Professional Transparency
Class
http://proethica.org/ontology/intermediate#ProfessionalTransparency
Class Hierarchy
- Thing
- ↳ entity (bfo)
- ↳ continuant (bfo)
- ↳ generically dependent continuant (bfo)
- ↳ information content entity (iao)
- ↳ directive information entity (iao)
- ↳ Principle (proethica-core)
- ↳ Relational Principle (proethica-intermediate)
- ↳ Professional Transparency
Definition
Relational principle requiring engineers to conduct professional activities openly and without concealment from affected colleagues, particularly when those activities involve evaluating or overseeing another engineer's work.
Case Provenance
Discovered in
This class was discovered during extraction of the case(s) above; the supporting verbatim quotes are in Source Evidence.
Properties
Abstract Nature
Requires contextual judgment about what information must be disclosed to whom, and at what stage of a professional process, to preserve trust and fairness in collegial relationships.
Confidence
0.91
Derived Obligations
Decline to conduct covert review of a colleague's work
Inform the original engineer of the scope and purpose of the review
Notify the original engineer before commencing peer review
Extensional Examples
NSPE BER Case 94-7 on notification obligations when reviewing another engineer's work
NSPE Code Section III.8 requiring engineers to notify the other party when asked to review another engineer's work
Operationalization
Requires the reviewing engineer to notify the original design engineer before or at the outset of a peer review, and requires the client to permit such notification as a condition of the engagement.
Potential Conflicts
Confidentiality
Loyalty
Principle Category
relational
Value Basis
Engineers whose work is subject to review have a legitimate professional interest in knowing that review is occurring, so they may respond, correct errors, or provide context.
Property Structure
1 · Object and Data Properties
rdfs:domain on this class or ancestor
| Property | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| establishedBy inherited | CodeProvision | Indicates which code provision establishes this ethical concept. |
| invokedBy inherited | Agent | Relates a Principle to the Agent(s) that invoke it in the case scenario (the parties who appeal to the principle to justify or evaluate conduct). May name several agents. |
2 · Definitional Attributes
SHACL definitional shape
| Attribute | Property (sh:path) | Description |
|---|---|---|
| principle kind | principleCategory | The controlled principle kind, which drives the four-kind subClassOf typing: FundamentalEthicalPrinciple, ProfessionalVirtuePrinciple, RelationalPrinciple, DomainSpecificPrinciple. The canonical leaf label becomes the rdf:type; the category is a routing input, not stored as a literal. |
| extensional cases | extensionalCases | Class-level prior cases that instantiate the principle (McLaren extensional grounding); an optional class-mint field. |
3 · Bearer Attributes
SHACL property shape
individual data
| Attribute | Property (sh:path) | Description |
|---|---|---|
| interpretation | interpretation | Per-case reading of what the principle requires in this situation (a defeasibility-pipeline source field). |
| concrete expression | concreteExpression | How the principle is concretely expressed in the case (a defeasibility-pipeline source field). |
| applied to | appliedTo | What the principle is applied to in the case (the situation or party it bears on). |
| balancing with | balancingWith | The competing principle or value this principle is balanced against in the case, recorded as a literal; extraction records the tension but asserts no defeat or precedence, and the defeasibility edges are materialized by a separate pass from this field. |
| tension resolution | tensionResolution | How the case resolves the tension involving this principle (a defeasibility-pipeline source field). |
| invoked by | invokedBy | The agent who invokes the principle, via the P->Agent invokedBy edge (resolved to a case Agent by embedding shortlist + LLM select; a Board-pattern invoking party resolves deterministically to the case-scoped NSPE Board of Ethical Review Agent). Range: Agent. |
4 · Referenced By
rdfs:range on this class or ancestor
| From | Property | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Action | guidedByPrinciple inherited | Relates an action to a principle that directs it. The principle supplies the value the action is taken to serve. |
| Code Provision | establishes inherited | Relates a code provision to the ethical concepts (principles, obligations, constraints) it establishes or defines. |
| Obligation | derivedFromPrinciple inherited | Relates an obligation to the principle or principles it operationalizes. The obligation gives concrete directive force to the more abstract value the principle expresses (Dennis et al. 2016). |
| Role | adheresToPrinciple inherited | Relates a role to principles that guide its conduct; the role-relative applicability edge of the R->P->O chain (the role determines which principles apply to conduct in that standing). |
Source Evidence
Text references
Engineer B objects to conducting the peer review without advising Engineer A
Owner instructs Engineer B to conduct the peer review without letting Engineer A know
When Owner reluctantly consents to notifying Engineer A
Source text
Owner instructs Engineer B to conduct the peer review without letting Engineer A know
@prefix core: <http://proethica.org/ontology/core#> .
@prefix owl: <http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#> .
@prefix pcsh: <http://proethica.org/shapes/core#> .
@prefix proeth: <http://proethica.org/ontology/intermediate#> .
@prefix proeth-prov: <http://proethica.org/provenance#> .
@prefix prov: <http://www.w3.org/ns/prov#> .
@prefix rdfs: <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#> .
@prefix sh: <http://www.w3.org/ns/shacl#> .
@prefix skos: <http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core#> .
@prefix xsd: <http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#> .
proeth:ProfessionalTransparency a owl:Class ;
rdfs:label "Professional Transparency" ;
proeth:abstractNature "Requires contextual judgment about what information must be disclosed to whom, and at what stage of a professional process, to preserve trust and fairness in collegial relationships." ;
proeth:confidence "0.91" ;
proeth:derivedObligations "Decline to conduct covert review of a colleague's work",
"Inform the original engineer of the scope and purpose of the review",
"Notify the original engineer before commencing peer review" ;
proeth:extensionalExamples "NSPE BER Case 94-7 on notification obligations when reviewing another engineer's work",
"NSPE Code Section III.8 requiring engineers to notify the other party when asked to review another engineer's work" ;
proeth:operationalization "Requires the reviewing engineer to notify the original design engineer before or at the outset of a peer review, and requires the client to permit such notification as a condition of the engagement." ;
proeth:potentialConflicts "Confidentiality",
"Loyalty" ;
proeth:principleCategory "relational" ;
proeth:textReferences "Engineer B objects to conducting the peer review without advising Engineer A",
"Owner instructs Engineer B to conduct the peer review without letting Engineer A know",
"When Owner reluctantly consents to notifying Engineer A" ;
proeth:valueBasis "Engineers whose work is subject to review have a legitimate professional interest in knowing that review is occurring, so they may respond, correct errors, or provide context." ;
proeth-prov:discoveredInCase 15 ;
proeth-prov:discoveredInPass 2 ;
proeth-prov:discoveredInSection "facts" ;
proeth-prov:firstDiscoveredAt "2026-06-02T19:55:30.891672+00:00"^^xsd:dateTime ;
proeth-prov:firstDiscoveredInCase 15 ;
proeth-prov:matchConfidence 0.88 ;
proeth-prov:matchReasoning "The principle maps closely to the existing Transparency class in the ontology. The case instantiates transparency as the obligation to disclose to Engineer A that a peer review is being conducted, which is a direct application of the Transparency principle governing openness in professional conduct." ;
proeth-prov:matchedOntologyClass <http://proethica.org/ontology/principles#Transparency> ;
proeth-prov:matchedOntologyLabel "Transparency" ;
proeth-prov:matchesExisting true ;
proeth-prov:sourceText "Owner instructs Engineer B to conduct the peer review without letting Engineer A know" ;
rdfs:comment "Relational principle requiring engineers to conduct professional activities openly and without concealment from affected colleagues, particularly when those activities involve evaluating or overseeing another engineer's work." ;
rdfs:subClassOf proeth:RelationalPrinciple ;
skos:definition "Relational principle requiring engineers to conduct professional activities openly and without concealment from affected colleagues, particularly when those activities involve evaluating or overseeing another engineer's work." ;
prov:generatedAtTime "2026-06-02T19:55:30.891672+00:00"^^xsd:dateTime ;
prov:wasAttributedTo "Case 15 Extraction",
"claude-sonnet-4-6" .
pcsh:CaseAnnotationShape a sh:NodeShape ;
rdfs:label "Shared per-case annotation schema (all nine components)"@en ;
rdfs:comment "The cross-component annotation fields on committed case individuals: proeth:confidence (extraction confidence, decimal; all components except Action, whose Step-3 contract carries no confidence field), proeth:textReferences (verbatim supporting quotes, universal), proeth-prov sourceText (the source snippet, on the Step-1/2 provenance layers; Step-3 A/E individuals ground via textReferences only), and the involvement gloss (proeth:caseInvolvement on role individuals, proeth:caseContext on obligation, capability, and constraint individuals). Values are per-individual; the fields do not individuate any type."@en ;
sh:property [ sh:description "Extraction confidence for this individual (0 to 1)." ;
sh:name "confidence" ;
sh:order 1 ;
sh:path proeth:confidence ],
[ sh:description "Verbatim case quotes supporting this individual." ;
sh:name "text references" ;
sh:order 2 ;
sh:path proeth:textReferences ],
[ sh:description "How this individual figures in the case narrative (role individuals; the same text is routed into rdfs:comment)." ;
sh:name "case involvement" ;
sh:order 3 ;
sh:path proeth:caseInvolvement ],
[ sh:description "Grounding context in this case (obligation, capability, and constraint individuals)." ;
sh:name "case context" ;
sh:order 4 ;
sh:path proeth:caseContext ] ;
sh:targetClass core:Action,
core:Capability,
core:Constraint,
core:Event,
core:Obligation,
core:Principle,
core:Resource,
core:Role,
core:State .
pcsh:PrincipleDefinitionShape a sh:NodeShape ;
rdfs:label "Principle definition schema (type-level, descriptive, field contract)"@en ;
rdfs:comment "What individuates a principle TYPE: its canonical kind (drives the four-kind subClassOf typing; the canonical leaf becomes the rdf:type) and the extensional cases that ground it (McLaren). The five per-case narrative literals and the invokedBy edge are per-individual and now declared on PrinciplePropertyShape, mirroring the RoleDefinitionShape/ProfessionalRolePropertyShape split so the {{ principle_schema }} prompt separates the type judgment from what the case supplies. Descriptive only (no validation result); principle_category is a routing input, not stored as a literal."@en ;
sh:property [ sh:description "The controlled principle kind, which drives the four-kind subClassOf typing: FundamentalEthicalPrinciple, ProfessionalVirtuePrinciple, RelationalPrinciple, DomainSpecificPrinciple. The canonical leaf label becomes the rdf:type; the category is a routing input, not stored as a literal." ;
sh:name "principle kind" ;
sh:order 1 ;
sh:path proeth:principleCategory ],
[ sh:description "Class-level prior cases that instantiate the principle (McLaren extensional grounding); an optional class-mint field." ;
sh:name "extensional cases" ;
sh:order 2 ;
sh:path proeth:extensionalCases ] ;
sh:targetClass core:Principle .
pcsh:PrinciplePropertyShape a sh:NodeShape ;
rdfs:label "Principle per-case schema (individual data, non-definitional)"@en ;
rdfs:comment "What a principle INDIVIDUAL is described by in a specific case: the five narrative literals the defeasibility pipeline consumes and the agent that invokes it. These do NOT individuate the principle TYPE (that is PrincipleDefinitionShape); their values are per-case, asserted on the individual. Descriptive only."@en ;
sh:property [ sh:description "Per-case reading of what the principle requires in this situation (a defeasibility-pipeline source field)." ;
sh:name "interpretation" ;
sh:order 1 ;
sh:path proeth:interpretation ],
[ sh:description "How the principle is concretely expressed in the case (a defeasibility-pipeline source field)." ;
sh:name "concrete expression" ;
sh:order 2 ;
sh:path proeth:concreteExpression ],
[ sh:description "What the principle is applied to in the case (the situation or party it bears on)." ;
sh:name "applied to" ;
sh:order 3 ;
sh:path proeth:appliedTo ],
[ sh:description "The competing principle or value this principle is balanced against in the case, recorded as a literal; extraction records the tension but asserts no defeat or precedence, and the defeasibility edges are materialized by a separate pass from this field." ;
sh:name "balancing with" ;
sh:order 4 ;
sh:path proeth:balancingWith ],
[ sh:description "How the case resolves the tension involving this principle (a defeasibility-pipeline source field)." ;
sh:name "tension resolution" ;
sh:order 5 ;
sh:path proeth:tensionResolution ],
[ sh:description "The agent who invokes the principle, via the P->Agent invokedBy edge (resolved to a case Agent by embedding shortlist + LLM select; a Board-pattern invoking party resolves deterministically to the case-scoped NSPE Board of Ethical Review Agent). Range: Agent." ;
sh:name "invoked by" ;
sh:order 6 ;
sh:path core:invokedBy ] ;
sh:targetClass core:Principle .
Metadata
Extraction details
Discovered in case
15
Discovered in pass
2
Discovered in section
facts
First discovered
2026-06-02T19:55:30.891672+00:00
First case
15
Match Confidence
0.88
Match Reasoning
The principle maps closely to the existing Transparency class in the ontology. The case instantiates transparency as the obligation to disclose to Engineer A that a peer review is being conducted, which is a direct application of the Transparency principle governing openness in professional conduct.
Matched Ontology Label
Transparency
Matches Existing
true
Generated
2026-06-02T19:55:30.891672+00:00
Attributed to
['Case 15 Extraction', 'claude-sonnet-4-6']