Design, production & ethical issues

Aluminium cans

Approximately 1 billion are produced in the USA each year. The first can was designed in 1958 by Kaiser Aluminium. This metal proved ideal as it was a lightweight, flexible material that allowed manufacturing of the bottom & sides of the can from a single sheet, leaving the top to be added after the can was filled.

The first cans were opened with a separate opener but this was inconvenient so Ermal Fraze designed a small lever attached to the can which was removed as the can was opened.

The design was workable but after a while it created an ethical dilemma:

First of all it was a human problem because discarded drink tabs were a health hazard, despite what has been going around over half a century; the recycling of used aluminium cans has been the driving force in the growth of the aluminium sector world-wide.

So in 1976 Daniel F. Cudzik invented a simple, stay-attached opener of the sort familiar today.

As improvements were made in the design & production of aluminium cans, various ethical problems arose concerning:

a. Human safety: Millions of pounds of aluminium are used in producing aluminium cans; they are melted and cast safely in the industry at their specific foundries all over the world. However, there are inherent hazards in virtually every activity. These hazards can be minimized or eliminated by careful attention to safe handling practices.

b. Environmental pollution: Each ton of alluminum cans requires 5 tons of bautxite ore to be crushed, washed, and produced as an alumina product; this process itself is considered as a threat in terms of enviromental pollution since it creates about 5 tons of caustic red mud residues which can seep into surface and ground water.

c. Convenience: Few beverage can technologies of the past decade have made as big a splash as have aluminium cans. Yet another convenience technology,  aluminium cans have helped the aluminum beverage industry regain some of the ground lost to the rise in popularity of polyethylene cans.

d. Money: Aluminium cans are the only container permitted in a couple of Asian countries such as Himalayas, Nepal because they are light and easy to crush. The local people who collect used aluminium cans also earn money from recycling the cans.

 

Ethical Issues; Hiroshima and Nagasaki dilemma

Was the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki the right thing to do?

I believe World war 2 was the wrong thing to do for everyone involved in it. Having said that, I believe all bets were off in so far as what any of the parties did once it was going.

The Japanese chose to invade China, rape Shanghai and Nanking, bomb Pearl Harbor, to refuse to surrender when they were given a chance with regards to the bomb being dropped. Those choices were made by the Japanese.

At any point that war could have stopped in the Pacific if the Japanese had chosen to end it.

Meanwhile, the United States was acting and making choices, largely in response to choices made by the Japanese. Each side was acting in what it believed were the best interests of the populations or governments in each country. Neither was considering the best interests of the opposing side. It would be dishonest and unreasonable to expect them to.

The Japanese made the decision to have two bombs dropped on cities it controlled. It didn't have to happen. They could have chosen otherwise. The choice rests firmly on the government of Japan.

To suggest the United States had an obligation to lose a single soldier more than it would have otherwise to obtain a choice from Japan to end the war is contradictory to the entire concept of the times and the situation and has nothing to do with ethics, morals, anything but strategy and tactics with the object of squeezing a specific, narrow choice out of Japan and the leaders the Japanese had chosen to follow in their choices.

Furthermore, every population of every country lives with the consequences of decisions made by the governments of those countries.

 

References:-

1.       Hiroshima and Nagasaki." Www.crisismagazine.com. Terry Hall, n.d. Web.

Ethical Issues

Ethics is the application of morality within a context established by cultural and professional values, social tradition, and accepted standards of behavior.

• Morality refers to values subscribed to and promoted by society in general and individuals within society.

• Ethical behavior is that which falls within the limits prescribed by morality.

• Ethical questions are rarely black and white, but typically fall into a gray area between the extremes of right and wrong. (Personal experience, self-interest, point of view, and external pressure often cloud this gray area further.)

THIS FOLDEDMIND (Mind Map #33: [Gray Area])

 

 

 

 

 

 



Do Gray Areas exist in our lives ?

Do we mean Gray Areas as far as unclear situations? By way of ignorance, sure. Most everything we do or say is a matter of estimation or theory. However if you mean Gray Areas as it is related to moral/ethical questions, as to how one should live or what one should do I'd have to say no.

If we are about to accept the idea that there are gray areas of life then it stands to reason that by  the requirement of comparison alone there must be White and Black areas. In principle 100% correct choices or responses and 100% incorrect.

If there is in fact a correct course of action, in any situation, then the principle of "being correct" must have some inherent value or form universally.

If there is a universal "correctness" then there can be no "Gray" areas as it pertains to living one's life as everything done can either be seen to support or not-support what is correct.

If an action seemed not to affect living correctly or acting correctly in one way or the other, completely uncertain, to commit that action is allowing yourself to be used for a purpose other than what you should do.

Of course it's not reasonable for any man to believe he knows what he should or should not do at a given point, to have that knowledge would approach the area of uncertainty but still the ideal decision is set.

What I am trying to say is, whenever you accept anything as having definite values or qualities then an immediate contradiction is created. All things with said value on one side and all things without on the other.

 

References :

1. "Ethics." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 22 Feb. 2014. Web. 23 Feb. 2014.
2. N.p., n.d. Web