How professional ethics work • Hacker News Board

Re: How professional ethics work

#51

Post by hackyhacky » Fri, Jul 21, 2023, 11:47 PM UTC

k__ wrote: post #17

dan-robertson wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps you would prefer an analogy to law where there are things which are illegal and they may not precisely correspond to the things which you personally consider unethical?

I mean, I understand that laws and professional ethics are enforced. But that doesn't make any of them anything other than opinions.

> I understand that laws and professional ethics are enforced. But that doesn't make any of them anything other than opinions.

Sure, in the same sense that any law is an opinion of the body that defined it, e.g. "It is the opinion of the legislature that a person who commits the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought shall be guilty of murder."

It's an opinion, but it's an opinion with real-world consequences... just like professional ethics, according to the atricle.

Re: How professional ethics work

#52

Post by OkayPhysicist » Fri, Jul 21, 2023, 11:48 PM UTC

alphazard wrote: post #42

OkayPhysicist wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As the article clearly lays out, there's no need for profession ethical considerations to be "of divine origin". It's simply a set of rules which an entire industry can hold as superseding the whims of the flunkies with MBAs that write our paychecks.

If they are just a set of rules made up by people, why can't we call them "laws"? You know, like those other rules made up by people. The article advocates a set of laws intended to prevent certain people from writing software, and constraining how a select few do write software. It doesn't talk about how exactly those laws will be decided on. Although it does say they are "facts", it doesn't tell me about a way to o…

Ethics are likewise "a set of rules made up by people". In fact, all rules, by definition, are made up by people.

Re: How professional ethics work

#53

Post by FishInTheWater » Fri, Jul 21, 2023, 11:51 PM UTC

alphazard wrote: post #47

_fbpp wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All this under the auspices of "ethics", which as a reminder, is just an arbitrary set of rules which someone is trying to pass off as having a divine origin. They are arbitrary only in the sense that, sans a religion's God laying down ethics from on high, all ethics are arbitrary human creation. But we care about ethics all the same. Engineers care about ethics because if they do not, they kill people . Civil engine…

I wouldn't use "ethics" to describe any of the rules in place to ensure the quality of the designs or deliverables in civil/mechanical/electrical engineering. I'm glad that there are building inspectors, and safety standards for consumer electronics. I'm also glad that those rules are written clearly in terms of lbs and amp*hours and volts, and not philosophical terms. If you want rules, say you want rules, but don't…

your rules will have not objective justification, and will be based on the personal philosophies of those in charge.

The "objective" safety standards are often a lot more philosophical than you think. There is no "objective" truth for road design, it is a trade-off between how important you deem the safety of pedestrians and cyclists, versus the convenience and throughput of cars.

But also, just look at fields like journalism. Journalistic ethics exist because without them they kill people.

Not ratting out your anonymous sources isn't some technical requirement laid down in the physics of the universe, it's a philosophical belief.

And yes. Choosing to not take people's personal data is a philosophical belief. But the harm isn't philosophical.

Re: How professional ethics work

#54

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Jul 21, 2023, 11:59 PM UTC

FishInTheWater wrote: post #24

k__ wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find that's a bit too handwavy. Why would you redefine something as fundamental as a fact, that's quite different from an opinion, as "the opinion that a group enforces"? The repercussions if you violate those opinions might have factual consequences for you, but that makes the basis for all this not more factual.

For personal ethics, they are mere opinion as you get to choose what those ethics are. For professional ethics, those ethics are the opinions of the relevant professional associations and regulatory bodies. They are facts in the sense that "The Bar believes that it is unethical to lie to the court" is a fact. It is simply factually true that the legal profession holds that ethics belief. And thus the point, anyone wh…

[deleted]

Re: How professional ethics work

#55

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 12:01 AM UTC

kazinator wrote: post #48

k__ wrote: post #2

That explanation makes quite the leap from "personal ethics are an opinion" to "professional ethics are facts". Everything that comes after that seems just to explain why professional ethics are crucial, but I'm still missing where the opinions of a bunch of people suddenly become a fact.

No it doesn't; it just says that professional ethics aren't your opinon, not that they aren't opinion.

[deleted]

Re: How professional ethics work

#56

Post by janalsncm » Sat, Jul 22, 2023, 12:31 AM UTC

efficulty wrote: post #14

hackyhacky wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Professional ethics are facts in the sense that they are codified by an organization, not in the sense that they are objective and immutable. The author's running example is that of psychotherapy licensing, but the same applies to any medical license, law license, teachers, coroners, etc. The ethics of your profession are standardized across all practitioners, which means that it's hard for an unethical employer to f…

I am surprised at the narrow view the author of the article takes. They are using one particular meaning for the word professional ethics. In my country it's a much broader term, definitely not law or anything close to it, often not even a standard. It can be informal or formal, it does exist (and is treated seriously) in some unlicensed trades. For every licensed profession out there, there's got to be 10s or 100s m…

> Maybe it's cultural? I'm from central Europe and the author seems to be American

It’s not cultural, it’s a question of enforcement. The author describes professional licenses that are enforced by a board. You describe a “license” that isn’t enforced. If your legal system doesn’t enforce licenses, that’s not a cultural difference it’s a legal one.

> unlicensed professions can still have professional ethics

This is like saying you can have laws without police to enforce them. If the consequence for violating the ethical norm does not jeopardize one’s license (because there isn’t one) then you don’t have a norm, you have a suggestion.