NCEES FE Other Disciplines Professional Practice, Ethics & Laws: practice questions

1 · Codes of ethics for engineers · medium

A design engineer finds that a dryer his firm has already sold to many farmers can overheat and start fires under a foreseeable operating condition. His manager tells him to stay silent until the next model. What should he do first?

1. Stay silent as instructed, since the decision to recall belongs to management alone
2. Post the defect on social media at once so that farmers learn of it without delay
3. Resign immediately and take the design files with him as evidence of the defect
4. Report the hazard in writing to management with the evidence and a proposed remedy

2 · Codes of ethics for engineers · hard

A client asks an engineer to word a report on a small earthen dam so that a marginal spillway capacity appears adequate, to speed approval. What should the engineer do?

1. Report the findings and their uncertainty accurately, and explain the risk clearly
2. Reword the report as asked, because the client owns the report and decides its content
3. Reword it, but keep a private note of the true findings in case of later inquiry
4. Leave out the spillway section, since a report need not cover every design element

3 · Licensure law: RA 10915 (Philippines) and NCEES model law (USA) · hard

A licensed engineer is asked by a developer to seal drainage plans prepared entirely by an unlicensed draftsman whom she has never supervised. What is this practice called, and is it allowed?

1. Delegated sealing; it is allowed if she keeps a copy of the plans on file
2. Plan stamping; prohibited because she had no responsible charge
3. Peer endorsement; it is allowed if the draftsman has more years of experience
4. Countersigning; it is allowed for drainage work but not for structural work

4 · Intellectual property · easy

Which three criteria must an invention meet to be patentable in most countries?

1. Originality, fixation in a tangible form and authorship
2. Distinctness, uniformity and stability over generations
3. Distinctiveness, use in trade and absence of confusion
4. Novelty, inventive step and industrial applicability

5 · Intellectual property · easy

Under the TRIPS Agreement, what is the minimum term of a patent?

1. 20 years from the date of grant
2. 10 years from the filing date
3. 20 years from the filing date
4. Life of the inventor plus 50 years

6 · Safety and liability · easy

Which four elements must normally be shown to establish negligence?

1. Intent to harm, a written contract, payment and loss
2. A defective product, a sale, a warning and an injury
3. Ownership, possession, use and depreciation of the asset
4. Duty of care, breach of that duty, causation and damage

7 · Safety and liability · medium

In strict product liability, what must an injured person usually prove against the manufacturer?

1. That the manufacturer intended the product to injure its users
2. That the manufacturer was careless in the way it designed or made the product
3. That the product was defective and that the defect caused the injury
4. That the injured person had a contract directly with the manufacturer

8 · Safety and liability · medium

Every unit of a model of grain auger has an unguarded intake that a safer, practical design could have guarded. Which kind of product defect is this?

1. A manufacturing defect
2. A warning defect
3. A marketing defect
4. A design defect

9 · Safety and liability · easy

What is the correct order of preference for dealing with a hazard on a machine?

1. Eliminate by design, then guard, then warn and instruct, then personal protective equipment
2. Warn and instruct, then guard, then eliminate by design, then personal protective equipment
3. Personal protective equipment, then warn, then guard, then eliminate by design
4. Guard, then personal protective equipment, then eliminate by design, then warn

10 · Safety and liability · easy

Which environmental principle holds that those who cause pollution should bear the cost of preventing and remedying it?

1. The polluter-pays principle
2. The precautionary principle
3. The principle of public participation
4. The principle of sustainable yield