1 - Ethics after the Information Revolution

Summary

Introduction: history as the information age

Humanity has organized its history according to many metrics. Some are natural and circular, relying on seasons and planetary motions. Some are social or political and linear, being determined, for example, by the succession of Olympic Games, the number of years since the founding of the city of Rome (ab urbe condita), or the ascension of a king. Still others are religious and have a V-shape, counting years before and after a particular event (e.g. the birth of Christ). There are larger periods that encompass smaller ones, named after influential styles (Baroque), people (Victorian era), particular circumstances (Cold War) or some new technology (Nuclear age). What all these and many other metrics have in common is that they are all historical, in the strict sense that they all depend on the development of systems to record events and hence accumulate and transmit information about the past. It follows that history is actually synonymous with the information age, since prehistory is the age in human development that precedes the availability of recording systems. Hence, one may further argue that humanity has been living in various kinds of information societies at least since the Bronze Age, the era that marks the invention of writing in different regions of the world, and especially in Mesopotamia.