From the Alphabet to the Web

The article discusses the issues of social and cultural construction of the concepts of time, space, and thought. This analysis is matched by a parallel between the physics and those of communication. To be used as a reference is the shift from the Newtonian conception of time and space to the one proposed by Einstein. In fact, the concepts of space and time outlined in Newtonian physics well befits to what is the cultural and experiential that outlines M. McLuhan in his description of the aural and visual culture—an examination that, starting from the introduction of the alphabet, takes us to Gutenberg and the electric media. The revolution introduced by Einstein seems similar to the one that goes to the concepts of time, space, and thought with the advent of the Net. This article includes a review of the literature on the subject, through the lesson of Meyrowitz, McLuhan, Innis, Castells, Appadurai, Manovich, Berners-Lee to get to Carr. Facing this path is referred to as the birth of the hypertext moment of transition from linear thinking to the reticular