Indeed. Engineers need to understand that the things they build may be "cool," but they have higher-order consequences beyond that. Just because we can build something doesn't mean we should. I mean really, didn't anyone learn anything from Jurassic Park? :P
This is a very good point that I keep coming back to as the NSA scandal continues to unfold. You may think that as an engineer your concern is the engineering and going heads down on technical issues is the end of your responsibility but it is not.
Nothing absolves you of your fundamental responsibility to behave ethically to the best of your abilities. There's a good article on this topic here:
There's no such thing as a job where you will never have to make an ethics based decision and you need to be prepared to do the right thing. Philip Zimbardo (sp?)(Stanford prison experiment) talks about the necessity of training people to be heroes before they face ethical conundrums to short circuit our natural instincts and take action. I think this is an important thing to do from time to time - ask yourself if you are compromising your ethics in some way. Look in the mirror and remind yourself that you're going to do the right thing especially when its hard. Make the decision ahead of time so its easier to follow through when it counts.
Here's hoping there are folks at the NSA and elsewhere asking themselves these kind of questions and rereading that oath to protect the constitution.
