricator (Havens Steel Company) and the engineering design team (G.C.E. International, Inc., a professional engineering firm). The fabricator changed the design from a one-rod to a two-rod system to simplify the assembly task, doubling the load on the connector, which ultimately resulted in the walkways collapse.1

• The fabricator, in sworn testimony before the administrative judicial hearings after the accident, claimed that his company (Havens) telephoned the engineering firm (G.C.E.) for change approval. G.C.E. denied ever receiving such a call from Havens.2

• On October 14, 1979 (more than one year before the walkways collapsed), while the hotel was still under construction, more than 2700 square feet of the atrium roof collapsed because one of the roof connections at the north end of the atrium failed.3 In testimony, G.C.E. stated that on three separate occasions they requested on-site project representation during the construction phase; however, these requests were not acted on by the owner (Crown Center Redevelopment Corporation), due to additional costs of providing on-site inspection.

• Even as originally designed, the walkways were barely capable of holding up the expected load, and would have failed to meet the requirements of the Kansas City Building Code.5

Innovation and Ethics

• Innovation by nature is experimental

• Levels of full disclosure

• Balancing harm and benefits

• Human dignity

• Minimizing harm

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Environmental Ethics

Products can be designed so that:

• less material is used initially – smaller size, more sophisticated design approaches

• greater durability, reduced wear, less corrosion

• they can be more easily repaired

• easily adapted for alternative use after the primary design use has been fulfilled.

• easily recycled as products (remanufactured – inner loop recycled)

• easily and efficiently recycled to basic reusable materials (outer loop recycling)

Safety and Recalls

• Child safety - An Indiana company recalled 800 building sets. Reason: “Small magnets inside the plastic sticks can fall out. Magnets found by small children can be swallowed or aspirated. If more than one magnet is swallowed, the magnets can attract each other and cause intestinal perforation or blockage, which can be fatal."

• The ethical question is this: How much responsibility should the producer or service provider have? How liable should they be?

• On the other hand, how much responsibility does the consumer bear to learn how to use products properly and safely? When does the consumer become guilty by virtue of negligence or carelessness?

New Products

Ethical Reasoning Skills

• Meta/Analytical Ethics

• Normative Ethics

• Descriptive Ethics

Ethics in the Workplace

• Decisions for Engineers in the workplace

• Current knowledge about your institution and their ethics and practices

• Hazards and risks – private/public test results

• Degree of public participation – voluntary

• Accuracy and Timeliness of reports

• Extent to which strengths and weakness of data are identified