Engineers as Professionals
What is a Profession?
According to the Oxford Shorter Dictionary
“ the occupation which one professes to be skilled in and
to follow….A vocation in which professed knowledge of
some branch of learning is used in its application to the
affairs of others, or in the practice of an art based upon it.
Characteristics of a Profession
1. Extensive period of training of an intellectual character,
usually obtained at a college or university.
2. Possessing knowledge and skills vital to the well-being of the
larger society.
3. A monopoly or near-monopoly on the provision of
professional services, and considerable control over
professional education and the standards for admission into
the profession.
4. An unusual degree of autonomy in the workplace.
5. A claim to be regulated by ethical standards, usually
embodied in a code of ethics, that promotes the good of the
public
Should Engineers Have to Be Registered to
Practice Engineering?
NO. Registration Should Not Be Required to
Practice Engineering.
Registration might increase the cost of engineering
services, because the costs of registration would be
passed on to clients and customers.
Registration might make certain types of cooperation
between engineers and non-engineers on the same
project difficult, because registration would prohibit
non-engineers from doing engineering work.
Engineers already must be licensed in order to sign
off on work that directly affects the public.
Should Engineers Have to Be Registered to
Practice Engineering?
YES. Registration Should Be Required to Practice Engineering.
Some countries already require registration to practice, and the
types of problems described above have not appeared to be
serious.
The distinction between work that does and does not affect the
public is not clear, since most engineering work affects the public
in some way.
Registration might increase the professional autonomy of
engineers in the workplace, because engineers could more easily
resist management requirements to violate professional
standards. An engineer could say, complying with your requests
might lead to the revocation of my license, and other engineers
would face the same problem if they complied with your request.
A Profession with a Difference: The Primacy
of the Public Good
The first of the Fundamental Canons of the code of
the National Society of Professional Engineers
(NSPE) says that engineers shall “hold paramount
the safety, health, and welfare of the public.”
The code of the Association for Computing
Machinery obligates its members to “contribute to
society and human well-being” (I.1). This same
section says that well-being includes a safe natural
environment.
A Profession with a Difference: The Primacy
of the Public Good
One of the Guidelines to Canon 1 of the code of the
American Society of Civil Engineers affirms that
engineers should utilize “their knowledge and skill
for the enhancement of human welfare and the
environment.”
A part of the introductory statement of the code of
the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
states that its members “recognize the importance of
our technologies in affecting the quality of life
throughout the world.”
A Profession with a Difference: The Primacy
of the Public Good
Promoting the well-being of the public is the
primary responsibility of the engineering
profession.
What is Well-being?
Essential conditions for “quality of life” might be:
having food, shelter, and water,
Having satisfying human relationships
(communication, the Internet),
having free movement and expression (highways,
air travel, the Internet, telephone, etc.), and
having a satisfactory relationship to the natural
world (environmental preservation)
Prohibited Actions
Prohibitions are a prominent part of professional
ethics, including engineering ethics.
Approximately 80 percent of the code of the NSPE is
taken up with statements that are, either explicitly or
implicitly, prohibitive in character.
First duty of professionals, is to refrain from harming
others.
It is easier to enforce rules that specify what is
prohibited than rules that require, or at least
encourage, more open-ended and positive objectives.
Examples of Prohibited Actions from the
NSPE Code
Do not associate with dishonest professionals (II,1,d)
Do not accept compensation from two parties on the
same project (II,4,b)
Do not participate in governmental decisions related
to your own work (II,4,d)
Do not solicit work from a governmental body on
which a member of your firm has a position (II,4,e)
Do not falsify your qualifications (II,5,a)
Do not give bribes (II,5,b)
Preventive Ethics
Engineers are obligated not only to abide by code
prohibitions, thereby refraining from causing
harm, but also, under some circumstances, to
actively prevent harms caused by technology or by
other engineers.
Prevention of harm usually involves
(1) Identifying and disclosing potential harms
(2) Attempting to prevent them.
Preventive Ethics
Canon 1 of the code of the Institute of Electrical
and Electronics Engineers says that its members
commit themselves “to accept responsibility in
making decisions consistent with the safety, health
and welfare of the public, and to disclose promptly
factors that might endanger the public or the
environment.”
Preventive Ethics
Engineers shall at all times recognize that their
primary obligation is to protect the safety, health,
property and welfare of the public. If their
professional judgment is overruled, under
circumstances where the safety, health, property, or
welfare of the public are endangered, they shall
notify their employer or client and such other
authority as may be appropriate.
Aspirational Ethics
Engineers Without Borders (EWB-USA)
An organization primarily for engineering students and
professionals who want to use their expertise to promote human
welfare.
Engineering students from the University of Arizona chapter
developed a water supply and purification project in the village
of Mafi Zongo, Ghana. The project s aim was to supply 30 or
more villages, with approximately 10,000 people, with safe
drinking water.
Engineering students from the University of Colorado installed
a water system in Muramka, a Rwandan village. The system
provides villagers with up to 7,000 liters of safe water for
everyday use.
Aspirational Ethics
Colorado School of Mines has created a program
in Humanitarian Engineering which is devoted to
research and design intended to improve the well-
being of poor and marginalized communities
around the world.
Even after his retirement, engineer Carl Clark
devoted extensive time to the development of air
bags for car bumpers, and wearable air bags for the
elderly to prevent broken hips. Much of his work
was done on his own time and without pay.
Designing for Well-being
The primary way in which engineers improve
well-being is through design.
Two important themes that should govern design:
1. Technology functions in a social context, and
2. Engineers must adopt a critical attitude toward
technology.
The Social Context of Engineering
Technologies always function in a social context:
they have consequences for good or ill.
Engineering innovations whether consumer
products, bridges, or buildings are tested on
members of the public.
The social context comprises a two-way causal
relationship: technology affects society and the
social context influences the development of
technology.
The Social Context of Engineering
Autonomous cars
Technology also obviously affects the jobs we
hold. Some jobs have been diminished in numbers
due to technology.
Technology has also affected our social
relationships in many ways, sometimes affecting
people in different generations differently.
The Social Context of Engineering
Social forces also direct the development of technology.
The early history of the bicycle
The early evolution of the bicycle had two “branches” : a
sportsman’s bike with a high front wheel that was relatively
unstable and a more utilitarian version with a smaller front wheel
that was more stable. The sportsman’s version was designed for
speed and was especially attractive to young athletic males. The
utilitarian version was more appropriate for pleasure riding and
ordinary transportation. Eventually, the utilitarian design came to
be more widely accepted, and the high-wheeled bike disappeared.
Most people evidently decided that producing a sportsman’s toy
was not as important as producing a useful means of
transportation.
The Social Context of Engineering
Standards for consumption of gasoline are
changing. Even if it is more “efficient” to build
automobiles by older standards or to use less
environment-friendly standards in other areas,
society will almost certainly continue to change the
standards in favor of the environment.
Adopting a Critical Attitude toward
Technology
Most scholars are in favor of the view that humans can
influence the direction of technological development.
Technological optimists believe that most technological
development promotes well-being and should be
encouraged. For example, growth of IT industry
Technological pessimists, on the other hand, while not
opposing all technological development, want to enter a
cautionary note. Technological development may
weaken or destroy many aspects of traditional life.
The fireplace versus modern furnace
Traditional family meal versus microwave meal
Adopting a Critical Attitude toward
Technology
The truth lies between technological optimism and
pessimism. Creators of technology (engineers)
should try to maximize the desirable aspects and
minimize the undesirable aspects.
Example of social networking
