Knowing that technologies are inherently value-laden and systemically interwoven with society, the question is how individual engineers can take up the challenge of accepting the responsibility for their work? This paper will argue that engineers have no institutional structure at the level of society that allows them to recognize, reflect upon, and actively integrate the value-laden character of their designs. Instead, engineers have to tap on the different institutional realms of market, science, and state, making their work a ‘hybrid’ activity (...) combining elements from the different institutional realms. To deal with this institutional hybridity, engineers develop routines and heuristics in their professional network, which do not allow societal values to be expressed in a satisfactory manner. To allow forms of ‘active’ responsibility, there have to be so-called ‘accountability forums’ that guide moral reflections of individual actors. The paper will subsequently look at the methodologies of value-sensitive design and constructive technology assessment and explore whether and how these methodologies allow engineers to integrate societal values into the design technological artifacts and systems. As VSD and CTA are methodologies that look at the process of technological design, whereas the focus of this paper is on the designer, they can only be used indirectly, namely as frameworks which help to identify the contours of a framework for active responsibility of engineers. (shrink)

Situated in critiques of the “moral muteness” of technical rationality, we examine concepts of ethics and the avoidance of ethical language among Australian gas pipeline engineers. We identify the domains in which they saw ethics as operating, including public safety, environmental protection, sustainability, commercial probity, and modern slavery. Particularly with respect to ethical matters that bear on public safety, in the course of design and operational activities, engineers principally advocated for action using technical language, avoiding reference to potential consequences such (...) as death or destruction of property. Within their organizations, they saw themselves as occupying a technical “line of defense”. We argue that this focus on technical language is action-oriented. Ethics tells practitioners of unacceptable outcomes, but it does not guide them in what they need to do to avoid that outcome in practice. We observed some cases where engineers had not made the connection between their role and ethics in the sense of public safety. We argue that muteness on ethical matters can obscure the nature of the risk where technical advice is being taken on by non-technical actors, and where technical actors themselves do not have a clear sense of their public safety obligations. (shrink)

Engineers must deal with risks and uncertainties as a part of their professional work and, in particular, uncertainties are inherent to engineering models. Models play a central role in engineering. Models often represent an abstract and idealized version of the mathematical properties of a target. Using models, engineers can investigate and acquire understanding of how an object or phenomenon will perform under specified conditions. This paper defines the different stages of the modeling process in engineering, classifies the various sources of (...) uncertainty that arise in each stage, and discusses the categories into which these uncertainties fall. The paper then considers the way uncertainty and modeling are approached in science and the criteria for evaluating scientific hypotheses, in order to highlight the very different criteria appropriate for the development of models and the treatment of the inherent uncertainties in engineering. Finally, the paper puts forward nine guidelines for the treatment of uncertainty in engineering modeling. (shrink)

In the last decades increasing attention is paid to the topic of responsibility in technology development and engineering. The discussion of this topic is often guided by questions related to liability and blameworthiness. Recent discussions in engineering ethics call for a reconsideration of the traditional quest for responsibility. Rather than on alleged wrongdoing and blaming, the focus should shift to more socially responsible engineering, some authors argue. The present paper aims at exploring the different approaches to responsibility in order to (...) see which one is most appropriate to apply to engineering and technology development. Using the example of the development of a new sewage water treatment technology, the paper shows how different approaches for ascribing responsibilities have different implications for engineering practice in general, and R&D or technological design in particular. It was found that there was a tension between the demands that follow from these different approaches, most notably between efficacy and fairness. Although the consequentialist approach with its efficacy criterion turned out to be most powerful, it was also shown that the fairness of responsibility ascriptions should somehow be taken into account. It is proposed to look for alternative, more procedural ways to approach the fairness of responsibility ascriptions. (shrink)

This study explores building code negotiation between straw bale advocates’ ecology-oriented values and health and safety values that underlie building codes in general by focusing on how values and ethics are articulated and embodied in practice and discourse in the two states where straw bale building standards were first initiated. The local, contingent nature of interactions, grounded in particular practices, material culture, and written and visual texts in which values were embedded, coupled with organizational factors contributed to strategies for a (...) prescriptive code in Arizona and for a performance code in New Mexico. Examination of situated practice in standards development for unconventional materials that may not fit well with practices based on conventional technologies sheds light on how norms associated with the ethics of safe building are enmeshed in existing practice where they can be taken for granted as ethical absolutes and illustrates the kinds of insights available through paying attention to ethics in practice. (shrink)

Persistent public distrust of food additives is often explained in terms of safety and health issues. The broad variety of ethical, aesthetic, and cultural concerns tends to be structurally ignored by food engineers and occasionally even by consumers themselves. The public controversy of food additives—commonly known as “E-numbers”—in the Netherlands is a case in point. Two discursive mechanisms prevent these concerns from becoming legitimate public issues: irrationalization and privatization. But these consumer concerns may not be as unreasonable as they seem, (...) and they may even turn out to be not that private. As long as ethical, aesthetic and cultural concerns are not recognized by food engineers as legitimate issues, the controversy of food additives is not likely to find closure. Moreover, this lack of recognition blocks the opportunity for meaningful dialogue and trust building between food technology developers, policy makers, citizens and consumers. (shrink)

Designing security measures often involves trade-offs between various types of objectives. Multiple stakeholders may have conflicting demands and may have different ideas on how to resolve the resulting design conflicts. This paper reports on an application of value-sensitive design. Based on argumentation theory and social values, the paper develops a structured approach for discussing design conflicts, called value-based argumentation. The application domain examined in the paper is concerned with physical safety and security issues that arise in cross-border shipments. We first (...) identify the kinds of dialogues that take place in this domain, in particular, audit dialogues to determine whether security measures comply with regulations. Based on argumentation theory we develop a formal language and a diagramming approach intended to facilitate parties in identifying, discussing and reaching agreement about security risks and corresponding mitigation measures. Trade-offs can be dealt with by making underlying values explicit. Using a stylized example, the approach was successfully taught to practitioners working with EU customs regulations. Practitioners generally found the approach helpful, in particular to bring out implicit underlying motivations. We conclude by discussing how our approach can be generalized to other kinds of dialogues involving design conflicts. (shrink)

In the era of global digitalization, interfaces have become an essential part of social and cultural life, defining the interaction between the individual and the collective. The subject of this article is to analyze the relationship between interface design and socio-ethical aspects of society. The research focuses on how interfaces reflect and shape social norms and ethical values, influencing the processes of self-identification and social integration in the context of global digitalization. Special attention is given to the mechanisms through which (...) interfaces contribute to the formation of personal and collective identity, as well as how they participate in cultivating cultural identities and ensuring accessibility and inclusivity in the digital space. The main goal of the research is to analyze the role of interfaces in the process of forming personal and collective identity, and their impact on the socio-ethical aspects of public life. The research methodology is based on an interdisciplinary approach, combining elements of social philosophy, cultural studies, and design analysis. Qualitative methods, including theoretical literature analysis and case studies, are used to investigate the influence of interfaces on social processes. The study highlights that interfaces facilitate social integration and cultural exchange, influencing socio-cultural identities and norms. Interface design, with its accessibility and inclusiveness, is crucial for social justice and ethical standards in the digital realm. It underscores the importance of ethical considerations in interface development, which significantly affects technology-society interaction and impacts social and cultural dynamics. The research advocates exploring interfaces' social and ethical implications in the digital era, suggesting new academic and practical research directions. (shrink)