On the Nature of Our Craft -- As a supplement to my Manifesto
The widening of inequality may be tolerated only when it benefits the least-advantaged among us. In this context, it is the engineer who often serves as the very wellspring of value creation that fuels such disparity. It follows, then, that if an engineer seeks to secure their position by concealing knowledge or rendering their skills entirely person-dependent, they commit a most grievous transgression. We are but stewards, entrusted by the public with the authority to exercise our engineering craft. To make our work inscrutable is to betray that trust, for it is the public that ultimately suffers when indispensable technology is made a private fortress.
Herein lies a lesson from the guilds of old. A guild existed to fulfil the commissions of a client, not to resolve the hardships of the common person. The vulnerable, least of all, found no place within its walls. We, however, are not mere artisans; we are engineers. Our practice is the product of a social contract, predicated upon a sworn oath to serve the public welfare. The exercise of our power is permitted only under this oath, and it is subject to the constant scrutiny of the society we serve.
Engineering, in its essence, is a continuous line stretching back to those who constructed the great siege engines of the past. It is crucial to acknowledge the deceptive nature of this legacy. The ingenium, from which our very name derives, was a tool designed for the methodical extermination of human beings who had been given the label "enemy". Technology itself bears no inherent label, yet it is driven by the labels we assign to it. We must recognise that we hold the dual potential to advance society or to bring it to ruin. Indeed, this dichotomy of progress and destruction is often merely a matter of perspective. It is for this reason that our duty must be to resolve the problems of ordinary people. Without this charge, we have no claim to righteousness; we are left with nothing but hollow justifications, brandishing fragments of truth we have skimmed from the whole.
The engineering ethics that ought to be driven into our hearts like a wedge are written in the blood of our predecessors – and the blood of their victims. To understand these commandments, forged in failure, is to accept our role. The engineer declares themself a servant of the public good, and on this basis, their power is sanctioned and monitored by the citizenry. This is our social contract. And should we spill blood, or cause it to be spilt, our own transgressions will be recorded by this same standard. Even if it costs us everything, this accounting must be done.
Therefore, engineering ethics are of a different order from general human morality. Ethics, alongside the law which prosecutes outcomes, forms a complementary pair. Its purpose is to modulate and chasten our impulses before they manifest – to compel our own restraint.
And even if they sound hollow at times, we require ideals to give form to our purpose. Effort without a starting point or a destination is not perseverance; it is merely wandering. We are destined to lose our way, and in those moments, we must at the very least know two things: whence we came, and whither we are bound.
At the same time, we ought to leave a trail of breadcrumbs and tie ribbons to the branches for those who follow. We have not walked this path alone, nor do we walk it so now. It is only fitting, then, that we ourselves should ultimately serve as sustenance for others on their journey.
For me, the phrase "Progress and Harmony for Mankind" has become a personal slogan. As you may know, it was the theme of the 1970 Osaka Exposition. Yes, this too is something I have borrowed. Yet, I believe it remains a theme worth contemplating, particularly as a solemn response to the unbridled optimism of the New York and Montreal expositions that preceded it.
It is ironic that the very era that championed such ideals also produced the Ford Pinto, the Therac-25, the Challenger disaster, and, going back a little further, the collapse of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge. But we must not forget the integrity of those who recorded these failures. The 1970 Osaka Exposition seemed to recognise this early on, though perhaps only the Tacoma Narrows case was fully appreciated at the time.
Of course, the matter is not so simple. The Tacoma Narrows Bridge was designed with what was then the finest engineering knowledge and built with the most advanced construction techniques. Yet, it fell. The Therac-25 emerged from technological advancement and a response to new needs. At Three Mile Island, operators trusted human instruction over computer judgement. Ford executives, pressed by a certain kind of corporate 'correctness', made their fateful choice.
To label these instances as simple "mistakes" is a gross oversimplification. Anyone can be wiser than those who came before; we have been nourished by their very blood. To fail to learn, to fail to become wiser, is a profound sin – not a crime in the legal sense, but a moral one.
So yes, we inherently possess a dual nature: the capacity for progress and the capacity for destruction. Acknowledging that this is often a matter of perspective leads us back to one conclusion: we must dedicate ourselves to solving the problems of the common person. Otherwise, we lose our claim to any genuine righteousness and are degraded to beings who wield slivers of truth, far removed from its core. This is why I reject the guild model. A guild serves its client, whose requests are seldom the humble troubles of the public. The weak do not appear at its gates. And as history shows, while the guild system advanced "skills", it required the decline of that very system for Engineering – that is, a discipline capable of synergy with all other fields of knowledge and wisdom – to truly flourish.