DP6

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

DP6

Does Engineer A have an independent ethical obligation to assess and communicate the proportionality between the 30-minute travel time savings for the traveling public and the irreversible displacement of a 100-year-old historic property — including second-order cultural, communal, and precedential harms — even when the state client has not requested that comparative judgment, and does omitting that framing constitute selective disclosure that distorts the state's decision-making calculus?

Engineer A: Proportionality Assessment and Multi-Interest Balancing — Whether Engineer A Must Independently Assess and Communicate the Proportionality Between the 30-Minute Travel Time Savings and the Irreversible Displacement of the Historic Farmhouse

Independently assess and explicitly communicate to the state the proportionality between the 30-minute travel time savings and the irreversible displacement of the historic farmhouse — including second-order cultural, communal, and precedential harms — framing the asymmetry between diffuse public benefit and concentrated irreversible harm as a material professional judgment the state must weigh before exercising condemnation authority

Present the quantitative route comparison — travel time savings, cost differentials, and third-party impact summary — without independently framing the proportionality judgment, on the grounds that weighing travel efficiency against cultural heritage loss is a policy determination within the state's sovereign authority and outside the scope of engineering professional judgment

Include a proportionality notation in the technical report flagging the asymmetry between diffuse travel time savings and concentrated irreversible harm, while explicitly deferring the value judgment to the state and recommending the state consult historic preservation specialists and legal counsel before proceeding — treating Engineer A's role as surfacing the question rather than framing its weight

Engineer