Duty of care in the context of "Palsgraf v. Long Island Railroad Co."

Delict (from Latin dēlictum, past participle of dēlinquere ‘to be at fault, offend’) is a term in civil and mixed law jurisdictions whose exact meaning varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction but is always centered on the notion of wrongful conduct.

In Scots and Roman Dutch law, it always refers to a tort, which can be defined as a civil wrong consisting of an intentional or negligent breach of duty of care that inflicts loss or harm and which triggers legal liability for the wrongdoer. Other civil wrongs include breach of contract and breach of trust. Liability is imposed on the basis of moral responsibility, i.e. a duty of care or to act, and fault (culpa) is the main element of liability. The term is similarly used in a handful of other English-speaking jurisdictions which derive their private law from French or Spanish law, such as Louisiana and the Philippines, but tort is the equivalent legal term used in common law jurisdictions and in general discussions of non-contractual liability.

The commanding officer (CO) or commander, or sometimes, if the incumbent is a general officer, commanding general (CG), is the officer in command of a military unit. The commanding officer has ultimate authority over the unit, and is usually given wide latitude to run the unit as they see fit, within the bounds of military law. In this respect, commanding officers have significant responsibilities (for example, the use of force, finances, equipment, the Geneva Conventions), duties (to higher authority, mission effectiveness, duty of care to personnel), and powers (for example, discipline and punishment of personnel within certain limits of military law).

In some countries, commanding officers may be of any commissioned rank, although in others the term only refers to officers in command of units of specific sizes. Usually, there are more officers than command positions available, and time spent in command is generally a key aspect of promotion, so the role of commanding officer is highly valued. The commanding officer heads the command team within the modern military hierarchy.

Negligence (Lat. negligentia) is a failure to exercise appropriate care expected to be exercised in similar circumstances.

Within the scope of tort law, negligence pertains to harm caused by the violation of a duty of care through a negligent act or failure to act. The concept of negligence is linked to the obligation of individuals to exercise reasonable care in their actions and to consider foreseeable harm that their conduct might cause to other people or property. The elements of a negligence claim include the duty to act or refrain from action, breach of that duty, actual and proximate cause of harm, and damages. Someone who suffers loss caused by another's negligence may be able to sue for damages to compensate for their harm. Such loss may include physical injury, harm to property, psychiatric illness, or economic loss.

In law, an omission is a failure to act, which generally attracts different legal consequences from positive conduct. In the criminal law, an omission will constitute an actus reus and give rise to liability only when the law imposes a duty to act and the defendant is in breach of that duty. In tort law, similarly, liability will be imposed for an omission only exceptionally, when it can be established that the defendant was under a duty to act or duty of care.

In legal terminology, the assured clear distance ahead (ACDA) is the distance ahead of any terrestrial locomotive device such as a land vehicle, typically an automobile, or watercraft, within which they should be able to bring the device to a halt. It is one of the most fundamental principles governing ordinary care and the duty of care for all methods of conveyance, and is frequently used to determine if a driver is in proper control and is a nearly universally implicit consideration in vehicular accident liability. The rule is a precautionary trivial burden required to avert the great probable gravity of precious life loss and momentous damage. Satisfying the ACDA rule is necessary but not sufficient to comply with the more generalized basic speed law, and accordingly, it may be used as both a layman's criterion and judicial test for courts to use in determining if a particular speed is negligent, but not to prove it is safe. As a spatial standard of care, it also serves as required explicit and fair notice of prohibited conduct so unsafe speed laws are not void for vagueness. The concept has transcended into accident reconstruction and engineering.

This distance is typically both determined and constrained by the proximate edge of clear visibility, but it may be attenuated to a margin of which beyond hazards may reasonably be expected to spontaneously appear. The rule is the specific spatial case of the common law basic speed rule, and an application of volenti non fit injuria. The two-second rule may be the limiting factor governing the ACDA, when the speed of forward traffic is what limits the basic safe speed, and a primary hazard of collision could result from following any closer.

In tort law, the standard of care is the only degree of prudence and caution required of an individual who is under a duty of care.

The requirements of the standard are closely dependent on circumstances. Whether the standard of care has been breached is determined by the trier of fact, and is usually phrased in terms of the reasonable person; this is sometimes labeled as the "reasonable physician standard". It was famously described in Vaughn v. Menlove (1837) as whether the individual "proceed[ed] with such reasonable caution as a prudent man would have exercised under such circumstances".