we all make mistakes
in life and engineering you're not
always going to succeed what's important
is that you learn from your screw-ups
and incorporate those lessons into what
you do next
because when you don't the consequences
can be bad even deadly to help keep us
on track
we need something that will provide a
sense of morality and a set of best
practices for doing good in the world
we need ethics specifically we need
engineering ethics
engineering is a broad ever-changing
field for so many different branches
it's good to have some common ground
a general set of guidelines or ideas for
how the engineers of the world
should go about solving problems one of
these is safety which we'll talk about
more next time the other
is ethics in general ethics is a moral
philosophy that tries to deal with
what's right
what's wrong and what your duty is to do
good
and not do bad engineering ethics is
essentially the same mindset
just apply to the field of engineering
it's the study of values
issues and decisions that are involved
with the work of engineers ethics has a
particular importance for engineers
because people's lives are so often
going to be in your hands
it's not just about remembering your
manners or being nice to your neighbor
what you create as an engineer could
save a person's life
or take it away when you swallow a pill
at the hospital you need to be able to
trust that the people that came up with
it
had your best interests in mind when you
drive over a bridge you need to know
that the civil engineers who designed it
took the time to make it as sturdy as
possible the foods you eat the cars you
drive the wires in your home
they all need to be designed with ethics
in mind if you want to see how bad an
engineering failure can be
look no further than the kansas city
hyatt regency collapse
in july of 1980 the hyatt regency hotel
in kansas city missouri
was showing off its new multi-story
atrium decked out with two levels of
suspended walkways these walkways were
supported by beams which were supposed
to be held up by long rods hanging from
the ceiling to even the load and reduce
the stress on each beam
the walkways were supposed to have a
single rod extending all the way through
them but something happened between the
initial
design stage and the actual building of
the atrium when the builders had some
difficulty putting it together
the system was modified to have two
separate shorter rods
instead of a single longer one this
design change meant that the upper rod
had to not only support the weight of
the walkway that it held up
but also the one below it essentially
doubling the load during a party about a
year after the atrium opened
these beams failed and the two walkways
collapsed killing 114 people
and injuring 216 others in terms of lost
lives it was one of the most devastating
structural failures in u.s history a lot
went wrong
much of it caused by poor oversight and
bad communication a formal review of the
change design never happened
strength calculations were never
performed work was subcontracted out
and the engineer on record put their
seal on the design
without personally checking everything
it all could have been prevented if only
they'd followed the engineers code of
ethics there are a couple of different
ones out there but today we'll use the
code of ethics from the american society
of civil engineers
or asce their code of ethics has eight
distinct principles
the first being hold safety paramount
this means that your chief concern as an
engineer
needs to be the health and welfare of
the public the rule goes on to say that
you should only approve designs that are
determined to be safe
and that conform with accepted
engineering standards the fact that
there weren't any calculations done on
the design changes to the walkway
and that the engineer on duty approved
the designs without properly checking
them clearly goes against this principle
that's why the committee of professional
conduct that reviewed the case
ruled that the engineer had violated
their code and suspended them from the
society for
three years if you take a look at the
rest of the code you can see some other
useful rules about how engineers should
approach a problem the second rule is to
service with competence
which means that you should only work in
areas that you're skilled in if you're
not an electrical engineer you shouldn't
be messing with the wires in a building
the third states that you should always
issue
true statements basically don't lie then
comes the need to act as a faithful
agent
for each of your employers or clients
and avoid conflicts of interest
one of your jobs shouldn't cause you to
sabotage another there's also the rule
of reputation by merit which means your
reputation is built up by the work that
you do
and not by unfair means that goes hand
in hand with the requirement to uphold
professional honour
where you act with integrity and have a
zero tolerance policy
for bribery fraud or any sort of
corruption the seventh rule is to
continue professional development
and it's one of the most important for
the long-term growth of society in the
engineering field you need to not only
foster your own development as an
engineer but that of other engineers as
well
you always need to report what happens
no matter the consequences
and finally the eighth rule is to treat
all persons fairly
which is really just a good mantra for
life now codes are great but they're not
perfect
people can and do break the rules and
codes can't always address every
situation
they may need to be updated as society
and technology advance
so it all comes down to this what are
the highest priorities
if engineers are trying to create good
for the public you need to ask
what is good and how can we prioritize
goods it can't just be consequentialism
having the end justify the means or you
leave the door open for some pretty big
ethical grey areas
no we need better ethics than that one
of the most influential ethical theories
to engineering has been utilitarianism
this is the belief that actions are
right if they're useful or beneficial to
the majority of people
you should try and maximize the overall
good that you can do
taking into account all of those that
will be affected by your actions
rights ethics is also very important
simply put
you should do your best to respect the
rights of others acts of respect
aren't just ideal but necessary
regardless of whether or not they always
maximize the overall good
in that way you can see how ethical
theories can stack on each other there's
also duty ethics which is all about
respecting another person's autonomy
this builds on rights ethics but puts
the spotlight on your duties rather than
another person's rights
if you have a right to live then i have
a duty to not market a misleading
product that could kill you
or sign off on a new walkway design that
i haven't checked applying engineering
ethics is all about trying to balance
these ethical theories
with whatever situation you're put in is
not always easy or simple
but as an engineer you have a duty to
try your best we improve individually
and as a community with practice and
learning from the past remember that
city court building we talked about last
episode the one whose pillars were in
the middle of its size
rather than at the corners wind from the
wrong angle could cause the entire
structure to fall
and no one realized until a student
pointed out the problem
after it was already built after those
discoveries were made and they started
immediate repairs
did they have an obligation to inform
everyone in the building how about the
church that was underneath it
what about the people in the surrounding
area or the media
or the local government what was the
proper protocol that they should have
followed if you pick apart this incident
you can zero in on the ethics
surrounding several of these points to
start you need to analyze those win
loads you need to check all of your
calculations and not simply rely on
building codes
which only set minimum requirements and
aren't always what a specific project
needs then you should address the design
changes which in this case was a switch
from welded connections
to bolted ones those changes need to be
considered in the overall design and
checked by everyone involved
it can't just be a hasty decision you
also have your professional
responsibility to follow the codes of
conduct for every chartered institution
that applies to what you're doing public
statements are absolutely necessary in a
situation like this
the public has a right to know what's
going on so they can plan accordingly if
you don't release a public statement
or like city court put one out that's
misleading you're denying people their
right to ensure their own safety
and make their own educated decisions
finally no matter what happens
you need to share and contribute to the
advancement of professional knowledge
concealing the city court problem for
over 20 years robbed everyone of decades
of ethical and engineering learning
that's why even when tragedies happen
it's important to treat them as case
studies on what you might learn to do
differently in the future
when approaching other problems like if
you're going to try and go into space
you need to know about the space shuttle
challenger disaster in 1986 a leak in
one of its solid rocket boosters ignited
the main liquid fuel tank
resulting in the loss of the vehicle and
the death of the crew nasa found the
cause of the disaster to be the failure
of an
o-ring seal in the solid fuel rocket and
while there were many factors that
contributed to this disaster
it was fundamentally an ethics problem
sufficient testing hadn't been done
on the o-rings and nasa management
didn't listen to the concerns
of some engineers all so they could stay
on their launch schedule who knows what
would have happened if a better ethical
code was followed
it could have still gone wrong but maybe
it wouldn't have all we can do is try
and with a strong code of ethics at our
side
and knowledge of the past at our backs
we can make the best most informed
decisions to ensure our designs have the
best possible
impact there's no better way to do it
today we talked about ethics and how it
can be applied to engineering
we learned what a code of ethics is and
how it can apply to a situation like the
kansas city higher regency collapse
then we learned about engineering ethics
and the ethical theories of
utilitarianism
rights ethics and duty ethics finally we
brought it all together by going back to
the situation with citicorp
and analyzing it from an ethical
perspective i'll see you next time when
we'll talk about safety crash course
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