Professional Responsibility

Summary of different senses of responsibility

Reactive Senses of Responsibility

• Causal– Physical motions produce

an event

• Role– individual stands

committed to carry out common goods around which a social or professional role is oriented

• Capacity– Determining the conditions

under which someone can be held responsible for their actions

• Blame– Praising or blaming

someone for what they have done

Proactive Senses of Responsibility

• Sharing Responsibility– Answering for the actions of

others within one’s group. (Share action-causing attitudes)

– Providing moral support to group members when they have gone astray.

– Does not entail accepting blame for their actions

• Responsibility as a Virtue

• When responsibility becomes proactive and supererogatory (i.e., goes beyond what is minimally required)

• Uncovering risk and preventing harm• Recognizing and taking advantage of

opportunities to promote value, • Expanding range of control, • Caring for stakeholders and their goods,

and …• Also indignation, shame, guilt, pride and

other participatory, self-referential emotions

• Developing overlapping role responsibilities

Where one falls below the moral minimum

Prerequisites for Blaming

Capacity Responsibility

• Conditions that connect an agent with an action for moral evaluation

• When one is capacity responsible, one is

– …capable of acting freely and knowingly in a given situation

Acting Freely…

• When we act freely, we act without compulsion

• Compulsion is the production of a state of mind or body independently of the will (F. H. Bradley)

– Overwhelming fear compels me to do something that I would not do in a calm state of mind

– When somebody pushes me, they create a state of body (my falling toward the floor) which runs contrary to my actual will (remaining standing)

Acting knowingly…

• Acting knowingly means acting free from two kinds of ignorance:

– Moral ignorance (Not being able to appreciate the moral quality of my actions)

– Specific ignorance (Not knowing important details in the situation in which I am acting)

Moral Ignorance

• Moral sense (the ability to appreciate the moral quality of my actions) includes…

– bringing moral concepts, rules, and principles to bear on the situation (social injustice)

– responding in an emotionally appropriate way to the situation (indignation and rightful resentment)

– shaping one’s actions in accordance with moral understanding and moral emotion (opposing injustice with justice)

Specific Ignorance

• One fails to act responsibly in a situation because one lacks crucially relevant situational details

– I betray my sister’s secret

– But I am not responsible because I did not know that what I told was in fact a secret

– My ignorance of that crucial detail relieves me of responsibility in this situation

Not satisfying the knowledge and volitional conditions allows for excuses

• Condition—Performing the action knowingly

– Excuse—I didn’t know what I was doing or I couldn’t appreciate the moral quality of what I was doing

• Condition—Performing the action willingly

– Excuse—I was forced to do it (I couldn’t have done otherwise)

Exception for Excuses

• Excuses based on ignorance and compulsion both have an important qualification

• I am responsible for what I do under ignorance and under compulsion if I got myself into the excuse-generating situations in the first place

• Examples:

– My ignorance was caused by past negligence– My being compelled was caused by past recklessness (I recklessly took

another drink and lost control)

Mitigating or exculpating conditions

Excuse Source Excuse Statement

1. Conflicts within a role responsibility and between different role responsibilities

I cannot, at once, carry out all my conflicting role responsibilities.

2. Overwhelming situational constraints: hostile social surround or moral ecology

The moral ecology in which I act makes it impossible to act responsibly. (Central commitments exclude moral values)

3. Overwhelming situational constraints: Money and Time

I lack time and money to carry out my role responsibility.

4. Overwhelming situational constraints: technical and manufacturing limits

Carrying out my role responsibility goes beyond technical and manufacturing limits

5. Overwhelming social constraints: persons, societies, legal, and political

Personalities, societies, laws, or political climate set forth overwhelming obstacles to my carrying out my role responsibilities

6. Knowledge limitations: general and situation-based ignorance

I lack the knowledge (general or specific) to act effectively and responsibly in this situation.

Blame Responsibility

When one runs out of excuses

Blame Responsibility: Prerequisites

• 1. Untoward Event – A wrong or harm has occurred

• 2. Causal Connection – The agent identified is the one who has brought

about the untoward event

Blame Responsibility: Prerequisites

• 3. Moral Fault – A moral fault contributed directly to the occurrence of the

untoward event– The moral fault can be attributed to the agent in question

• Examples of Moral Fault – Intentional Wrongdoing – Negligence – Recklessness

Blame Responsibility: Prerequisites

• 4. Capacity Responsibility

– The agent satisfies the requirements of capacity responsibility

– Acted free from compulsion

– Action free from general and particular ignorance

Blame Responsibility: Results

• Agent is answerable for the action and subject to punishment– Agent must answer for action by explaining it,

justifying it, or excusing it

• Obligation to responsively adjust to avoid action in future– Taking measures to prevent the act from

reoccurring

A Brief Excursion on Moral Fault

Intentional WrongdoingNegligence

Recklessness

Moral Fault: Intentional Wrongdoing

• Agent intends, through the untoward action, to bring about a wrong or harm

• The intended harm or wrong contributes to the untowardness of the action

• A disgruntled employee intentionally introduces a virus into the company’s computer system which causes the system to break down and produces severe financial harm

Moral Fault: Negligence

• No harm or wrong is intended but nevertheless occurs because the agent did not exercise minimal care

• A software program malfunctions producing harm. The programmer did not know of the error that produced the malfunction but normal testing would have exposed this error

• The programmer failed to subject the program to normal testing and was, therefore, negligent

Moral Fault: Recklessness

• Agent does not intend the harm but foresaw it and was willing to risk it in pursuit of another intention

• French’s Example:

– The pianist practices at 2:00 a.m. in his apartment with its paper thin walls

– His primary intention is to improve his playing skills– But he is willing to risk disturbing his neighbor in pursuit of

his primary intention

Feinberg on Negligence and Recklessness

• “When one knowingly creates an unreasonable risk to self or others, one is reckless;

• when one unknowingly but faultily creates such a risk, one is negligent.”

• Joel Feinberg, Doing and Deserving, 193

Role Responsibility

SourcesTies to Codes

Role Responsibility

• Commitment to carry out common goods around which a professional or social role is oriented– Goods arise in relations– Example:

• Relation—professional to public• Goods—well-being, health, and safety• Professionals should not deprive the public of goods,

work to prevent others from depriving, and strive (through their work) to increase goods

Sources of Role Responsibilities

• 1. Explicit commitments such as contractual obligations and promises

• 2. Implicit commitments embedded in our social relations and roles

• 3. Legal Responsibilities– Due care, avoiding conflicts of interests, maintaining

confidences, and faithful agency (law of agency)– Professionals: Due care– Employees: Faithful agency as specified under law of agency

Sources of Role Responsibilities

• 4. Job Description

• 5. Codes of Ethics (Professional and Corporate)– Arise from professional relations and the goods

involved– Public, Client, Employers, Peers, Profession

Role Responsibilities arise out of key relations of computing professional (AMC/IEEE Code)

• Public– Contribute to society and human well-being (1.1)

• Protect fundamental human rights• Respect the diversity of all cultures• Minimize negative consequences of computing systems

including threats to health and safety• Ensure that CT and CS are used in socially responsible

ways

• http://www.acm.org/about/code-of-ethics/#sect2 Accessed 10/14/10

Role Responsibilities in Code

• Public– Avoid harm to others (1.2)

• Injury or negative consequences• Generally accepted standards for system design and

testing• Credible assessment of risk and responsibility• Report any signs of system dangers

– May require whistle blowing

Other Responsibilities to Public

– Respect the privacy of others (1.5)

– Honor property rights including copyrights and patents (1.6)

– Improve public understanding of computing and its consequences (2.7)

Responsibilities as Employees

• Contractual obligations

– Working hours– Job responsibilities– Codes of ethics– Position in org decision

structure– HR issues

• As Employees (law of agency)

– Honor Employer interests – Follow legal orders– Avoid conflicts of interests– Maintain confidences

Responsibilities to Client• Exercise due care in carrying out interests of client

– Due care defined in terms of professional standards– Avoiding bad faith, negligence or recklessness

• Avoid conflicts of interests

• Maintain confidences

• When professional judgment is overruled, notify client of consequences– Includes dissent when issues of public health and safety are involved– May require that engineers do not approve plans even when public

safety is not involved

• Maintaining trust

Responsibilities to Peers

• Give peers due credit for their work

• Refrain from slandering peers

• Share research and innovation

• Refrain from disloyal competition

Responsibilities to Profession

• Work to uphold the reputation and integrity of the profession

• Support ethical professionals

• Honor and support professional standards and professional codes of ethics

Proactive Responsibility

Going Above and Beyond the Minimum

Responsibility as a Virtue

Responsibility as a Virtue

• Proactive

– Future-oriented, focusing on preventing harm and realizing value

• Supererogatory

– Goes above and beyond what is minimally required for avoiding blame

Responsibility as a Virtue

• Uncovering risk and preventing harm

• Uncovering risk– Imaginatively reconstructing ordinary situations to

produce scenarios in which normal events take on unusual configurations and produce harm

• Preventing harm– Developing/designing effective counter-measures to these

scenarios to prevent the latent harms from occurring

Responsibility as a Virtue

• Recognizing and taking advantage of opportunities to promote value

– Developing an expertise in participatory design methodologies

– Working to uncover community needs

– Creatively using one’s professional knowledge and skill to respond to these needs

Responsibility as a Virtue

• Expanding area of control

• Not giving way to the temptation to retreat from action in order to avoid blame

• Extending knowledge and skills to fill in gaps that can lead to loss of control accidents

• See Ladd, Perrow, and Reason for description of loss of control accidents– Perrow: Chain reaction metaphor– Reason: Disease metaphor– Ladd: Accidents caused by lack of care

Responsibility as a Virtue• Caring for stakeholders and their goods

• Lack of care is at the root of many normal accidents

• Boisjoly tests: – Is it safe enough for someone I care about? – Identify oneself with one’s designs and actions

Responsibility as a Virtue

• Developing overlapping of role responsibilities

• The scope or range of one’s role responsibilities overlap with others

• One “takes up” task-responsibilities that others have “dropped”

• Recognition that responsibilities can and should be shared

• Hitting the volleyball between different players or between front and back row

Responsibility as a Virtue

• Taking responsibility can be understood as a virtue

• Publicity Test– Computing specialists choose actions and designs

that reveal them as responsible– These actions and designs would be chosen by

MECP (=morally responsible computing professional)

Virtue Ethics

• Virtue comes from the Greek word, arete, which means excellence

– Represent characteristics that exemplify human excellences

– Stem from dispositions that are refined by moral reason and appropriate emotion

– Especially suited to promoting the common goods around which professional roles are constituted

• Preventing harm, Promoting safety & health, Enhancing well-being, Maintaining/promoting client trust

Virtue as the mean between two extremes

• Aristotle characterizes virtue as the skill of identifying and acting from the mean between two extremes, excess and defect

• Courage is the skill of identifying the mean between two extremes in facing danger– Recklessness—taking too great a risk– Cowardice—taking too little risk

Responsibility as a Virtue

Defect: Irresponsibility

Mean: Taking Responsibility

Excess: Carrying the World on Your Shoulders

1. Negligence and recklessness2. Egocentric or egoistic attitude

3. Retreating to avoid blame4. Apathy & Indifference5. Mapping RR into separate domains

1. Uncovering risk and preventing harm2. Recognizing and exploiting oppor-tunities to do good3. Extending causal control4. Attitude of care for region of RR5. Overlapping mapping of RR

1. Paralysis of analysis and action2. Telescopic Philanthropy

3. Trying to control everything4. Too much care

5. Mapping includes everything