Being a professional engineer requires the individual to adhere and respect codes of ethics to protect the health and safety of not only their product, but the general public, environment, and even their employer in many instances. Sourour developed and sought approval from his superiors on a program that manipulated the results to always choose the drug from the client’s website. When engineers are on assignment for a project, there should always be some level of risk analysis that takes place to ensure the product they are creating doesn’t harm the public, even indirectly. As the ethics of care show, the interdependent relationship of engineers and the public requires collaboration, support, and utilization from the public while engineers provide technological and infrastructural advancement. Engineers must also provide strict regulations and the implementation of ethics to protect the health and safety of the public. In this case analysis I will argue that the ethics of care shows that the code was morally problematic because there was not a sufficient amount of risk analysis performed on the product to understand possible indirect effects. Sourour should have performed a risk analysis assessment to realize the manipulation of results earlier rather than later because ethics of care requires engineers to recognize the interdependency and, thus, provide safety and regulations to protect the public and prevent misuse of the product.
The works of Armstrong describe the importance of confidentiality for professionals in different areas of professionalism including the engineering field. Overall, confidentiality is a prima facie rule, “but not considered to be an obligation.” In order to break the prima facie principal of confidentiality, the author presents a number of requirements that need to be met. This requires the infringement of confidentiality to be performed after critical assessment and analysis to determine the impact of the infringement and how to minimize the effects. The representation of positive and negative duties defines potential reasonings to breach confidentiality and baseline obligations that define the profession respectively. Positive duties require initiative from the professional to bring more good to society and is considered and obligation if the situation for a positive duty arises. To determine the severity of the situation and how necessary it may be to break the rule of confidentiality, Armstrong references a table that compares the probability of harm and the magnitude of harm that can come from the situation. The magnitude of harm is in reference to the magnitude of consequences increasing for the positive duty and decreasing for the negative duty. To determine the level of obligation a positive duty has, a relation must be made in the probability of harm that may occur if the duty is not fulfilled. If the engineer happens to come across a situation where he/she has noticed a potentially harmful situation and gotten no response from a direct superior, the act of whistle blowing may help resolve their solution. Whistle blowing can be a tricky process that requires, at the very least, careful planning, solid evidence, and the exhaustion of all other possible solutions.
Sourour explains that in the process of developing the program for the company, he did not put much thought into the requirements given to him after finishing all but the portion of the quiz that produces the results for the end-user. Proper risk analysis of the required tasks would have revealed the blatant manipulation of the information being provided into the quiz. By guiding all answers towards the client’s pharmaceutical drug, the client will be misleading the end user into thinking that specific drug is right for them even if the end user doesn’t meet the correct criteria. This, at the very least, should have been seen by the time the product was ready to be tested. It is clear that his direct superior did not provide any resistance once she was told the requirements that stated to manipulate the results of the quiz.
The ethics of care shows how one can be partial to individuals or groups of people beyond their individual relationships. Engineers, because of the often-close proximity the public interacts with their products, should be partial in such a way that they favor the safety and well-being of the general public before favoring the profits of their employer. With proper risk analysis of the requirements for the online quiz, Sourour should have noticed the deceit the client was portraying to the end-user. It is very clear that the client company did not respect the health and safety of the public more than their profits. However, this situation could have been avoided with the proper execution of whistle blowing. After noticing no resistance with his direct superior on the results of the quiz, Sourour should have gone to the next ranking superior and expressed his concerns. Armstrong states that an engineer should move up the ladder of superiors after receiving no result from a direct superior. By doing this, Sourour would be partial to the safety and well-being of the public rather than the profits coming from the contract with the client.
The three codes of ethics presented all discussed, at varying degrees, the general guidelines in which an engineer should follow to be considered an ethical professional. A large responsibility of an engineer is to attempt to minimize negative consequences of modern computer systems and also prevent threats to public health and safety. The code references that engineers should try and ensure the proper use of their product and prevent any harm to the safety and wellbeing of the public. Section 1.2 of the ACM code of ethics focuses specifically on the avoidance of harm on others. This includes not only the public, but the employer, users of the product, and employees. To prevent the indirect harm of the environment, users, or the general public, the code of ethics mentions to perform an assessment of social consequences. This assessment is used calculate the potential and magnitude of harm that could arise from the product. The code also mentions that any system feature that is misused or misrepresented by direct supervisors, coworkers, and end-users, the professional behind the product is “responsible for any resulting injury.” This paragraph can be paired with section 2.5 that focuses more specifically on performing an in-depth and thorough evaluation of all possible risks and potential impacts on the environment, company/client, and the general public. This section mentions the importance of mentioning any conflicts of interest, potential hazards, or anything the professional feels may be worth mentioning. The section also mention that the professional should never refuse an assignment, but to instead let the client know of all risks and provide recommendations for a more ethical solution if necessary. This prevents the professional from having an obligation to implement or produce an unethical product and allows them to work with the client to build a product that still fits within the requirements and resolves the concerns of the professional.
Sourour specifically stated in the article that he had not put much thought behind the product he was implementing. The requirements given to him were followed without proper and thorough risk analysis to determine possible risks of the end-users, general public, or the company. Sourour may have viewed the implementation of the product as a “well-intended action” as he was doing the job required of him and providing the client with the product they were expecting. However, any harm that comes from a “well-intended action” is still considered to be the responsibility of the person who created the product. It is then the responsibility of the professional to mitigate or reduce the unfavorable consequences. After finding out about the teenager who had taken her own life, Sourour did not take any action to mitigate the indirect harm he had caused. By not taking any additional action to prevent or mitigate the potential harm done to the end-users or general public, Sourour’s actions do not take into account the safety and well-being of the public.
As stated before, the ethics of care is way of being partial and recognizing the interdependent relationship of a personal relationship. However, this ethical theory can be applied to larger groups of individuals that aren’t considered to be personal relationships. Engineers, as a profession, provide innovations and products for use by anyone inside or outside their profession. Due to the nature of providing new products for the public, the ACM, IEEE, and NSPE codes of ethics provide detailed guidelines to protect the safety and wellbeing of the public. These guidelines mark an interdependency between engineers and the public, but mostly the end-users of the product. Sourour, as an engineer and stated in the codes, has the obligation to protect the safety and wellbeing of the public. This would mean providing thorough risk analysis of the product and requirements before starting to confirm there aren’t any that have the potential to harm the end-users, public, or employer/client. For Sourour to be more ethical in this situation, he should have provided a deep risk analysis of the product and requirements givcn to him. Within the risk analysis he would have seen the manipulation of the results being performed by the requirements of the client. By not performing this risk analysis, Sourour fails to recognize the interdependent relationship he, as an engineer, has with the public.
The product created by Sourour manipulated the results of an online medication quiz to show the client’s pharmaceutical drug no matter what the results of the quiz entailed. It was stated by Sourour that he had “not put too much thought” into the implementation of the product and did not perform the proper risk analysis to determine the potential risks and hazards associated with this product. By performing the proper risk analysis, Sourour would have taken notice of the manipulation of the results and expressed concerns regarding the requirements. As an engineer, he must also provide alternatives that align with his previous risk analysis to protect the safety and wellbeing of the public. The argument could be made that he was serving as an agent to the client and respecting the requirements brought forward to him. Although this claim is true, the engineer also has an obligation to bring up potential risks that may affect the health and wellbeing of the public. Overall, Sourour could have acted more ethically and recognize the interdependent relationship between his profession and the public by providing a thorough risk analysis of the probability of harm towards the public and providing adequate alternatives that still satisfy the client.