Engineering Ethics

Engineering disciplines evolved as a result of continuous exploration by man of the dwelling place that he found himself in, and his endeavors to make his earthly home a less strange and safer place, while he instinctively yearned to cultivate a sense of belonging and a feeling of ownership to be able to relate and adapt to an unknown habitat and surroundings, with no one to guide him but his instincts and a superior intelligence. Although he might have found himself to be similar to the animals that roamed the Earth, his instinctive urge to bring improvements in life, the innate intelligence that he could invoke in contriving to counter the problems he faced or to build the tools that he could skillfully use to hunt for food or construct a dwelling place for his family, safe from the approach of predators, placed him much above other apparent forms of life on Earth at the time. While he knew, what set him apart from other forms of life was his intellect, he was also inwardly conscious of the higher emotions he harbored and which were evoked in a corresponding correlation by a peculiar circumstance. For instance, what truly distinguished him was a sense of integrity of character, chastity, moral uprightness, sympathy towards his fellow habitants, a compulsive longing to improve life in general.

On one hand, where he did harbor pristine characteristics and emotions, he was not without prejudices and vicious inclinations that often led to a confrontation of sorts when required upon to act or make a decision. This is where the Creator seemed to have chosen man to be born with an innate sense of morals, ethics, justice and an internal sense of judgment that told him whether his actions were right or wrong. In a way, the Creator charged His best creation with the additional responsibility in exchange for the gift of a superior intelligence. It soon dawned upon man that he was in many ways responsible and accountable for his actions towards himself and society in general. The precedent of valuing and upholding the notion of justice, pursuit of knowledge and abandonment of the slavery of false gods was first set by Socrates, considered to be the wisest of men in his own lifetime by the Oracle of Delphi and Athenians in general (Public Broadcasting Services online articles on Socrates).

As it transpired later, many vocational disciplines and fields of human endeavor came to recognize and embrace ethical and moral principles as the platform upon which it would ever be needed to build any intellectual enterprise. Ethics was likewise introduced and made an integral part of the professional practitioners in law and medicine, very early, as was evident in the Hippocratic Oath that every doctor had to undertake before starting the practice. The reason of an early introduction of the ethical principles in the named vocations might have been easy discernability of the effects that could have been observed or had been observed without having a mandatory following of the actual principles in many cases. Engineering disciplines, in the course of their evolution, seemed to demand an equally intense and conscientious consideration of the ethical principles from the point of inception till the completion of any project. The late embrace of ethics as a part of curriculum and essential grooming of graduating engineers was partly due to the fact that unlike medicine and law, it was somewhat later in history that engineering was recognized as a profession and its practitioners were required to have had undergone a sound technical training in order to be considered well-equipped for being resourced for private and public contracts. Early philosophical inclinations and bearings of Greek thinkers had also much to do with the trend, which gave rise to legal argument and reasoning. With 19th and Early 20th century advancements in the profession of Engineering, leading to materialization of awe-inspiring engineering wonders, some of which met failures, it was soon clear that disregard of ethics would bear no fruit and would be a dangerous path to tread for the designer as well as for the intended end-users in any project. Modern engineering history is not without its share of scars despite all magnificence, which exposed laxity in observing all design and ethical considerations, or an inability to foresee all contingencies on part of project designer or engineer. Some of the well-knows disasters that resulted in loss of life or property, and which are now studied by the students of engineering ethics as case studies are mentioned here, to prove our point.

Tampa Bridge Bay Collapse

The Bridge collapsed under the weight of a locomotive carrying more than 70 passengers in a heavy storm and was later found to be designed without consideration of wind loadings. The fracture point of some of the material used was found to be too lower, than would have been necessary to carry the expected load. The negligence shown in completing all checks could easily have classified as an ethical issue, since the matter dealt with human lives.

Boston Molasses Tank Rupture Again due to a criminal show of negligence on part of designer of the cylindrical Molasses tank which was not even checked for leaks before commissioning, more than 20 lives were lost in resulting high tide of sticky flood besides severe damage to the property.

Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant disaster Flawed reactor design and improperly trained operational team combined to cause the accident releasing in the atmosphere critically high levels of radioactivity. Apart from the radiation, the trauma proved to be highly disturbing and led to more tragedies in vast vicinity. In this incident again, the utter disregard or slackness to provide operators with requisite level of training proved itself a criminally unethical premise (World Nuclear Association). Coming to an accident that affected Pakistan badly: Margalla Towers collapse In an earthquake in Pakistan in the year 2005, aftershocks far from the epicenter caused the residential building in Islamabad to crumble down to ground killing all the residents, yet again showing that mandatory seismic consideration in architectural design had not been made and sub-standard material had been used in the construction. The list includes several disasters of varying scales that have pointed to at least some involvement of engineering design in the causes unearthed. The most notorious ones, having also been documented in detail, are; Exxon Valdez Oil Tanker spill, Space Shuttle Challengers crash, DC-10 crashes, Kansas City Hyatt Regency walkway collapse. Sadly, the list is not limited to these incidents. Time and again, it came to the fore that an engineer had to make compromise because of nonavailability of specific-grade part, as seemingly insignificant as just a screw of a recommended diameter or length, only for the minor omission to cause a plane-crash. Or, when an engineer had to suppress data at his superiors order because time was running out and the project could not have had waited for further tests. The data-suppression done to appease the management, ignoring the ethical responsibilities incumbent upon the subordinate engineer, eventually became the sore point as the method which was finalized proved to be too costly, handing the competitor an edge in offering an attractive price for a substitute product in market.

What to say of the engineering planning in dam-design that ignored the nearby habitation and became the cause of heavy flooding in monsoon rains? Or, what about the environmental impact that a proposed deforestation for the purpose of constructing a cement-producing plant and afterwards the plants operations shall have, in view of the fact that cement production is one of the most polluting of all industrial processes? Similarly, whose responsibility it was to think of the consequential weakening of a bridge structure which resulted as a bending angle in excess of that stipulated by engineering design was allowed to pass and bridge was constructed with again a disregard of the nearby population, suspending the hanging structure on their heads like a Damocles sword? The mentioned countless actual occurrences and similar possibilities could simply be avoided if the person in charge of overseeing and designing the project or those working under his supervision were not to disregard their moral and ethical obligations. Although morals and ethics are considered to be ingrained instincts, yet in certain situations could be prevailed upon by greed, prejudice, or fear. The critical need of meeting the ethical responsibilities in designing in engineering projects to ward off the chances of a future disaster makes it imperative that the future engineering graduates be grounded firmly and trained for a profound inculcation of a spontaneous and unthinking show of heeding the moral and ethical duty whenever saddled with the minutest scale of work and presented with multiple choices in situations.

Dr. Michael S. Pittard (1992), who headed the National Society for Professional Engineers initiative to design a curriculum for engineering ethics, mentioned in his article that the Hasting Center (an interdisciplinary group of educators) had agreed for the curriculum to be so designed as to be comprehensively fulfilling the following five requirements;

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It should be so designed as to stimulate students ethical imagination The curriculum should help recognize the ethical issues, they are faced with The curriculum should not constrict analytical thinking and instead, should make the engineers capable of analytically making the most appropriate choice when faced with multiple alternatives. Furthermore, it should promote a non-mechanical interpretation of the consequences of the choices they come to make. The curriculum should evoke a sense of responsibility towards society at large, and

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Last, but not the least, the curriculum should eliminate ambiguity and disagreement on ethical matters.

Universities, the world over, are now making it a point to include Engineering Ethics in their engineering curriculums. The world sees with consensus on taking pre-emptive measures to avoid disasters and loss of precious human lives. Occupational Health and Safety practices, a discipline that was spawned by general awareness of its criticality for industries, have been made mandatory and take qualified engineers to implement the standards recommended by international bodies. A neglect to implement the minimum-recommended standards is now considered to be unsafe as well as unethical.

Bibliography iWorld Nuclear Association, 2012. Chernobyl Accident 1986, (Public Information Services article) [Online] (Updated April, 2012) Available at: www.world-nulcear-org/info/chernobyl/info07.html [Accessed 23 September, 2012] Pittard, Michael S., 1992. Teaching Engineering Ethics : A Case Study Approach, 1992. NSP Case Report [Online]. Available at: Zachry University Department of Civil Engineering website, www.ethics.tamu.edu/NSFReport.aspx. [Accessed : 23 September, 2012]. Public Broadcasting Service. Socrates and the Oracle of Delphi, (Research Articles on Socrates) [Online]. Available at: www.pbs.org/empires/thegreeks/characters/socrates_p4.html. [Accessed : 23 September, 2012].

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