DP6

DecisionPoint
http://proethica.org/ontology/cases#DecisionPoint

DP6

Should Engineer B treat the Dual-Mode Seal Authorization principle as conferring ethical equivalence between supervisory sealing and self-authored sealing unconditionally — relying on the formal direction-and-control relationship as sufficient — or must Engineer B demonstrate that supervisory engagement was substantive enough to produce a level of technical confidence in the document's accuracy that approximates what personal preparation would provide?

The Dual-Mode Seal Authorization principle treats Engineer A's self-authored sealing and Engineer B's supervisory sealing as ethically equivalent outcomes, but the epistemic basis for each engineer's confidence in the sealed document differs fundamentally. This decision point addresses whether the ethical equivalence of the two modes is absolute or conditional, and what quality of supervisory engagement Engineer B must demonstrate to compensate for the epistemic asymmetry between personal preparation and mediated supervisory knowledge — including the virtue-ethics question of whether Engineer B's sealing reflects genuine professional ownership or a procedural formality that masks diffusion of moral responsibility.

Treat the Dual-Mode equivalence as conditional — sealing CADD documents prepared by subordinates only when Engineer B's supervisory engagement was substantive enough to produce genuine technical confidence in the document's accuracy, including active direction throughout production, review of critical decision points, and the capacity to articulate the technical basis for key design choices embedded in the sealed documents.

Treat the Dual-Mode Seal Authorization principle as conferring ethical equivalence unconditionally once the formal direction-and-control supervisory relationship is established, on the grounds that Code Section II.2.c expressly authorizes supervisory sealing and that imposing a further substantive-equivalence condition creates an unworkable standard that undermines the Code's explicit accommodation of team-based engineering workflows.

Address the epistemic asymmetry and moral diffusion risk by requiring that subordinate engineers who prepared the CADD documents also sign the documents — with Engineer B's seal representing supervisory certification and subordinates' signatures representing authorship attestation — distributing accountability explicitly rather than concentrating it solely in Engineer B's seal.

Engineer B — Dual-Mode Seal Authorization and Responsible Charge Integrity