Representation and misrepresentation: Tufte and the Morton Thiokol engineers on the Challenger

Abstract

This paper examines the role of the Morton Thiokol engineers in the decisions surrounding the launch of the Challenger, particularly with reference to an analysis of this event by Edward Tufte. The engineers at Morton Thiokol recommended against the launch of Challenger because the projected launch temperature between 26 degrees F to 29 degrees F was far outside their field database of successful launches. The engineers had asked for, but not received, data necessary to determine the cause of massive blow-by on the launch the previous January, and they had informed their managers and NASA that continuing flights could be catastrophic if the cause of the problems with the launches was not discovered. The authors conclude that the engineers thus did what they were ethically as well as professionally obligated to do.

Design principles for visual communication

“…Either way, the results can be catastrophic; for example, Tufte 24 explained how Morton Thiokol engineers failed to visually communicate the risks of launching the Challenger Space Shuttle to NASA management in 1986, leading to the vehicle's disasterous failure. While Robison et al 20 argued the engineers must not be blamed for the Challenger accident, better communication of the risks might have prevented the disaster.…”

Emotional engagement in professional ethics

“…[27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37] The above should not be construed as yet another ethical analysis of this case; instead it describes the decision-making process in terms of the changing personal involvement leading to varying degrees of emotional engagement which, it is believed, played a significant role in the decision to launch.…”

Nano-Technology, Ethics, and Risks

“…No one tested the Vitron used for the O-rings in the booster rockets to determine its resiliency under conditions of cold [see 17]. No one tested the ignition switches in Fords for their potential for shorting out and causing fires.…”

“…Nothing about gold as we know it from its features at the macro-level would allow us to infer that at a particular nano-level it appears red-or that, as it happens, at other nano-levels it appears other colors. 17 Or consider that magnetite at 12 nanometers binds "up to 100 times as much arsenic as the larger iron particles currently used in [water] filters" and yet is "much more sensitive to low-strength magnetic fields than would have been expected based on the behavior of larger particles [7,9,20]" Nothing in the behavior of magnetite would have led anyone to expect such features at the nano-level.…”

“…As I have argued at great length elsewhere, choosing that as our guiding maxim is the reasonable and moral response when we have even a small risk of great harm. It is not the likelihood of harm that drives adoption of the maxim, but the magnitude of the harm, and we do not need evidence that harm will 17 It also seems unlikely that we will be able to go the other way, determining a substance's macro-features from an understanding of its nano-features. John Locke was right in saying, "Had we Senses acute enough to discern the minute particles of Bodies, and the real Constitution on which their sensible Qualities depend, I doubt not but they would produce quite different Ideas in us; and that which is now the yellow Colour of Gold, would then disappear, and instead of it we should see an admirable Texture of parts of a certain Size and Figure," but the hope he expressed of being able to know the world fully by understanding its atomic structure thus seems even less probable now that we have gotten down to the atomic structure of things [12].…”