The Network Metaphor & the New Renaissance

This article is about art and science and a certain parallelism between them in the evolution of Western culture, particularly over the last 150 years. I will try to describe what changes have taken place in our society’s operational schema and our shared paradigm. My construct will be one of art, though a strong influence from science will be evident. I propose that we have been living through a second renaissance provoked by a profound change in the definition and representation of reality by both art and science. Throughout the 20th century, the ideas put forth by both have been extremely unconventional and the two have interacted in ways not always obvious, providing new metaphors, new patterns for defining the future shape of our culture.