From the technical-scientific-informational environment to the technical-scientific-cognitive-algorithmic period

Abstract

This essay advances the hypothesis that the technical-scientific-informational environment, as theorized by Milton Santos, is undergoing a qualitative transformation within the context of contemporary capitalism, giving rise to what may be conceptualized as the “technical-scientific-cognitive-algorithmic period.” While Santos’ framework continues to operate as a fundamental infrastructural condition, the centrality historically attributed to information is increasingly subsumed under the algorithmic modulation of collective cognition. In order to substantiate this argument, the analysis articulates Santos’ critical geography with Trotsky’s Law of Uneven and Combined Development, Virilio’s dromological approach, Han’s notion of psychopolitics, Bratton’s platform theory, and Foucault’s analytics of power. It is argued that the convergence of temporal acceleration, algorithmic mediation, and the capture of subjectivity significantly enhances the capacity for intervention within the psychosphere.

The essay concludes that the technical-scientific-cognitive-algorithmic configuration signals a new phase of the networked territory, in which political contestation increasingly shifts toward the control of perception, attention, and collective cognition. This dynamic ultimately delineates a process herein conceptualized as neuro-territorialization.