Honest Disagreement Permissibility — BER 79-2 Landfill Design Dispute
P · Principle
Individual
http://proethica.org/ontology/case/94#Honest_Disagreement_Permissibility_—_BER_79-2_Landfill_Design_Dispute
Properties
Instance of
HonestDisagreementAmongQualifiedEngineersPermissibilityPrinciple
http://proethica.org/ontology/intermediate#HonestDisagreementAmongQualifiedEngineersPermissibilityPrinciple
Applied to
Public contention that the higher-level landfill design concept was environmentally unsound
Balancing with
Professional Judgment as Final Arbiter in Environmental Trade-Off Decisions
Public Policy Engineering Debate Open Resolution Principle
Concrete expression
Engineer C's public challenge to Engineers A and B's landfill expansion design — contending it was environmentally unsound due to methane migration and groundwater pollution — was ethically permissible as an honest professional disagreement, even though Engineers A and B had also acted ethically in preparing the design.
Confidence
0.94
Importance
high
Interpretation
Both the design engineers and the challenger acted ethically because the environmental trade-off question admitted of no single correct answer; conflicting public views between engineers on such matters are not an ethical concern.
Invoked by
Engineer C BER 79-2 Resident Public Challenger
Tension resolution
The principle resolves the apparent conflict by affirming that both positions can be ethically held simultaneously; the public authority, not engineering consensus, resolves the policy question.
Source Evidence
Source text
That there are conflicting public views between engineers in this case should be of no concern.
Text references
Engineer C was acting within the intent of the code in raising his concern.
That there are conflicting public views between engineers in this case should be of no concern.
while certainly Engineers A and B should consider the technical data each project requires a case-by-case analysis and judgment
TTL
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@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#> .
<http://proethica.org/ontology/case/94#Honest_Disagreement_Permissibility_—_BER_79-2_Landfill_Design_Dispute> a proeth:HonestDisagreementAmongQualifiedEngineersPermissibilityPrinciple,
owl:NamedIndividual ;
rdfs:label "Honest Disagreement Permissibility — BER 79-2 Landfill Design Dispute" ;
proeth:appliedto "Public contention that the higher-level landfill design concept was environmentally unsound" ;
proeth:balancingwith "Professional Judgment as Final Arbiter in Environmental Trade-Off Decisions",
"Public Policy Engineering Debate Open Resolution Principle" ;
proeth:conceptCategory "Principle" ;
proeth:concreteexpression "Engineer C's public challenge to Engineers A and B's landfill expansion design — contending it was environmentally unsound due to methane migration and groundwater pollution — was ethically permissible as an honest professional disagreement, even though Engineers A and B had also acted ethically in preparing the design." ;
proeth:confidence "0.94" ;
proeth:discoveredincase "94" ;
proeth:discoveredinpass "2" ;
proeth:discoveredinsection "discussion" ;
proeth:firstdiscoveredat "2026-02-28T20:45:31.508319+00:00" ;
proeth:firstdiscoveredincase "94" ;
proeth:generatedattime "2026-02-28T20:45:31.508319+00:00" ;
proeth:importance "high" ;
proeth:interpretation "Both the design engineers and the challenger acted ethically because the environmental trade-off question admitted of no single correct answer; conflicting public views between engineers on such matters are not an ethical concern." ;
proeth:invokedby "Engineer C BER 79-2 Resident Public Challenger" ;
proeth:principleclass "Honest Disagreement Among Qualified Engineers Permissibility Principle" ;
proeth:sourcetext "That there are conflicting public views between engineers in this case should be of no concern." ;
proeth:tensionresolution "The principle resolves the apparent conflict by affirming that both positions can be ethically held simultaneously; the public authority, not engineering consensus, resolves the policy question." ;
proeth:textreferences "Engineer C was acting within the intent of the code in raising his concern.",
"That there are conflicting public views between engineers in this case should be of no concern.",
"while certainly Engineers A and B should consider the technical data each project requires a case-by-case analysis and judgment" ;
proeth:wasattributedto "Case 94 Extraction" ;
prov:generatedAtTime "2026-02-28T20:55:42.370315"^^xsd:dateTime ;
prov:wasGeneratedBy "ProEthica Case 94 Extraction" .
Metadata
Extraction details
Discovered in case
94
Discovered in pass
2
Discovered in section
discussion
First discovered
2026-02-28T20:45:31.508319+00:00
First case
94
Generated
2026-02-28T20:45:31.508319+00:00
Attributed to
Case 94 Extraction
Generated
2026-02-28T20:55:42.370315
Generated by
ProEthica Case 94 Extraction