Module 2 : Introduction to Professional Ethics

Topic: Profession and Professionalism

Nirbhay Kashyap
Assistant Professor,
Department of Computer Science & Engineering
ASET, AUUP, Noida

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 Module II : Introduction to Professional
Ethics

• Basic Concept; Professional and Professionalism

• Types of Professional Ethics

• Professional Association

• Professional Responsibility

• Professional Accountability

• Ethical Governance

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 Topics to be covered

• Definition of profession.

• Attribute of a profession.

• Criteria of a profession.

• Professionalism.

• Attribute of professionalism.

• Aspects of professionalism.

• Type of professional ethics.

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 Definition of Profession
• “A profession is an occupation founded upon specialized educational
training, the purpose of which is to supply disinterested objective counsel
and service to others, for a direct and definite compensation.”

• “Profession is the work of persons who posses a body of knowledge, skills

and practices that must be continually tested and upgraded.”

• A profession is “an occupation or calling requiring advanced training and

experience in some specific or specialized body of knowledge which
provides service to society in that special field.”

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 Attribute of Profession

Profession

Adherence to common
Body of theory and Acceptance of
code of values and
skills duty to society
conduct

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 Criteria of a Profession
1. A profession must satisfy an indispensable social need and must be based
upon well established and socially accepted scientific principles.

2. It must demand adequate pre-professional and cultural training.

3. It must demand the profession of a body of specialized and systematized

training.

4. It must give evidence of needed skills which the public does not possess;
that is, skills which are partly inherent and partly acquired.

5. It must have developed a scientific technique which is the result of tested

experience.

6. It must have a group of consciousness designed to extend scientific

knowledge in technical language.

7. It must recognize its obligations to society by insisting that its members live
up to an established code of ethics.

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 Professionalism
• “Professionalism can be defined as comprising of professional values and
ethics as evidenced in behaviour and comportment that reflects the values
and ethics of psychology, integrity and responsibility”

• “Professionalism is having the knowledge, ethical standards, regulation

compliance, and concern for primary stakeholders and customers”

• “Professionalism is set of rules, regulations, and a code of conduct that

governs how a profession deals with each other and others outside the
profession.”

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 Attribute of Professionalism

Professionalism is based on following characteristics of individual:

• Behaviour.

•Skills.

•Knowledge.

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Aspect of Professionalism

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 Types of Professional Ethics

Types of professional ethics:

1.Metaethics (what is good? etc.)

2.Normative ethics (what should we do?)

3.Applied ethics (how do we apply ethics to work and lives?)

4.Moral psychology (the biological and psychological bases)

5.Descriptive ethics (what morals people follow)

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 Meta Ethics
• Metaethics is a branch of analytic philosophy that explores the status,
foundations, and scope of moral values, properties, and words.

• Meta-ethics is the study of the nature, scope, and meaning of moral judgment.

• According to Richard Garner and Bernard Rosen, there are three kinds of
meta-ethical problems, or three general questions:

1. What is the meaning of moral terms or judgments? ( moral semantic)

Asks about the meanings of such words as 'good', 'bad', 'right' and 'wrong'

2. What is the nature of moral judgments? (moral ontology)

– Asks questions of whether moral judgments are universal or relative, etc.

3. How may moral judgments be supported or defended? (moral epistemology)

– Asks such questions as how we can know if something is right or wrong, if
at all.

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 Normative and Applied Ethics
• Normative ethics:

It is the study of ethical action. It is the branch of philosophical ethics that

investigates the set of questions that arise when considering how one
ought to act, morally speaking.

• Applied Ethics:

Applied ethics is the philosophical examination, from a moral standpoint,

of particular issues in private and public life which are matters of
moral judgment. It is thus the attempts to use philosophical methods to
identify the morally correct course of action in various fields of everyday life.

Note: The fields of applied ethics and normative theory focus on what is moral,
whereas meta-ethics focuses on what morality itself is?

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 Moral and Descriptive Ethics

• Moral ethics:

Moral psychology is a field of study in both philosophy and psychology. Some

use the term "moral psychology" relatively narrowly to refer to the study
of moral development. However, others tend to use the term more
broadly to include any topics at the intersection of ethics, psychology, and
philosophy of mind.

• Descriptive Ethics:

Descriptive ethics, also known as comparative ethics, is the study of

people's beliefs about morality.

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Thank You

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