27/02/2018 A brief reflection on geoscience ethics codes - AusIMM Bulletin

POSTED FEBRUARY 2018

A brief re ection on
geoscience ethics codes

By David M Abbott Jr FAusIMM(CP), AIPG Ethics Columnist and Ethics Chairman Emeritus; and
AusIMM Ethics Committee member

Ethics codes are an important tool that help reassure the public of the
expertise and integrity of professionals. While the AusIMM represents
resources professionals from all disciplines, this article looks at the importance
of ethics codes for geoscientists.

Professional organisations representing geoscientists, including those founded in the 19th century like
AusIMM, generally have membership requirements that include some stated amount of professional
education and perhaps experience. These requirements were and are, at least in part, intended to
provide assurance to the public that the organisation’s members can be relied on to act competently and
honestly. However, professional ethics codes were not initially part of these organisations’ formal

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documents. The American Association of Petroleum Geologists, founded in 1917, adopted an enforceable
Code of Ethics in 1924 to address the increasing number of oil and gas frauds. Other professional
geoscience organisations have adopted ethics codes more recently, often in the last 60 years. These
codes provide additional assurance of professional practice and those backed by disciplinary proceedings
provide means for addressing fraudulent or incompetent practice.

Bernard Gert, in his book Common Morality: Deciding What to Do (2004), points out that there are two
kinds of moral statements, rules that must be followed at all times, and aspirational statements that
encourage but do not require a particular activity. An example of a moral rule is ‘Do not injure.’ An
example of a moral aspiration is ‘Contribute to the ght against cancer.’ Gert also provides a procedure
for determining when a moral rule can be morally violated, for example, doctors are allowed to injure by
performing surgery in order to avoid or mitigate greater injury.

Ethics codes di er from statements about general morality by being written statements. Ethics codes
frequently contain both rules and aspirational statements. The AusIMM Code of Ethics contains both.
Clause 9, ‘Members of the AusIMM shall comply with all laws and government regulations relating to the
minerals sector and shall keep up to date with relevant laws in jurisdictions in which they conduct
business, and members dealing with public companies shall comply with the rules, regulations and
practices governing such companies as are published by the relevant stock exchange from time to time’
is a rule requiring compliance. Clause 3, ‘Members of the AusIMM shall, on all occasions, act in a manner
which upholds and enhances the honour, integrity, honesty and dignity of the profession’ is largely an
aspirational statement – although being dishonest is a clear violation.

Clause 8, ‘Members of the AusIMM shall continue their professional development throughout their
careers …’ is an aspirational statement and one that is common in many geoscience ethics codes.
However, increasing numbers of geoscience organisations are now requiring that at least some class of
members engage in a speci ed minimum amount of professional development, thus converting an
aspiration to a rule. For example, AusIMM Chartered Professionals are now required to complete a
professional development program while for other membership classes, the continuing professional
development remains an encouraged, aspirational activity.

Protecting the public versus con dentiality

One of the most important points Gert makes in Common Morality is that moral or ethical analysis
cannot decide all ethical or moral questions. This results from di erent people giving di erent weights to
various morally or ethically desirable principles. The result is that people on either side of a debate can
have thoughtfully considered bases for their opposing positions. Two principal provisions in most
geoscience ethics statements are:

protection of the public’s health, safety, and welfare (public protection)

maintaining the con dentiality of an employer’s or client’s con dential information (con dentiality).

These two provisions can come into con ict if the employer or client is proposing or is doing something
that is adverse to public protection.

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The AusIMM Code of Ethics Clause 1 state that in conducting their professional activities, ‘the safety,
health and welfare of the community shall be the prime responsibility of members.’ The principle here is
that the interests of the community have priority over the interests of others. It follows that members
shall:

Avoid assignments that may create a con ict between the interests of their client or employer and
the public interest.
Work in conformity with acceptable technological standards and not in such a manner as to
jeopardise public welfare, health or safety.
In the course of their professional life endeavour to promote the wellbeing of the community. If
their judgement is overruled in this matter they should inform their client or employer of the
possible consequences and, if appropriate, notify the proper authority of the situation.

Clause 1 makes clear that public protection is the more basic and overruling principle when con icts with
con dentiality arise. The General Guidance for Members section of the code addresses this issue
explicitly.

The International Association for Promoting

Geoethics
The International Association for Promoting Geoethics (IAPG) approved the ‘Geoethical Promise’ on 26
October 2016 as part of the results of the 35th International Geological Congress in Cape Town. The IAPG
de ned geoethics as ‘research and re ection on the values which underpin appropriate behaviors and
practices, wherever human activities interact with the Earth system. Geoethics deals with the ethical,
social and cultural implications of geosciences knowledge, education, research, practice and
communication, and with the social role and responsibility of geoscientists in conducting their activities.’
The IAPG issued its ‘Geoethical Promise’ that summarises its ‘Fundamental Values of Geoethics’. This is
intended to be like the medical profession’s Hippocratic Oath, to be adopted by early-career geoscientists
to promote respect for geoethics values in geoscience research and practice.

Just how the aspirational statements of the ‘Geoethical Promise’ and the ‘Fundamental Values of
Geoethics’ apply to day-to-day geoscienti c practice varies with the statement. Adherence to basic
concepts like honesty, integrity, competence, transparency, strict adherence to scienti c methods and
life-long learning have been part of geoscience ethics codes for a long time. The aspiration to ensure the
sustainability of the supply of energy and other natural resources for future generations con icts with
the fact that the supplies of energy and other natural resources are depletable and that individual
deposits have a limited extent. This conundrum appears in the various papers I’ve read that address
resource extraction in the spirit of the geoethical values.

The last of the ‘Fundamental Value of Geoethics’ states ‘Promoting geo-education and outreach for all, to
further sustainable economic development, geohazard prevention and mitigation, environmental
protection, and increased societal resilience and well-being.’ While geoethics may address the
intersection of geoscience, sociology, politics, and human welfare, geoscientists are not experts in all
these areas. Albarello’s 2015 book chapter, ‘Communicating uncertainty: managing the inherent
probabilistic character of hazard estimates,’ makes an important ethical point regarding geoscience

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predictions (Albarello, 2015). As geoscientists, we should e ectively communicate the probabilities of a

geohazard event occurring. But we are not the policy makers deciding what the public should do. Doing
so, or being viewed as having done so, leads to the legal troubles of the seismologist defendants in the
L’Aquila, Italy trial (the subject of another chapter in the same geoethics book in which Albarello’s chapter
appears).

Specialised provisions in some ethics codes

In addition to the ethical principles commonly included in ethics codes, some codes contain more
specialised provisions. Some organisations that publish a lot of papers, books, etc include provisions on
the ethics of publishing. The American Geophysical Union’s (AGU) provisions for publication ethics are an
example. The American Statistical Association’s Ethical Guidelines for Statistical Practice states that stated
principles apply to ‘all other disciplines who use statistical methods in their professional work’ (2016).
Geoscientists often use statistical methods and are included within these ethical guidelines.

One of the major distinctions between professional ethics for geoscientists compared to other
professions that have strong ethical codes (eg doctors, lawyers, biologists etc) is that geoscientists do
relatively little work with living research subjects. However, there have been some recent discussions
surrounding the potential impact that geoscientists’ work has on people and communities, and these
discussions are worth considering in light of ethics for geoscientists.

Therefore Scown et al’s 2017 article, ‘People and water: exploring the social-ecological condition of
watersheds of the United States’ caught my eye. The rst two sentences of the abstract state ‘A recent
paradigm shift from purely biophysical towards social-ecological assessment of watersheds has been
proposed to understand, monitor, and manipulate the myriad interactions between human wellbeing
and the ecosystem services that watersheds provide. However, large-scale, quantitative studies in this
endeavour remain limited.’ This is an example of the sort of study that some geoscientists may be
becoming engaged in and for which the ethics of working with living subjects may well be appropriate.
Those geoscientists engaged in such studies should look to the ethical provisions of those professions
that regularly deal with living research subjects. There may be a time in the future when enough
geoscientists are working with living subjects that appropriate provisions may be added to geoscience
ethics codes. For the moment, incorporation of such ethical principles by reference will be the
recommended approach. This recommendation is like the similar incorporation by reference to the
AGU’s provisions for publication ethics.

Conclusion
Comparison of various professional geoscience organisations’ ethics codes shows many similarities in
topics despite di erences in the codes’ organisation and wordings. Basic concepts like honesty, integrity,
competence, transparency, strict adherence to scienti c methods, provisions for con icts of interest,
respect for one’s colleagues, and life-long learning have been part of geoscience ethics codes for a long
time. Other provisions, like those on publishing, are restricted to a few organisations that do a lot of
publishing. The most recent ethics code provisions envision far more interaction between geoscientists

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and the public in areas like geohazards, long-term access to natural resources and the environmental
e ects of human existence. While such intersections are worth consideration and study, there are limits
to what geoscientists can and should do.

Present codes serve an important purpose in reassuring communities of the expertise, professionalism
and integrity of geoscientists’ work, and as public perceptions change we need to ensure our codes
continue to protect the public from incompetent or unethical behavior.

Feature image: TippaPatt/Shutterstock.com.

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