“Normalization of Deviance”
Sadly, that sounds fairly descriptive of our society these days.
Strictly from an Engineering environment & engineering organization, should this high level philosophy be kept in context. Just a bit of horse blinders to keep from spiraling into the "lunacy vectors" of a societal context.
Temptation is in every part of life, including engineering. The engineering hero in Atlas Shrugs *John Galt* illustrates the fearlessness & qualities that should drive the moral core of the engineering conscience. Often, engineering organizations have the saying, you need to have older/elder "grey beards" around as part of the group. Why, because these veterans are the heart & conscience of maintaining high standards and maintaining the moral core. Usually, they are fearless, (in the sense of maintaining engineering qualities, with no compromises) and are unafraid of challenging against the temptation to swizzle specifications or "reason away" parameters or outcomes for some type of false benefit. Often, they serve as mentors to the younger engineers.
I've seen engineers get corporate awards for saving big $'s on volumes of reduction of numerous decoupling capacitors on Computer boards, as measured by finding they could meet or beat RF radiated emissions as tested to FCC Class B standards in a computer enclosure. (I'm non-grey - yet I worked on these crisis problems) - I brought up the fact that they just intensified the internal RF emissions into a radiated state where internal mixing of the RF was causing a "chance" complex cancellation & reabsorption in the metal skins of the enclosure. They created a monster in allowing this energy to "develop" & it would find a way out on a cable or seam in a future enclosure modification. Nobody thought of that. (let alone the radical increase of Vcc noise in the power quality in the computer Vcc/Gnd specs). The engineer just went by - the computer was still working - it didn't crash. I could go on for months over wild cases in engineering examples.
This type of engineering creep of temptation or incompetence in design degradations must be eliminated by skilled, experienced, unafraid, leadership heroes within organizations. Perhaps there should be more books written on these heroes to help raise awareness of this critical important moral core.
I will say one thing, it takes a special breed of person to be fierce in these qualities. Sometimes, it is within the quietest of personalities (excuse the term - nerd).
- - - for those interested in "Normalization of Deviance" - snip from wiki The Challenger Launch Decision:
Diane Vaughan developed her theory of the normalization of deviance in The Challenger Launch Decision. She details how, during the developmental phase of the Space Shuttle Program, the normalization of deviance resulted in a dangerous design flaw in the design of the spacecraft. The group that was assessing the joints on the solid rocket boosters conducted analysis to find the "limits and capabilities of joint performance. Each time, evidence initially interpreted as a deviation from expected performance was reinterpreted as within the bounds of acceptable risk"[7]. The acceptance of this risk led to the Challenger exploding on the morning of January 28, 1986.
NASA and Morton-Thiokol suffered from the normalization of deviance when assessing the safety of the SRBs. Diane Vaughan states, "As [NASA and Morton-Thiokol] recurrently observed the problem with no consequence they got to the point that flying with the flaw was normal and acceptable"[10]. On January 28, 1986, the normalization of deviance within the two organizations contributed to the loss of the Space Shuttle Challenger and the seven astronauts on board.