Listen to episode 5 of Digital Pilgrims
Space And Time Unbound: The latest episode of our podcast series is out.
In Episode 5 of our podcast series we explore how digital technology has unfettered humanity from the constraints of time and space. Witness the emergence of a new zeitgeist as networks expand our reality and accelerate the pace of change.
We investigate what constitutes an era, and whether we stand at the dawn of a new age defined by global interconnection and rapid innovation. We consider how to navigate uncertainty, find purpose and forge a shared destiny in times that never stand still.
https://open.spotify.com/episode/3ip3ZGTutzd7ADEl9ewG3H?si=3fc8e22f6a884ef3
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Read the episode transcript right here:
Episode 5: Digital Zeitgeist
What defines a historical period? Do we indeed have the ability to observe and describe the processes we are experiencing? Once again, in the face of uncertainty, we look to history. In order to think about the confusion we feel today, it is interesting to consider the collective notion of Zeitgeist, that is, the shared way in which a society perceives and understands phenomena. This set of shared ideas and social agreements through which we explain our surroundings and according to which we make decisions remains relatively constant throughout a given period.
However, it may be that the Zeitgeist changes, or a new Zeitgeist emerges, thanks to a discovery of such magnitude that it changes our perception of reality. Something like that could change the world in two directions: on the one hand, our prior ideas about the universe could be reshuffled in order to make sense of this new information; on the other, this new conception could change our future interventions in the world and the ways in which we transform it.
The term Zeitgeist comes from German and concentrates the meaning of a “spirit of the times,” materializing a series of philosophical debates on this topic. It refers to a social property that affects people in disparate socioeconomic circles and even from different generations. It is a set of ideas that surpasses the context of each individual and is shared by all of society. The mere passage of time is not enough to transform it, but various social factors can give rise to a change at that level. For example, there are technological leaps forward that have the ability to alter the Zeitgeist of a particular historical period. This new Zeitgeist can arise gradually in society due to a triggering event.
On the other hand, we could think of the Zeitgeist as springing from other, even more permanent and stable, ideas: those that explain what the universe is, who we are, and how everything began. This set of responses that we can associate, according to each historical period, with religion, science, and other traditions of thought that explain “the beginning and the purpose” is referred to as a cosmogony. A historical period’s cosmogony is made up of a combination of knowledge and perception. It has a social effect on the Zeitgeist but also an individual expression. We use this collective knowledge to define territoriality, that is, we give shape and meaning to the part of the universe we inhabit. We are probably unable to consciously describe our cosmogony while it is being developed because we cannot clearly see its borders.
Reviewing history allows us to identify certain collective moods for each historical period that transversally intertwine apparently disjointed movements and occurrences in such diverse spheres as science, art, commerce, politics, or daily life. This kind of underlying sensitivity weaves a way of existing in the world and understanding reality through individual stitches that are invisible to people living at the time and only reveal their design over the course of decades or centuries. That design is a cosmogony, which is subconsciously shared and builds the interpretive framework through which we interact with the world.
Is it possible to identify a particular Zeitgeist in our current historical period? Is digital technology relevant in characterizing it? Despite differences in age, socioeconomic conditions, and access to technology for different people, we can argue that our entire world and our lives are affected by our relationship to digital technology. Its development seems to mark a turning point. Many of us can think back and remember moments in our own lives in which we became aware of our dependence on the digital world: the time we lost hours’ worth of work because we had not backed up our data, that time our Internet connection was interrupted at a critical moment, the times we left the house without a cell phone. Others, who were born when the Digital Environment had already been developed, feel that being without Internet today is like being without electricity. At the community level, we can identify occasions on which this need began entering our social life: the arrival of computers in our homes and offices, the generalization of online shopping, the transition from dial-up connections to broadband, the first cell phones, instant messaging without signing in and out, etc.
In the late 1990s, reality was very different in countries around the world, but we shared a sensation of always knowing what was happening in any corner of the planet. The process of globalization was an event that broke down spatial and temporal barriers, allowing us to feel in some way part of a larger community, affected by the same problems. On a daily basis, we discussed the news fro m other cities, elections in other countries, and the weather on other continents. We were reaching the end of the century, and that gave rise to worldwide anticipation. However, one small detail triggered a fear that traveled round the globe.
Programmers, who had been developing their field at an incredible rate during the last forty years, had been using two digits to signify the year, assuming that the beginning was “19,” as it had been for a hundred years. At the end of year “99,” automated programs would begin the year “00,” which machines would interpret as 1900. This small informatics error, or bug, called Y2K was duly prevented thanks to an enormous effort that included a worldwide investment equivalent to 214 billion euros in today’s value. The bug had no serious consequences for people or institutions, but it had all of humanity on edge for more than a year.
At that time, we thought that on January 1st, all computers might fail. And what was the problem with that? By 1999, computers ran all social systems: transportation, finance, communications, mass media, and a large portion of archives, to name just a few examples. Less than fifty years after the invention of the chip, humanity faced the possibility of all such devices in the world failing, and fear spread. Twenty years after the first commercial that said the microprocessor “affects everyone’s lives,” we felt in our bones the possibility of that supposed tool spinning out of control. We had the clear feeling that we were a global community, going through the same thing. At the same time, we made our relationship to technology concrete. Something in our community’s Zeitgeist was changing.
Elements like these, which are so important that they transform both systems of production and society, impact the way in which we understand reality. Indeed, what changes is the dialectical and constructive relationship between the world and the perception of the people within it. In other words, changing the world modifies the way we perceive it and, in turn, our actions within it.
In line with the Gestalt school of thought, developed in Germany in the early 20th century, the course of history can be understood as a spiral, that is, cyclical progress that returns to previous moments but in different positions, like concentric circles that move forward as they extend, without overlapping. The Zeitgeist, defined in part by the technical capabilities of each moment, responds to the distance between those cycles: the capacity to move through similar events but from another place. These changes can be read as society’s return to a known place, but with the ability to experience it from a different point of view, through the lens of a new perception.
Every culture, then, produces its own way of understanding and explaining the world based on its knowledge and the capacities allowed by its technology. Does this mean that technology can alter the Zeitgeist? It appears this is the case. Can it go even further and provide elements of cosmogonic importance? A new understanding of reality motivates humanity to look for another model of beliefs and comprehension of the universe they inhabit. We could relate this to a change in Zeitgeist, but when the transformation is deeper and changes our conception of the universe and people’s place within it, we are dealing with cosmogonic changes.
Thanks to the distance granted by time, we can see the process of cosmogonic changes throughout the centuries and in different cultures. Human perception of the universe changes due to scientific discoveries, artistic and social movements, etc. For example, in the Middle Ages, the idea of God and belief in His existence were central to the system and were used to organize a worldview. Beginning in the Renaissance, humanity came to be the bar by which things were measured and the central organizing element. By the 19th century, humanity gave way to the atom. The idea of that miniscule particle colored our perception of the universe and anchored us in matter, in space-time. Now, we find ourselves facing the proliferation of a different tiny particle: the bit, whose characteristics give rise to the Digital Environment with which we are forging an ever more interdependent relationship. Indeed, we have the sensation that we are moving beyond the limitations of matter. How does our perception of the world and the universe change once we have discovered a new environment we can inhabit?
In the next episode
Delve into the past to uncover the secrets of the future and discover whether we’re living in a new Renaissance or total chaos.
