Essay Sample on Artifacts of Engineering and Ethics

Introduction

Engineers are always mandated in designing variety of equipment, for instance, automobiles which we usually use in the everyday activity. Life without technology is hardly imaginable, especially on all the engineering products. Do artifacts imitate the culture or aid in creating it? Does technology embrace both? More specifically the moral values the technology has to the society. The technological device for this study is the traffic lights also known as the stoplights.Technology, especially in the engineering sector, has brought tremendous changes, for example, the stoplight. The stoplight also called traffic light is a signal light always position at the pedestrian crossing, road intersections as well as other designated areas to control the flow of traffic. The oldest invented global traffic light was ephemeral and was manually operated as the gas-lit signal. It was installed in London. The gas-lit used the words "STOP" and "PROCEED" simultaneously but word never lit up.

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The stoplight interchange the precise way accorded to consumers by displaying standard color lights as amber, red, together with green and then followed by a universal color code. The colors occurred sequentially. Whenever the colors are displayed at ago they have different meanings as yellow indicates a warning signal but in a case where a combination of amber-red signal, it gives drivers an indication to pass if only no pedestrian is on the crossing. Consequently, the red symbolizes a signal that prohibits drivers and any traffic from moving on. But, flashing red is treated as a stop sign. In addition, the entire signal the engineers designed and considered the moral values they may have to the general society in daily operations.

Technological advancement has greatly led to the improvement of the stoplight from the single aspect that used simplest traffic light composed of either a pair of colored aspect or single, the dual aspect that had two lights that were mounted vertically. They could be often seen around railway crossings, street intersections, and fire stations. Moreover, three or more aspects and positioning of aspects of traffic signals. The positioning of these three aspects especially horizontally or sideways depended on the road rules. For example, different nations have unique traffic lanes. The right-lane countries have a sequence from left to right i.e. red-yellow-green. The left-lane countries have a sequence of green-amber-red. At a time in the road intersections, the signal may show red at once to clear whichever delay depending on the traffic and road condition. Thus the modern signals invented by engineers are sometimes all red but pedestrians are allowed to walk freely either direction even diagonally or across the intersection.

Not only in roads where stoplights are in usage but also in waterway as well as on railroads for rail traffic. In waterway red means another vessel is fleeting through. The amber indicates that the locked amber is emptied or filled to the level of approaching vessel. But when the gate is opened the green indicate vessel may enter. Nevertheless, the railroad uses the opposite color positioning as green at the topmost and red below. These have the decent values of the societal usage.

Conclusion

With the rise of technology in the developed nations, it is progressing to advance and is in an increasing move. Engineers have improved the system by developing smart traffic lights on road usage. This is where the system adapts to the information which is received from an innermost central processing unit about the speed, direction of the vehicle and the position. The central controller communicates with the drivers to alert them of the impending light alteration as well as reducing the waiting for a considerable time. Even though a lot of trials have been made in the implementation, there are still hurdles that are wide spreading and need to be addressed.