Chapter 2 Notes, Thinking Like an Engineer

Ethics

Ethical decision making is a part of everyday life. Most ethical decisions you make in a day are not considerably important but they might lead to consequences that are not desired. As an engineer decisions that you make could affect thousands and thousands of people. Practicing analyzing day to day decisions from an ethical standpoint is important to be able to make good decisions. The reasons people make ethical decisions are to make the world a better place and to avoid unpleasant consequences. Religions made brief codes that summarize how one should live their lives, like the Code of Ur Nammu.

Some Ethical Decisions are straight forward. Just like for the majority of people it is unethical to kill someone. There is no set of rules or algorithms that somebody can follow that ensures that the best ethical decision is being made. However, some people have made procedures that you can follow to consider certain ethical decisions.

A Four Step Procedure is listed for people to follow like mentioned above. (1) "Determine what the issues are and who (stakeholders) might be affected by the various alternative courses of action that might be implemented." Identifying issues is normally easy because problems normally stand out. For example... Using bio-fuel instead of Gasoline. The issues would be the price of gasoline, fossil fuel company business. The Stakeholders would be Fossil fuel company's, and the population of people who depend on gasoline. (2) "Consider the effects of alternative courses of action from different perspectives." The first perspective would be Consequences when you consider this perspective you have to ask yourself how the stakeholders are going to be affected. For example if bio-fuel was a big hit it would drive the fossil fuel company's out of business. The second Perspective would be Intent which is the reason why the person is doing the action. The third perspective would be Character and that is the attributes of the said person doing an action. (3) "Correlate perspectives" Consider the results from the 3 perspectives that were discussed. If the three perspectives do not agree then you should rethink the question. (4) "Act" This is usually the hardest step to take, since some ethical action takes courage. Take action to do what is right.

The three perspectives are discussed above but they are consequences, intent, and character.

Example 2-1, "Consider the question of whether to allow further drilling for oil in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). List several issues and stakeholders.

Issues:
Gas Prices
Sustainable Energy
Disruption of the Ecosystem
Disruption of Life for Local Residents
Stock Market

Stakeholders:
Oil Companies
Employees (Local and Foreign)
Ecosystem Organisms
Foreign Relations
Stockholders in Oil Companies

Local Residents

I think that it is not ethical at all, no matter what, to touch a wildlife refuge. Living by a wildlife refuge for the majority of my life has made me realize the true importance of them... to protect the wildlife, and it is completely unethical to drill for oil and risk the lives of the wildlife of Alaska.

Example 2-2, "Should all U.S. children be fingerprinted when entering kindergarten and again each third year of grade school (3, 6, 9, 12)? Identify the stakeholders and consequences."

Stakeholders:
Software Companies and Developers (Database Configuration)
U.S. Children and Their Families
U.S. Government
U.S. Law Enforcement Departments
Cyber Hackers
Ink Companies

Consequences:
Record of U.S. Children
Confidentiality Precautions
Risk of Cyber Hacking for Info

I honestly do not see a need for a kid to get finger printed every three years. I can see how it can help with finding criminals but not missing children... And for the criminal aspect... the children have to be old enough to do a crime. But it does raise a lot of questions about personal freedom.

Example 2-3, "Should you download music illegally over the Internet?"

Unless you want to get caught by the federal government, probably not...

Example 2-4, "Your friends are deriding another student behind her back because she comes from a poor family and does not have good clothes"

1. Join the criticism?

That would be extremely harsh.

     2. Ignore it, pretend it is not happening, or simply walk away?

What good would that do to the situation.

     3. Tell your friends that they are behaving badly and insist that they desist?

Yes it sounds like the most productive option to take.

Example 2-5, "Your company has been granted a contract to develop the next generation of electronic cigarette, also known as "nicotine delivery system," and you have been assigned to the design team. Can you in good conscience contribute your expertise to this project."

You might just ask yourself the same thing I ask myself... Is it healthier than cigarettes? Sometimes even though some ideas may not sound good they are better than others. If people can live healthier lives smoking E-Cigarettes instead of cigarettes, I could see myself supporting this project.

Plagiarism is when you claim someone else's work as your own. Sometimes it is easy to spot plagiarism and other times it can be much harder. We ourselves plagiarize sometimes because our brains bring up other peoples information disguising it as an original thought.

The Engineering Creed is a code of ethics known by the (NSPE). Its a pledge to give utmost performance, to participate, to live and work according to the laws of man, and to place service before profit.

Engineers have a big Social Responsibility because they have problem solving skill that could possibly affect the lives of many people. It is engineers responsibility to use their problem solving talents to solve problems.

Engineers have the ability to do and solve so many problems the world has today. An engineer has the chance to solve certain issues that can affect the public safety. Its how the engineer answers questions and how they make ethical decisions that can affect the public safety.

I found this online regarding "The Whole Life Concept". It is covering the topics of Passion, which is something that drives someone to make decisions in life. The Impact which how someone makes a difference in the world. This can be related back to making ethical decisions for the better. Finally, there is Knowledge which is mainly used for coming up with possible answers to some problems.