Rebooting ethics education in the digital age

Abstract

1951 was the year that J. Lyons & Co. used a computer (LEO) to manage stock for its renowned chain of over 200 high-street cafes and tea shops. It was the first time across the world that computers were used commercially for business data processing (Ferry, 2003) and marked a sea change. 1995 was the year that Apple launched its first WWW server, Quick Time On-line. It was the year Microsoft released Internet Explorer and sold 7 million copies of Windows 95 in just 2 months. This was a second global sea change; the move away from computers and data processing to the digital age via the information superhighway. It was a move away from highly educated, usually, men in lab coats undertaking elitist science and technology, shifting to a world where almost everybody uses accessible digital technology which could have been developed by almost anyone including young children and elderly adults.