Ethics of Chemistry

Abstract Imagine yourself a chemist confronted with the use of chemical weapons during World War IO. Or a citizen living in Bhopal, India, perhaps having negotiated the siting of the plant in your city as a politician or an employee bringing home a good wage working at Union Carbide’s methyl isocyanate plant. Or perhaps you are a student in 2023 needing to make informed choices about climate engineering or the rapid full-scale extraction of rare-earth materials to mitigate the climate crisis. What is the right thing to do in each of these scenarios? How can the study of the moral values, norms, judgments, and virtues relevant to chemistry equip students to deeply reflect about the practice of chemistry and guide them to make informed and responsible choices about their behaviour as professionals?