8 - Conclusion

Summary

Every age is an age of information, in which systems of communication and knowledge exchange shape events and institutions in distinctive ways. The specific nature of these systems helps determine how individuals in an age made sense of themselves and the world around them. This book has shown that in early modern Europe approaches to information underwent profound change, resulting in new containers for the housing and conveyance of information; new institutions chiefly concerned with information flows; new jobs and social functions tasked primarily with information management; and new attitudes towards the importance of information, including the need to organize and taxonomize it systematically. Taken together, these phenomena constitute a revolution in information.