Abstract
During the past few decades, engineering ethics has been oriented towards protecting the public from professional misconduct by engineers and from the harmful effects of technology. This “preventive ethics” project has been accomplished primarily by means of the promulgation of negative rules. However, some aspects of engineering professionalism, such as (1) sensitivity to risk (2) awareness of the social context of technology, (3) respect for nature, and (4) commitment to the public good, cannot be adequately accounted for in terms of rules, certainly not negative rules. Virtue ethics is a more appropriate vehicle for expressing these aspects of engineering professionalism. Some of the unique features of virtue ethics are the greater place it gives for discretion and judgment and also for inner motivation and commitment. Four of the many professional virtues that are important for engineers correspond to the four aspects of engineering professionalism listed above. Finally, the importance of the humanities and social sciences in promoting these virtues suggests that these disciplines are crucial in the professional education of engineers.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Vaughan, D. (1996). The challenger launch decision. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Schaller, W. (1990). Are virtues no more than dispositions to obey moral rules? Philosophia, 20, 1–2.
Martin, M. (2000). Meaningful work. New York: Oxford University Press.
Aristotle. (1972). Nicomachean ethics (trans: Ostwald, M.). Indianapolis, IN: Library of Liberal Arts.
Hursthouse, R. (2006). Virtue ethics. In Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. Stanford, CA: Metaphysics Research Lab Center for the Study of Languages and Information, Stanford University.
Harris, C. E. Jr., Pritchard, M. S., Rabins, M. J. (2005). Engineering ethics: Concepts and cases. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Perrow, C. (1984). Normal accidents: Living with high-risk technologies. New York: Basic Books.
Kuhn, S. (1998). When worlds collide: engineering students encounter social aspects of production. Science and Engineering Ethics, 1, 457–472.
Mumford, L. (1934). Technics and civilization. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
Kulka, W. (1986). Measures and men (trans: Szreter, R.). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Heidigger, M. (1977). The question concerning technology and other essays (trans: Lovitt, W.). New York: Harper.
Borgmann, A. (1986). Technology and the character of everyday life. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Latour, B. (1987). Science in action: How to follow scientists and engineers through society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Callon, M., Law, J. (1994). Agency and the hybrid collectif. South Atlantic Quarterly, 94, 481–607.
Pinch, T. J., Bijker, W. E. (1987). The social construction of facts and artifacats: Or how the sociology of science and the sociology of technology might benefit each other. In W. E. Bijker, T. P. Hughes, & T. Pinch (Eds.), The social construction of technological systems: New directions in the sociology and history of technology. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Feenberg, A. (2003). Democratic rationalization: Technology, power, and freedom. In R. C. Schariff & V. Dusek (Eds.), Philosophy of technology. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
Winner, L. (1993). Upon opening the black box and finding it empty: Social constructivism and the philosophy of technology. Science as Culture, 16, 427–452.
Hursthouse, R. (2007). Environmental virtue ethics. In R. L. Walker & P. J. Ivanhoe (Eds.), Working virtue. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Pritchard, M. S. (1992). Good works. Professional Ethics, 1, 155–177.
Florman, S. (1996). The introspective engineer. New York: St. Martin’s Press.
Wordsworth, W. (1933). In de Selincourt, E. (Ed.), The prelude. Oxford University Press, New York.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Harris, C.E. The Good Engineer: Giving Virtue its Due in Engineering Ethics. Sci Eng Ethics 14, 153–164 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-008-9068-3
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-008-9068-3