American Nurses Association Code of Ethics

• The nurse provides services with respect for human dignity and the uniqueness
of the client, unrestricted by considerations of social or economic status,
personal attributes, or the nature of health problems.
• The nurse safeguards the client's right to privacy by judiciously
protecting information of a confidential nature.
• The nurse acts to safeguard the client and the public when health care
and safety are affected by the incompetent, unethical or illegal practice of any
person.
• The nurse assumes responsibility and accountability for individual
nursing judgements and actions.
• The nurse maintains competence in nursing.
• The nurse exercises informed judgement and uses individual competence and
qualifications as criteria in seeking consultation, accepting responsibilities,
and delegating nursing activities to others.
• The nurse participates in activities that contribute to the ongoing
development of the profession's body of knowledge.
• The nurse participates in the profession's efforts to implement and
improve standards of nursing.
• The nurse participates in the profession's effort to establish and
maintain conditions of employment conducive to high quality nursing care.
• The nurse participates in the profession's effort to protect the public
from misinformation and misrepresentation and to maintain the integrity of
nursing.
• The nurse collaborates with members of the health professions and other
citizens in promoting community and national efforts to meet the health needs of
the public.

The "Nightingale Pledge"

The Nightingale Pledge was composed by Lystra Gretter, an instructor of nursing at

the old Harper Hospital in Detroit, Michigan, and was first used by its graduating
class in the spring of 1893. It is an adaptation of the Hippocratic Oath taken by
physicians.

~~~

I solemnly pledge myself before God and in the presence of this assembly, to
pass my life in purity and to practice my profession faithfully. I will abstain
from whatever is deleterious and mischievous, and will not take or knowingly
administer any harmful drug. I will do all in my power to maintain and elevate the
standard of my profession, and will hold in confidence all personal matters
committed to my keeping and all family affairs coming to my knowledge in the
practice of my calling. With loyalty will I endeavor to aid the physician, in his
work, and devote myself to the welfare of those committed to my care.

~~~

What is a Code of Ethics and

What is its Role?
A code of ethics (code) serves as a central guide to support day-to-day decision
making at
work. It clarifies the cornerstones of your SHRM Chapter-- its mission, values and
principles –
helping your leaders, members and volunteers understand how these cornerstones
translate into
everyday decisions, behaviors and actions. While some may believe codes are
designed to limit
one’s actions, the best codes are actually structured to liberate and empower
members and
volunteers to make more effective decisions with greater confidence.
An effective code has many uses, but two critical ones stand out. A code should
(1) clarify
gray areas or questions members and volunteers may have concerning SHRM Chapter
values
and expectations and (2) help build trust and commitment in your SHRM Chapter.
At best, a code “reflects the covenant that [your]chapter has made to uphold its
most important
values, dealing with such matters as its commitment to members and volunteers, its
standards for doing
business and its relationship with the community.”2 A code also serves as a key
reference tool. Use it to
locate key documents, support services and other resources related to ethics and
values within your Chapter.

For all that a code is, it is not meant to stand alone. It cannot address all of a
chapter’s ethics needs, nor
can it answer every ethical question or issue that may arise. Rather, view your
code as one key element in a broader effort to make ethics a priority at your
Chapter-- a critical bridge for helping your members and volunteers to put your
ethical principals into practice.

code [kōd]
noun (plural codes)
1. system of letters, numbers, or symbols: a system of letters, numbers, or
symbols into which normal language is converted to allow information to be
communicated secretly, briefly, or electronically
2. information system of letters or numbers: a system of letters or numbers that
gives information about something such as postal or telephone areas
3. comput computer information: a system of symbols, numbers, or signals that
conveys information to a computer
4. law public administration rules and regulations: a system of accepted laws and
regulations that govern procedure or behavior in particular circumstances or
within a particular profession
the penal code

5. way of behaving: a set of unwritten rules concerning acceptable standards of

behavior
her moral code

6. medicine patient with no heartbeat or breathing: a patient whose heart has

stopped beating or who has stopped breathing (slang)

verb (past and past participle cod•ed, present participle cod•ing, 3rd person
present singular codes)
1. transitive verb put something in code: to put a message or text into code
2. transitive verb comput write computer program: to write a computer program
that provides instructions to a computer
3. intransitive verb genetics provide genetic information: to act as or provide
the genetic information that enables a polypeptide, RNA molecule, or one of their
constituent groups to be produced (refers to codons or genes)
4. intransitive verb medicine undergo heart or breathing stoppage: to go into a
state in which the heart has stopped beating or the lungs have ceased to function
(slang)

Logic is the study of the principles of valid inference and demonstration. The
word derives from Greek λογική (logike), fem. of λογικός (logikos), "possessed of
reason, intellectual, dialectical, argumentative", from λόγος logos, "word,
thought, idea, argument, account, reason, or principle".[1][2]

As a formal science, logic investigates and classifies the structure of statements

and arguments, both through the study of formal systems of inference and through
the study of arguments in natural language. The field of logic ranges from core
topics such as the study of validity, fallacies and paradoxes, to specialized
analysis of reasoning using probability and to arguments involving causality.
Logic is also commonly used today in argumentation theory.[3]

Traditionally, logic was considered a branch of philosophy, a part of the

classical trivium of grammar, logic, and rhetoric. Since the mid-nineteenth
century formal logic has been studied in the context of foundations of
mathematics, where it was often called symbolic logic. In 1879 Frege published
Begriffsschrift : A formula language or pure thought modelled on that of
arithemetic which inaugurated modern logic with the invention of quantifier
notation. In 1903 Alfred North Whitehead and Bertrand Russell attempted to
establish logic formally as the cornerstone of mathematics with the publication of
Principia Mathematica.[4] However, except for the elementary part, the system of
Principia is no longer much used, having been largely superseded by set theory. At
the same time the developments in the field of Logic since Frege, Russell and
Wittgenstein had a profound influence on both the practice of philosophy and the
ideas concerning the nature of philosophical problems especially in the English
speaking world (see Analytic philosophy). As the study of formal logic expanded,
research no longer focused solely on foundational issues, and the study of several
resulting areas of mathematics came to be called mathematical logic. The
development of formal logic and its implementation in computing machinery is
fundamental to computer science. Logic is now widely taught by university
philosophy departments, more often than not as a compulsory discipline for their
students, especially in the English speaking world.

History of logic
Several ancient civilizations have employed intricate systems of reasoning and
asked questions about logic or propounded logical paradoxes. In India, the
Nasadiya Sukta of the Rigveda (RV 10.129) contains ontological speculation in
terms of various logical divisions that were later recast formally as the four
circles of catuskoti: "A", "not A", "A and not A", and "not A and not not A".[8]
The Chinese philosopher Gongsun Long (ca. 325–250 BC) proposed the paradox "One
and one cannot become two, since neither becomes two."[9] In China, the tradition
of scholarly investigation into logic, however, was repressed by the Qin dynasty
following the legalist philosophy of Han Feizi.

The first sustained work on the subject of logic which has survived was that of
Aristotle.[10] The formally sophisticated treatment[citation needed] of modern
logic descends from the Greek tradition, the latter mainly being informed from the
transmission of Aristotelian logic.

Logic in Islamic philosophy also contributed to the development of modern logic,

which included the development of "Avicennian logic" as an alternative to
Aristotelian logic. Avicenna's system of logic was responsible for the
introduction of hypothetical syllogism,[11] temporal modal logic,[12][13] and
inductive logic.[14][15] The rise of the Asharite school, however, limited
original work on logic in Islamic philosophy, though it did continue into the 15th
century and had a significant influence on European logic during the Renaissance.
In India, innovations in the scholastic school, called Nyaya, continued from
ancient times into the early 18th century, though it did not survive long into the
colonial period. In the 20th century, western philosophers like Stanislaw Schayer
and Klaus Glashoff have tried to explore certain aspects of the Indian tradition
of logic. According to Hermann Weyl (1929):

Occidental mathematics has in past centuries broken away from the Greek view
and followed a course which seems to have originated in India and which has been
transmitted, with additions, to us by the Arabs; in it the concept of number
appears as logically prior to the concepts of geometry.

During the medieval period, major efforts were made to show that Aristotle's ideas
were compatible with Christian faith. During the later period of the Middle Ages,
logic became a main focus of philosophers, who would engage in critical logical
analyses of philosophical arguments.

Nominal versus Real Definitions

Note: this continues the discussion Verbal versus Real Definitions.

Nominalists make the mistake of treating all words as [if they were] names,
and so of not really describing their use ... (PI § 383)

Nominalism, this one "conception of meaning" (PI § 2), is, I believe, the origin
of all philosophical confusion: "Words are names and the meaning of a name is the
thing the name stands for", whether that thing is an object or "spirit", a
phenomenon [process], or a concept [idea]. This is particularly the case when it
is a concept, especially a concept mistaken for a phenomenon or an object, e.g.
"time", "mind".

The etymology of the word 'nominal': Latin 'nomen' = English 'a name'.

In the words of Aristotle, a 'nominal definition' is "a set of words

signifying precisely what the name signifies; for example, 'thunder' can be
defined as 'noise in the clouds'." A 'real definition', on the other hand, says
what the nature of the thing named is; for example, "the statement of what the
nature of thunder is will be: The noise of fire being quenched in the clouds".
(Anal. Post. 92-94)

One of Wittgenstein's methods for determining [explaining] a word's meaning [--

other methods were: to ask for the word's use as if it were a move in a game or as
if it were a workman's tool, or to ask how we learn to use the word or how we
would teach someone else to use it; these are all ways of conducting "grammatical"
investigations (PI § 90b) --] was:

... to bring words back from their metaphysical to their everyday use. (PI §
116)

Explanations of that quotation: Of what importance is a word's "original home"?

and What is a "metaphysical use" of language?
What then is Logic?

1: logic's real definition

1: real definition of logic

"What is logic really?" The only reply is that this question misunderstands the
logic of our language. The word 'logic' is not the name of an object or a
phenomenon having an independent existence apart from our language. To begin at
the beginning: What is the word 'logic'? It is ink marks on paper or spoken
sounds; and now the question is: what gives those ink marks or sounds [their]
meaning? Wittgenstein: the meaning of a word is its use in our language (cf. PI §
43). But for the word 'logic' -- as for most of the words of our language -- no
general (ibid. § 71) or "essential" definition -- i.e. no statement of what all
the word's uses [applications] have in common -- can be given, because all uses of
the word 'logic' [i.e. all the "things" we call 'logic'] do not have something in
common. In this respect, the rules for using the word 'logic' [i.e. its
"grammar"] are like the rules for using the word 'game'.

There are many meanings of 'meaning' -- and therefore many types of definitions.
But there is no object or phenomenon named 'logic' and therefore there is no real
definition of logic -- i.e. there is no hypothesis to construct such as
Aristotle's hypothesis about thunder. There are many other types of definitions,
however, that can be given for the word 'logic'. For example: we can ask for the
etymology of the word 'logic'; or how the word 'logic' has been defined
historically by various philosophers; or how it is defined in the textbooks one
finds on the library shelf; or how the word 'logic' is "further defined" -- i.e.
how additional rules are added or subtracted from our common ones -- by some
contemporary thinker in his jargon. And so on ...
The word 'logic' as jargon

An example of 'logic' used as a jargon-word is of course Wittgenstein's logic of

language, where 'logic' is identified with 'grammar'.

A kind directory editor described this site as my "study of Wittgenstein's view of

grammar as a tool for philosophizing"; that is good -- but only if one knows that
'grammar' is a jargon word in Wittgenstein's philosophy. Therefore, although the
meaning is the same, it would be less confusing -- in order to avoid suggestions
of syntax or form -- to use the characterization: A study of Wittgenstein's view
of logic as a tool for philosophizing; -- that would be quite good.
There is no "essence of logic"

What might be meant by the expression "real definition of a concept" other than:
what do all applications of the concept-word have in common? But many different
things have been called 'logic' over the centuries, and they do not all have
something in common: by some philosophers 'logic' has been applied to the subject
of formal linguistic relations [e.g. syllogistic deductions], but by other
philosophers it has been applied to the subject of linguistic meaning. As a
general definition, of course, one might define the word 'logic' as "the art or
rules of reasoning" -- but a definition that vague is not serviceable. What does
it mean? There will be different answers -- i.e. different definitions of the
word 'logic' -- given in reply. You might as well say that a general definition
of the word 'game' was: "one of a collection of various human activities having
various rules and sometimes equipment undertaken for a variety of reasons". --
Neither of those statements would not be a definition in Socrates' sense of
'definition' because it could be applied to things that are not games (e.g. law
courts): the only way to define the word 'game' is to give examples of games, and
the same is the case with 'logic'.
But if words do not have fixed meanings ...

1: wittgenstein careless language

"If words don't have fixed meanings, then how do we [how can we] use them to mean
anything?" Just so. [The query is an allusion to some of Wittgenstein's students
who drew the mistaken conclusion from his teaching that there was no need to take
much care in one's choice of words.] We must take the trouble to specify what we
mean in each particular case, e.g. by giving examples to explain what we mean (If
we cannot give examples, then we ourselves do not know what we are talking about),
and sometimes we must make our own rules for the use of a word (i.e. invent
jargon). We can be very specific [clear about what we mean] if we take the
trouble [which is what ethics would demand of us].

Saying that generally words don't have fixed meanings is a caution against taking
it for granted that they do -- as if once one had grasped ["abstracted"] the
essence of a word's meaning [i.e. "somehow" perceived its real definition], one
didn't any longer need to be concerned about explaining oneself in the particular
case (thus Kant's statement about illustrations, and also the vagueness of legal
language), and therefore one could make all sorts of statements about logic
without explaining what one meant by the word 'logic', because of course that word
meant the same thing here, there, and everywhere else it appeared.
Realism versus Nominalism

'Nominalism' contrasts with 'realism', which is the picture, if you want to call
it a picture, that the word 'shape' names an abstract -- i.e. essentially
invisible -- object. This object is called a 'concept' and exists independently
of its name (nomen). Sometimes the word 'shape' is called a 'universal [as
opposed to a 'particular' or 'proper'] name'. And so 'realism' is the "doctrine"
that universals exist; they are not merely the names of classes or categories of
things ("Shape itself" exists, not merely e.g. square, circle, and oval shapes).

Or again: by the word 'realism' is meant the notion that the word 'shape' names
not only a class/category of objects (e.g. square, circle, oval) but also an
invisible object that exists independently of that class of objects (and also
independently of the human species ["form of life"]).

So the word 'philosophy' names not only the works of such-and-such philosopher or
such-and-such questions [philosophical problems], but also an indefinable
something apart the members of the category 'philosophy', and that indefinable
something is the essence of philosophy. And therefore "the real definition" of
philosophy is not conventional or arbitrary (as is the nominal definition of the
word 'philosophy') but necessary. But what this real definition is, or where it
is to come from [there is no cow in the pasture to investigate], no one knows.

In Plato's view, I believe, knowledge of such a definition [essence] is impossible

"while we keep to the body". In order to know a spirit, one must oneself be a
spirit. That is the type of unverifiable picture that is called 'metaphysics'.
[Strange to call Plato "realism" rather than fantasy.]
Logic from a Metaphysical Point of View

1: nominal and real definition of logic

1: nominal meaning of logic in philosophy

If someone is convinced that something exists, is there any point in telling him
that it does not exist -- even if you explain why it does not exist?

This is what the metaphysician wants to say about "logic", that it has both a
"nominal" meaning (i.e. a more or less arbitrary verbal definition) and a "real
[or, true] meaning". We can give a nominal definition of the common name 'dog' --
if by 'nominal' here we mean: point to dogs (because we do not define the word
'dog' verbally) -- and then we can investigate dogs without any reference to the
word 'dog'. But the case of "abstractions" [-- It is, however, utterly misleading
in philosophy to speak of "abstract objects" as opposed to "physical objects" --],
there is nothing to point to, nothing to investigate independently of its "name".
Again: What is logic? The first thing we can say is that it is a word -- or more
clearly, a sign, which is Wittgenstein's jargon means: ink marks on paper, spoken
sounds, i.e. the words of our language looked at purely as physical objects -- and
then the question we must ask is: what gives a word meaning?

The metaphysician will want to say that the meaning of an "abstract objects" such
as logic is the thought, idea, or notion that the word 'logic' names, as if this
case were very similar to the case of the word 'dog', which of course it is not.
There really is no reason to call the word 'logic' a name at all, unless we simply
mean by that that 'logic' is the name of a subject -- whatever that subject may be
-- found in books on library shelves and taught at universities, etc. But again,
that definition of the word 'logic' is hardly serviceable. What is the subject
matter? Because that is what the metaphysician wants -- purely by "thinking about
it" -- to grasp the essence of: that would be "logic's real definition".

And that is another way we are confused [self-mystified]. That 'logic' is not the
name of an object, one will readily admit, but then one says: but 'logic' is the
name of a subject matter. -- And surely a subject matter in some sense exists [but
in which sense]? And we have the picture of a gaseous ball floating above us in
the gray sky somewhere -- i.e. an object of some kind, and we think: that object
is logic itself, whatever logic itself is.

"Abstract objects" do not have real definitions. -- How do I know? I know simply
because 'real definition' is undefined language [an undefined combination of
words] except in the cases of physical objects and physical phenomena, where we
can identify something independently of its name. In other words, 'real
definition' only has a clear meaning if it is equivalent in meaning to 'empirical
proposition' or 'scientific hypothesis'. "Abstract objects" -- i.e. what I would
prefer to simply call 'concepts' -- have only verbal definitions, and it was
methods for giving verbal definitions that Wittgenstein sought in his philosophy.