Thursday, September 13, 2007

Ethics

Just a quick note to let you all know that I got the results back from the MPRE (Multi-state Professional Responsibility Exam) and I am ethical enough to practice in a little over half of the states, most of the Territories, and the District of Columbia. I am not ethical enough to practice in Texas or New York, but California, New Mexico, and Wisconsin are all on the OK list. (Actually Wisconsin doesn't even care...)

I can take the test as many times as I want (without penalty or averaging of scores), and in fact some states make you take it within a certain amount of time of taking their Bar Exam, so I'd have to take it again for those states if I moved into them anyways...

I'm sure that I could have smoked the test and could have appeared to be ethical enough to practice in all the states, but I thought that it would be unethical to study for an ethics test! At least I know that I am truly ethical, and not just talking the talk, right?

Oh, don't worry, if someone in NYC wants me to come work for them, I'll talk the talk. I just wanted to see how I measured up without pretending first...

7 comments:

Alex Wade said...

I guess I missed the part about VFR motorcycles...

Alex Wade said...

Just kidding!

Are you sure you aren't TOO ethical to practice in NY or TX?

Matt Wade said...

yeah... I find that pretty funny myself. it is a "scaled" score, which I'm not sure what that means, or if I care to know...

Eric said...

What a concept. Seriously, I had no idea that attorneys had to pass ethics tests. I wonder how much of the test is determining if you are within the first couple standard deviations of the mean, because it so makes sense that anyone WAY out of bounds in either direction could be a problem.

Of course it goes without saying that the idea of being ethically acceptable in one state and not in another is hilarious to me.

And I'm not sure I even truly buy into the concept of a state exam being able to determine that since I am guessing all you have to do to pass is put on a personality filter that second guesses the qusestions "What would an ethical person do" strategy will still pass you the test, am I right? So in effect, it seems more like a filter to make sure the dumb and honest guys get Darwinned out of the profession. Which, when I think about is, could be GOOD, since I know I don't want a dumb, honest attorney!

Eric said...

Today the US Army reported its first kill from an Unmanned drone. As posted on AirForceTimes.com:

<><><><><><><>SNIP
Army records first UAV kills

kosborn@defensenews.com - kosborn@defensenews.com
Posted : Sunday Sep 16, 2007 10:46:05 EDT

When Army scouts in Iraq spotted two men planting a roadside bomb Sept. 1, they called in a nearby Hunter unmanned aircraft, which dropped a laser-guided bomb and killed the two men.

END SNIP <><><><><><><><><><><>

The story fgoes on to say that the drones can fly around for 21 hours at three miles above the ground and wait for a signal to attack a laser-spotted target with a bomb so sensitive that it can land within one meter of its target --- while doing little enough damage that nearby windows ARE NOT BROKEN so locals feel minimal impact.

At this point, there are still a lot of humans in the decision chain, including the ultimate firing of the weapon. Eventually, though, this might present some ethical issues for the Army. Matt - here's a subject for you to study!

Alex Wade said...

I guess the real question is: Where can I get one of those lasers?

Eric said...

Okay, it's comments like that what make me wanna give you a great big man-hug.

That's some funny response!