UNIT-II Questions:

Part – A

1. What is engineering ethics?

A Engineering ethics is the field of system of moral principles that

apply to the practice of engineering. The field examines and sets the
obligations by engineers to society, to their clients, and to the profession.

2. What do you mean by Kohlberg’s and Gilligan’s Theory?

A Carol Gilligan opines that Kohlberg’s theories are biased upon the
male thinking process. According to Gilligan, Kohlberg seemed to have
studied only privileged men and boys. She believed that women face a lot
of psychological challenges and they are not moral widgets. The
women’s point of view on moral development involves caring which
shows its effect on human relationships.

3. Explain about the Utilitarianism briefly.

A Utilitarianism is a family of consequentialist ethical theories that

promotes actions that maximize happiness and well-being for the
majority of a population.

4. What are the Moral problems that frequently arise in one’s

Profession?

A Ethical behavior is acting in ways that are consistent with how the
business world views moral principles and values. The four major factors
that can cause ethical problems in the workplace are lack of integrity,
organizational relationship problems, conflicts of interest, and misleading
advertising.

5. What is Titanic disaster? How you can relate with the real-world
problem.

A The first few years of the 20th century, when the Titanic was built, were
full of brash optimism based on remarkable advances in science and
technology. It was a time of peace, progress and endless promise. Things were
getting bigger, better and faster—the age more opulent and prosperous. “What
 could possibly stop the engines of progress or the captains of industry at their
controls?” the book’s prologue asks. The Titanic thus embodied a spirit of
invulnerability characteristic of the times. In fact, when at the beginning of her
maiden voyage one of the deck hands was asked whether the ship really was
unsinkable, he replied, “God Himself could not sink this ship!”.

6. Define Moral Autonomy.

A Moral Autonomy is the philosophy which is self-governing or self-

determining, i.e., acting independently without the influence or distortion of
others. The moral autonomy relates to the individual ideas whether right or
wrong conduct which is independent of ethical issues.

7. What is safety?

A It is the condition of being protected from or unlikely to cause danger,

risk, or injury.

8. What are the senses of Engineering Ethics?

A Engineering ethics is the field of system of moral principles that apply to

the practice of engineering. The field examines and sets the obligations by
engineers to society, to their clients, and to the profession.

9. What are the sorts of complexity and murkiness that may be involved
in moral situations?

A Types of Complexities

The difficulties in arriving to a solution, when segregated, can be divided into

the following three sections.

Vagueness

This refers to the condition where the doubt lies in whether the action refers to
good or bad. This is just like having a thought that following the rules is
mandatory. This sometimes includes the unwritten rules like being loyal,
having respect, maintaining confidentiality, etc.

Conflicting reasons
When you know about the solutions you have, the making of better choice
among the ones you have, will be the internal conflict. Fixing the priorities
depends upon the knowledge and the moral values one has. The reason why the
particular choice is being made, makes sense.

Disagreement

When there are two or more solutions and none among them is mandatory, the
final solution selected should be best suitable under existing and the most
probable conditions. The interpretation regarding the moral reasons behind the
choice and analysis should be made keeping in mind whether this is the better
or the worse solution in the probable aspects.

10.What are the steps confronting moral dilemmas?

A Steps in Facing Moral Dilemmas

Whenever a person is faced with a moral dilemma, the issue is to be solved with
a stepwise approach as this will generate a better output. The steps include the
following −

Identification

The step of identification involves the following −

• The issue has to be thoroughly understood.

• The duties and the responsibilities of the persons involved are to be clearly
known.

• The moral factors related to the issue are to be understood.

• The conflicting responsibilities, the competing rights and the clashing ideas
involved are to be identified.

11.What are the types of theories about morality?

A Six principal ethical philosophies can and should be used to analyze a

situation. They are the categorical imperative, utilitarianism, hedonism, the
golden mean, the golden rule, and the veil of ignorance. These are the principle
theories that have survived from 2500 years of Western moral philosophy.
12.What are the drawbacks of utilitarianism?

A Utilitarianism seeks to predict the consequences of an action, which is

impossible. Utilitarianism fails to identify that we have certain duties or
obligations to others. Happiness is subjective. Whereas someone may find
happiness in cake, another may find it in murder.

14.What are the drawbacks of Rights ethics?

A The disadvantages claimed for ethical business include: Higher costs – e.g.
sourcing from Fairtrade suppliers rather than lowest price. Higher overheads –
e.g. training & communication of ethical policy. A danger of building up false
expectations.

15.What is a Disaster?

A It is a sudden accident or a natural catastrophe that causes great damage or

loss of life.

16.What is the importance of Risk analysis?

A Risk Analysis is a proven way of identifying and assessing factors that

could negatively affect the success of a business or project. It allows you to
examine the risks that you or your organization face, and helps you decide
whether or not to move forward with a decision.

17.What are the factors of safety and risk?

A Safety is the freedom from risk. If you want to increase safety, you must
first consider risk. Risk is the “probability or threat of damage, injury, liability
or loss, or any other negative occurrence that is caused by external or internal
vulnerabilities, and that may be avoided by preemptive action” (Business
Dictionary). Note that risk can be avoided by preemptive action. Herein lies the
message we want to make sure all drivers understand. Behavior modification
can increase safety. This is due to the fact that safety and risk have an inverse
relationship. When one goes up, the other goes down. To increase safety, you
need to decrease risk.

18.What are the facts that affect Risk acceptability?

A
• Familiar vs Unfamiliar technology. Familiarity with a given technology or a
situation helps reduce the level of the perceived risk

• Personal control vs Lack of control over a situation

• Voluntary vs Involuntary exposure

• Dreaded vs Not-dreaded outcomes

• Direct vs Indirect benefits

• Fair vs Unfair exposure

19.What is difference between responsibility and accountability?

A Accountability and responsibility can’t be lumped into the same bucket.

Although these two terms have some similarities, a few distinct characteristics
separate them in the workplace.

Responsibility can be shared. You can work with a team of people to divide
responsibilities. On the other hand, accountability is something that can be
specific to an individual depending on their skill set, role, or strengths.

20.Define Environmental ethics?

A Environmental ethics is the part of environmental philosophy which

considers extending the traditional boundaries of ethics from solely including
humans to including the non-human world. ... There are many ethical decisions
that human beings make with respect to the environment.

PART-B:

1. Explain in detail about Kohlberg’s and Gilligan’s Theory.

Kohlberg’s theory:
 Lawrence Kohlberg was a professor at Harvard University during the
early 1970s and was famous for his works on developmental psychology. He
conducted many studies at Harvard’s Center for Moral Development and
proposed a theory on moral development which is popularly known
as Kohlberg’s theory.
His theory of moral development was dependent on the thinking of the Swiss
psychologist Jean Piaget and the American philosopher John Dewey. He was
also inspired by James Mark Baldwin. These men had emphasized that human
beings develop philosophically and psychologically in a progressive fashion.
Kohlberg proposed that people progress in moral reasoning based on their
ethical behavior. He postulated this theory based on the thinking of younger
children throughout their growing period as adults. He conveyed that younger
children make judgment based on the consequences that might occur, and the
older children make judgment based on their intuitions.
He believed that there are six stages of moral development which are further
classified into three levels. The following illustration shows the different
levels.

The process being discussed here is about the judgment made by

the thinker about the protagonist in a given situation. The steps of the
thinking process show the moral development of the thinker.
Pre-conventional Level
This can be understood as the first level of moral thinking, which is generally
found at Elementary school level. The thinker at this stage tends to think and
behave based on the direct consequences that might occur. There are two sub-
stages in this.

Conventional Level
This can be understood as the second level of moral thinking, which is
generally found at the primary and high school level. The thinker at this stage
tends to think and behave based on the want to please others. There are two
sub-stages in this.
Post-Conventional Level
This can be understood as the third level of Moral thinking, which is generally
found after the high school level. The thinker at this stage tends to think and
behave based on a sense of justice. There are two sub-stages in this.
 Gilligan’s Theory:
Carol Gilligan opines that Kohlberg’s theories are biased upon
the male thinking process. According to Gilligan, Kohlberg seemed to have
studied only privileged men and boys. She believed that women face a lot of
psychological challenges and they are not moral widgets. The women’s point
of view on moral development involves caring which shows its effect on
human relationships.
Hence, she proposed a theory which has the same three stages of Kohlberg but
with different stages of moral development. Let us understand the stages in
detail.

Though the names of the stages are the same, the stages differ in this method.
The moral development in Gilligan’s theory are based on pro-social behaviors
such as Altruism, caring and helping and the traits such as honesty, fairness
and respect.
Pre-conventional Level
• A person in this stage cares for oneself to ensure survival.
• Though the person’s attitude is selfish, this is the transition phase, where the
person finds the connection between oneself and others.
 Conventional Level
• In this stage, the person feels responsible and shows care towards other
people.
• Carol Gilligan believes that this moral thinking can be identified in the role of
a mother and a wife. This sometimes leads to the ignorance of the self.
Post-conventional Level
• This is the stage, where the principle of care for self as well as others, is
accepted.
• However, a section of people may never reach this level.
According to the Carol Gilligan’s theory of moral development, changes occur
due to the change of self rather than the critical thinking. It was stated that
the post-conventional level of Kohlberg is not attained by women. But Carol
Gilligan researched and found that the post-conventional level of thinking is
not being easy for women to go through because they care for the
relationships.

2. Explain in detail about Heinz’s Dilemma

Lawrence Kohlberg quoted an example for his Moral development theory.
This example is popularly called the Heinz’s Dilemma.

Story of Heinz
A story of a middle-aged ordinary middle-class man, called Heinz is
considered as an example. Heinz is an ordinary man having a wife. His wife
suffers from a dreadful disease. Doctors believe that a special drug which
was invented recently and is available at the BIG pharma store, can only save
his wife.
When Heinz went to buy the drug, the drug-seller costed it around $2,000
dollars, while the actual manufacturing cost of the drug is $20 dollars. Heinz
borrowed the money from friends and lenders and could finally collect only
$1,000 dollars. Though Heinz pleaded a lot, the greedy drug-seller refused to
sell the drug at low cost.
Now, Heinz had no other option but to steal the drug from the shop to save
the life of his wife. Is this a better option to do? What is your judgment?
 Now, to solve this Heinz’s dilemma, a thinker has the following options.

Options for the Thinker

In this section, we will discuss the options for the Thinker.
• Heinz should not steal the drug because it is the disobedience of law.
• Heinz can steal the drug but should be punished by the law.
Heinz can steal the drug and no law should punish him.
The answer which you choose indicates your moral development. Each
answer has its consequences and explanation. Let us go through the answers.
Heinz should not steal the drug because it is the disobedience of law.
This decision makes it impossible for Heinz to save his wife. His wife dies
and the rich drug-seller becomes richer. Though the law was obeyed, no
moral justice was done. This is a pre-conventional level of moral thinking.
Heinz can steal the drug but should be punished by the law.
This decision helps Heinz save his wife, but Heinz will be kept in prison.
Though Heinz took a moral decision, he had to undergo the punishment. This
is a Conventional level of moral thinking.
Heinz can steal the drug and no law should punish him.
This decision lets Heinz save his wife and both of them can live happily. This
thinking is based on the thought that the rigidity in law should be rejected and
justice should be done on moral grounds. This is a post-conventional level of
moral thinking.

3. Discuss about Moral integrity, social and professional behavior.

INTEGRITY:

Integrity is the practice of being honest and showing a consistent and

uncompromising adherence to strong moral and ethical principles and
values. In ethics, integrity is regarded as the honesty and
truthfulness or accuracy of one's actions. Integrity can stand in opposition
to hypocrisy, in that judging with the standards of integrity involves regarding
internal consistency as a virtue and suggests that parties holding within
themselves apparently conflicting values should account for the discrepancy
or alter their beliefs. In this context, integrity is the inner sense of "wholeness"
deriving from qualities such as honesty and consistency of character. As such,
one may judge that others "have integrity" to the extent that they act according
to the values, beliefs and principles they claim to hold.

SOCIAL BEHAVIOR:

Social behavior is behavior among two or more organisms within the

same species and encompasses any behavior in which one member affects the
other. This is due to an interaction among those members. Social behavior can
be seen as similar to an exchange of goods, with the expectation that when
you give, you will receive the same. This behavior can be affected by both the
qualities of the individual and the environmental (situational) factors.
Therefore, social behavior arises as a result of an interaction between the
two—the organism and its environment. This means that, in regard to humans,
social behavior can be determined by both the individual characteristics of the
person, and the situation they are in.

A major aspect of social behavior is communication, which is the

basis for survival and reproduction. Social behavior is said to be determined
by two different processes, that can either work together or oppose one
another. The dual-systems model of reflective and impulsive determinants of
social behavior came out of the realization that behavior cannot just be
determined by one single factor. Instead, behavior can arise by those
consciously behaving (where there is an awareness and intent), or by pure
impulse. These factors that determine behavior can work in different
situations and moments and can even oppose one another. While at times one
can behave with a specific goal in mind, other times they can behave without
rational control, and driven by impulse instead.

PROFESSIONAL BEHAVIOR:

Professional behavior is a form of etiquette in the workplace that is

linked primarily to respectful and courteous conduct. Many organizations will
have a formal code of professional conduct in place, but many do not. Believe
it or not, professionalism and ethical behavior can benefit your career and
improve your chances of future success.
Being conscious of how you treat co-workers and clients and ensuring a
positive workplace attitude can help you to improve your productivity and
effectiveness in the workplace. In general, professional behavior comes down
to ethics and dedication. Although possessing the necessary skills to do your
job effectively is essential, understanding what constitutes professional
behavior will help you develop your own high standard of work habits that
could contribute to future career success.

4. List and Explain Moral issues encountered by professional engineers during

their day to-day operations.

“Moral issue is a working definition of an issue of moral concern is presented

as any issue with the potential to help or harm anyone, including oneself.”

Types of Moral Issues

There are mainly two types of Moral issues that we mostly come across while
keeping the ethical aspects in mind to respond. They are −
Micro-ethics
This approach stresses more on the problems that occur on a daily basis in the
field of engineering and its practice by engineers.
Macro-ethics
This approach deals with social problems which are unknown. However,
these problems may unexpectedly face the heat at both regional and national
levels.
Let us now understand a few examples related to moral issues.
Example 1
After a recent collapse of a structure in which many people died, an Engineer
came to know about a bridge which is marginally safe. He informed his
superior who asked him to stay calm and not to discuss with anyone, while
waiting for the next year budget sessions to get some financial help for the
repair required. What should the engineer do?
Example 2
What should an Engineer who observes his colleague copying confidential
information unauthorized, do immediately? If he chooses to stop his friend,
what if this gets repeated without his notice? If he chooses to report the
management, what if his friend loses the job? Which is morally correct?
Example 3
An engineer who develops a proto-type for the project, loses it due to a
mishap exactly the day before the submission. Is it morally correct to
outsource the prototype of the project and reduce the risks of job insecurity?
What should he do?
5. Describe about Moral problems that frequently arise in one’s profession.

Ethical problems occur because companies have a lack of integrity,

organizational relationship problems, conflicts of interest, and misleading
advertising.

Ethical Problems
Ethical challenges occur within every business organization. In this lesson, we
will discuss the reasons why ethical problems happen in business and what
companies can do to develop a positive ethical behavior.
Ethical behavior is acting in ways that are consistent with how the business
world views moral principles and values. The four major factors that can
cause ethical problems in the workplace are lack of integrity, organizational
relationship problems, conflicts of interest, and misleading advertising.
Trendon is a large financial investment company on Wall Street. They have
just been fined billions of dollars by the government, and most of their top
executives have been sentenced to federal prison.
Why? They violated each of the four areas that can cause immense ethical
problems. Here is how they accomplished the task.

Lack of Integrity
Trendon's executives were lacking integrity in how they operated their
business. The employees at Trendon did not show any fairness or honesty in
their dealings. In fact, most of their financial deals were formed through
intimidation, harassment, or lies.
Trendon would hold meetings to teach their executives how to withhold
certain data or misrepresent investments in order to acquire clients. This type
of behavior can result in loss of clients, federal fines, and prison time. In order
to prevent this ethical problem from occurring, Trendon needed to
establish ethical codes of conduct that provide guidelines on how their
employees should act at work.
The atmosphere of any company should reflect a belief in treating customers
with the highest respect and honesty. Many companies offer a 24-hour hotline
that customers and employees can use to report any unethical behavior.
Trendon should have had something like this, which may have stopped them
from getting into trouble.
Another recent integrity issue facing Trendon was how they used customer
private information via the Internet to attain other information about their
customers. New laws are being passed to protect consumer's personal and
financial information from being shared with other companies or stolen by
hackers.
6. Take a case study and discuss about the Indian Space Shuttle.

The loss of the space shuttle Challenger, which was destroyed 73 seconds in
its flight, killing all onboard. To mark the anniversary, IEEE Spectrum is
republishing this seminal article which first appeared in June 1989 as part of a
special report on risk.

ASA started experimenting with this program in response to the Jan. 28,
1986, Challenger accident that killed seven astronauts. The program’s goals
are to establish a policy on risk management and to conduct risk assessments
independent of normal engineering analyses. But success is slow because of
past official policy that favored “engineering judgment” over “probability
numbers,” resulting in NASA’s failure to collect the type of statistical test and
flight data useful for quantitative risk assessment.

This Catch 22–the agency lacks appropriate statistical data because it did not
believe in the technique requiring the data, so it did not gather the relevant
data–is one example of how an organization’s underlying culture and explicit
policy can affect the overall reliability of the projects it undertakes.

NASA documents show that the airline vision also applied to risk. For
example, in the 1969 NASA Space Shuttle Task Group Report, the authors
wrote: “It is desirable that the vehicle configuration provide for
crew/passenger safety in a manner and to the degree as provided in present
day commercial jet aircraft.”

Statistically an airliner is the least risky form of transportation, which implies

high reliability. And in the early 1970s, when President Richard M. Nixon,
Congress, and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) were all
skeptical of the shuttle, proving high reliability was crucial to the program’s
continued funding.

OMB even directed NASA to hire an outside contractor to do an economic

analysis of how the shuttle compared with other launch systems for cost-
effectiveness, observed John M. Logsdon, director of the graduate program in
science, technology, and public policy at George Washington University in
Washington, D.C.

At the start of the space shuttle’s design, the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration defined risk as “the chance (qualitative) of loss of personnel
capability, toss of system, or damage to or loss of equipment or property.”
NASA accordingly relied on several techniques for determining reliability and
potential design problems, concluded the U.S. National Research Council’s
Committee on Shuttle Criticality Review and Hazard Analysis Audit in its
January 1988 report Post-Challenger Evaluation of Space Shuttle Risk
Assessment and Management. But, the report noted, the analyses did “not
address the relative probabilities of a particular hazardous condition arising
from failure modes, human errors, or external situations,” so did not measure
risk.
A failure modes and effects analysis (FMEA) was the heart of NASA’s effort
to ensure reliability, the NRC report noted. An FMEA, carried out by the
contractor building each shuttle element or subsystem, was performed on all
flight hardware and on ground support equipment that interfaced with flight
hard ware. Its chief purpose was to identify hardware critical to the
performance and safety of the mission.
Items that did not meet certain design, reliability and safety requirements
specified by NASA’s top management and whose failure could threaten the
toss of crew, vehicle, or mission, made up a critical item list (CIL).

The NAC committee concluded that “the isolation of the hazard analysis
within NASA’s risk assessment and management process to date can be seen
as reflecting the past weakness of the entire safety organization.

7. Discuss about Responsibility and accountability issues while dealing with

public.

RESPONSIBILITY:

Responsibility is an ethical concept that refers to the fact that individuals and
groups have morally based obligations and duties to others and to larger
ethical and moral codes, standards and traditions.

Responsibility in a business context refers to “a sphere of duty or obligation

assigned to a person by the nature of that person’s position, function or
work.”

The roles taken on by decision-makers imply a responsibility to perform

certain functions associated with those roles. To be more specific,
responsibility refers to more than just the primary function of a role; it refers
to the multiple facets of that function, which includes both processes and
outcomes, and the consequences of the acts performed as part of that set of
obligations. A responsible actor may be seen as one whose job involves a
predetermined set of obligations that need to be met in order for the job to be
accomplished.

According to Aristotle, moral responsibility was viewed as originating with

the moral agent as decision-maker, and grew out of an ability to reason, an
awareness of action and consequences, and a willingness to act free from
external compulsion.
ACCOUNTABILITY:
Accountability is the readiness or preparedness to give an explanation or
justification to stakeholders for one’s judgements, intentions and actions.
“It is a readiness to have one’s actions judged by others and, where
appropriate, accept responsibility for errors, misjudgments and negligence
and recognition for competence, conscientiousness, excellence and wisdom.”
While responsibility is defined as a bundle of obligations associated with a
role, accountability could be defined as “blaming or crediting someone for an
action”—normally associated with a recognized responsibility. The
accountable actor is “held to external oversight, regulation, and mechanisms
of punishment aimed to externally motivate responsive adjustment in order to
maintain adherence with appropriate moral standards of action.”

In the professional context, accountability is about answering to clients,

colleagues and other relevant professionals. The demand to give an account
of one’s judgments, acts and omissions arises from the nature of the
professional-client and the professional-professional relationships. For
communication professionals, accountability has more specific implications.
Recent years have seen more practical and concrete interpretation of the
concept of accountability by communication specialists. It is associated with
responsiveness to the views of all stakeholders, which includes a willingness
to explain, defend, and justify actions.

8. How would you summarize Titanic disaster?

On the morning of April 15, 1912, the sinking of the Titanic the
previous night shocked the world. The year had dawned bright with promise
and the maiden voyage of the Titanic was a symbol of the advance’s
mankind had made in the last few years.
The ship was considered to have been so well constructed it was believed
she could sustain any amount of damage and still remain afloat. Late on the
night of April 14, 1912, the sinking of the Titanic proved this idea wrong in
a horribly tragic way.
The causes of Titanic to sink have been the subject of much study and
debate. Obviously, the instigating factor was the collision with the iceberg;
however, the question of 'how did it sink' is frequently the center of most
questions regarding the Titanic.

In 1912 the sinking of the Titanic began late on the night of April 14th.
Information on the sinking Titanic indicates that the ship approached a
massive iceberg, and although efforts were made to steer clear of the large
frozen mass, all efforts were to no avail. Sadly, further records of the Titanic
accident history indicate that the Titanic disaster may very well have been
able to have been completely avoided had officers on ship paid heed to
reports received earlier regarding the frozen waters they were approaching.
Even though crew members were desperately trying to turn the ship in
the other direction, when the ship collided with the berg a massive rip was
torn parallel across the ship's bulk. The Titanic sinking began almost
immediately, as the ship began to take on water.

Surprisingly, many of the passengers remained unaware of this fact. Some

passengers reported hearing and feeling a strange quivering in the ship;
however, they did not attribute this to any potential problem and went on
about their business.

Others had seen the iceberg has it passed their window and hurriedly donned
dressing gowns and robes, anxious to discover whether or not they had truly
hit the berg. At first, passengers were assured that there would only be a
slight delay and were given no indication of the true severity of the situation.

Passengers located at strategic points in the ship already knew the

devastating truth however: the Titanic was sinking and sinking fast. An SOS
was sent out to neighboring ships. The Carpathia picked up the ship's
distress call and radioed back to let the ship's crew know they were on their
way. It would be too late, however. By the time the Carpathia arrived, all
that remained of the Titanic was a handful of lifeboats filled with shocked
survivors.

Since the ship sank to her watery grave, almost one hundred years ago, a
number of theories have been put forth to explain how in the year of 1912
the sinking of the Titanic could have occurred. Some theories suggest that
had the ship's crew not attempted to turn the ship in the opposite direction of
the iceberg and instead took the blow head-on, the collision would not have
resulted in such catastrophic disaster.
Where did the Titanic sink? The Titanic sank somewhere in the Atlantic
Ocean, south of Newfoundland, Canada. Here's a map with the exact
location of the Titanic's resting place. Use the + and - buttons to zoom, the
arrows to move.
Consequently, neighboring ships in the area had reported earlier in the
evening that the waters ahead contained numerous masses of solid ice and
that approaching ships should proceed with caution. The Titanic, however,
thought to be unsinkable, plowed full speed ahead. This proved to be a fatal
mistake and is certainly one of the factors that led to the disaster.