QUERY Future Development Directions
Posted: Sat Feb 17, 2007 1:42 pm
Posted by John Sterman <jsterman@MIT.EDU>
I cannot accept the idea that modelers, consultants or advisors are responsible only for helping their client make better decisions regardless of the morality of those decisions or the purpose for which their advice will be used. We all have an ethical responsibility to provide the best advice we can and to use the scientific method with integrity to ground our work. We also have a responsibility to work only on projects we judge to be morally acceptable and to shun those that are not. To take an extreme conditions test, it would have been immoral to help Eichmann improve the efficiency of Auschwitz.
I am not suggesting that anyone posting to this list would have helped the Nazis. Many of the decisions we face are much less clear. But we must all actively consider the moral implications of what we do, professionally as well as personally. We are people first and have a responsibility to act ethically in everything we do.
John Sterman
Posted by John Sterman <jsterman@MIT.EDU> posting date Fri, 16 Feb 2007 07:26:19 -0500 _______________________________________________
I cannot accept the idea that modelers, consultants or advisors are responsible only for helping their client make better decisions regardless of the morality of those decisions or the purpose for which their advice will be used. We all have an ethical responsibility to provide the best advice we can and to use the scientific method with integrity to ground our work. We also have a responsibility to work only on projects we judge to be morally acceptable and to shun those that are not. To take an extreme conditions test, it would have been immoral to help Eichmann improve the efficiency of Auschwitz.
I am not suggesting that anyone posting to this list would have helped the Nazis. Many of the decisions we face are much less clear. But we must all actively consider the moral implications of what we do, professionally as well as personally. We are people first and have a responsibility to act ethically in everything we do.
John Sterman
Posted by John Sterman <jsterman@MIT.EDU> posting date Fri, 16 Feb 2007 07:26:19 -0500 _______________________________________________