Digital Commons Network^™

Deepening Disagreement In Engineering Education, Robert Irish, Brian Macpherson

OSSA Conference Archive

This paper argues that deep disagreements stem from conflicting worldviews. In particular, I examine how recent moves in engineering education contribute to deep disagreement by inculcating stu-dents into valuing the environment as a key stakeholder in engineering design. However, some graduates who value the environment meet resistance from employers who hold a more traditional engineering worldview, which regards the environment as an externality. Clashing worldviews can, as Robert Fogelin posited, render rational resolution to argument impossible. Disputants must consider the emotional and rhetorical as means to move toward productive ground for argument. I offer two moves from classical rhet-oric–making an …