2.013  Engineering Systems Design

Dear Everyone,

Today I finished posting my summary comments/responses to your ethical dilemma essays. I had had some handwritten notes on them, and only in the last few days did I make them into something readable. I tried to both respond to the dilemma you presented and offer some writing advice, as if this were an essay draft that might someday be revised (even though it was not expected in 2.013). Below are some gang comments. Best wishes to all of you! Feel free to stay in touch. ~Jane

Commonalities in the ethical dilemmas

One thing that's cool about reading a batch of essays is how it gives me a view of these interconnections among members of the class that you may not necessarily know you have. Some of you described an inner battle between doing the right thing and doing the advantageous thing. Some described being torn between the needs or rights of two people you are close to. Some observed the conflict between the individual and a group or team. A few of you described and reflected on the nature of your work, in an internship or a chosen profession. Many of you tried, or are trying to, sort out ethical dilemmas through your own analysis and internal dialog. A few of you have reached out to others for advice when you realized that the nature of the dilemma itself went beyond your sphere of knowledge or even responsibility.  Most of you look at ethical dilemmas in the same way you seem to look at scientific problems, and you subject them to penetrating analysis. Many of you scrutinize your own motives and behaviors rigorously.

As a group, you seem to honor friendship, honesty, and privacy. The rights (and accountability) of the individual is a very strong theme. You also seem to place a lot of responsibility on yourselves -- to the degree of crushing, if I may be frank -- and this may in part make you excellent people as well as thinkers.

Observations about the writing

You all write well, and yet differently. In writing an essay based on personal experience, there are two modes: observation and reflection. There is no perfect balance, but I would say that each of you prefer one mode over the other. People who like the observation mode are good at concrete detail and story-type elements, like dialog and scene description. Such writers tended to minimize the language of overt thought and reasoning. Writers who like the reflection mode are very skilled at conveying their thoughts and articulating the ethical dilemma. These same writers did not always give enough detail to evoke what actually happened.

No matter which kind of writer you are, in the future, as you are writing your grad school and fellowship essays, make sure you have some of each: observation (or description) and reflection (or analysis). Describe, and also indicate your thoughts or what you learned. There is no perfect balance, but you must do some of each. Readers want to see and sense what you've experienced, and they also want to enter your thoughts.

If this were a writing class, I would say also that everyone's conclusion could be taken to the next level in a revision. The best advice on a conclusion I've ever gotten for essays is this (from the director of Columbia University's UG writing program): "A conclusion must leave the reader with a new way to think about the question or issue." Try to avoid the neat or pat ending. Try not to use the ending to reassure yourself. Like the end of a scientific report, the conclusion does not close down the topic; instead, it leaves us with a way forward.

Suggestion for 2.014 discussion on team ethics

In preparation for the CDR, we ran out of time for a discussion of your ethical dilemmas. You could use your reflections at the beginning of 2.014 to craft a team ethics code. ASME has one: web.mit.edu/2.009/www/resources/mediaAndArticles/ASME_ethics.pdf  In a different style, an MIT friend/colleague has one for his design studio: www.goinvo.com/about/code-of-ethics/ 

In some of your ethical dilemma essays, the writers were drawing on a code that they had somehow incorporated in their lives in such a way that they had forgotten the source. It may have been the Law of the Playground; maybe it was a religious code; or maybe it was even from the Boy or Girl Scouts (I still recall my scouting pledge). In any event, the usefulness of a code is that it can guide our actions as either individual or team, and we can draw on it when confronted with a dilemma or controversy. If a team has codified its values, then members can use it to inspire their actions and decisions, and it can also be referenced in times of disagreement or conflict. It can also be an optimistic exercise to put one together; a team code of ethics says, "This is what we believe in collectively."