Spirituality and Materiality in the Digital Age

Last updated on: February 16, 2016 at 5:14 am by Sable Manson

Spirituality and Materiality in the Digital Age 2016-02-15T20:14:31-05:00 Sable Manson

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How many times have we heard that science is based on evidence while faith is based on belief? Even if the speaker is not speaking pejoratively of faith, implicit in this idea is that science is based in the empirical material world and that faith is something different.

Science and faith have had a contentious history, however, many point to the Age of Enlightenment in Europe as contributing significantly to the strict differentiation we place on the two concepts. The systemization of the Scientific Method stressed observation of the natural world, empirical evidence, and the establishment of testable hypotheses through experimentation. Faith, in comparison, was understood to be a personal experience in which objective testing was impossible. Science was championed because it dealt with the material world, which could be physically investigated. Faith, which appeared to only operate in the non-physical realm, was belittled and even trivialized.

This forced dichotomy persisted for centuries until the advent of digital technology began to turn our material world upside down. The creation of the Internet irrevocably changed the course of human history by connecting people and information in ways no one could have dreamed of before. Digital technology had an unprecedented and profound impact on globalization, but it also had a unique influence on humans’ relationship to the physical and material world.

Material to Digital Timeline*

*Approximation of significant events in digital technology

1993 – Creation of the Internet
1993 – MP3s become publically available
1994 – Developments in Digital photography
1995 – First Photo Sharing Site
1999 – Napster
2000 – First Camera Phone
2000 – USB Flashdrives; Secure Digital (SD) Memory Cards
2001 – iTunes Released
2001 – MP4s Expand Public Use
2002 – Smartphones Developed
2003 – iTunes Store Introduced
2003 – Digital cameras outsell film cameras
2004 – Kodak stops selling traditional film cameras in Europe and North America
2005/2006 – iTunes begins to sell Music videos, TV shows, and Movies
2006 – Cloud Storage Introduced
2007 – First iPhone released
2007 – Netflix begins video streaming
2007 – Dropbox created

The Internet came online in 1993 around the same time digital photography and audio (MP3s) became available to the public. Advances in digital technology allowed greater information storage capacity with less and less physical constraints, while smartphones with Internet capability allowed greater accessibility to information anywhere. When iTunes launched in 2001 it touted the ability to rip music from physical CDs, yet within two years was offering customers the ability to download music, as MP3s, directly from their online store. By 2005 cloud technology allowed individuals and business to store and access essential business documents remotely. And video streaming services like Netflix completely transformed how we consume entertainment.

In less than 25 years our music, photos, and documents have dematerialized to be accessed anywhere and anytime. We may not buy “real” cds, books, or movies anymore yet we have access to hundreds of libraries, often right at our fingertips through our multiple digital devices. What becomes of our relationship with the physical world when all of our most precious “things” aren’t physical things anymore but rather 01s floating in a cloud somewhere?

“Not everything that can be measured matters, and not everything that matters can be measured” – Elliot Eisner

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