Research Article Volume 2 Issue 4
Kazan Federal University, Russia
Correspondence: Gennady Pavlovich Menchikov, Kazan Federal University, Kremliovskaya str, 18, 420008, Kazan, Russia
Received: July 20, 2018 | Published: August 21, 2018
Citation: Menchikov GP. About the logic of the stages of development of humanity: from the stages of “varvaria” and “civilization” to the stage of “own culture”. Art Human Open Acc J. 2018;2(4):232-236. DOI: 10.15406/ahoaj.2018.02.00063
The problem of the stability of the development of society, of humanity – in what "era" we live, where we are moving and why – in the situation of the "second axial time" of society on the planet becomes especially acute. Because it is a) connected not only with tactics, but with the strategy of the life of mankind; b) in essence with the main existential motivation of the life of society and each of us – with the meaning of life; c) and errors and errors here put the life of humanity on the verge of "to be and / or not to be." The idea of some kind of forthcoming new stage of the development of mankind is in the air, begins to be discussed in academic science, but there is not yet a clear understanding of it, there is not even a definite title for the next stage, the clarity of the criterion in the approach to such a sacramental question. The purpose of this article, referring to the theory of stadiality, to show discussion concepts in this issue, which, as it turned out, a lot; to audit in them the criterion of the stagial development of mankind; try to answer the question of what stage of development of mankind is inevitably waiting for us and how we today live further. Our worldview is the modern neoclassical philosophy,1 the transition to a realistic view of the world based on the synergetic picture of the universe, on its "deterministic evolution" deep in it.
Keywords: open and closed system, neoclassical philosophy, constructive realism, the stage of development of society, anthropic principle, the stage of culture proper, fractal determinism, observer of neoclassical type
1In contrast to the post-non-classical/post-postmodernist in the scope and content of the "neoclassical philosophy", in addition to the epistemological aspect, in addition to the epistemological aspect, ontological, axiological, praxeological, and cultural aspects are inseparably, as in life. It would be incorrect to reduce the living life of a human being to his epistemological (cognitive machine) or some other component.
The study of the problem shows that in the theory of the stability of the development of society, repeated attempts were made to answer the above (in what "era" we live, where we are moving and why–in the situation of the "second axial time" of society on the planet) question. There are accumulated and there are different concepts of stages of development of mankind, with different criteria.1
Free–forming (Hegel): According to the degree of development of freedom and the need for an absolute spirit in society, Hegel identifies four stages of the ascent of freedom of the spirit of society: the Eastern world; The Greek world; The Roman world; The German world.
Intellecto–developing (Cont): On the development of intelligence in society, O. Cont identifies three stages of the development of the intellect of society: Theological; Metaphysical; Positive (scientific) stage.
Cognitive (Sorokin): On the development of cognitive culture in society P. Sorokin sees three types of development of the intellectual culture of society: Sensual culture; Ideal culture; Idealistic culture.
Cyclic (Spengler, Toynbee, Sorokin P): By the type of cyclical existence of a culture of society, they distinguish eight cyclic types of culture: Egyptian; Indian; the Babylonian; Chinese; Greco–Roman; Byzantine–Arabic; Mayan; Russian–Siberian.
Communication (Dostoevsky): According to the nature of people's communication in society, the ratio of collectivism and self–interest in him, FM Dostoyevsky sees three stages in the development of society: patriarchalism, natural collectivity; Civilization, painful individualization; Christianity, their synthesis.
The complexities of existence (Leontiev): By the degree of complexity of society's life. K.Leontiev defines three stages of development of simplicity–complexity of a society: Initial simplicity; Blooming complexity; Mixing simplification.
Economic development (Rostow, Tofler): According to the degree of economic growth of U. Rostow, A. Tofler defines five stages of the development of society: Traditional society; Transitional society; Society of Shift; Industrial society; Post–industrial society.
Comfort–developing (Galbraith, Aron): According to the degree of development of technology, information and comfort, J. Galbraith, R. Aron distinguish such stages of development of society as: Agrarian society; Industrial society; A new industrial society or informatization, a society of convergence, a society of general prosperity.
Technological (Tofler): In the wavy development of technology in society, A. Tofler sees such stages of the development of society as: First wave, agrarian revolution; The second wave, the industrial revolution; The third wave, the postindustrial, informatization society; The Fourth Wave, the super–industrial civilization is supposed.
Creativity (Polishchuk, Nikolko): According to the degree of development of creativity, SV Polischuk, V.Nikolko define four stages of development of the society: Pre–industrial; Industrial; Information; Creative.
Conflict–resolving (Russell, Einstein, and Gorbachev): By the degree of violence in society through the development of weapons of individual, group and mass destruction B. Russell, A. Einstein, M. Gorbachev distinguish two stages of human development: the era of violence, the pre–nuclear stage; era of nonviolence, painful tolerance, and nuclear stage.
Social and economic formations (Marks K, Engels F, pre–reform domestic social science): According to the degree of development of the economy, politics and ideology, primitive communal society is distinguished in society; Slave–owning; Feudal; Capitalistic; The socialist and communist formations themselves.
Civilization (Morgan L, Engels F): According to the degree of civilizational development of society, L. Morgan, F. Engels distinguish three stages of human development: Wildness; Barbarism;Civilization.
Thus, in each of them there is a lot of valuable, but one–sided and often intuitive. They complement each other quite well, if they are not opposed and learn something from each of them.
It should be noted that the main drawback in them is the arbitrariness, the ontological unreliability of the criterion and the scientific doubt arising from them in them. It is no accident that there is a direction of views that opposes in general the theory of the stagial development of mankind, which doubts the existence of a single man (the telos) and denies the whole sequence of its development ("end of metanarratives").2 Yes, a person has freedom of choice, history is open and the laws of history have a probabilistic nature, for doubt there are some grounds. However, we note that the conversation is not about a single line of development, but about the stages of the development of society in the meaning of a single, integrated humanity and any part of it. Such a conversation is legitimate and realistic–vital. Of course, it is methodologically important at the same time not to replace the "idea of a single mankind with the program for the formation of a common human megotholp, a docile power hand";3 It is also important not to identify in its existence a "single" and "one." But, coming first of all ontologically, one cannot ignore that the real bearer of mankind is a living person, and that the basic contradiction in being and its being is still the relation of life and "death".4,5 Given the "difference", humanity cannot be called "just a word for youths, profane, clerical and social scientists".6 Mankind, as a reality in the universe, as a phenomenon, and not an epiphenomenon of being, as earthmen, has already happened, exists. And we will not understand anything in ourselves or around until we finally come to everything from the standpoint of the methodology of universal evolutionism or Big History,7 to see the "end–to–end determination of being", where humanity is inscribed as an integral part of the ontological whole. The view from eternity–infinity says that humanity, formed as co–reality, is already "built into eternity" and it is his path with its stages and "represents history".8,9 Humanity not only exists, but there is also its stadial development, even the search and regularities of this global continuous–discontinuous, that is, stage development.10,11
Returning to the concepts of the stadiality of society, we note that the main drawback in many of them, it seems to us, is that in them, even an unexpected methodological inversion occurred most often: when people's living conditions were identified with people's lives in conditions. Which is not the same thing.8 Man was understood and involuntarily ontologically turned out to be a thing among things. It turned out as if the "depopulated" concepts of the stagial development of mankind. And attempts at their actual implementation involuntarily turned out to be illusory, unrealistic,12 concepts with people like things and things without people." In mankind and in the stages of its global development, the main and their real bearer, the living person, was eliminated, he, their the carrier, proved to be an epiphenomenon not only of the existence of the universe, but of society, not in the text, but only in the context of being, not with the being of eternity (the anthropic principle), but only a temporary, nothing, or only means for history. Another,13 or the "human personality" in society,14 turned the very real humanity into an ephemeral phenomenon. Today, the situation with depopulation and the selfishness of history Unfortunately, this became typical of the embodiment of the theory of socio–economic formations.
We have to state that our Russian society, and even mankind, is latently guided by the paradigm of well–known socio–economic formations, whose dignity and theoretical insufficiency, unfortunately, is obvious after many years and is sufficiently comprehended.15,16 The main shortcomings in it, in our opinion, are that this is not the stage of development of society as a whole, but the stage of development of one of its sides (socio–economic, more precisely, economic and political). In the context were other important areas for human life, such as spiritual and cultural and personalistic. But the most important flaw is that care for people's living conditions has been superseded, ate people themselves. People, alas, can turn into food for conditions. Especially conditions, absolute, ideal, without fail to be absolute, instead of real – "good".17 It turned out a kind of substitution of the thesis. The concept was without people, impersonal and dehumanized. In this concept fell man – a man in his essence, a man as a man;18 man was like a thing. In other words, the conceptual concept has a rational grain, but as a holistic, general methodological one, it turned out to be one–sided, actually private–scientific. It is not accidental that it is considered to be reduced, the concept of economic determinism.
Closer to the essence of human life is, apparently, the Morgan–Engels concept with its stages of savagery, barbarism and civilization, which is increasingly used today to understand the stages of development of society. But it also needs to be substantially refined, since it has fundamental shortcomings. First, it stops at the stage of "civilization", and secondly, there remains the same "inhumanity": we are talking about the stages of development of a society in which a person again remains only in the context of history, especially a fatalistic history (separate from a living person, existing as if over a person, outside a person). But the main thing, thirdly, it does not follow from her, what will happen next. Today civilization as a stage of development in relation to a person has especially revealed its cynical and dangerous essence. "Civilization" as a stage of the development of mankind is usually associated primarily with the development of the state of external (and not internal) and material and technical (and not spiritual) living conditions, rational–mechanistic ordnung of the order of life of the surrounding person. But not the man himself. Today, the situation with the depopulation of history has become blatant.
It is not by chance that in academic science the idea of a maturing some new stage in the development of mankind is in the air begins to be discussed, but there is as yet no clear understanding or even a specific title. Thus, M.T. Stepanianz means "megacivilization", Stepin VS19– "some kind of civilizational development, which includes a global history", GR Ivanitsky – the offensive "a new geocultural technogenic civilization on the whole planet", P.F. Draker – "post–capitalist society or knowledge society", etc. The main reason for this state is, in our opinion, the ambiguity of the criteria for the stagial development of mankind, the unrealistic nature of the approach in answering such a question.
Of course, in the stages of society it is impossible to cover all aspects of his being, but to turn off the existence of man himself in human society or to see him as an epiphenomenon of society, the planet, the universe is represented by an incorrect formulation of the question and scholasticism.20,21 Therefore, we believe that the development of human society is based on the development of man himself as a person and, of course, taking into account the development of the conditions of his life, which are referred to above concepts of stadiality. But neoclassical anthropological expertise in this case clarifies a) what is a person: not confusing the nature of man and the essence of man, explores the substantial essence of man as a human being as a cultural being,5 although, naturally, in different degrees and forms of manifestation. And also takes into account b) what is culture, not identifying culture with society, distinguishing the "norm" and "essence" of culture. This means that man as a human being, as an event of the universe, is able to live normally (ontologically realize the meaning of his life as the basic determinant of his life), not "nervous" or "psychic" in various forms of destructiveness, only in culture. And since any person is initially a substantively cultural being, although in different degrees and form, then we represent the further stage of the development of society on such an essential – the cultural basis: these are the stages of "savagery," "barbarity," "civilization," and "culture proper". Terminologically, there is a coincidence with the civilizational concept of the stage of development of society, but in fact they are different.
Why – to the stage of "actual culture"? First, and most importantly – in the stage of "culture proper", the life of a living person under certain conditions is not replaced by the conditions of his life. Yes, a person cannot be torn from the conditions of his life, but there is no coincidence: "living conditions" and "life in conditions" are far from the same. We proceed from the essential criterion – from the fact that the real bearer of society is man and the development of man in man – this is the very essence of human society. Therefore, the generalized criterion of the stages of the development of society is the development of man himself as a species in the universe; of course, together with a change in the necessary and sufficient conditions for culture – material, economic, social, organizational, political, spiritual and cultural. How much the person has changed, the human in man has changed in the conditions created by him, and not only his conditions, such are the stages of development of human society. "All progress is reactionary, if a person collapses." Secondly, it is important not to confuse "the nature of man" (its genesis) and "the essence of man" (its essence is a person as a person). With such illegibility, the essence of man is involuntarily identified with the essence of the animal with all the impermissible relation to man, man to himself. And since we do not confuse the nature of man and the essence of man, that man in his essence, by definition, is not an animal, not a thing, not a means, but a supernatural being, with a fundamentally different type of determination, aristocratic, spiritual (consciousness + soul + unconscious the sphere of the spirit), the cultural that constructs the world and itself in it; or, briefly, a person is a cultural being – capable of not living languish or "nervous" (wars, social revolutions, repressions, terrorism) to live as human beings only in culture and culture as III House Being – this essential fact can also be put in the foundation of the stage–by–stage development of the human community.
As for the civilizational approach, then, like others, it creates a theoretical insufficiency in the analysis of the stadiality of society. Since "civilization" as a stage of development of society, as quality and as a term, no longer express the essence human society. The life of mankind has gone further; it is no longer similar to "civilization". On the Earth, a qualitatively new stage of human history begins, which, after Shvitser A, we call "culture proper", with all before it proto–strictly cultural stages of development. Third, in the stage of the culture proper, despite its painful development, real substantial cultural characteristics themselves begin to be seen,22–24 both in the development of the person himself and the conditions of his existence. The stage of "civilization" along with the positive aspects of its development bears within itself a dangerous essence – the formation of an informed and creative, but cynical person. Capitalism is capitalism (a society organized according to the laws of the jungle), with its steady decline to self–destruction of itself and humanity.25–27,3 On Earth, the actual actual cultural stage of development is already beginning, on which one can rely.21,28 Therefore, the future of mankind, its prospects and strategy can only be seen: either not to be, or, relying on the cultural imperative, culture as the third house of being, evolve–grow–nurture itself through "civilization" towards "culture proper" (other) from the proto culture. The third is not given, the era is not the same, and the transition in the development of weapons of group defeat to weapons of mass destruction, the final, with all the ensuing consequences, leaves no chance for mankind. And also because the matter is in the essence of culture itself, the most cultural imperative, culture as the third house of being.
How can we implement this strategy of "proper cultural development"? The beginning is in the adequate identification of the situation,29,30 in the understanding that we need to change and change in what direction and in what direction. Further. Of all types of development, each part of humanity can afford a self–cultivating type, but not catching up and not imitating modernization. "Competitive progress" is fatal, as practice shows. And modernization, which would not have led to the resurrection of the archaic, began to develop the West and the East, and the tops of their ancient development.19 And their top, where all of us, peoples, humanity inevitably converge, we find each other, is "culture", "cultural imperative", "culture as the third house of life".22
And here it is necessary to return to the essence of culture itself, the structure and content of the cultural imperative, culture as the third home of being. By the essence of culture we mean its neoclassical development, and not post–nonclassical / postmodern and not classical. In the notion of culture, it is often not understood that the phenomenon and concept of "culture" is already phenomena and concepts of "society", and society is broader than culture, it is possible to identify the society and culture of this society. Hence, in our opinion, there are at least four more obvious incorrectnesses. First, when culture is treated in isolation from man, outside man, over man. For example, a common "culture is a collection of material and spiritual values" and this puts a point or "culture is the second nature". The second, when the content of culture includes everything in a row and how horrible it was created by people in society, not differentiating, in contrast to the activity of society, the intentionality, the means and results of the existence of culture, what the creative essence of the human species is directed at, what other means and ways it gets to a person and what it leads to and is intended to lead, the whole society, and everything in society. The third, when culture is understood primarily as art, identify culture and art, which in fact is a nuclear element of culture, but not reducible to it. And, fourth, when culture is identified with civilization, or interpret a civilization wider than culture; and still identify with society. Although, of course, here, to whom it seems when it comes to values, eras, etc., but nevertheless.
One of the discoveries of neoclassical philosophy is precisely that in it, under the influence of the realism of life and modern discoveries, such phenomena of being as "society" and "culture" (at least the volumes of these concepts) are not identified, the "first, second and the third house of human existence. " It is difficult for us to agree with the widespread point of view on the essence of culture, that "culture is the second nature", that is everything that society creates. Under the essence of culture is understood not all that and how society does, not all the constructs of the spirit, because they produce everything and for everyone, but only those that are associated with the ennobling of being, the more human being. Therefore, the concept of society is broader than culture. Often the essence of culture, especially historically, is reduced to Production, then to Creativity, then to the Warehouse of values. But since culture is associated with the ennobling of being, the culture of any society is legible, involuntarily selective; therefore it is not identical in society to all of its Production, to all of its Creativity, to the Warehouse of created "things", etc. Still, the deep essence of a culture of the first order is in the connection of man with the eternity of being; in its own ontological understanding of it, culture is the biophilic qualitative side of what is done, committed by society. "The culture of war" is, of course, an oxymoron or complete misunderstanding of the essence of neither one nor the other. In other words, culture is the aggregate of material and spiritual values leading to the humanization of man, to the cultivation of the human (together with the process of creating values, storing, protecting, spreading, applying, complicity in their creation, at least in the form of use and communication), all further pushing the person away from the edge of his pre–dominance.20 Indeed, all progress is reactionary, if a person collapses (A. Voznesensky).
In addition to the essence of culture, determination, the effectiveness of culture as a cultural imperative is that culture includes inseparable and simultaneous unity of structural and content elements: truth + goodness + beauty + utility + technological thinking and action. And as a realizer, a beneficiary of ennoblement, as a social institution of society, culture is the unity of efforts of special subsystems and social institutions: science + art + education + upbringing + etiquette. In the cultural imperative would be wrong to tear them apart, reduce them to one of them or oppose them.
Today, both the West and the East are changing and are not geographical, but cultural phenomena and concepts. And they change in different ways, in different forms, at different speeds, but they change in one direction – towards culture, culture as the Third House of Being. A clear fact (not an event, but a fact) is, for example, the Japanese society. It has changed not because of the fact that the popular mental cultural matrix has changed (the matrix has remained essentially the same), but because the state and, above all, the elite of society and the state have adjusted their goals and means to matrix–cultural ones. "Intellectual fashion" on the diversity problem, as well as monotony, is extremely complex, confusing, manipulative and really dangerous.31 It was not culture that adapted to modernization tasks, but the state and, above all, the elite of society adapted to the development of the essence of their culture as the third house of being (they adapted not to archaic archetypal but to modernity archetypal in the cultural imperative of their people).
We need to change. If we talk about Westernization or Orientation in an age of competitive proverbial progress, then this is not the subject of this either. For us, especially for managers of all levels, this is the implementation of the technological revolution, combined with the cultural imperative, this is the creation of economic mechanisms and some forms, rather than the content of political life (socialism / capitalism ?, which have already shown themselves, or which ethnic group is better / worse? , and what is better / worse?). Neither socialism, nor capitalism in mankind in their completed political state, in fact, did not smell or smell – the problem most likely lies on a different plane.32 Apparently, the culture of management is a global problem for us, earthlings: the transition to heterarchy of thinking as the quintessence of "good governance" is an objective necessity of transition from a) pre–classical (magical–manipulative), b) classical (performer–power), c) nonclassical (liberal–irresponsible) to d) neoclassical (new–humanistically–responsible) type of government.8,33 For among all the global problems of our time, "good governance" (we do not confuse management with manipulation) has become, apparently, the main and main global problem of our time. We need to build a social state. We will notice not the socialist and the capitalist. And the moral and cultural factors at least enter into politics. More or less normal states, their managers, the elite at all levels of organizational activity have socio–cultural functions, and do not transfer them to individual individuals. We, Russia, like all mankind, also do not have three roads, like the hero at a crossroads, but two: in the stage of culture proper or self–liquidation. It is better to enter the stage of culture proper.
Thus, it is not unimportant for mankind to know who it is, where it is and what will happen to it next. Turning to the theory of stadiality, it turned out that in this problem there are many "concepts of social development." The most realistic, in our opinion, is the civilizational concept that distinguishes three stages of human development: Wildness, Barbarism and Civilization, but it needs its refinement, processing. Since Civilization as a stage in the development of society, is outliving itself, showing its real doomed anti–human essence, dangerous not only for the human species, but for all life on our small planet.21,34
Why are we doomed? Since civilization as a construct, stage of social reality, a) is built according to the law of the jungle, in violation of the law–governed logic of the existence of the universe33– a complex coevolutionary, fractally deterministic logic of the coevolutionary formation ("genesis") of people, humanity on our planet, its existence and development in space and in the universe. b) Built according to the law of the animal's life, and not of the human world; on principle inadmissible for the essence of man, if we do not confuse and identify in man its "nature" and "essence", "the conditions of human life" with "the life of man in conditions," and "living conditions" do not reduce to any single, a totalitarian "dominant" factor.
An analysis of the criterion of the stadiality of the development of mankind leads us to the fact that the next stage in the development of mankind can be the stage of "culture proper": the stage of a new quality of human interaction, in mankind as a telos, based, finally, on the core of culture – the cultural imperative with its labor morality –moral core. In the neoclassical understanding of the essence of culture, by definition it is incorrect to identify "culture" with "society": with everything that society exerts, creates and "gets up." The cultural imperative is not a factor and not one of the factors. The classical and non–classical is replaced by neoclassical philosophy, based on the evident synergetic discovery of the determination of the universe. And this means that humanity will gradually and inevitably change, change how to nurture itself.
First of all, it means gradually parting with the Absolute21,24–to place hope in well–being only on the grown mankind only in themselves;7,15,17,22,23 to part with absolutist and relativistic thinking, representation and behavior (not to perish), to cultivate a heterarchic. Then cultural natural selection, instead of the natural biological, with the possibility and necessity works.34–36
To begin as if to reimpose hope in prosperity only on understanding the essence of man not as an animal, thing, means, tool, cog in the machine of being, thinking reed, etc., but as a cultural being, as a subject–object of culture, as he by definition is ontologically in being.37–39
None.
Author declares there is no conflict of interest.
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