Engineering profession

A profession is a learned job demanding methodical information and familiarization in addition to a commitment to a societal good. Engineering is the innovative line of work of applying technical know-how for the service of all humanity and therefore is a profession.

The use of technological knowledge needs to count the sense of duty to provide high-value products and services. This sense of obligation also needs to judge creating a productive impact on society and the quality of life. Because engineering is a profession, engineers must take into consideration the impact of their products.


Ethic standards as guides

Ethic can be considered as "pertinent to morality" and ethical as "in accordance with the regulations or standards for suitable conduct or practice, especially the values of a profession." As moral values may be shaped by the ideals of the society, each profession therefore has to nurture its own set of standard rules so that there is a good perception of what practices are acceptable and what are not. In this way, not only the members of the profession know which actions are recommendable, others outside the profession will be able to know what to anticipate from the profession as well.


Inadequacy of ethical standards

However, it is not reasonable to provide directives to cater to all settings. Therefore, there are situations when they are shades of gray with no lone right or wrong answer. In such predicaments, engineers must derive their best personal solutions. Many preferences will have equally major results. Different interest groups are influenced differently and to different levels.

Solutions to ethical circumstances are seldom black or white issues. In making decisions when ethical dilemmas arise, engineers need to be receptive to how their decisions will involve diversed groups. What may make the pick making extra hard is that the alternatives that are more ethical may put the engineers themselves, or their employer, at a very unfavorable position.


Example of ethical dilemma

We shall go to show the predicaments often encountered by engineers by refering to the well-understood Challenger space shuttle explosion case.

In order for the space shuttle to have adequate power to escape from the gravitational pull to reach the orbit, the shuttle's own rockets are supplemented by two booster rockets that use solid fuel. These solid-fuel booster rockets were made by Morton Thiokol. As a consequence of the low temperature expected during the launch of the shuttle, a teleconference was held the night before the launch between NASA officials and Thiokol officials and engineers. We can expect that all the officials were either engineers or familiar with rocket engineering.

The early recommendation by Thiokol was not to launch the shuttle until the temperature had risen to a high enough level so that the O-rings would be able to perform the sealing job. However, as a consequence of the displeasure by NASA officials over the recommendation, it was revised to launch recommendation. Unfortunately, the space vehicle exploded soon after launch.

Let us review the tight spots faced by each of these three groups in this case:

Group 1 - NASA Officials
Group 2 - Thiokol Managers
Group 3 - Thiokol Engineers


Dilemma of NASA officials

The NASA officials were under the pressure to launch the space vehicle as a consequence of a few reasons. Further delay in the launch would involve the launches of following missions. Delay in the launch would result in more cost and made the space shuttle project less economically worth having. The lauch date was critical as President Reagan would be making the State of the Union speech as the shuttle was in space. Also, he was to talk about education, and what better time for the president to promote education than when a teacher was in orbit?

On the other hand, NASA managers were not supplied with sufficient verification to conclude that the launch would be risky as a result of cold temperature. In addition, they did specify the perfromance of the solid-fuel rockets even at a cold temperature, although not as low as what was expected during the launch.


Dilemma of Thiokol officials

Insisting on the no-launch recommendation would antangonize the company's relationship with NASA authority and affects their prospect for further contracts. Also, their engineers could only provide circumstantial evidence of the danger of cold condition on the perfromance of the O-rings but it was not very reliable.


Dilemma of thiokol engineers

Although they were aware of the poor performance of the O-rings at cold temperature, they did not have adequate time to prepare a very convincing case. Although they expressed strong opposition to the change in the recommendation from no-launch to launch, they were over-ruled.


Conclusions drawn from case

The viewpoints of a situation depend significantly on the position a professional is in. In particular, a young professional is very apprehensive with the techical problems even though as he climbs up the organizational ladder, he becomes more and more worried with the business problems of the organization. When we teach engineering ethics, we have to reflect upon the apprehension faced by engineers at different levels of their careers.

Jacob Gan PhD (Michigan) writes for www.succezz.com, www.JacobGan.com, www.JacobEducation.com, www.DemystifyCancer.com, www.understanding-orchids.com, www.motivate2success.com, www.JacobLearning.com and hosts Jacob.TheeLearningcentre.com, an elearning portal.