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Sci Eng Ethics. 2024 Nov 25;30(6):57. doi: 10.1007/s11948-024-00512-1.
Engineers make decisions with global impacts and empathy can motivate ethical reasoning and behavior that is sensitive to the needs and perspectives of stakeholders across the globe. Microethics and macroethics offer two frames of reference for engineering ethics education, but different dimensions of empathy play distinct roles in micro- and macroethics. Microethics emphasizes individual responsibility and interpersonal relationships whereas macroethics emphasizes societal obligations and impacts. While empathy can support ethical reasoning and behavior for each, in this paper I argue that affective empathy plays a primary (but not exclusive) role in microethics whereas cognitive empathy plays a primary role in macroethics. Gilligan's and Kohlberg's theories of moral development are used to further depict how affective empathy aligns with care (depicted as an interpersonal phenomenon) and how cognitive empathy aligns with justice (depicted as a systems-focused phenomenon), thus positioning these ethical principles as playing primary (but again, not exclusive) roles in micro- and macro-ethics, respectively. Building on these ideas, this study generates a framework that describes and visualizes how empathy manifests across six frames of reference, each of which are increasingly macro-ethical in nature: self, team, operators, participants, bystanders, and future generations. The paper describes how proxy stakeholders can be identified, developed, and leveraged to empathize with stakeholder groups. Taken together, the manuscript seeks to clarify the role of empathy in engineering ethics and can enable engineering students to better empathize with the range of stakeholders impacted by engineering decisions, ranging from one's self to stakeholders across the globe. The intrapersonal understandings and motivations that students generate by empathizing across six frames of reference can facilitate ethical reasoning processes and behaviors that are more inclusive and comprehensive.
工程师做出具有全球影响力的决策，同理心可以激发对全球利益相关者的需求和观点敏感的道德推理和行为。微观伦理和宏观伦理为工程伦理教育提供了两种参考框架，但同理心的不同维度在微观和宏观伦理中发挥着不同的作用。微观伦理学强调个人责任和人际关系，而宏观伦理学则强调社会责任和影响。虽然同理心可以支持两者的道德推理和行为，但在本文中，我认为情感同理心在微观伦理中起着主要（但不是唯一）作用，而认知同理心在宏观伦理中起着主要作用。本文利用吉利根和科尔伯格的道德发展理论进一步描述了情感同理心如何与关怀（描绘为一种人际关系现象）相一致，以及认知同理心如何与正义（描绘为一种以系统为中心的现象）相一致，从而将这些道德原则定位为在微观和宏观伦理中分别发挥主要（但同样不是唯一）作用。在此基础上，本研究提出了一个框架，描述和可视化同理心如何在六个参考框架中表现出来，每个框架在本质上都越来越具有宏观伦理意义：自我、团队、操作人员、参与者、旁观者和后代。本文描述了如何识别、开发和利用代理利益相关者，以与利益相关者群体产生同理心。总的来说，本文旨在澄清同理心在工程伦理中的作用，并使工程专业的学生能够更好地理解受工程决策影响的利益相关者的范围，从自身到全球各地的利益相关者。学生通过在六个参考框架中产生同理心而产生的个人理解和动机，可以促进更具包容性和全面性的道德推理过程和行为。
