The impact of science and technology on culture raises a number of questions about the ways in which people relate to each other and to their environment. Such questions cannot be answered by traditional approaches. Thus another level of analysis is needed to complement the traditional approaches and to address future challenges.

The first step in creating this new analysis was taken by Willem H. Vanderburg in 1985 with his pioneering work The Growth of Minds and Cultures. In this book, the first of a multi-volume series that includes Our Battle for the Human Spirit (2016), Vanderburg shows how the culture of a society underlies its science, technology, economy, social structure, political institutions, morality, religion, and art. As such, he seeks to build bridges not only between the ‘two cultures’ but between all the sciences in order to gain a deeper understanding of our age. This expanded second edition makes the author’s ground-breaking analysis available to a generation of digital natives.