Broome

Karl Salting EGR 402 Dolske Can Engineers Hold Public Interests Paramount? The first problem mentioned with engineering codes of ethics that require engineers to hold public welfare “paramount” is the rule that “the engineer shall hold paramount the health, safety and welfare of the public in the performance of his professional duties.” Risk-free engineering often cannot be achieved because engineering involves many trial and error applications that involve a more learn by doing process. A problem is posed for the incorporation of a public paramountcy rule into codes of ethics since any rule stipulating what one should do has no logical status if one cannot do it. It is stated in the text instead of suggesting that public paramountcy rules be repealed from engineering codes of ethics, qualifications are offered that provide consistency between such rules and the correct conception of engineering. The notion of public paramountcy is inconsistent with the new conception of engineering because people think of the application of science and engineering as the same concept. This presumption misleads into assuming that engineering judgements are scientifically sound and, thereby, be misled by his assessment of the possibility of risk being associated with engineering work. I agree that the notion of public paramountcy is inconsistent with the new conception of engineering because though science and engineering are related in some aspects, there are many differences associated with the risks involved with applications in both fields. The risks that the application of science deals are usually with lab

experiments while engineers do not have that luxury all the time. Most of the time, engineers unfortunately risk the lives of people in order to apply their new concepts.