So, as an engineer, is "ethics" important to you?

So, as an engineer, is "ethics" important to you? The Royal Academy of Engineering thinks it should be. "Engineers have a profound impact on the world in which we live. To ensure that this impact is always directed towards the public good, it is essential that we operate with a real commitment to honesty and integrity," says Lord Broers FREng FRS, President of the RAEng. "We can only be proud of our profession if we behave, and are seen to behave, ethically."

In practice, I'm sure few engineers will have the ethics of what they're doing uppermost in their thoughts on a Thursday afternoon. But if the subject can be given more priority when we first study engineering, it must be a good thing. The RAEng, the Engineering Council (UK) and other professional engineering institutions have just launched a "Statement of Ethical Principles" for professional engineers, along with a 'curriculum map' for the teaching of ethics in undergraduate courses.

The 'statement' is worthy enough, built around the four fundamental principles of accuracy and veracity, honesty and integrity, respect for life, law and the public good, and responsible leadership. But think it's the educational aspect which has the best chance of making an impact. The 'curriculum map' is full of the almost obligatory 21st century mumbo-jumbo (a 'pedagogic focus' is what, exactly?) but if you skip past all the tortuous prose there's a good framework (oh no, they've got me at it too now) for teaching institutions to consider.

Anyway, see what you think. http://www.engineeringtalk.com/information/raeng-editorial.html

The next generation will be even more familiar with the word "taikonaut"

We grew up accepting the words "cosmonaut" and "astronaut" to describe the same thing, and it may be that the next generation will be even more familiar with the word "taikonaut", after China's second manned space mission launched successfully this week. The Chinese space programme is ambitious, but pedestrian in comparison to the US-Soviet "space race" of the sixties. Two years have gone by between the first taikonaut going into space and the current two-man spacecraft, and there's no sign that the next steps will come any faster.

But why should they? There's no "race" this time. Russia has a competent but relatively unspectacular space programme in progress, which does not seem to have plans for anything as ambitious as sending cosmonauts to the moon. The US does have some big targets, but the programme is in some disarray, and it's unlikely any astronauts will be setting foot on the moon again much before the end of the next decade.

Meanwhile, the Chinese have the ambition, the confidence and the technological capability to get to the moon much sooner. A space walk is planned for two years' time, followed eventually by a Chinese space station and a permanent base on the moon. I'm not someone who likes to ascribe specific characteristics to entire nations, but as an observer from a country which has only ever been involved in space exploration as an enthusiastic partner, it's fascinating to watch the different approaches of China, Russia and the US, and the differing results. Latest news at http://www.spacedaily.com/

Update: Successful prototype test of Japan's National Experimental Supersonic Transport aircraft - http://www.engineeringtalk.com/information/japan-sst-editorial.html

When JCB decided to investigate the tractor market, the company asked the question "what is a tractor actually used for?"

JCB announced a major order from the US army this week for 500 "high speed diggers". The 12-tonne High Mobility Engineer Excavators (HMEEs) have a top speed of 57 miles per hour, can lift more than two tonnes and dig to a depth of almost four metres. What makes this particularly interesting to me is that it's another spinoff from a great piece of market-research-led design a few years ago. The company's "Fastrac" tractor (from which the HMEEs are derived) is now a familiar sight on Britain's roads - and it's the word "roads" which is the key to the design's success.

When JCB decided to investigate the tractor market, the company asked the question "what is a tractor actually used for?" The answer, after some research, was not what you see in every primary school child's picture books - ploughing. The majority of a tractor's working hours turned out to be spent pulling trailers, particularly on public roads. Yet few were primarily designed for this purpose; they had the power, but rarely the speed. The Fastrac was designed with this in mind.

The rest of course is history, but it's a wonderful example of how sometimes the best designs come about by remembering to ask what the users are going to want to do with the product. The electronics and telecoms industries seem to be pursuing a policy of developing every product idea that comes out of each brainstorming meeting, and seeing what sticks, quietly retiring the failures. But in most markets, designers don't have that luxury. It'd be fun though, wouldn't it?