University Distinguished Professor of Philosophy and Business Administration University of Kansas

It is an honor to have been chosen the first Bell Atlantic Visiting Professor in Business Ethics and Information Technology, and a pleasure to be here to inaugurate the professorship. Bentley College has always been in the forefront of business ethics. The college's Center for Business Ethics was one of the first established in the world. As the home of the Ethics Officer Association, the center continues its pioneering work. And it is now leading us into the new millennium as signified by this new professorship. Where business ethics is heading - what the next stage of business ethics should be - is the topic of my remarks today.

The fact that we are entering the information age is a truism, yet exactly what that means is understood differently by different people. The extent to which we have entered the Information age is hinted at by the Y2K phenomenon. Correcting the Y2K problem will cost more than $600 billion dollars worldwide. This shows the extent to which business has integrated and become dependent on computer technology. We shall come to realize on January 1, 2000, all the little places where date-sensitive information has entered our lives in ways that we have forgotten.

As we enter this new age, we will face new ethical and business issues. I shall briefly present some thoughts about these issues in seven theses that I hope we can pursue in questions and comments from you in the interactive portion of this presentation.

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