A Study On The View Of Engineering Ethics Of The Engineering Undergraduates

Engineering activities can improve human being’s level of productivity and standard of living, but they can also do harm to or even threaten human being’s safety, health and well-being. A number of shocking accidents related to engineering occur not only because of the limitation of cognition, but also because of the internal value orientation of the engineering professionals. In our modern society, with engineering activities as important driving force, it is especially needed that the subject of the engineering behaviors always put the "people oriented" idea at the initial position and therefore fulfill their professional duties without misconducts.China has stepped onto the crucial stage of transforming from a big engineering country to a real engineering power, and striving for building a well-off society in an all-round way. But the fact can not be neglected that the level of engineering professionalization is still very low, and the engineers are still not well-reputed. This is a major practical issue which calls for the fields of engineering, engineering education and even all walks of life to deeply understand the implication of engineering as profession, to cultivate the sense of engineering professional duties and to put into practive the responsibilities of engineering profession. However, the undergraduate education, which is the initial period of cultivating occupation consciousness, has, to a large extent, neglected the education of professional ethics, and as the important promoter in carrying out professional duties, the engineering professional organizations are busying handling the extensive growth of the economy and therefore leads to the underdevelopment of self-government in engineering.The documents of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council have clearly stated that professional ethics education is an important part of the undergraduates’ideological and political education. However, for a long time, engineering undergraduates’professional ethics education has been marginalized, the contents of the education of professional ethics for the engineering undergraduates are not to the point, the research on engineering ethics has just started, and the theoretic framework of engineering ethics education has not taken shape. Basing on profound investigations and first-hand foreign resources, this dissertation puts forward the basic theory of engineering ethics, including the definition of engineering ethics, the major contents and their inner logic. Special emphasis is on the view of engineering ethics of the Chinese engineering undergraduates oriented professional ethics education.Chapters3-7illustrate the core contents of engineering ethics, which complies with the socialist core values, from a dialectical materialist perspective.In Chapter Three, the author puts forward the idea that engineering benefits human being, which is people-oriented and sustainable professional ideal and pursuit, and is the primary and elementary idea of engineering ethics. It governs the other three and embodies such important contents of socialist core values as the prosperity of the country, harmony of the society, and eco-civilization.Chapter Four is on the idea of engineering reputation with integrity as its soul. In this chapter, the author puts forward the value orientation that professional judgement should be objective, scientific and indenpent, and the value measurement of integrity. This is the basic requirement of professional ethics for those people in the field of engineering.Chapter Five is on the idea of loyalty to Party A."the master". In this chapter, the author puts forward the way of conducts that both the interests of Party A and other parties should be fairly considered, and accusation should be prudent.Chapter Six is on the idea of cooperation, the key to which is treating coworkers as equals. In this chapter, the author puts forward such rules of conduct as equality and mutual benefit, sharing, respecting intellectual property rights, and team work, etc. Chapter Seven is on the idea of self-government, with the engineering undergraduates’ education of professional ethics as the source power. In this part, the author puts forward that professional ethics safeguards self-government in engineering, of which education of engineering professional ethics is the premise.The innovative points of the dissertation are as follows:Ⅰ. The innovation of research perspective:In view of the weak point in the engineering undergraduates’ideological and political education, i.e. professional ethics education, this dissertation starts from the rising interdisciplinary field-engineering ethics, combines the characteristics of engineering and the ethics problems in engineering practice, and clinches its arguments on engineering professional ethics education from the pespective of value theory and that of responsibility.Ⅱ. The innovation of theory:It is for the first time that the author clearly puts forward the concept "engineering ethics" and has elaborated the five categories:engineering benefits human being, engineering reputation, loyalty, cooperation, and self-government in engineering.Ⅲ. Significance in practice:In practice, it has been put forward in this dissertation that professional ethics safeguards self-government in engineering, of which education of engineering professional ethics is the premise, in that only when one achieves self-consciousness in ethics can they achieve self-discipline, and then self-government.