Syllabus                                                          Professor Tom Atchison 
Ethics in the Information Age                     Email: Thomas.Atchison@metrostate.edu --- (Email is the best way to get a quick response.)
PHIL 327-50                                                  Office 323 St. John's Hall, St. Paul Campus
Fall Semester 2026                                           Office Phone: 651-793-1493 (rarely checked - send me an email)
Credits earned = 4                             Office hours: Tuesdays 11-3 In person at my office or virtually on zoom (see link in D2L announcement)

You can use my Bookings page to make an appointment at other times.  Please feel free to email me for an appointment if none of the available times work for you.

                                    Class meetings will be on Zoom every Monday except Labor Day from August 24 to December 7, 2026  (See the class D2L announcement or my email for the Zoom link.)

Course Objectives:

1. To learn the basic concepts and methods of several approaches to ethics and to see how these may be used to think about moral problems connected to information technology. 
2. To get better at analyzing and evaluating decisions, institutions, policies and issues from an ethical point of view by:
   1. Learning something about the history of laws, policies, and practices
   2. Becoming more familiar with the positions people have developed to address these issues and the arguments for and against those positions
   3. Practicing the skills involved in defending and criticizing your own and others’ ideas about what practices, policies, decisions, etc. would be best.

Catalog course description:

This course explores a range of moral issues raised by the introduction of new technologies for the production, distribution and use of information -- issues about privacy, surveillance and data-mining, freedom of speech, copyright, computer crime and abuse, justice in access to information, the political and social significance of the Internet, and so on. The course is intended to be helpful not only to information technology professionals, who will encounter some of these issues in connection with their work, but also to anyone who has an interest in the way information technology is changing our lives. Students will study moral theory, professional codes of ethics and a variety of case studies.

Texts:

There is one book to purchase through the University Bookstore: Ethics for the Information Age (9th edition) by Michael Quin.  Be sure you get this latest edition. All other course readings will be be available on the Internet.  Most will be available through links posted on my open website. A few will be made available through D2L (to protect other people's intellectual property). Many assignments for this class will require access to the Internet and the ability to read significant amounts of online material.  Metro State provides access in its computer labs and library as do public libraries.  It is your responsibility to make sure your home internet access is adequate or to make time to do your reading at school or a library. Please let me know ASAP if this is going to be a problem for you. I might be able to help.

Class website:  I maintain my own website (not part of D2L) where I post course handouts and information at:  www.tomatchison.net.     The online course readings will be linked here.  Bookmark this site and consult it frequently. It is your best source of up-to-date information about this class.

Please make sure your Metro State email account is working and check regularly for class related emails

Please have the assigned readings with you for our Zoom class each week

Please keep copies of all the work you hand in.

Coursework      

Reading assignments
I expect you to find time (several hours) to do the reading for each class and to come prepared to discuss it.  Come to class ready to say what you found interesting, what you found confusing, silly, or just plain wrong, what seemed to you to be the most important claims made, and what arguments or justifications were offered for those claims.

Reading summary and response papers

            20 % of your grade will be earned by submitting brief (1-2 pages, typed, double-spaced) responses to the readings for each class.  These must be uploaded to the appropriate D2L assignment folder (AKA dropbox) or emailed to me before class to get full credit.  Late response papers will earn half credit.  (If you must miss class, you can still get your response paper submitted on time for full credit.) Each week's paper should contain a (very) concise summary of each of the assigned readings for the week along with a response: whatever questions, objections, observations and/or reactions you have. I will not grade these (or even return them consistently), but I will reject any that do not seem to be based on a reasonably conscientious reading of the assignment for that week. You can miss one or two of these and still earn an ‘A’ for this part of the course work, but missing more will be penalized on the following schedule: 85% completed = A; 70% = B; 60% = C; 50% = D; less than 50% = F. I will also notice and reward particularly perceptive or thoughtful response papers.

Position Papers
At approximately 5 week intervals you will be asked to submit a 4-6 page position paper explaining and defending your position on some ethical question or issue connected to the topics we have studied in the preceding third of the course.  See the schedule of assignments on the website for due dates.  Detailed instructions for each assignment will be made available later.  (Last year’s assignments are available now and will give you a good idea of the kind of thing I will be asking you to do.)

Class discussion
Most weeks we will have guided small group discussion projects.  The purpose of these projects is to open discussion and to focus it on particular issues. They are also intended to be "mini-labs" in which to practice the skills of careful reading and evaluation of reasoning.  The projects are done in class in groups of 3-5 and take roughly 20-45 minutes to complete.  Each group should keep notes on its discussion, sign the notes and hand them in at the end of each class session. [For our Zoom classes the group’s recorder will need to email the report to me and make sure everybody’s name gets on the report.] Often groups will also report orally on their discussions.
If you miss a discussion project, you should get hold of the instructions from my website, write out responses to the questions on your own, and hand them in as soon as you can.  10% of your grade will be determined by the number of discussion projects you complete satisfactorily (on the same schedule as the response papers above.)

10% of your grade will also be determined by my evaluation of the quality of your participation in class discussions.  Just showing up and paying attention earns a C for this component; occasionally making helpful contributions earns a B; regularly making helpful contributions earns an A.  Helpful contributions include: asking pertinent questions, answering questions asked by the instructor or by other students, expressing your views about the texts or topics we are discussing, responding (relevantly and respectfully) to the views expressed by others.

Groundrules for class discussion       
In my view, high quality class discussion is informed  by careful reading of assigned texts, respectful  of the other participants, relevant  to the issues we are trying to discuss and thoughtful  in that points are made or questions are raised that help us move toward greater understanding.  I believe the following guidelines help foster this kind of discussion:

• Come to class with the reading done and some ideas in mind;
• Be willing to say what you really think even if it might be unpopular or not what the teacher wants to hear    
• Never  demean or "put down" others for their perceptions or opinions, but honestly express disagreement with or confusion about what they say;
• Speak from your own experience—don’t presume to speak for others;
• Be sensitive to what we don't  know about each other—don’t assume that we all share certain experiences or perceptions;
• Don’t take up more than your fair share of the time available for discussion.  Remember that some people need a longer pause than others do to feel like there is space to enter the conversation. If you are the sort of person who tends to jump in quickly, and you have already spoken on a topic, maybe wait a bit before you jump in again.

Grading criteria
I try hard to base my evaluation of your work on your understanding of the reading, the quality of your reasoning and questioning, and the clarity and effectiveness of your expression of your thoughts, not on whether I agree with your ethical ideas and positions.

Time commitment outside of class
In accordance with Metropolitan State University guidelines, I've designed this course with the expectation that students will do 2-3 hours of course-related work outside of class for every hour spent in class.  In other words, you should expect to spend 6-10 hours a week outside of class working on this course. 

Needed reading and writing skills
Although there are no specific prerequisites for this course, it is an upper-division philosophy course, intended for students who have completed at least 30 credits of college-level courses.  This means I assume you have the following reading and writing skills, and assignments are made with this expectation in mind:

• Ability to read and summarize the main points of analytical, abstract material such as Supreme Court decisions and academic essays;
• Ability to include appropriate citations of quoted and paraphrased sources in academic writing;
• Ability to construct short, analytical essays including stating and supporting a thesis, presenting and addressing objections to your thesis, and drawing conclusion
• Ability to edit written work well enough to eliminate most errors in grammar, punctuation and spelling.

If you do not have these skills, it will be difficult for you to earn a good grade in this class.

Course Policies

                       
Students with disabilities
It is the policy and practice of the university to create inclusive learning environments. If there are aspects of the instruction or design of this course that result in barriers to your inclusion or to accurate assessment of achievement—such as time-limited exams, inaccessible web content, or the use of non-captioned videos—please notify the instructor as soon as possible. Students are also welcome to contact the Center for Accessibility Resources.
The Center for Accessibility Resources is located in New Main, room L223.  Phone number is 651-793-1549 and email is Accessibility.Resources@metrostate.edu.

Attendance
I do not require attendance per se, but part of your grade is determined by your prticipation in discussion projects and general class discussion.  So, when you are in class, contribute to the discussion and please be sure your name is on your small group's discussion report and that the report gets turned in.  When you miss a class, get the instructions for the discussion project, write out answers on your own and turn them in.  I strongly advise regular attendance (and prompt completion of missed discussion projects), because the material in this course is relatively difficult and confusing, and few students are able to do well on the position papers without the explanations and practice provided in class.

Late work
Weekly summary and response papers must be turned in at (or before) the beginning of class to receive full credit.  Late summary and response papers will receive half credit. In fairness to students who turn their position papers in on time, I will subtract one grade (e.g., B+ to B) for each day that a position paper is late.  Of course, students with medical or other emergencies may avoid these penalties. Requests for extensions on assignment due dates should be submitted prior to the due date. All requests will be reviewed on an individual, case-by-case basis and may include consultation with the Center for Accessibility Resources.

Incompletes
Incompletes are generally considered when students experience unexpected and/or significant barriers late in the semester. Requests for an incomplete grade will be determined on an individual, case-by-case basis and will normally be available only for students who have completed most of the course work.

Plagiarism
All work submitted for this course must be your own.  Plagiarism is the academic ‘sin’ of presenting someone else’s work as your own.  It is plagiarism if you copy something verbatim (word for word) from a published source, from the Internet, from ChatGPT or from another student.  It is still plagiarism if you rearrange, paraphrase, condense, or summarize someone else’s work (or the product of an AI tool) without making clear to your reader what is your contribution and what is taken from your source. If the exact wording comes from your source, then use quotation marks.  If the idea comes from someone else, give him or her credit for it. The way to do this is to cite your sources.  There is a clear and detailed explanation of various forms of plagiarism and of proper citation practices at http://cmsw.mit.edu/writing-and-communication-center/avoiding-plagiarism.  I will give a grade of ‘F’ to any student who submits plagiarized work for this course.   

Drop date, Tuition Refunds, and Academic Standing
Withdrawing from courses after the drop deadline (Friday, August 28  by midnight) will result in a ‘W’ on your record and may bring your completion rate below the ratio required to remain in  good academic standing (66.66%).  It will also eliminate any possibility of a refund of the tuition you have paid and this may have an impact on your financial aid.  My advice is to determine quickly whether or not this is the right course for you and to drop before that deadline, if it is not.  This is an academically demanding class with a relatively heavy schedule of reading and writing assignments.  In addition some of the readings are relatively difficult.  If your reading and writing skills are not up to this challenge, or if you do not have 6-10 hours per week to devote to completing these assignments, I urge you to drop this class before the end of the week, so you can get your money back.

The following information is now required to be included in syllabi by the University:

Catalog Learning Outcomes (course specific):

1. Compare and contrast major moral theories and applied professional codes specific to information ethics.
2. Apply, at an advanced collegiate level, the resulting understandings to an analysis of the moral dilemmas inevitably facing all members of the information community, from information technology professionals to citizen concerned to contribute to the shaping of information policies.
3. Assess case studies, comparing various professional codes of ethics with accounts developed in the course, focusing on issues such as privacy, surveillance and data mining, freedom of speech, copyright, computer crime and abuse, justice in access to information, the political and social significance of the Internet, and so on.
4. Focus most acutely on the centrality of justification for claims made in these accounts.
5. Use the work of the course to reflect on personal beliefs and attitudes about these central issues, and to construct ways, as a citizen concerned about the ways in which information technology is changing our lives, to act on those beliefs.

GELS (Transfer Curriculum) Learning Outcomes:

Goal 06 - Humanities/Fine Arts

1. Articulate an informed personal reaction to works in the arts and humanities.
2. Understand those works as expressions of individual and human values within an historical and social context.
3. Demonstrate awareness of the scope and variety of works in the arts and humanities.
4. Respond critically to works in the arts and humanities.

Goal 09 - Ethical/Civic Resp

1. Understand and apply core concepts (e.g. politics, rights and obligations, justice, liberty) to specific issues.
2. Analyze and reflect on the ethical dimensions of legal, social, and scientific issues.
3. Examine, articulate, and apply their own ethical views.
4. Recognize the diversity of political motivations and interests of others.
5. Identify ways to exercise the rights and responsibilities of citizenship.

University Non-Attendance and Reporting Policy and Procedure
The purpose of the Non-Attendance and Reporting Policy is to ensure Federal Title IV regulations are adhered to with respect to a student’s enrollment level for the purpose of calculating and paying financial aid.  While Metropolitan State University is not required to take attendance, Federal Title IV financial aid regulations require a procedure to establish that students have attended, at a minimum, one day of class for each course in which the student’s enrollment status was used to determine eligibility for the Pell Grant Program.  In addition, the university needs to determine a last date of attendance for those students who receive all failing grades or unofficially withdraw.
Attendance is defined based on course delivery mode. A student is “in attendance” if he or she meets the following conditions before the end of the second week of the course:
•      Classroom Courses – the student is present in the classroom.
•      Online Courses –the student submits at least one academically relevant assignment
•      Independent Studies – the student contacts the instructor or submits at least one academically relevant assignment.