Fantastic precedent. When your boss tells you to do something unethical and possibly illegal, you now have a great reason to say no.
And one would think the Germans would have learned that lesson.
VW engineer sentenced to 40-month prison term in diesel case
21–30 of 134 posts
Re: VW engineer sentenced to 40-month prison term in diesel case
#22Good. For context, air pollution kills 200,000 in the US and 40,000 in UK every year. You have to consider ethics in your work as an Engineer. Refusing an unethical task is your moral duty.
The numbers really vary by source, and the vast majority who do die from air pollution were already on deaths door and it can be blamed for taking a few days to months at most.
Re: VW engineer sentenced to 40-month prison term in diesel case
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is it a good enough reason though? That would depend on the likelihood of losing your job by refusing, the ease of finding a different job, the seriousness of the unethical request, and the likelihood of getting caught.
Extracting the maximum value from their employees is a core competence of most automotive companies. With no union to protect them, naive low ranking software engineers are exceedingly vulnerable to aggression and abuse from their line manager, It is hardly surprising that the resulting culture is one which rewards dishonesty and fraud above all else.
In Germany the automotive industry is basically the last bastion of high union membership.
Re: VW engineer sentenced to 40-month prison term in diesel case
#24Good. For context, air pollution kills 200,000 in the US and 40,000 in UK every year. You have to consider ethics in your work as an Engineer. Refusing an unethical task is your moral duty.
40,000 people are dying from air pollution in the U.K.? Citation really needed.
A quick Google search shows these as the fist two results:
* http://www.bbc.com/news/health-35629034
* https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2017/03/06/air-pollution-ca...
Re: VW engineer sentenced to 40-month prison term in diesel case
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
Extracting the maximum value from their employees is a core competence of most automotive companies. With no union to protect them, naive low ranking software engineers are exceedingly vulnerable to aggression and abuse from their line manager, It is hardly surprising that the resulting culture is one which rewards dishonesty and fraud above all else.
In Germany the automotive industry is basically the last bastion of high union membership.
Not if you are working for a German automotive company in the UK ...
Re: VW engineer sentenced to 40-month prison term in diesel case
#26And all this, while the VW share just reached new record highs...
Re: VW engineer sentenced to 40-month prison term in diesel case
#27Good. For context, air pollution kills 200,000 in the US and 40,000 in UK every year. You have to consider ethics in your work as an Engineer. Refusing an unethical task is your moral duty.
>You have to consider ethics in your work as an Engineer. Refusing an unethical task is your moral duty. It's easy to say, but ethics isn´t always so black and white. What about yourself. Do you drive a car? Then you are guilty of contributing to the air pollution that kills 200,000 in the US ever year, and you also endanger others' life by participating in traffic and making it more dangerous. You are also contribut…
The context was pretty clear here. This particular engineer got asked to do something he knew was unethical and he did it anyway. That is pretty black on white to me.
Consumer behaviour is an entirely different thing.
Re: VW engineer sentenced to 40-month prison term in diesel case
#28Let this be a lesson to all that refusing unethical Management decisions might get you fired but at least you won't go to prison.
Re: VW engineer sentenced to 40-month prison term in diesel case
#29Good. For context, air pollution kills 200,000 in the US and 40,000 in UK every year. You have to consider ethics in your work as an Engineer. Refusing an unethical task is your moral duty.
>You have to consider ethics in your work as an Engineer. Refusing an unethical task is your moral duty. It's easy to say, but ethics isn´t always so black and white. What about yourself. Do you drive a car? Then you are guilty of contributing to the air pollution that kills 200,000 in the US ever year, and you also endanger others' life by participating in traffic and making it more dangerous. You are also contribut…
I think there is a major difference in butterfly effect scenarios and intentionally misleading and commiting fraud. It's why mens rea is part of the equation for judgement. Intent means a lot; if it weren't, we wouldn't differentiate between manslaughter and murder.
The VW engineers intentionally designed a system meant to defraud tests and avoid regulations, misleading consumers and regulators about the product. This was an order from on high, I dont doubt, but it's still an intentiknal decision. I do this knowing the direct result is fraud and pollution. My intent is to commit fraud, and I do not care about the side effect of pollution. And it's not really possible to not know what the intent of such a system is.
I think we do need to be aware of the impact of our decisions and our choices, and we cannot just dismiss unethical choices on the basis of "everything could be bad.". That's just eschewing responsibility.
Re: VW engineer sentenced to 40-month prison term in diesel case
#30Good. For context, air pollution kills 200,000 in the US and 40,000 in UK every year. You have to consider ethics in your work as an Engineer. Refusing an unethical task is your moral duty.
>You have to consider ethics in your work as an Engineer. Refusing an unethical task is your moral duty. It's easy to say, but ethics isn´t always so black and white. What about yourself. Do you drive a car? Then you are guilty of contributing to the air pollution that kills 200,000 in the US ever year, and you also endanger others' life by participating in traffic and making it more dangerous. You are also contribut…
I find that the rule "you are always responsible for bad outcomes in proportion to your ability to prevent them" to be a fairly straightforward principle.
And from that rule we are of course all guilty but some are more guilty than others. I assume I'm kind of stating obvious stuff though?