information

Article
Culture and Society in the Digital Age
Ilya Levin 1, * and Dan Mamlok 2

1 Department of Mathematics, Science and Technology Education, School of Education, Tel Aviv University,
Tel Aviv-Yafo 69978, Israel
2 Department of Educational Policy and Administration, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv-Yafo 69978, Israel;
danmamlok@tauex.tau.ac.il
* Correspondence: ilia1@tauex.tau.ac.il

Abstract: This paper aims to examine a theoretical framework of digital society and the ramifications
of the digital revolution. The paper proposes that more attention has to be paid to cultural studies as
a means for the understanding of digital society. The approach is based on the idea that the digital
revolution’s essence is fully manifested in the cultural changes that take place in society. Cultural
changes are discussed in connection with the digital society’s transformations, such as blurring the
distinction between reality and virtuality and among people, nature, and artifacts, and the reversal
from informational scarcity to abundance. The presented study develops a general model of culture.
This model describes the spiritual, social, and technological facets of culture. Such new phenomena as
individualization, transparisation, and so-called cognification (intellectualization of the surrounding
environment) are suggested as the prominent trends characterizing the above cultural facets.

Keywords: digital revolution; digital society; digital culture; information technologies; web presence;
online-identity; social media







Citation: Levin, I.; Mamlok, D.

1. Introduction
Culture and Society in the Digital
Age. Information 2021, 12, 68. We live in a dynamic world, which is continuously and rapidly changing. The ubiquity
https://doi.org/10.3390/ of information communication technologies (ICTs) has transformed the human experience.
info12020068 The influence of current digital technologies on the lives of individuals and communities is
evident, and one may claim, unprecedented. Over the past three decades, technological
Academic Editor: Arkaitz Zubiaga convergence of communications and computing has evolved and flourished. The internet,
and David Bawden the World Wide Web (WWW), and mobile communications have become an intrinsic
Received: 19 December 2020 element of today’s society and each of its members’ lives. Our everyday life experiences
Accepted: 2 February 2021 have been immersed in a new reality, which is significantly dissimilar from the habitual
Published: 5 February 2021 realities in which people have lived for thousands of years.
It is evident that the widespread use of ICTs platforms constructs and arranges virtual
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral cyberspace that has become an integral part of people’s existence. Yet, cyberspace does
with regard to jurisdictional claims in not replace the habitual reality but rather supplements it and becomes its integral part.
published maps and institutional affil-
However, perhaps the most crucial change relates to the replacement of the traditional
iations.
concept of the human being as a separate entity by a new ontological self-perception of
human beings as an information organism, interconnected with the entire world. The
information revolution has brought the capacity to easily communicate with every other
person and to access myriad forms of information and knowledge without any concerns.
Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. In addition, as a result of significant advances in artificial intelligence (AI) [1,2], today’s
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. digital technologies are becoming increasingly smart and personalized. The interaction of
This article is an open access article almost every human experience is mediated through a sophisticated shell connected to big
distributed under the terms and
data [3]. This shell provides a person with context-oriented information prepared exclu-
conditions of the Creative Commons
sively for that individual, which is necessary for making a wide variety of decisions. Thus,
Attribution (CC BY) license (https://
the principles of human behavior, which mostly consist of sequences of these decisions,
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/
have been changed. Namely, because human conditions are changing, their worldviews
4.0/).

Information 2021, 12, 68. https://doi.org/10.3390/info12020068 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/information

Information 2021, 12, 68 2 of 13

are contingent on both their immediate (physical) and virtual spaces. For that reason, the
central question posed in the Onlife Manifesto [4] is “What does it mean to be human in a
hyper-connected world?”
In our paper, we explore the ramifications of the hyper-connected world on human
experience by focusing on the digital culture phenomenon. We consider culture as a
kind of information shell, which unlike nature, is a human creation. The informational
essence of the concept of culture serves as a point of departure for this paper. We aim
to identify prominent cultural features of the digital society. We propose a model that
illustrates various phenomena and processes of the digital society, both those discussed in
the scientific literature and those reflected from everyday experiences.
There are several known approaches to studying the digital shift. It is considered as
a technological [5], or post-industrial [6] revolution, a transition to an information [7] or
network [8,9] society, and a revolution in human consciousness [4]. All of these approaches
complement each other to create a whole picture of the essential phenomenon of this epoch.
Among the most important contributions to examining the digital turn through the
lens of cultural studies is the work of Dan Sperber. In Explaining Culture: A Naturalistic
Approach [10], he proposes a new understanding of culture. In brief, Sperber suggests
that culture is not a space inhabited by people, but rather a network whose outlines
allow exploring how individuals’ behaviors create sustainable, long-lasting patterns. This
interpretation of culture is used by Acerbi [11] for defining digital society’s culture.
A more skeptical and dystopian understanding of digital culture is offered by Bernard
Stiegler, who suggests that current digital culture, fueled by the big corporations, degen-
erates and disrupts social life. The obsession of the big corporations on fostering con-
sumerism, using seductive and sophisticated algorithms, redefines human experience [11].
Akin to the critique of Horkheimer and Adorno, in their critique about the culture indus-
try [12], Stiegler warns the current nihilist zeitgeist entails the loss of knowledge and the
trivialization of intellectual and scientific knowledge. Stiegler describes digital technology
as a pharmakon, a Greek term that can be understood both as a cure and a poison [11].
The intrinsic tension of digital technology is reflected, on the one hand, by its promise to
provide more opportunities to human culture, but on the other hand, by its destructive
powers. Such powers endanger hermeneutic knowledge, draining off one’s capacity to re-
flect upon experiences and breaking social solidarities. The proliferation of misinformation
and the growth of divisive and antagonist political spheres are the epitomes of Stiegler’s
warning of living in an age of disruption.
Drawing on Stiegler’s approach, Ganaele Langlois explicates the fine relationships
between the embodied self in the digital networks and the technoscientific rationality
that governs those networks. She contends that in light of the transformation of human
experience, it is important to critically observe how the self is mediated and recreated
through online spaces. This claim is important for the care of the self and for understanding
how digital technology has restructured culture and society [13]. The restructuring of
society and culture can be related to the transformation of the human experience. In this
respect, Jonas Schwarz argues that the immersion of technical means in everyday life, there
“are no purely ‘social’ phenomena; all human activity involves some degree of technical
integration” [14].
The integration of online spaces in human culture is further discussed in Alberto
Acerbi’s book, Cultural Evolution in the Digital Age, where he portrays several dimensions of
human experienced that have been transformed as a result of the communication revolution.
Acerbi complicates the ways in which different phenomena such as the availability of
knowledge, the opacity of interaction among unknown users, and the fluidity of knowledge
(which he compares to the Chinese Whispers game) has transformed our sense of being [15].
In light of the growing interest in the ways in which digital environments trans-
form human culture, this paper proposes a theoretical approach based on cultural studies
of society’s digital transformation. Our examination is based on cultural-historical ap-
proaches [16] and particularly aims to complicate Luciano Floridi’s theoretical framework,
Information 2021, 12, 68 3 of 13

as introduced in the Onlife Manifesto [4] This paper will focus on some major transforma-
tions in human experience and social culture. We argue that different dimensions that are
examined in this paper can deepen the understanding of digital society’s culture.
The paper is organized as follows. The web presence concept, which is essential for
the proposed approach, is introduced in Section 2. Section 3 discusses the fundamental
digital transformations of society. The proposed theoretical model of culture and the digital
society’s culture are introduced and discussed in Section 4. We conclude in Section 5 by
discussing how cognification radically changes the human experience, and how it reshapes
one’s worldview.

2. Web Presence
Before elaborating on the different dimensions of society’s digital transformation,
it is essential to recognize the ontological shift we have experienced since the advent of
the internet. The information revolution is not limited to a more advanced technological
solution for attaining knowledge or completing various daily tasks. Rather, it signals a
shift in the ways in which we, as individuals and societies, understand the very basic
idea of what it is meant “to be.” As such, our new ontological state can be portrayed, at
least to some extent, as the information organism. We call this new ontological state “web
presence,” referring to the shift of humans’ presence as perceived in hyperconnectivity
times, compared to humans’ presence in the pre-digital era.
In its first years, cyberspace was perceived (and de-facto served) as a convenient
communication technology platform. In particular, even an interface (browser), which
converted the internet into the World Wide Web (WWW), was perceived (and even now is
often conceived) only as hypertext, and just being more advanced and more convenient
to use than a book. Yet, it seems that focusing primarily on technological achievement
and its benefits glosses over the intricate socio-cultural layers that significantly influence
humans’ everyday lives. Indeed, until the emergence of Web 2.0, the hegemony of a more
reductionist approach was rooted in the assumption that the internet served as the global
storage of information.
Much of the substantial change of how we perceive the meaning of what it means “to
be” in the digital age relates to Web 2.0., which has profoundly changed the user experience.
In brief, moving from a one-way relationship (the user can seek or attain information) to
a two-ways-relationship (In addition to access various types of content, one can produce
content), has transformed user experience from being passive to active [17]. In addition,
the widespread of smartphones have shifted the notions of space and time, vis-à-vis the
ways people conduct their daily lives. The immediacy of communication and the constant
availability are parts of the cultural change that we experience in the digital age. The
embodiment of digital technology thereof is indispensable not only from how one conducts
his everyday life but also from how one’s ontological existence is constituted.
William Mittchell [18], an American educator and architect, described the above trans-
formation. According to him, the proliferation of the internet and the emergence of artificial
intelligence have influenced how people understand their own identity. Mitchell suggests
that the separation between man and machine is not valid any longer. Comprehensive vir-
tual networks are practically fusing with the human being on a biological level, leading to
awareness—the self as a cyborg dispersed in space. In terms of how time is conceived, the
hyper-connectivity coupled with efficient technologies led to the expedition of a plethora
of actions. In terms of space, one can work, communicate, consume, and conduct many
other actions from almost every place on the globe.
Inevitably, those changes reshaped how people interact among themselves, with
nature, and in how they recognize their own self-conceptions. Among the many qual-
ities of cyberspace, it involves a degree of unpredictability. Artificial intelligence, for
example, stipulates new modes of action, and as result, reshapes humans’ experience [19].
In addition, because living in a digital environment is a relatively new phenomenon, the
history of our new cyber habitat is concise. For that reason, digital society’s current state
Information 2021, 12, 68 4 of 13

is often called “digital feudalism,” [20] as estimated similar to the corresponding state
of the early medieval period expressing by this belief in the approaching era of Digital
Enlightenment [21].
In contrast to other emerging technologies (e.g., nanotechnologies, gene engineering),
cyberspace is relevant to everybody since it is our new reality, i.e., everybody lives or will
live in it shortly. Cyberspace has a direct influence on everyone’s life. The ubiquity of
digital technologies, social media, and the network, in general, have influenced almost
every domain in everyday life. Because cyberspace has played a more dominant role in
humans’ lives, it has reshaped our humans’ ontological state and can be understood as
forming a networked consciousness. The new, digital culture is being formed in namely
such a new reality.
Thus, the new reality cannot be seen as the old one, just supplemented by cyberspace.
“Systematic research shows that physical space and cyberspace interpenetrate as people
actively surf their networks online and off-line”, as reported by Barry Wellman [22]. The
new, digital environment, combining reality and virtuality, is very different from our usual
natural reality. It reconceptualizes how people consider their transition into the digitized
world that change conceptions of who people are and how they engage with ourselves
and others.
In a specific sense, culture, which can be described as the second nature of a human
being, has reached a new level and a new layer in the form of interactive virtual space.
In a digital society, a person does not only create a new objective world as it occurs in the
“second” nature (culture) but also creates objects of a different nature (e.g., networked,
communicative, and multimedia). For that reason, some scholars tend to consider digital
society’s culture as a “third” nature [23].

3. Transformations of the Digital Society

Determining the essence of a digital reality requires us to recognize the basic transfor-
mations of human experience in digital times. These transformations were first formulated
in Floridi’s Onlife Manifesto [4]. The manifesto foresees and reviews the major transfor-
mations of the digital society. In our paper, we discuss the following three forms of
transformation—the blurring of the distinction between reality and virtuality, the blurring
of the distinction between human, machine, and nature, and the reversal from information
scarcity to information abundance.

3.1. Blurring the Distinction between Reality and Virtuality

The dualism of “reality/virtuality” is grounded in human history, which can be traced
back to Plato’s allegory of the cave [24]. The distinction between reality and virtuality
in different historical epochs reflected societal norms, values, conventions, and beliefs.
For example, in the Middle Ages, which was characterized mainly by its religion and
the arts, the virtual component dominated, whereas, in the Industrial Age, the reification
took place. While each historical era was based on different assumptions about reality, the
aforementioned dualism has always been endured.
When considering the issue more in-depth, from a philosophical point of view, the
traditional real/virtual duality is well-known as the distinction between body and mind,
between fantasies and actions. The duality has become a fundamental dichotomy of how
we think and act [25].
The phenomenon of web presence supplemented has changed the hitherto common
perceptions of physical reality. The inexorability of blurring the distinction between reality
and virtuality is palpable. In many everyday situations today, it becomes difficult to
identify the difference between reality and virtuality. It may even be claimed that there is
no reason to limit our worldviews to these two possibilities. By blurring the distinction
between reality and virtuality, the digital transformation compromises our dualist forms of
thinking. It requires reinvigorating different ways of thinking (e.g., monism, a new dualism,
or pluralism), which would help individuals critically develop one’s worldview [4].
Information 2021, 12, 68 5 of 13

3.2. Blurring the Distinctions among People, Nature, and Artifacts

For most of human history, distinguishing artifacts from nature was a relatively un-
complicated task. Today, based on the significant advances in medicine and biotechnology,
humans and artifacts are becoming increasingly linked [4]. In addition, the extensive
integration of smart sensors in human life and the integration of the emerging technologies
of the internet of things (IoT) are blurring the distinction between humans and artifacts.
The intensive growth of a plurality of advanced artifacts, which are becoming an in-
tegral part of our natural environment, contradicts the traditional concept of nature.
The remarkable manifestation of the blurring “people, nature, and artifacts” is the emerging
integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into almost every domain of the life sphere, which
is considered as a total cognification of humans’ environment [26].
The digital transformation accelerates the blurring of the traditional divide.
The distinctions between the natural and artificial world are changing. As we consider
the various ramifications of the discussed blurring, it is crucial to ask: what is the impact
of the blurring on the human culture in general and the arts, literature, and education,
in particular?

3.3. The Reversal from Information Scarcity to Information Abundance

The third transformation refers to the abundance of information (data), which dras-
tically distinguishes the digital society from its predecessors [4]. Historically, there was
always a scarcity of access to information in previous times. Prior to the advent of the
internet, the encyclopedic utopia represented the omnipotence of knowledge. This premise
of the encyclopedic utopia is that knowledge serves as a normative compass, which directs
individuals and societies. The more we know, the better we act. Conversely, mistakes and
misconducts, according to this rationality, are associated with a lack of knowledge. In the
new digital reality, the most important condition for existence is not our knowledge but our
ability to pay attention. Information becomes abundant, similar to natural resources. Our
sense of limitlessness has shifted from natural resources to information. This significant
change is a direct consequence of the digital turn. Today, there are just a few kinds of
activities that do not generate the so-called digital shadow. For instance, the digital devices
we use leave a recorded trace of our interactions, online activities, and physical activities,
such as our coordinates, interests, tastes, purchases, locations, etc. The scale of such in-
formation is globally growing exponentially. It is not to suggest that we should aspire to
return to the encyclopedic ideal of information. Rather, we contend that we must learn to
navigate the world of information. Clearly, this fundamental shift in our consciousness has
a significant impact on human culture. Our notions of what is information and knowledge
are changing. People strive to survive in a sea of information. However, we have to bear
in mind that this sea is not “clean”—inter alia, it includes various types of manipulated
data, information, and knowledge from unreliable sources, which must be accountable.
In turn, the informational abundance requires new filtering activities, such as, for example,
a digital curation [27].
The phenomenon of data abundance manifests in ubiquitous and unlimited access
to a huge amount of data. Today, there is an understanding that intensive and unlimited
growth of data leads to the fact that data dominate peoples’ lives. Data flows are becoming
the ontological basis of the surrounding reality. According to the emerging theory called
Dataism, “universe consists of data flows, and the value of any phenomenon or entity is
determined by its contribution to data processing” [28]. Whether the Dataism theory is
correct is an important research question. Yet, it is already clear that the informational
abundance-based transformation plays an essential role in forming a digital society.

4. Culture of Digital Society

The concept of culture includes various definitions. Edward Taylor suggested that
culture refers to the various modes of knowledge, beliefs, and ethical codes that consolidate
a society. Hershkovits referred to the ways in which humans create a society to become part
 dance-based transformation plays an essential role in forming a digital society.

4. Culture of Digital Society

The concept of culture includes various definitions. Edward Taylor suggested that
Information 2021, 12, 68 culture refers to the various modes of knowledge, beliefs, and ethical codes that consoli- 6 of 13
date a society. Hershkovits referred to the ways in which humans create a society to be-
come part of the environment. George Herbert Mead focused on the arrangement of
shared behaviors of people in society 29. Clifford Geertz related to the symbolic elements
ofofculture
the environment.
and the ways George Herbert
those symbolsMead focused
confer on the arrangement
socio-historical meanings of shared
30. Thebehaviors
sum of
of people in society [29]. Clifford Geertz related to the symbolic elements of culture and
symbols, habits, rules, artifacts, and other societal capabilities are qualities of human cul-
the ways those symbols confer socio-historical meanings [30]. The sum of symbols, habits,
ture.
rules, artifacts, and other societal capabilities are qualities of human culture.
Because culture is contingent upon human creation and its absence of nature, it is
Because culture is contingent upon human creation and its absence of nature, it is
unique to human beings. In contrast to human beings, transferring knowledge among an-
unique to human beings. In contrast to human beings, transferring knowledge among
imals from one generation to the next one is based on genetics. During life, the experience
animals from one generation to the next one is based on genetics. During life, the experience
accumulated by an animal is not inherited by his descendants; each generation starts to
accumulated by an animal is not inherited by his descendants; each generation starts to get
get its experiences “from scratch.” Therefore, the amount of information available to the
its experiences “from scratch.” Therefore, the amount of information available to the genus
genus does not increase from generation to generation.
does not increase from generation to generation.
With the emergence of culture, humans have a special form of storing and transmit-
With the emergence of culture, humans have a special form of storing and transmitting
ting knowledge absent from animals. It is fundamentally new and incomparably richer in
knowledge absent from animals. It is fundamentally new and incomparably richer in its
its possibilities
possibilities type
type of information
of information process.
process. In culture,
In culture, knowledge
knowledge is not encoded
is not encoded for genesfor but
genes butsystems.
for sign for sign systems.
ThoughtsThoughts
and notionsand expressed
notions expressed in these systems
in these systems are detached
are detached from the
from the individual,
individual, acquiring acquiring independent,
independent, non-personal
non-personal existence.existence. They become
They become social
social informa-
information, the bearer of which is not a separate individual but a social culture.
tion, the bearer of which is not a separate individual but a social culture. Unlike biological Unlike
biological
information,information, social information
social information expressed expressed in sign systems
in sign systems does notdoes not disappear
disappear with the
with the death of the individual. Culture forms a specifically human,
death of the individual. Culture forms a specifically human, extra-genetic “mechanism”extra-genetic “mech-
anism” of its inheritance—social
of its inheritance—social heredity.
heredity. On accountOn account of culture,
of culture, civilizations
civilizations can documentcan docu-and
ment
createand create
their their histories
histories throughout throughout
generations.generations.
Culture
Cultureisisthe
theinformational
informationalbasisbasisofofhuman
humansociety,
society,aavital
vitalcondition
conditionfor foritsitsexistence.
existence.
As such, culture is inseparable from the information. Apparently, in
As such, culture is inseparable from the information. Apparently, in the information the information (dig-
ital) society, cultural studies are of particular interest.
(digital) society, cultural studies are of particular interest.
One
Onewell-established
well-established presentation
presentation of ofhuman
humanculture
cultureis is
thethe
formform of “three-dimen-
of “three-dimensional
sional
spacespace of culture”
of culture” shown shown in Figure
in Figure 1 31.
1 [31,32].
Values

e Social Culture
l t ur
C u
al
ir i tu
Sp Regulatives

Technological
dg
e Culture
le
n ow
K

Culturalspace.
Figure1.1.Cultural
Figure space.

Thecultural
The culturalspace
space(Figure
(Figure1)
1)isisformed
formed by
by three
three axes—knowledge,
axes—knowledge, values,
values, and
and regula-
regu-
tions. Each couple of the axes forms a plane corresponding to one of the facets of
lations. Each couple of the axes forms a plane corresponding to one of the facets of human human
culture. The spiritual culture is represented by a plane correspondence between knowledge
and values axes; the values and regulations axes form a plan correspondence to the social
culture; the technological culture is represented between regulations and knowledge axes.
Within the cultural space, the facet of spiritual culture is usually identified as the most
influential on everyday life. This facet includes such cultural forms as religion, art, and
philosophy. A characteristic feature of all forms of spiritual culture is that they have a
combination of knowledge and values in the foreground. Spiritual culture is the “cognitive
and value facet” of the cultural space.
Similarly, the cultural space involves a set of cultural forms that determine the social
relations of people, and their interactions with society. This includes ethical, legal, and
Information 2021, 12, 68 7 of 13

political culture. These forms of culture reflect social values and ideals, and general
regulations of behavior, driven by the aspiration to them. This form of culture reflects
social relations, which can be defined as the social culture. In the cultural space, its domain
is placed within the “regulations” and “values” axis.
Finally, it is important to pay attention to the construction of technological culture.
In its broadest sense, it refers to a culture of mastering and processing of any material,
artifacts, performance, production, and designing various artifacts. Knowledge and regula-
tions are necessary and essential elements of the technological culture. Values are placed in
a second priority here. In the cultural space, the facet of technological culture lies in the
domains of knowledge and regulations axes.
In 2013, the above three-dimensional model was first applied to represent the digital
culture [33]. Recent advances in emerging technologies, especially AI and data science
progress [34], allow a more in-depth and more accurate representation of the digital age
culture. It was the starting point that initiated this paper. In the following section, we
present an updated model of the culture in today’s society.

4.1. Spiritual Culture of Digital Society

Spiritual culture, in general, is comprised of some distinctive features:
1. In contrast to technological and social culture, spiritual culture is not utilitarian.
It is a facet of culture that is distanced from what is known in everyday language as practice.
Spiritual culture is essentially unselfish. Its cornerstones are not benefiting or gain, but the
“joys of the spirit”—beauty, knowledge, and wisdom. People need it on their own, not for
the sake of solving any utilitarian problems;
2. In contrast to other facets of culture, spiritual culture provides people the most
creative freedom. Engaging in the spiritual culture is not contingent on utilitarian con-
siderations and practical considerations and can break away from reality, carrying away
on the wings of fantasy. The freedom of creativity is already manifested in ancient myths.
It also plays a significant role in religions. Unlimited space for creativity is the ground for
the creation of the arts;
3. Creative activity in spiritual culture involves a unique spiritual world created by
human thought’s power. The spiritual world is inimitably richer than the real world because
it includes images of unprecedented phenomena in addition to the physical sensations.
Even though the spiritual world is filled with a fictional representation of reality, it exists
by its laws and impacts our lives;
4. Spiritual culture is the most sensitive facet of culture, the most responsive to
external influences. Therefore, it is in constant tension and movement. Sensitivity and
responsiveness make it vulnerable and exposed.
The spiritual culture of a digital society is a unique phenomenon. First of all, it is
facilitated by its intrinsic connection with the virtual world of cyberspace. It is apparent
that as virtuality has become an integral component of life, the network presence, affects
humans’ spiritual culture. In our times, humans’ spiritual world has been immersed in
virtual cyberspace, and the hitherto balance of virtuality and reality has been changed.
It is manifested by the transformation of “blurring the boundaries of the real and virtual.”
The manifestation of the digital spiritual culture is reflected in the rapid growth of diverse
forms of humans’ activities in the network, including creating myriad kinds of texts, photos,
and videos of various contents and forms. Prior to the digital age, the production and
the publication of contents used to be strictly regulated and were based on a fundamental
distinction between the author and his/her readers or viewers. In the digital age, this
difference is obsolete, as everyone can be an author.
The non-utilitarian nature of spiritual culture has manifested itself in the digital age
in a very unexpected way. A considerable number of essential and high-quality content on
the network was created by people who did not need to invest money in its publication
process. One can recall how the internet, as a source of reliable knowledge was rejected
at the beginning of the 21st century because of the high cost of the project [26]. This grim
Information 2021, 12, 68 8 of 13

forecast of the internet was ultimately wrong and proved the deep connection between
human spiritual culture and the digital world.
The ease of accessibility to myriad kinds of information (e.g., news, literature, music,
scientific knowledge) has changed the nature of human experience—the ability of any
person (with access to the internet) to choose his or her desired content confers new
ways in which people construct their worldviews, their relationships with other, and their
understanding of what counts as being a fully human. The spiritual culture in a hyper-
connected world is individualized, and one may claim—decontextualized. This trend of
hyper individualization poses a problem for traditional societal structures, such as the
educational system, that is based on practices that standardize and unify teaching and
learning. We will elaborate on this issue in our discussion on digital society’s social culture
in the next section.
The spiritual culture in a hyper-connected world is composed of individuals’ predis-
positions, self-perceptions, and identities. Both types of “blurring” that were discussed in
Section 3 are manifested in a new network personality phenomenon. It affects the internal
spiritual world of a person and entails changes in the spiritual culture in general, such as
the arts, literature, and philosophy.
A human being forms his/her own network personality in cyberspace and includes
complex interactions with diverse network personalities and network communities.
A “virtual personality” of a person may be significantly different from his/her habit-
ual “real personality.” In her inclusive study, Sherry Turkle shows how the freedom to
create your own character on social media plays a major role in youths’ lives (e.g., by
making your own avatar) and reframe human relationships. She contends that while
self-presentation was always involved a degree of conflict, self-presentation in the digital
age is always mediated through social media [35]. Thus, it is evident that personalization
in cyberspace is a new phenomenon, which is connected with one of the most fundamental
questions of human culture—“who am I?” Socrates taught, “Know thyself!”, Petrarca
asked, “who are we, where are we from and where do we go?”. The problem of “what is a
human being?” is one of the recurrent open philosophical questions.
Personal identity online (PIO) [36,37] is a concept that elucidates how a person presents
oneself in cyberspace. The PIO characterizes a style of an individual’s behavior in the
network, which allows the person to form and exhibit her/his identity differently than
in reality. Personality is something that a person develops by him/herself, a model that
develops in her/his head, his/her individual identity. This model has evolved in certain
places: society, family, and culture.
In contemporary life, the distinction between reality and virtuality is blurred. The
emergence of virtual network life as an inseparable part of real life is significant for
personality formation. The most intimate thing that one can have—one’s own persons,
one’s own self—are being significantly affected by digital technologies [38].
In the 1980s and 1990s of the last century, the center of the formation of pioneer
ideas related to digital technologies in human life was the famous Media Lab. Its founder,
Nicholas Negroponte, expressed the first ideas regarding the digital personality in [39],
where he predicted humans moving toward an entirely digital society. Seymour Papert,
who worked in the Media Lab, and known as one of the forefathers of the idea of a digital
revolution in education [40], recognized the influences of personalizing a computer user
on the construction of one’s identity. According to his constructionist theory, creating a
user’s identity involves the replacement of the traditional unified curriculum with the
personally chosen content. Characterizing the personalization process, Papert used the
term “intimacy,” emphasizing the profoundly personal nature of learning environments or
so-called micro-worlds that one creates in the cognition process. The micro-worlds are free
of a social component, making them a pure element of the spiritual culture [41].
Papert’s personalization can be seen today as a critical feature of the spiritual culture
since it has manifested itself in a growing number of humans who live within personal
cultural micro-worlds. It is a direct consequence of our discussion on the transformation of
Information 2021, 12, 68 9 of 13

the digital society in Sub-Section 3.3—the transition to information abundance. Naturally,

the situation of information abundance has important implications for human spiritual
culture. The accessibility of the cultural wealth of humankind to every member of society
is undoubtedly an outstanding achievement. At the same time, this accessibility leads to
the individualization of human cultural space. People have the opportunity to choose the
content in their studies, work, and entertainment. The main feature of this choice is its
individuality. As a result, people find themselves in unique personal cultural micro-worlds,
formed according to their inclinations and personal priorities. The formation of micro-
worlds is accompanied, amplified, and actively supported by the emerging AI software,
which tailors to people with the desired content that “suits” them.
Indeed, the growing influence of AI on human experience merits in-depth examination
that cannot be captured in this paper. It would be fair to suggest that individualization
might be considered as the primary movement that characterizes the spiritual culture in
the digital age. As such, it raises some critical questions related to public life, and especially
to education, as it can lead to solipsistic rationality, which decontextualizes contents from
every life, and challenges the attempt to create a vibrant social culture, comprised of people
who develop mutual responsibility.

4.2. Social Culture of Digital Society

Social culture is defined by regulations, values, and ideals that determine people’s
behavior in society and their social interactions. The primary forms of social culture include
ethical, legal, and political culture. Social and spiritual cultures have a number of essential
differences, which are as follows:
1. A person can strive to achieve individual spiritual values, regardless of society’s
norms. Attaining spiritual values requires an independent effort from individuals since
they require a high degree of resilience against social practices and conventions. Artistic
masterpieces and new philosophical ideas are born in the minds of individuals, who in
some cases spend their whole lives without success, fighting for public recognition of the
value of their works. The values of social culture cannot be achieved alone. For example,
mercy, equality, humanity, law and order, democracy, and civil liberties are realized only
in people’s relations. It is impossible to inspire the public by remaining out of social
connections;
2. The products of spiritual culture are valuable in and of themselves, even if they
exist only in people’s imagination and are not translated into reality. Its higher values form
the heritage of the “mind and heart” of the individual. In contrast, social cultures’ values
and ideals are “designed” to implement them in “real” life. Society normalizes people and
requires its members to behave according to certain laws and ethical codes;
3. Spiritual culture is not utilitarian. It cannot establish norms of behavior in society
and ensure that the desired values will be implemented. At the same time, social culture
includes values and regulations, norms, rules of behavior, and interaction of people in
society aimed at their implementation. Compliance with these norms and regulations is
controlled by public opinion, law enforcement agencies, and the state;
The mentioned collectivity and specificity of social culture is most vividly expressed
in the digital society in the new dynamics of public consciousness formation. This point of
view has become, practically, generally accepted. A well-known example is the 2010 Arab
Spring, which is often referred to as the Tweeter Revolution, emphasizing the special impor-
tance of social media in shaping protest emotions and mobilizing protesters. However, one
thing is clear—social media are fundamentally very different from traditional mass media.
They are fast, dynamic, and, most importantly, personalized. This property of social media
is due to the fact that each member of the network is connected with “his/her” community,
which matches her/him and that she trusts. Today, there is a growing tendency to consume
everyday news through social media platforms, such as Facebook or Twitter [11].
A prominent feature in the network society is its dynamic nature and people’s ability
to be both consumers and content producers. Effective communication between people
Information 2021, 12, 68 10 of 13

requires fast responses to any networking event. Living in a hyper-intense society makes
delayed responses or reactions to contents irrelevant. The rationality of network society
renders the idea that effective communication cannot be attained unless there is constant
activity throughout the network. In this respect, the process of socialization has been
dramatically changed and plays a significant role in today’s network society. The net-
work’s social character contradicts the hierarchical models of communication, where the
principles of vertically arranged status and suppression dominate. The network converts
interaction between its users into regular social communication and brings it to a higher
level in developing digital society. This type of open and free communication challenges a
traditional civil society’s concept. Notice that it is the creation of the civil society that is the
great achievement of the Enlightenment epoch.
Informational openness is one of the main features of the social culture of digital
society. It brightly manifests in the style of using network activity. A person’s intel-
lectual, creative action required the author’s exclusive copyright on traditional society
content. In traditional society, people were used to sharing with others only the results
of their work. Even in the early stages of the digital age, people shared just the final
products of their creations—media content and social network posts. In other words, they
shared their successes [26]. In today’s advanced digital society, people started sharing
almost everything. They share with others the process of creations, not just the results.
This principle is becoming more and more universal, regular, and desirable as a routine
practice. This sharing contradicts traditional principles of the ownership of the creations.
At the same time, it characterizes an essential feature of the social culture of a digital society.
The transition from traditional forms of creation to a more open space, where people
share their contents in different stages, characterize the digital society. This transition is
symbolic and significant because it demarcates new characteristics of creativity and reflects
a substantial modification to human relationships and human experience. We call the
general tendency to constantly share everything “transparisation”, as a process of moving
to the transparency of human interactions and the transparency of society.
The transparisation of the social culture is supposed to counterbalance the individ-
ualization of spiritual culture. These two alternative trends are expected to impact the
shaping of digital society’s social culture. The study of the interaction and joint dynamic
of individualization and transparisation is closely related to essential notions such as “re-
lational self” [42]. It refers to aspects of the self-associated with one’s relationships with
significant others.
Digital technologies have brought a new understanding of the notion of the relational
self [43]. The generally accepted in Western civilization perception of self as primarily
individual. In contrast, relationships with others are secondary and even often undesirable.
On the one hand, this understanding of self is focused on the concepts of personal freedom
and privacy. On the other hand, this personal self may contradict social values.
In contrast, the relational self-manifests itself, namely in society. Martin Buber [44]
argued that the self-manifests itself only in a relationship with another. This claim is
confirmed today by the phenomenon of social networks, which facilitate connections
among people by unprecedented opportunity to create an almost infinite variety of
social relationships.
By claiming that spiritual culture is individualized and that social culture tends to be
transparent, we support the relative self’s trend. It allows us to explore this phenomenon in
a new way. By asserting that the phenomenon of individualizing spiritual culture enriches
Western attitudes toward the self, we, at the same time, discover the nature of a relative
self that is based on transparency.

4.3. Technological Culture of Digital Society

The following features of technological culture are noteworthy:
1. If spiritual and social cultures are aimed at creating values and ideals, then the
technological culture focuses on what and how to do it. The “value dimension” is
Information 2021, 12, 68 11 of 13

only present in a technological culture as evaluating the technical parameters of

activities and their products. Technological values are efficiency, precision, truth,
economy, strength, etc. They can only be instrumental values that serve to achieve
some fundamental values set by a spiritual or social culture [32];
2. Technological culture is utilitarian. In this respect, it acts, to some extent, in contra-
diction to the spiritual culture. In general, since culture develops unevenly, there is
a competition between its technological and spiritual dimensions. Because society
prioritizes the technological culture, its technical values colonize its spiritual values.
The denial of spiritual values coupled with current economic organization reinforce
the spread of consumerist society [11];
3. Concerning the spiritual and social cultures of technology plays a subordinate service
role. No achievement of science and technology can serve the ultimate goals to
which society or mankind should aspire. A technological culture’s progress must
be evaluated and controlled through the values produced outside the technological
culture [32];
4. Technological culture is a universal and indispensable condition for all cultural activi-
ties (or at least in the developed countries). Any cultural worker, whatever their field
of work, must be familiar with the technology of their work;
5. In the course of history, the technological culture evolves from mysticism to rational-
ity. Since the 17th century, technological and scientific developments have replaced
mythological and religious hopes for gaining a better future through miracles or
transcendental powers that cannot be rationally explained [45]. Contemporary tech-
nological culture is based on technoscientific rationality. It is not to suggest that this
rationality is superior to spiritual beliefs. Yet, it is to suggest that technoscientific
rationality plays an essential role in reshaping almost every domain in current culture.
Indeed, the technological culture of the digital society is contingent on information
technologies. The transition from material technologies to information technologies is
symptomatic of broader phenomena. The digital age signifies the transition to what
we described as the technological culture. After all, it is digital technology that is the
foundation of digital society, and they, in turn, are associated with both spiritual and social
cultures of man as a tool and as the basis of the media environment.
In light of the abundance of truly amazing, and sometimes magical phenomena of dig-
ital technology, it is challenging to identify prime trends that characterize the essence
of the technological culture of digital society. Let us take advantage of the analogy.
Let us turn to the technological culture of the industrial society. The basis of its technologi-
cal culture was electrification. The advent of electrification, or energetic hyper-connection,
provided energy to the remotest places in the world, made possible the progress that led to
the success of the 19th century and was the ground for the industrial revolution, changed
the world. The transition from energy to information society led to the idea of cyberspace
as a candidate for the role of the main phenomenon of the digital age. However, today
it already becomes clear that today’s cyberspace can be understood as an effective tool
for accessing information and knowledge and as a medium that significantly affects how
people construct their worldviews. This is due to the spread of AI in almost every sphere
of human experience. Kevin Kelly called this phenomenon “cognification”, characterizing
it as follows:
The AI on the horizon looks more like Amazon Web Services—cheap, reliable,
industrial-grade digital smartness running behind everything, and almost invisible except
when it blinks off. This common utility will serve you as much IQ as you want but no more
than you need. You’ll simply plug into the grid and get AI as if it was electricity. It will
enliven inert objects, much as electricity did more than a century past. Three generations
ago, many a tinkerer struck it rich by taking a tool and making an electric version. Take
a manual pump; electrify it. Find a hand-wringer washer; electrify it. The entrepreneurs
didn’t need to generate the electricity; they bought it from the grid and used it to automate
the previously manual. Now everything that we formerly electrified we will cognify. There
Information 2021, 12, 68 12 of 13

is almost nothing we can think of that cannot be made new, different, or more valuable by
infusing it with some extra IQ. In fact, the business plans of the next 10,000 startups are
easy to forecast: Take X and add AI. Find something that can be made better by adding
online smartness to it [26].
The cognification, in our view, clearly demarcates the growing colonization of the tech-
nological culture in the digital society. The basis of the technological culture of the digital
society, i.e., cognification, has replaced electrification—the main trend in the technological
culture of industrial society. In the digital age, we live in an intellectualized environment
connected to global networks. The traditional environment was based on natural laws and,
in a technological sense, was the source of energy as the foundation of life. In contrast, the
emerging environment is determined by machine learning technologies based on big data
analysis. It replaces energy with information as the main source of human life.
The cognified environment mediates human interactions and is even participates
in the interaction. Thus, the technological culture integrates spiritual and social culture,
forming a coherent culture of the digital age.

5. Conclusions
In this paper, we presented a theoretical study of the digital revolution as a cultural
phenomenon. We have developed a culture model and described digital society’s spiritual,
social, and technological cultures.
The presented model reflects known digital transformations of society and opens a way
to the future study of the digital society by analyzing expected emerging anthropological,
social, and technological phenomena.
We formulated trends characterizing the spiritual, social, and technological facets of
digital society’s culture. These trends are individualization, transparisation, and cognifica-
tion, respectively. In other words, human beings in the digital world develop their own
unique spiritual culture, opening it to others and enriching themselves with the cultural
achievements of other members of society. This openness characterizes the social culture
of the digital society. The digital society’s technological culture is based on the unique
phenomenon of cognification, radically changing our view of the world around us.
Despite the diverse scientific literature devoted to the digital revolution, as far as we
know, the study of the digital revolution as a classical cultural phenomenon is underthe-
orized. We have tried to fill this vacuum and hope our study’s initial results will initiate
new research in the field.

Author Contributions: Conceptualization, I.L.; investigation, D.M.; Writing—Original draft, I.L.;

Writing—Review & editing, D.M. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of
the manuscript.
Funding: This research received no external funding.
Institutional Review Board Statement: Not applicable.
Informed Consent Statement: Not applicable.
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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