Honest Disagreement Among Qualified Engineers Invoked for Landfill Environmental Dispute
P · Principle
Individual
http://proethica.org/ontology/case/113#Honest_Disagreement_Among_Qualified_Engineers_Invoked_for_Landfill_Environmental_Dispute
Properties
Instance of
HonestDisagreementAmongQualifiedEngineersPermissibilityPrinciple
http://proethica.org/ontology/intermediate#HonestDisagreementAmongQualifiedEngineersPermissibilityPrinciple
Applied to
Conflicting engineering opinions on environmental impact of higher-contour landfill expansion
Balancing with
Environmental and Infrastructure Policy Subjective Balancing Acknowledgment Principle
Public Policy Engineering Debate Open Resolution Principle
Concrete expression
The conflicting professional opinions of Engineers A/B (proceeding with the design) and Engineer C (challenging its environmental soundness) are characterized as honest differences of opinion among equally qualified engineers on the interpretation of known physical facts — not as an ethical violation by any party.
Confidence
0.97
Importance
high
Interpretation
The principle is invoked via explicit cross-reference to Case 63-6, establishing that the disagreement between Engineers A/B and Engineer C is a normal and ethically permissible feature of engineering practice, not evidence of misconduct by either side.
Invoked by
Engineer A Landfill Expansion Design Engineer
Engineer B Landfill Expansion Design Engineer
Engineer C Resident Engineer Public Interest Challenger
Tension resolution
The principle eliminates the apparent ethical tension between the competing engineering positions by establishing that both are legitimate expressions of professional judgment on a question that admits no single correct answer.
Source Evidence
Source text
There may...be honest differences of opinion among equally qualified engineers on the interpretation of the known physical facts.
Text references
That there are conflicting public views between engineers in this case should be of no concern.
There may...be honest differences of opinion among equally qualified engineers on the interpretation of the known physical facts.
if, after due consideration of his views and those of others, the decision should be to proceed with the proposed design of the expanded landfill, all involved should accept that each engineer had acted in conformance with the code.
TTL
@prefix case113: <http://proethica.org/ontology/case/113#> .
@prefix owl: <http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#> .
@prefix proeth: <http://proethica.org/ontology/intermediate#> .
@prefix prov: <http://www.w3.org/ns/prov#> .
@prefix rdfs: <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#> .
@prefix xsd: <http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#> .
case113:Honest_Disagreement_Among_Qualified_Engineers_Invoked_for_Landfill_Environmental_Dispute a proeth:HonestDisagreementAmongQualifiedEngineersPermissibilityPrinciple,
owl:NamedIndividual ;
rdfs:label "Honest Disagreement Among Qualified Engineers Invoked for Landfill Environmental Dispute" ;
proeth:appliedto "Conflicting engineering opinions on environmental impact of higher-contour landfill expansion" ;
proeth:balancingwith "Environmental and Infrastructure Policy Subjective Balancing Acknowledgment Principle",
"Public Policy Engineering Debate Open Resolution Principle" ;
proeth:conceptCategory "Principle" ;
proeth:concreteexpression "The conflicting professional opinions of Engineers A/B (proceeding with the design) and Engineer C (challenging its environmental soundness) are characterized as honest differences of opinion among equally qualified engineers on the interpretation of known physical facts — not as an ethical violation by any party." ;
proeth:confidence "0.97" ;
proeth:discoveredincase "113" ;
proeth:discoveredinpass "2" ;
proeth:discoveredinsection "discussion" ;
proeth:firstdiscoveredat "2026-03-01T22:25:29.144400+00:00" ;
proeth:firstdiscoveredincase "113" ;
proeth:generatedattime "2026-03-01T22:25:29.144400+00:00" ;
proeth:importance "high" ;
proeth:interpretation "The principle is invoked via explicit cross-reference to Case 63-6, establishing that the disagreement between Engineers A/B and Engineer C is a normal and ethically permissible feature of engineering practice, not evidence of misconduct by either side." ;
proeth:invokedby "Engineer A Landfill Expansion Design Engineer",
"Engineer B Landfill Expansion Design Engineer",
"Engineer C Resident Engineer Public Interest Challenger" ;
proeth:principleclass "Honest Disagreement Among Qualified Engineers Permissibility Principle" ;
proeth:sourcetext "There may...be honest differences of opinion among equally qualified engineers on the interpretation of the known physical facts." ;
proeth:tensionresolution "The principle eliminates the apparent ethical tension between the competing engineering positions by establishing that both are legitimate expressions of professional judgment on a question that admits no single correct answer." ;
proeth:textreferences "That there are conflicting public views between engineers in this case should be of no concern.",
"There may...be honest differences of opinion among equally qualified engineers on the interpretation of the known physical facts.",
"if, after due consideration of his views and those of others, the decision should be to proceed with the proposed design of the expanded landfill, all involved should accept that each engineer had acted in conformance with the code." ;
proeth:wasattributedto "Case 113 Extraction" ;
prov:generatedAtTime "2026-03-01T22:37:07.057021"^^xsd:dateTime ;
prov:wasGeneratedBy "ProEthica Case 113 Extraction" .
Metadata
Extraction details
Discovered in case
113
Discovered in pass
2
Discovered in section
discussion
First discovered
2026-03-01T22:25:29.144400+00:00
First case
113
Generated
2026-03-01T22:25:29.144400+00:00
Attributed to
Case 113 Extraction
Generated
2026-03-01T22:37:07.057021
Generated by
ProEthica Case 113 Extraction