It is Popper’s view that tribal or closed societies have a 
biological unity and that “our modern open societies function 
largely by way of abstract relations, such as exchange or co-
operation.” That the abstracting or opening of closed societies 
is the work of the phonetic alphabet, and not of any other form 
of writing or technology, is one theme of The Gutenberg Galaxy . 
On the other hand, that closed societies are the product of 
speech, drum, and ear technologies, brings us at the opening of 
the electronic age to the sealing of the entire human family into 
a single global tribe. And this electronic revolution is only less 
confusing for men of the open societies than the revolution of 
phonetic literacy which stripped and streamlined the old tribal 
or closed societies. Popper offers no analysis of the causes of 
such change, but he does give (p. 172) a description of the 
situation that is very relevant to The Gutenberg Galaxy :