in the United States, engineering ethics instruc-
tion is frequently offered in elective philosophy
=courses which focus on case studies of major
engineering disasters such as the Space Shuttle
Challenger, Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bho-
pal, and the Three-Mile Island nuclear power
plant. Although such case studies are important,
the focus on dramatic events of news-headline
proportion may lead students to think that ethical
issues arise only rarely in professional life. Moreo-
ver, since these courses are often taught by phi-
losophy instructors, students may conclude that
ethics is an optional specialized field, foreign to
their interests, especially if the ethics lessons are
not reinforced in technical courses. In response to
these concerns, Davis [ 11 recommends that
“stand-alone” ethics courses be supplemented by
ethics instruction integrated into engineering
courses and taught by engineering professors.
Another issue is the narrow scope of ethical
concerns typically addressed in engineering eth-
ics courses. The social responsibility of projects
such as the Space Shuttle is seldom questioned
within the framework of discussions involving
the integrity of O-ring seals. Winner 121 is criti-
cal of ethics instruction that fails to call into
question the context of engineering work. He
suggests that ethics education ought to include
an “exploration of the question of vocation,
one’s calling in a moral sense,” and that this be
“included in difficult technical courses, not just
humanities electives set aside in a separate, eas-
ily forgotten corner of the curriculum.”may print, download, or email articles for individual use.