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Contents : Epistemic Value Theory and Information Ethics DON FALLIS School of Information Resources University of Arizona 1515 East First Street Tucson AZ 85719 USA E-mail: fallis@email.arizona.edu Abstract. Three of the major issues in information ethics intellectual property speech regulation and privacy concern the morality of restricting people s access to certain information. Consequently policies in these areas have a signi cant impact on the amount and types of knowledge that people acquire. As a result epistemic considerations are critical to the ethics of information policy decisions (cf. Mill 1978 1859 ). The fact that information ethics is a part of the philosophy of information highlights this important connection with epistemology. In this paper I illustrate how a value-theoretic approach to epistemology can help to clarify these major issues in information ethics. However I also identify several open questions about epistemic values that need to be answered before we will be able to evaluate the epistemic consequences of many information policies. Key words: epistemic value theory epistemology information ethics intellectual property philosophy of information privacy social epistemology speech regulation 1. Introduction 1.1. INFORMATION ETHICS AND PHILOSOPHY OF INFORMATION Information ethics is an area of applied ethics that addresses policy decisions of the following sort:1 Should we adopt strong intellectual property legislation such as the Digital Millennium Copyright Act or the Sony Bono Copyright Term Extension Act. (cf. Hoffmann 2001 pp. 49 54) Should there be any government regulation of speech (cf. Mill 1978 1859 pp. 15 52 Goldman 1999 pp. 213 217) Should the privacy rights of library patrons be absolute (cf. Garoogian 1991 p. 231) The information policy decisions addressed by information ethics typically have to do with restrictions on people s access to information.2 For example the exclusive rights of creators to control their intellectual property often have the effect of restricting access to information.3 Also whenever a government regulates speech it is restricting its citizens access to information. Finally protecting people s privacy (e.g. by not informing FBI agents about what suspected terrorists have checked out from the library see Garoogian 1991 p. 218) typically involves restricting access to personal information. According to Luciano Floridi (2002 p. 138) the philosophy of information is concerned with how information should be adequately created processed manMinds and Machines 14: 101 117 2004. 2004 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands. 102 DON FALLIS aged and used. Thus information ethics clearly falls within the scope of the philosophy of information (cf. Floridi forthcoming). Information ethics however is not the only area of philosophy that is concerned with how information should be adequately created processed managed and used. In particular there are important connections between epistemology and the philosophy of information (cf. Floridi forthcoming). Accessing information is clearly not the same as acquiring knowledge but the rst is typically valuable precisely because it is an effective means to the second (cf. Goldman 1999 pp. 3 4 Fallis 2002 p. 1).4 Thus information policy decisions that involve restrictions on people s access to information can have a profound effect on knowledge acquisition. As a result information ethics is unique among areas of applied ethics in having an important epistemological component. And seeing information ethics as part of the philosophy of information has the bene t of highlighting this epistemological component. 1.2. ETHICS AND EPISTEMOLOGY Many non-consequentialist arguments have been given for particular information policies.5 For example a popular non-consequentialist argument for intellectual property rights is based on John Locke s theory of property rights (cf. Hettinger 1989 pp. 36 37). Also a popular non-consequentialist argument for privacy rights is based in the autonomous nature of human beings (cf. Benn 1984). However most people (even many non-consequentialists) think that what the right social policy is depends at least partly on the consequences that it has. In this paper I will investigate the prospects for a consequentialist evaluation of information policies. Because information policies can have a profound effect on knowledge acquisition evaluating their epistemic consequences is an especially important part of a consequentialist evaluation of such policies (cf. Goldman 1999 p. 6). For example the most common arguments for intellectual property rights appeal to consequentialist considerations (cf. Hettinger 1989 p. 47). Also John Stuart Mill (1978 1859 pp. 15 52) famously argues against government regulation of speech on the grounds that it has

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