ETHICS AND THE LAW

We should also mention the role of law in engineering ethics. The practice of engi- neering is governed by many laws on the international, federal, state, and local lev- els. Many of these laws are based on ethical principles, although many are purely of a practical, rather than a philosophical, nature.

There is also a distinction between what is legal and what is ethical. Many things that are legal could be considered unethical. For example, designing a process that releases a known toxic, but unregulated, substance into the environment is proba- bly unethical, although it is legal.

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Conversely, just because something is illegal doesn’t mean that it is unethical. For example, there might be substances that were once thought to be harmful, but have now been shown to be safe, that you wish to incorporate into a product. If the law has not caught up with the latest scientifi c fi ndings, it might be illegal to release these substances into the environment, even though there is no ethical problem in doing so.

As an engineer, you are always minimally safe if you follow the requirements of the applicable laws. But in engineering ethics, we seek to go beyond the dictates of the law. Our interest is in areas where ethical principles confl ict and there is no legal guidance for how to resolve the confl ict.

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