Democracy in the Data Age: Spatial Computing as a Cognitive Tool for Informed Citizenship

Democracy depends on citizens’ ability to make informed decisions, yet the scale, speed, and dimensionality of contemporary information increasingly exceed the limits of unaided human cognition. Wicked problems such as climate change, pandemics, and systemic inequality cannot be reasoned about through intuition or traditional data displays alone. This paper situates spatial computing, meaning technologies such as Virtual, Augmented, and Extended Reality, within the historical trajectory of cognitive artefacts including language, writing, mathematics, and mapping. Drawing on the concept of exaptation, it argues that spatial computing can repurpose evolved perceptual systems to interpret complex, high-dimensional data. Recent research prototypes illustrate how immersive environments enable users to “walk through” dimensionality-reduced datasets, annotate evolving multidimensional changes, and collaborate in shared data spaces, thereby making otherwise abstract information perceptible and actionable. As with literacy and numeracy in earlier centuries, the democratic value of spatial computing will depend on equitable access, institutional integration, and critical scrutiny. Far from a technological luxury, spatial computing should be understood as a civic necessity - an essential scaffold for collective reasoning amid the deluge of data.