At the Confluence of the Two Seas: On the Ontological Difference of Images

Abstract

If modernity was supposed to be the age in which world-images were abrogated or discredited as world-views, or as ideologies to be critiqued and deconstructed, our contemporary condition seems to be faced with an unexpected reappearance of images and of their importance for orienting our values. Instead of coming from mythology, theology or philosophy, these "world-pictures" are rather 'renderings' and 'accounts' of scientific models; by conceiving and studying their subject as a closed environment-as an oikos, a 'house'-disciplines like economy and ecology are able to project their own picture of the world. Yet, such pictures become normative (they acquire the power to legitimate policies) only when they are pushed to their own limit; in other words, these pictures become images whenever they stage the crisis of their own model. But is this phenomena limited to the contemporary condition and to its presumedly singular 'criticality', or is it rather pertaining to 'human' orders and to 'artificial' techniques at large? Looking at the interplay between images and crisis might open up a field of perspectives able, if not to escape, at least to rethink any apocalyptic prophecy, for how 'scientific' its base might be.