Engineering Ethics

I never really knew anything about ethics until I read The Civilized Engineer. I had heard people use the word ethics before and had a roommate that had taken an ethics class but did not look into it more. Since I had not taken a class on it, I figured it must not be that important. Now I realize how important ethics really are and understand a lot more about the topic.

I agree with Samuel Florman that we are responsible for what we do. People lives are put into our hands when we, as engineers, design something that is potentially unsafe. Florman discussed a time when an engineer designed a building and either did not oversee the construction to make sure it was done properly or did not design it in a safe way. The building later collapsed and it came back to being his responsibility since it was he that gave the order to build it under that design. His license was taken away after this incident. I feel that a person should at least check on the progress of something that his or her name is on. The bad part is the engineer is accountable for when something like this happens. He/she will be sued, loose a lot of money, and probably will never be allowed to work in that field again. The worst part is someone may have or could have died because of a poor design. I know that I would not want to live with the fact that I could have prevented someone from losing

their life had I been a responsible engineer.

Another topic Florman discusses in the topic of ethics is when you should or should not take on a project. He states that it is ok to feel strongly about something and it is also ok to make a political stand when it comes to projects one does not agree with. An example he uses is the making of weapons to use in national defense. Many groups refuse to help in the design of these weapons because they are very involved in the "world peace" movement. However, we know that there are many countries out there that do not agree with the way the United States does certain things. So, it is a relief to me that there are people out there that will work on these projects. In my mind it would be almost unethical for nobody to work to protect our country. It is ok to protest in the way of not being part of a weapons project but it is not good for us to have no way to defend ourselves should the need arise.

The other topic that interested me in Samuel Florman's book was the