The Excesses and Risks of the Postmodern Condition: from Globalization to Digitalization and the Threat of Non-Things

Globalisation and digitalisation are both part of the postmodern condition. We are experiencing the increasingly rapid rise of a new “black box society†characterised by black boxes where algorithms, observing the characteristics of users, predict a class, a rating and suggest decisions without explaining the motivation. If, with globalisation, the issues of the economic enhancement of culture saw the primacy of the economy over society, discussing a possible culture-driven vs data-driven economic development, now technology plays a leading role. We have dealt with the excesses of postmodernity in the past, discussing the risks associated with globalisation and the enhancement of museums and art cities as high-culture places, introducing the risk of the Non-Place, understood as an anthropological place, generated by the loss of meanings, relationships and history. Starting from the suggestions emerging from the literature, we now address the theme of the risks of digitalisation by introducing the concept of the “risk of Non-Things†, connected to computerisation, the dematerialisation of the world and the loss of memory that may involve objects, movable and immovable artistic heritage, natural heritage, territories, animals, plants, even perhaps humanity itself.