REPLY Future Development Directions (SD6276)

[System Dynamics Mailing List]

Posted by  John Sterman <jsterman at 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 at MIT.EDU>
posting date  Fri, 16 Feb 2007 07:26:19 -0500