Ethics in the information age

Abstract

Ethics in the Information Age requires an awareness of abstracted reasoning just as information itself is the integration of abstracted data. Recent works by Gibson and Boisot are employed to introduce the rise of an information society and the abstraction of information upon which we base our knowledge. Several ethical problems of the Information Age are discussed, including personal privacy, the specter of alternate personae in the virtual world of computer networks, the quality of information, even disinformation, and codes of conduct. The ethical problems inherent in the notion of intellectual property reveal themselves through application of John Locke's natural law of property right juxtaposed against the dilemmas encountered by fictional characters (in William Gibson's Idoru) living in a virtual world set just a few years from now. An ethical analysis for the Age of Information applies philosophical tenets found in deep ecology, social ecology, communitarianism, and anarchy to the current problems of ethics. In conclusion, the greater degree of abstraction required by ethical behavior in the Information Age requires even greater attention to the philosophers of the past, as well as the philosophies of the presen

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