Engineering Ethics

Ray W. James, P.E., received his Ph.D. from The University of Texas and is a Civil Engineering faculty member at Texas A&M University and Assistant Dean of the Dwight Look College of Engineering. He coordinates the Engineering & Ethics course that A&M requires of all engineering majors. Elaine E. Englehardt is Distinguished Professor of Ethics at Utah Valley University (UVU) with her Ph.D. from the University of Utah. She has taught ethics, philosophy, and communication classes at UVU for the past 35 years. As a professor of philosophy, she teaches courses such as Ethics and Values, Business Ethics, Communication Ethics, Bioethics, and Legal Ethics. She is a broadcast Philosophy Professor for Utah's channel 9 (KUED). For more than 20 years, she has written and directed seven multiyear, national grants. Four large grants are in ethics across the curriculum from the Department of Education, and three are from the National Endowment for the Humanities. She is the author of seven books. Charles E. (Ed) Harris, Jr., received his Ph.D. in philosophy from Vanderbilt University, having had an undergraduate major in biology and minor in chemistry. He is Professor of Philosophy and Sue and Harry Bovay Professor of the History and Ethics of Professional Engineering. His publications are primarily in applied ethics and engineering ethics. Michael S. Pritchard is Willard A. Brown Professor of Philosophy and Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Ethics in Society at Western Michigan University. His areas of teaching include ethics (theoretical and practical); the philosophies of David Hume, Adam Smith, and Thomas Reid; and the philosophical thinking of children. His publications are in the areas of ethical theory, practical and professional ethics, communication ethics, and philosophy for children. He is co-editor (with Elaine Englehardt) of TEACHING ETHICS, the official journal of the Society for Ethics Across the Curriculum. Michael J. Rabins was active in ASME and other volunteer organizations on engineering ethics issues. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin, and ended his teaching career at Texas A&M University. He helped establish a course in engineering ethics in 1989 that is now required of all engineering majors. Professor Rabins died in 2007.