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Ethics in Project Proposal & Ethics in Project Proposal & SchedulingScheduling

A Research Project Proposal is:1. A request to an agency for money2. A contractual agreement (if

funded)3. You are promising to do

something specific if they give you the money

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What is the nature of a What is the nature of a proposal?proposal?Usually 3 to 5 years in durationUsually involves hundreds of thousands of

dollars from the funding agencyExtremely competitive: about 1 in 10

actually get fundedIt’s research. That means you don’t know

for a fact what the outcome will be.

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What are the ethical issues?What are the ethical issues?

Proposals that don’t promise much don’t get funded

Proposals that promise to do everything don’t get funded

How much can/should you promise?How confident are YOU that you really

can do what you’re promising to do?

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Example: AMFeR ProjectExample: AMFeR Project

Utterly new type of material technologyNo one has every succeeded in doing this

yetAre there any ethical problems in this

proposal?

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SchedulingScheduling

Major proposals usually have to commit to either a schedule or at least an estimate of when major milestones are reached

By definition, if it’s research nobody’s ever done it before

How do you schedule innovation?Do YOU believe your own schedule?How much should you promise here?

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Example: AMFeR scheduleExample: AMFeR schedule

The schedule lists major milestonesAlmost all of them represent things no one

has ever successfully done beforeAll schedules for research contain great

uncertainty.If you’re too conservative, you won’t get

fundedWhen is optimism unethical?

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Closer to Home:Closer to Home:

On your first day here you found out what your research project was to be.

How did you feel when confronted with what you were being expected to do in just 8 weeks?

Were you sure you could do it?

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You decided to stay & to take You decided to stay & to take the moneythe moneyHow ethical do you think your decision

was?What would you have decided to do if you

had been totally certain you couldn’t do the job?

How much uncertainty does there have to be before a decision to take the money would not be ethical?

What might have been your options?