Философия. Учебное пособие (практикум) на английском языке

Philosophy ●

Philosophy of history is an area of philosophical knowledge, which is connected with the description of the development of society within its interaction with nature. The main problems of the philosophy of history is the direction and a sense of history, also methodological approaches to the analysis of the types of society, and the criteria for classifying of the historical progress of society. It should be emphasized that the history takes place in a different social time, in different cultures and civilizations, with different geographical environments, with different development of science and technology.

The purpose of philosophy of history is to identify the main historical facts and to show tendencies of development of historical events. In other words, the main task of philosophy of history is the study of the problem of meaning and intention of the history. The theoretical aspectsofthissubjectsbasedonHegel‘sLecturesonphilosophyofhis- tory. It was at the beginning of XIXth century when Hegel combined philosophy and history. One of the key principles developed by Hegel was the principle of «Historicism».

K. Popper criticized the main content of the principle of Histor- icism. He denied the objective laws of the historic process and the possibilities of the social prognosis. K. Popper proposed the following arguments: the dynamics of human history is largely dependent on the growth of human knowledge. Therefore, we cannot predict the development of scientific knowledge and we are not able to predict human history.

As part of preparation for the third question it should be kept in mind that in social philosophy there are two main approaches to the historical process of society.

Formation approach to the study of the historical development of society and culture formed in the materialistic concept of history by K. Marx and F. Engels in the 40–50 years of the XIXth century. This approach was formed as the opposition of the idealistic understanding of social development. The foundation of information theory is the idea of the defining role of material production in human life and society.

According to Marx, in the process of material production people enter in to the relations which are certain, necessary and independent against their will. These relations – are the productive relationships

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which correspond to a definite stage of the development of their material productive forces. Marx believed that the Asiatic, ancient, feudal and modern bourgeois ways (modes) of production can be described as progressive social and economic formations.

In the soviet social science the model which reflected five stages of the development of society was widely used. Such stages are primitive, slave, feudal, capitalist, socialist.

The disadvantages of the information approach.

Firstly, as the world historical development showed, there can be only three basic forms of society: primitive society, traditional and industrial society.

Secondly, five-staged model does not apply to many communities. In civilization approach the main concept is civilization. The term civilization has many meanings. In philosophical encyclopaedic dic-

tionary there are the following meanings:

1.Civilization is used as a synonym of culture.

2.Civilization is the level or degree of development of material or spiritual culture.

3.Civilization is the level of social development, following the bar-

baric.

In philosophy there are different theories of civilization, and civilization approach can be regarded as a set of similar methodological aims.

Traditionally there are three stages of the evolution of the concept of “civilization”.

The first stage corresponds to the first period, which lasted from the middle of the XVIIIth century to the middle of the XIXth century. Representatives of this period are Voltaire, Herder, Hegel demonstrated historical optimism, convergence of ideas of civilization and progress. In the other words this stage is of the lined understanding of the history. It means that the core concept of progress based on the idea of the aim of history, that is on the future development of the history.

In order to explain this aim, philosophers built historical events in a linear order, ignoring data which contradict the hypothesis of the linear historical development. At that time, the concept of civilization was used to identify the humanity in the whole.

Philosophy ●

The second period refers to the second half of the XIXth century. (A. Conte, H. Spencer, P. Rickert, E. Durkheim).

The foundation of this approach is the principle of the unity of historical and logical studies of the history. The main trend is the sociological theory of civilizations. That is why; the ideas of the main role of the geographical factor in the development of the society are taken place. As a result, the idea of historical optimism decrease and the idea of progress is being questioned.

During the second period, the conception of the so-called “local civilizations” was formed. The main representatives were: Danilevsky, Spengler, Toighnby. According to this theory, all nations are divided into primitive and civilized. The civilized nations are divided into certain cultural-historical types.

The particular interest here is the phenomenon “Call-and-Re- sponse”. The meaning of it is the following: the normal development followed by a critical situation. The critical situation in turn encourages the civilization to growth, up to the “breakdown” and “troubled times”. The authors of this conception tried to overcome Eurocentrism in understanding of the essence of civilization.

Thus, the history is a set of local civilizations, or social systems generated by specific conditions, peculiarities of people living in this region and a certain way of interaction with each other in the scales of the world history.

The third period is connected with the important role of the sub- jective motivations of activities related to the worldview of different cultures. Thus monistic conception of history finally replaced pluralistic. Civilization approach to understanding the historical process also has some disadvantages: it does not consider the relationship between different civilizations, does not explain the phenomenon of repeatability, which was explained in the formation approach.

At the end of the XXth century the so-called ”world-systematic” approach was formed (F. Brodel, I. Vallerstain). The appearance of this approach is connected with the process of the globalization of the economy, which got the name “the world – economy”. In this world conglomerate are “core and periphery”, they form a “world-system” existing under the laws of a superformula. The essence of this phenom-

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enon is that the main product of the modern type of production was information and everything which is connected with it. It changes the idea of a linear type of the historical process.

So,thesocietyisalivingorganism,subjectedtothelawswhichare common to all things, and are specific to the specific system. The study of these laws showed their extraordinary complexity.

Next, it is important to understand that one of the important problems is the problem of types of the development of society. The problem of the direction of changes originated in ancient times and remained quite controversial.

In the history of philosophy different views on the direction of society were formed

1.The representatives of French Enlightenment view history as a continuous renewal and improvement of all aspects of society.

2.Religious trends indicate a predominance of regression in many areas of society.

3.Plato, Aristotle, J. Vico, O. Spengler, A. Toynbee adhered to the theory of the historical cycle, that is the movement is carried out at certain stages within a closed cycle.

Progress (from the Latin progressus – progress, success) is the di- rection of the development which is characterized by the transition from lower to higher, from simple to more complex, moving forward to a more perfect.

Regress (from the Latin regressus-reverse movement) – this is a type of development, which is characterized by the transition from the highest to the lowest, and also the process of degradation, lowering the level of the organization, the loss of the ability to perform certain functions.

Thus Social development can be reformist or revolutionary.

Reform (from the Latin reformare – to reform) is the conversion of one or more spheres of public life, without affecting the fundamental basis (systems, phenomena, and structure). Types of reforms are: regressive, reactionary. Reforms can take place in all spheres of public life:

• economic reforms mean transformation of the economic mechanism: forms, ways of organization of economic management of the

country, etc.;

Philosophy ●

•social reforms mean transformations, changes, rearrangements of any aspects of public life without destroying the foundations of the social system (these reforms are directly related to people);

•political reforms mean changes in the political sphere of public life (changes in the Constitution, the electoral system, the expansion of civil rights, etc.).

Revolution (from the Latin revolutio-turn, coup) is a fundamental, qualitative change in all or almost all aspects of public life, affecting the foundations of the existing social order. The types of revolutions can be short-term and long-term revolutions.

Test questions and tasks

1.What is the difference between the philosophical and sociological approach to the study of society?

2.What is the social and historical process?

3.How did the ideas about society change at different stages of the history of philosophical thought?

4.What are the philosophers who have contributed most to the development of ideas about society?

5.List the main ideas of the system approaches to the study of so-

ciety.

6.What are the areas of society?

7.Describe the originality of each of the spheres of spiritual life, such as morality, law, religion, art, science. Give the examples of the combination of material and non-material components in each of these areas.

8.Give the examples of progressive and regressive development from the history of mankind, civilizations, ethnic groups.

9.Give a comparative description of the formation and civilization approaches.

10.Comment the following statement: ”Important historical changes took place under the influence of spiritual and economic fac- tors (together)” (M. Weber). What areas of social life does the author speak about? What ways of interaction of all spheres of public life exist?

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11.Comment the statement: “All progress are reactionary if the person collapses” (A. Voznesensky). Describe the problem considered by the author.

Fill in the table.

Literature

Basic: 1–2.

Additional: 1–4.

Internet-resources: 1–5.

Philosophy ●

Literature

Basic

1.Балашов Л. Е. Философия: учебник. 4-е изд., испр. и доп. М.: Издат.-торг. корпорация «Дашков и К°», 2017. 612 с.:

ил.; То же [Электронный ресурс]. URL: //biblioclub.ru/index. php?page=book&id=453870

2.Батурин В. К. Философия: учебник для бакалавров. М.:

Юнити-Дана, 2016. 343 с.; То же [Электронный ресурс]. URL: http://biblioclub.ru/index.php?page=book&id=426490

Additional

1.Философия: курс лекций (модульный аспект) / науч. ред.

А.Н. Егоров; сост.: О. В. Смирнова, С. С. Касаткина, Ю. Л. Балюшина. М.; Берлин: Директ-Медиа, 2016. 266 с.; То же [Электронный

ресурс]. URL: //biblioclub.ru/index.php?page=book&id=435530

2.Грядовой Д. И. История философии: учебник: [в 3 кн.]. М.: Юнити-Дана, 2015. Кн. 1. Древний мир. Античность. 463 с.: ил., табл., схемы – (Cogitoergosum); То же [Электронный ресурс].

URL: //biblioclub.ru/index.php?page=book&id=115302

3.Лавриненко В. Н. Философия: В вопросах и ответах: учебное пособие / В. Н. Лавриненко, В. П. Ратников, В. В. Юдин; под ред. В. Н. Лавриненко. М.: Юнити-Дана, 2015. 463 с. – (Cogitoergosum);

То же [Электронный ресурс]. URL: http://biblioclub.ru/index. php?page=book&id=117916 (26.02.2018).

4.Линдгрен М. Философия в зеркале рациональности / науч. ред. Б. И. Липский; гл. ред. И. А. Савкин. СПб.: Алетейя, 2016. 100

с.; То же [Электронный ресурс]. URL: http://biblioclub.ru/index. php?page=book&id=428283

Internet-resources

1. http://www.edu.ru/ – Федеральный портал «Российское образование»

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2.http://biblioclub.ru/ – Университетская библиотека online

3.http://www.iprbookshop.ru/ – «IPRbooks»: [Электронная библиотечная система].

4.http://iphras.ru/elib.htm – Электронная библиотека Института философии РАН

5.http://filosof.historic.ru/ – Цифровая библиотека по философии

Philosophy ●

Content

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Practice

1. Philosophy, its subject and place in Culture . . . . . . . . . . 5 2. Philosophy of Ancient World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 3. Philosophy of Modern Times and the period

of Enlightenment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 4. German Classical Philosophy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 5. The Problem of Being in Philosophy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 6. The Philosophy of Consciousness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 7. The theory of Knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 8. Society and its Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Literature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97