As the basis for the development of modern society,engineering activity exerts a profound effect over all aspects of human social life.As is well known,the most important part of engineering activity is the engineers themselves.With the increase of their knowledge and of their ability to dominate nature and society,engineers have greater and greater impact on the engineering activity and simultaneously on the society.For this reason,the makings of engineers have long been attracting the attention of human society.Of all the makings of engineers,the quality of their ethical responsibility forms the core.This core can not only foster the development of other elements of the makings,but also help engineers put,on their own initiative,in the first place the security,health and happiness of human beings.In addition,it can further strengthen their sense of responsibility to stakeholders.In a sense,the quality of engineers'ethical responsibility determines the outcome of the engineering construction of a nation,and hence the development of the nation.Therefore,western countries like U.S and Germany have attached great importance to the education of engineers'ethical responsibility which aims to foster the quality of engineers'ethical responsibility.Its significance is that in those countries there occur a series of influential research productivity as well as a large group of engineers with strong sense of ethical responsibility.In contrast,China,for various reasons,has not paid sufficient attention to the education of engineers'ethical responsibility and relevant research is relatively rare.What is worse is that we possess the largest number of engineers in all the countries of the world.This situation has already had an serious effect on the quality of our engineers and more seriously,on the process of our modernization.That is why the study of education of engineers'ethical responsibility has become an urgent topic for us.

The present research starts with the profession of the engineers.It gives definitions to such concepts as ethical responsibility,the engineers'ethical responsibility,the major part of the engineers'ethical responsibility as they are so important as to highlight the features of,and even restrict the education of engineers'ethical responsibility,yet still vague in the previous studies.The occurrence and development of the engineers'ethical responsibility correspond with the development of science and technology and with the expectation of the society.As the previous goal of the ethical responsibility,the pursuit of maximizing the engineering benefit on the basis of the hypothesis“completely rational”human beings,has outgrown the modern science and technology and the expectation of the society,a new pursuit occurs which aims to“satisfy”the stakeholders.The new pursuit calls for the new response from the education of engineers ethical responsibility.In other words,supporting evidence is needed for the rationality of the education of engineers ethical responsibility.In my study evidence is provided from two aspects,the practical base and theoretical ground.In terms of practical base,the education of engineers ethical responsibility is the necessity of development of society and growth of engineers.In terms of theoreti cal ground,it has the relevant theories in educational philosophy,technical philosophy,engineering philosophy and applied ethics as its ground.The education of engineers ethical responsibility should take benefit as the initiative step,target at engineers who are the major part of engineering activity,and view the fostering of engineers ethical responsibility as the destination of education.That is to say,benefit,engineers and sense of responsibility are to constitute the internal structure of education.

The education of engineers ethical responsibility is to be provided in an open and creative way.By comparing China's education of engineers ethical responsibility with that of the United States and Germany,my study discovers the gap between the two.Through a questionnaire distributed to the students in some representative universities and majors,the study reveals the problems existing in the present education of engineers ethical responsibility in China.These involve three levels: at the macro level,relevant policies of our country are neither clear nor constant; at the middle level,the engineering universities have defects in both understanding and practice; at the micro level,the engineers（the students）lack the sense of responsibility and their ethical choices go to the extremes.The root beneath these problems are some contradictory factors intertwining with each other,which include the contradiction in the target of education between the“science”model and the“engineer”model,the contradiction between the narrow design of subject teaching and the requirements of the complex engineering practice,the contradiction between analysis and synthesis of facts and values,the contradiction between compulsion and freedom,the contradiction between the individuals and the collective.

To solve the above-mentioned problems requires the cooperation of all the three parties,namely,our country（including communities and enterprises）,the universities concerned and the engineers（the students）.Therefore,my study proposes a regulation system,which involves the interacting of three levels.At the macro level,a supportive subsystem can be established which consists of the regulations of guidance and assessment,the regulations of engineering associations and regulations of enterprises.At the middle level,a long-term mechanism can be founded which comprises the training rules of the engineers ethical responsibility and of the two-sided teachers.It also includes the creative approaches of education.At the micro level,requirements can be made on the engineers（students）,which involve creating the conditions for internalizing ethical responsibility,striving for the increase of the awareness and capacity of ethical intelligence,and fulfilling their responsibility on their own initiative.

Key words: Engineers; Ethical responsibility; The makings of the ethical responsibility; Engineering education; Value choice