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SRM University, Kattankulathur

Faculty of Engineering and Technology, Department of Information Technology
15IT214 – Professional Ethics
Cycle Test-1
Degree : B.Tech Specialisation: IT
Year/Sem: II/III Date: 30/08/2017
Duration : 100 Minutes Max. Marks: 50

Instructional Objective(s) covered in this test:

IO1. Learn methodologies to resolve moral dilemmas
IO2. Understand how to practice the role of engineers as responsible experimenters

Student outcome(s) and Sub-outcomes covered in this test:

1. An understanding of professional, ethical, legal, security and social issues
and responsibilities. [outcome e]
2. An ability to understand professional responsibilities [outcome e1]
3. An Understanding of ethical, legal, security and social issues [outcome e2]

Part-A [Answer any five questions] (5x4=20 Marks)

1. Briefly explain inquiry and its types.
The three types of inquiries [request for help or information], in solving
ethical problems are:
a. Normative inquiry
b. Conceptual inquiry
c. Factual or descriptive inquiry
Engineering Ethics combines inquiries into values, meanings
and facts.
In order to find answers to many moral dilemmas, it is necessary
to understand the types of inquiry.
We have to explore how the ethical problems often arise in the
engineering profession.
.
2. Explain the models of professional roles
Savior: The representative engineer is a savior who will redeem society
from poverty, inefficiency, waste and drudgery of manual labor.
Guardian: The representative engineer knows the directions in which
and pace at which, technology should develop. Accordingly they should
be given positions of high authority based on their expertise in
determining what is in the best interest of the society.
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• Bureaucratic servant: The role of engineer is to be a servant who
receives and translates the directives of the management into concrete
achievements.
• Social servant: The role of engineers’ lies in obedient service to others
but their true master is society.
• Social enabler or catalyst: Ultimate power lies with the management.
Nevertheless, the engineer plays a vital role beyond mere compliance
with orders.
• Game Player: Engineers are neither servants nor masters. They play by
the economic game rules that happen to be in effect at a given time.

3. Distinguish between Moral Dilemma and Moral Autonomy.

MORAL DILEMMA: Dilemmas are situations in which Moral reasons
come into conflict
The application of moral values are problems, and one is not clear of
the immediate choice or solution of the problems.
Moral reasons could be rights, duties, goods or obligations.
These situations do not mean that things had gone wrong, but they only
indicate the presence of moral complexity. This makes the decision
making complex.
MORAL AUTONOMY: Moral autonomy is defined as, decisions and
actions exercised on the basis of moral concern for other people and
recognition of good moral reasons.
Alternatively, moral autonomy means ‘self determinant or
independent’.
The autonomous people hold moral beliefs and attitudes based on their
critical reflection rather than on passive adoption of the conventions of
the society or profession.
Moral autonomy may also be defined as a skill and habit of thinking
rationally about the ethical issues, on the basis of moral concern.

4. What are the tests required to evaluate the Ethical Theories?

Five widely used tests for evaluating ethical theories:
a. The theory must be clear
b. It must be consistent

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c. Neither the theory nor its defense can rely upon false
information
d. It must be sufficiently comprehensive to provide guidance in
specific situations of interest to us.
It must be compatible with our most carefully considered moral
convictions about concrete situations
5. Define the terms: a)Self respect b)Self interest c)Self control d)Self esteem
SELF-INTEREST is being good and acceptable to oneself. It is
pursuing what is good for oneself. It is very ethical to possess self-
interest.
As per Utilitarian theory, this interest should provide for the respect of
others also.
Duty ethics recognizes this aspect as duties to ourselves. Then only one
can help others.
Right ethicist stresses our rights to pursue our own good.
Virtue ethics also accepts the importance of self-respect as link to social
practice.

SELF-CONTROL:It is a virtue of maintaining personal discipline.

It means a strong will and motivation and avoidance of fear, hatred,
lack of efforts, temptation, self-deception, and emotional response.
It encompasses courage and good judgment also.
Self-respect promotes self-control.

SELF-RESPECT VS SELF-ESTEEM
Department of Information Technology

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6.Explain what you understand by Consensus and Controversy in engineering
practice.
Consensus means agreement.
Controversy means Disagreement.
Moral disagreements are natural and common.
 The ethics make the engineers realize the importance of tolerance
among them in case of disagreement while applying moral autonomy.
In exercising the moral autonomy, one is not likely to obtain the same
results as by others. This situation is likely to end in controversy.
 In this case, good amount of tolerance among individuals who are
autonomous, reasonable and responsible is necessary.
This does not mean forcing the engineers to reach unique moral
solutions. Many reasonable solutions are possible in a given ethical
problem.

Part-B [Answer all questions] (2x15=30 Marks)

7(a) . Explain and Compare the theories of Aristotle and Macintyre on virtues.
Aristotle Golden mean” ethics (Aristotle, 384 – 322 B.C.).

The best solution for ethical problems is achieved through reason and logic and is
a compromise or “golden mean” between extremes of excess and deficiency.
 For example, in the case of the environment, the golden mean between
the extremes of neglect and exploitation might be protection. Problem:
Variability from one person to another in their powers of reasoning and
the difficulty in applying the theory to ethical problems. Actions are
considered right if they support good character traits (virtues) and wrong
if they support bad character traits (vices)

 Closely tied to personal honor . Aristotle: Virtue and the Golden Mean

 Aristotle, the most influential of all virtue ethicist, defined the virtues as
acquired habits that enable us to engage effectively in rational activities.

 Moral virtues are tendencies, acquired thro’ habit formation, to reach a

proper balance between extremes in conduct, emotion, desire and
attitude.
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 Virtues are tendencies to find “The Golden Mean” between the extremes
of too much and too little.

 E.g. Truthfulness is the mean between revealing all information in

violation of tact and confidentiality and being secretive.

 Macintyre: Virtues and Practices

 Macintyre is a contemporary ethicist who has stimulated a
renewed interest in virtue ethics and applied it to thinking about
professional ethics.

 Macintyre begins with the idea of social practices.

 Cooperative activities aimed toward achieving public goods that

could not otherwise be achieved, at least not to the same
degree.

 These goods are internal to the practices in that they define

what the practices are all about.

 They differ from external goods.

 E.g. The primary internal good of medicine is the

promotion of health.
Or
(b) Discuss the points of social function of religion along with Divine Command
Ethics with an example.
 Religions have played major roles in shaping moral views and moral
values.
 Each religion lays stress on certain high moral standards.
 Hinduism holds polytheistic view and virtues of devotion and
surrender to high order.
 Christianity believes in one deity and emphasizes on virtues of
love, faith and hope.
 Islam on one deity and adherence to ishan and prayer.
 But many religious sects have adopted poor moral standards.

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 People are killed in the name of religion. Christianity has
influenced the Western countries, Islam in the Middle-East
countries, Buddhism and Hinduism in Asia, and Confucianism
in China.
 Further, there is a strong psychological link between the moral
and religious beliefs of people following various religions and
faiths.
 Religions support moral responsibility. They have set high moral
standards.
 Faith in the religions provides trust and this trust inspires
people to be moral.
 The religions insist on tolerance and moral concern for others.
 Many professionals who possess religious beliefs are motivated
to be morally responsible.
 DIVINE COMMAND ETHICS: As per this principle, the right action is
defined by the commands by God.
 It implies that to be moral, a person should believe in God and an
action is right only if it is commanded by God.
There are some difficulties in this approach, namely,
(a) whether God exists or not is not clear.
(b) How to know what are the God’s commands? and
(c) How to verify the genuineness of the commands?
Further, religions such as Hinduism, Islam, and Christianity
accept the existence of God. But Buddhism, Taoism, and
Confucianism adopt only faith in a right path and do not
believe in God.
1. Socrates was said to have argued that God, an entity which is
responsible, morally good, and beyond fear or favor, would not
command murder, rape, torture, immoral activities, and even mass
suicide.
2. Many such crimes were committed in the name of God then, and,
continue even now in different parts of the world. Some Western
leaders had claimed that God had commanded them to invade against
the Middle-East countries.
3. If anyone claims to have obtained commands from God to kill people
mercilessly, then we have to conclude that the person is not religious
but insane.

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_________________________________________________________________
8(a) Describe the space shuttle challenger accident. Analyze the factual, conceptual
and moral issues in the space shuttle challenger case.
The challenger was NASA’s second orbiter put into service
Flew 9 successful flights prior to 1986 and spent a total of 65 days in orbit
Carried many vital space-lab components into orbit
The shuttle stack is composed of…

- the external tank

- the Orbiter
- two solid rocket boosters

Two-thirds of the External Tank was filled with liquid hydrogen; the top
third with liquid Oxygen. This fuel supplied the three main engines of the

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Orbiter until about 8 1/2 minutes after liftoff. Then the External Tank would be
jettisoned at about 111,355m (roughly 69.2 miles) .
 Challenger space shuttle was designed to be a reusable one. The shuttle
mainly consisted of an orbiter, two solid propellant boosters and a single
liquid propeller booster.
 All the boosters were ignited and the orbiter was lifted out from the earth.
The solid rocket booster was of reusable type.
 The liquid propellant booster was used to finish the lifting of the shuttle
into the orbit. This was only a part of the shuttle which has been reused.
During lift-off, the main engines fire for about nine minutes, although
initially the thrust was provided by the two booster rockets. These booster
rockets are of the solid fuel type, each burning a million pound load of
aluminum, potassium chloride, and iron oxide
 The casing of each booster rocket is about 150 feet long and 12 feet in
diameter. This consists of cylindrical segments that are assembled at the
launch site.
 There are four-field joints and they use seals consisting of pairs of O-rings
made of vulcanized rubber. The O-rings work with a putty barrier made of
zinc chromate.
 The engineers were employed with Rockwell International (manufacturers
for the orbiter and main rocket), Morton-Thiokol (maker of booster
rockets), and they worked for NASA.
 This assembly mainly consists of tang-and-celvis joints which are sealed by
two O-Rings made of synthetic rubbers not specifically heat resistant. The
function of the O-Rings are to prevent the combustion gases of the solid
propellant from escaping.
 The O-Rings were eroded by hot gases but this was not a serious problem
as the solid rocket boosters were only for reuse initially for the first few
minutes of the flight.
 If the erosion of the O-Rings could be in a controlled manner and they
would not completely burnt through then the design of the joint would be
acceptable. However the design of the O-Rings in the shuttle was not so.
 After many postponements, the launch of Challenger was set for morning
of Jan 28, 1986. Allan J. McDonald was an engineer from Morton-Thiokol
and the director of the Solid Rocket Booster Project.

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 He was skeptic about the freezing temperature conditions forecast for that
morning, which was lower than the previous launch conditions.
 A teleconference between NASA engineers and MT engineers was
arranged by Allan.
 On many of the previous flights the rings have been found to have charred
and eroded. In freezing temperature, the rings and the putty packing are
less pliable.
 From the past data gathered, at temperature less than 65 °F the O-rings
failure was certain. But these data were not deliberated at that conference
as the launch time was fast approaching.
 The engineering managers Bob Lund and Joe Kilminster agreed that there
was a safety problem.
 Boisjoly testified and recommended that no launch should be attempted
with temperature less than 53 °F. These managers were annoyed to
postpone the launch yet again. The top management of MT was planning
for the renewal of contract with NASA, for making booster rocket.
 The managers told Bob Lund “to take-off the engineering hat and put on
your management hat”. The judgment of the engineers was not given
weight age. The inability of these engineers to substantiate that the launch
would be unsafe was taken by NASA as an approval by Rockwell to launch.
 At 11.38 a.m. the rockets along with Challenger rose up the sky. The
cameras recorded smoke coming out of one of the filed joints on the right
booster rocket. Soon there was a flame that hit the external fuel tank.
 At 76 seconds into the flight, the Challenger at a height of 10 miles was
totally engulfed in a fireball. The crew cabin fell into the ocean killing all
the seven aboard. Some of the factual issues, conceptual issues and moral
/normative issues in the space shuttle challenger incident, are highlighted
hereunder for further study.

1. Moral/Normative Issues
1. The crew had no escape mechanism. Douglas, the engineer, designed an
abort module to allow the separation of the orbiter, triggered by a field-
joint leak. But such a ‘safe exit’ was rejected as too expensive, and because
of an accompanying reduction in payload.
2. The crew were not informed of the problems existing in the field joints.
The principle of informed consent was not followed.

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3. Engineers gave warning signals on safety. But the management group
prevailed over and ignored the warning
2. Conceptual issues
1. NASA counted that the probability of failure of the craft was one in one lakh
launches. But it was expected that only the 100000th launch will fail.
2. There were 700 criticality-1 items, which included the field joints. A failure in
any one of them would have caused the tragedy. No back-up or stand-bye had
been provided for these criticality-1 components.
3. Factual issues
1. Field joints gave way in earlier flights. But the authorities felt the risk is not
high.
2. NASA has disregarded warnings about the bad weather, at the time of
launch, because they wanted to complete the project, prove their supremacy,
get the funding from Government continued and get an applaud from the
President of USA.
3. The inability of the Rockwell Engineers (manufacturer) to prove that the lift-
off was unsafe. This was interpreted by the NASA, as an approval by Rockwell
to launch.
Or
 (b) Explain valid and informed consent with examples
 VALID CONSENT” Valid consent when bringing an engineering
product to market, implies letting the customer know the following:
 (a) the knowledge about the product
 (b) risks and benefits of using the product and
 (c) all relevant information on the product, such as how to use and how
not to use (do’s and don’ts).
 (d)The consent must voluntary
 (e)The relevant factual information implies, that the engineers are
obliged to obtain and assess all the available information related to the
fulfillment of one’s moral obligations (i.e., wrong or immoral use of a
product one designs), including the intended and unintended impacts of
the product, on the society.
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 In case of Koodangulam power project as well as the Sethusamudram
Canal Project, Tamil Nadu, several citizen groups including Fishermen
Forums have responded. The Central government was able contain
many harsh apprehensions and protracted legal and political battles,
by providing all relevant information.

:
 INFORMED CONSENT Engineering experimentation is viewed as Societal
Experiment since the subject and the beneficiary are human beings. In
this respect, it is similar to medical experimentation on human beings.
 In the case of medical practice, moral and legal rights have been
recognized while planning for experimentation.
 Informed consent is practiced in medical experimentation. Such a
practice is not there in scientific laboratory experiments.
 Informed Consent has two basic elements:
 1. Knowledge: The subject should be given all the relevant information
needed to make the decision to participate.
 2. Voluntariness: Subject should take part without force, fraud, or
deception. Respect for rights of minorities to dissent and compensation
for harmful effect are assumed here.

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