Equivocating taking the engineer's oath with being a 'good robot' is childish, at best. I could also call it ignorant, or perhaps on its to criminal (if somebody truly believes that and puts it into practice).

The engineer's oath towards ethical practice is precisely about not being a robot. We have specifications, years of technical brainwashing in school, and employment imperatives to make us into robots. Ethical practice is about having a watchdog thread in your brain that monitors your situation as an engineer. When a situation comes up where you could be a robot and do something stupid/illegal/dangerous/corrupt, the hope is that you can invoke your ethical/moral compass and make the right choice. Hopefully your compass is better calibrated than some unnamed folks in this thread.

You want to talk about reducing a position simplistically? How about taking the backbone of a healthy engineering infrastructure, one which everybody relies on and must trust, and equating its core values to being a 'good robot'. I'm not reducing that person's position, I'm defending the position of the person who understands what they're talking about.

So, yes, I reiterate to anyone who agrees with the OP: grow up. Or better yet, don't be a god damn engineer.

> The engineer's oath towards ethical practice is precisely about not being a robot.

How so? I didn't get that at all from the oath.

Can you elaborate which part you think reads like being a robot? The main point is to do excellent work if you're going to do any work.

The argument reduces to "being a good engineer and not getting people killed". The insult is a dismissal with an eyeroll of a dumb comment.