Ethical issues in engineering design - 3TU.Centre for Ethics and ...

Ethical issues in engineering design
admitted that it had taken them about 5 years to figure out the regulative
framework and the relationships between elements of it; also in the bridge case,
the engineers did not know the regulative framework pertaining to health and
safety at construction sites. The engineers only knew that they had to make a
health and safety plan, but they did not know for example, whether there were
limits to the mass someone is allowed to lift repeatedly on a building site. These
examples show that it is problematic to assume that engineers will learn about
regulative frameworks in design practice. Engineering students should learn the
basics of regulative frameworks: the elements they consist of, the relationships
between these elements and the responsible organisations that formulate these
elements. This does not mean that engineering students should learn the
content of all the regulative frameworks that they might encounter in their later
professional life. If engineers have a basic knowledge of regulative frameworks
then they are capable of discerning particular details of the specific regulative
frameworks they encounter in their jobs. Without such basic knowledge
engineers will have difficulty establishing what regulations pertain to their
design processes and they cannot take up their responsibility for adapting the
frameworks. The engineers need this knowledge for the public to have
warranted trust in engineers making normal designs. In my opinion there is no
need for a separate course on regulative frameworks. The general outline of
regulative frameworks could be discussed in engineering ethics courses and in
design courses. Design assignments in normal design are apt to require
engineering students to design a product and to find the relevant regulative
frameworks and use these in the design. As I experienced in doing the casestudies,
it can be difficult and time consuming to list all the relevant EU
directives, national legislation, codes and standards pertaining to a product (see
sections 5.2, 6.3 and 8.6). EU directives are often amended and commonly refer
to other EU directives. Searching for codes is difficult because codes are not
freely available. Delft University of Technology library has to pay for access to
such codes and, while the Dutch NEN codes and standards are accessible, most
of the American, German or British codes are not. So there are difficulties to be
overcome when describing a regulative framework that is relevant for a product
design but if engineering students have had to do this once during their
education then it will be easier for them to find, use and understand regulative
frameworks in their professional lives. For example, an engineer who has
knowledge about regulative frameworks can see the importance of a design
requirement to design according to a certain code, while engineers who do not
have this knowledge may not realise that if they deviate from the code that they
carry the burden of proof concerning compliance with EU directives.
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