Ideas and Ideals

The article considers the genesis and essence of a library as a social institution and also the role and functions of the library in different periods. The author highlights the importance of emergence of libraries during every historical epoch and their performance of invariable initial functions and tasks. The mission of the library is implemented by means of concrete social functions, that’s why its transformation leads to changes of social functions of the library. The author shows the value of the library for the society depending on its type. The paper analyzes a library as a social institution, characterizing its historical variability. The purpose of the first libraries and their first mission was to store documented knowledge. The first libraries were storages-treasuries of mostly closed type as the collections of books existing in them had material value. The antique library can be considered both as a public library (for readers from certain strata of the society) and as the academic establishment. Monastic libraries played the leading role in saving the cultural heritage of antiquity, in maintaining continuity in the development of education, sciences and culture. During the Middle Ages monastic libraries significantly developed. In the early Middle Ages they were the only centers of culture and education. In the late Middle Ages they conceded the place to university libraries. The universities and their libraries played an important role in the distribution of books and education. Theology started gradually to concede its superiority to secular sciences in university audiences (respectively the structure of the libraries holdings changed). The circle of users of university libraries was much wider, than in other medieval libraries. The library has gradually become such an establishment which defines the character of educational, scientific and cultural policy of the state. The library development has passed a long evolutionary way from the collections of different plates and scrolls in the libraries of ancient empires, small book collections in monasteries comprised mainly of religious literature and having a very limited circle of users, to the university libraries and private collections which were a prototype of a modern public library with its universal book holdings of public use. During a long period of human history the libraries social functions have undergone essential changes.

The article is devoted to the study of the influence of the Italian and Flemish Renaissance traditions on the painting styles of Castile and Aragon in the 15th century. The subject of the study is the artistic features, which connect Spanish paintings with the Italian and Flemish Renaissance. The object of the study was the life and work of a Spanish artist Bartolomé de Cárdenas (Bartolomé Bermejo). The analysis of “Saint Michael Triumphant over the Devil with the Donor Antonio Juan”, “Nursing Madonna”, “Saint Dominic of Silos”, “Piedad Desplá”, “Saint Engracia” (central part, the Arrest of Santa Engracia, the Flagellation of Saint Engracia, Crucifixion), “Saint Augustine”, and “Lamentation” demonstrates the following features, characteristic for the painter: attention to proportions, a sense of perspective, physiognomic accuracy, abandoning the estofado technique, work with the landscape, addressing nature, etc. An analysis of the Bermejo’s works showed that the master found no conflict between the motives and characteristics of the two traditions. They coexisted in the same works. The article also describes the circumstances that influenced the spread and rooting of the influence of Italian and Flemish painting in the art tradition of the Iberian Peninsula, including political and economic conditions, artistic tastes of Spanish rulers (Juan II, Isabella I and Ferdinand II), the Arab heritage and its influence on painting, the connection between Aragon and the Papal Court in Avignon, pieces of art trade with Flanders. The author considers the methods, with the help of which these two schools found the way into the Iberian Peninsula. The article gives the answer to the question of why the Italian and Northern traditions were of key importance in shaping the national painting tradition of Spain. The paper contains a brief description of two different systems with many similarities that yet represent two different aspects of Renaissance. The author puts forward a thesis that in spite of the features brought by the art of Italy and Flanders, the paintings of Spanish Renaissance have their own unique identity, which is manifested in the works of its artists.

From the middle of the XIX century when the position of the artist was introduced in the Maritime Department, the display of military realities became the rule, first in the fleet, and later in the army. These were landscapes of famous marine painters - I.K. Aivazovsky, A.P. Bogolyubov, L.D. Blinov, genre paintings by V.V. Vereshchagin, I.A. Vladimirova. Full-fledged work of professional artists in the army and the navy broke down after the October Revolution of 1917. With the creation of the Battle Workshop, named after M.B. Grekov in 1934, in memory of the first Soviet artist-battalist M.B. Grekov, the battle genre began to develop in the vein of socialist realism. A colossal surge in the development of the battle genre falls on the years of the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945. Under the Main Political Directorate of the Red Army, the Political Administration of the Navy and the Chief Military Sanitary Directorate, propaganda and front-line art brigades started their work. Painting and graphics became not only a work of art, but a visual document of military reality. The subject of this article is the creation and work of front-line art brigades created by the order of E.I. Smirnov, the Chief of the Main Military-Sanitary Directorate (GVSU).The artists of the Moscow branch of the Union of Artists responded to the offer to work in the brigades: N.N. Volkov, D.N. Domogatsky, A.T. Ivanov, N.G. Kozlov, N.F. Korotkova, N.G. Kotov, E.A. Lvov, F.I. Nevezhin, Yu.G. Neroda, D.P. Pavlinov, N.S. Sergeyev, R.I. Sinilnikova, N.G. Yakovlev. For each trip of the brigade, an order was drawn up, a detailed route was prescribed, and a letter was sent to the heads of the sanitary departments of the fronts. The route could change in connection with the frontline situation and, as a rule the previously agreed route was enriched and additionally developed. Front art brigades worked on many fronts of the Great Patriotic War that enabled artists and photographers to cover a wide geographic range of military events. The artists had the task to portray the realities of the medical and sanitary service as truthfully as possible.

The world is rapidly becoming more complex. The proliferation of socio-cultural complexity has an impact on the media space of modernity. At present, the real-event environment of human existence is becoming more and more complex information-digital space. As a result, the world of a person, as well as his/her style of thinking are changing under the pressure of information complexity. The spheres of social life are integrated into the media space, there is an active mediatization of various social subsystems. The complication of culture threatens the human psyche. A man “drowns” in that complexity: in the details, nuances, unnecessary details and subjective opinions. Information noise, consisting of pieces of information and their unreliable interpretation, leaves no chance for an objective picture of the world. The explosive growth of sociocultural complexity changes the media space. The modern information space turns out to be an incarnate myth about the tower of Babel – the pandemonium of information flows devoid of linear logic and meaning. Modern macro-social changes express the fusion of many processes of different directions, which form a multidimensional and contradictory system of relations of solidarity and conflict, harmony and tension, complexity and simplification. All these processes have an impact on the nature of communication, determine the transformation of the media space. Modern media space is a clear demonstration of the conflict between the modern and postmodern episteme, linear logic of the text and the nonlinear logic of hypertext. Digital culture of modernity is objectively discrete, but subjectively it returns us to the “analog” forms of culture, experiencing the reality in audiovisual forms, mythological images. The media space is set by the network logic of electronic media, revealing a tendency to fragmentation and decentralization, rethinking the role of the author and the reader. The synthesis of television, the Internet and virtual reality creates a heterogeneous media space in which contradictory trends coexist, at the same time complicating and simplifying existence and thinking. The media space of modernity is nonlinear and narrative. The hypertextuality of the media space determines the complexity of the media space and the rhizomaticity of multidirectional information flows.

The article analyzes the ontological aspects of creativity and the human existence. The main research methods are hermeneutical and analytical. Resorting to the values of creative work became a logical continuation of spiritual and philosophical search of the Holy fathers and Russian philosophy. Humanistic character of creativity is connected with Christian morality and manifested in recognition of the values standing above material interests of a modern man. The author analyses the exclusiveness and degeneration of the soul and civilization, where the leading parts are played by anti-creativity and anti-freedom. The article considers the nature of misunderstanding and ignorance of the true creativity and the life creativity. The article also analyses the opposition of the fertility spirit and the creativity spirit, the Christianity spirit and the creativity spirit. The author considers creatodicy or justification of creativity. The paper highlights the ontological aspects of creativity and its meanings. The author reveals the meanings of the expressions: “to do serious work”, “God’s will”, the existence of a man, human dignity. Anti-creativity is perceived as unkind exclusiveness of the headstrong, shameless and inhuman. The author analyzes the creativity of his life and “the creative tragedy of human life” (Florovsky). This creativity is impossible without the priority of true faith and recognition of the Predestination of every person. The article emphasizes the Christian idea of godliness of a man, that is, overcoming evil in himself. The author pays special attention to the ideas of preserving honor and dignity as well as self-application of efforts in the Affairs of the God. The author stresses the necessity of radical (in the spirit of creativity) rethinking of accepted values of a modern man.

B.G. Yudin proposed the concept of humanitarian expertise and developed it together with a number of Russian researchers. He focused on the anticipatory nature of humanitarian expertise, due to its focus on both existing and new technologies. The idea of “preliminary habitation” of new technologies by society is essential for the theory of humanitarian expertise and can be theoretically explicated from the point of view of the precautionary principle and as an attempt to answer “the Collingridge dilemma.” Another theoretical perspective is connected with the relevance of the main humanitarian assessments to foreign approaches and programs that determine the social and humanitarian contours of the technoscience. In particular, the ideas of anticipation are considered as strategies for selecting the most stable path to the future and attracting the resources necessary for this. Accordingly, humanitarian expertise is revealed as a new “type of ethics”, which began to take shape in connection with the development of major scientific projects. It is characterized by the following features: interdisciplinarity and transdisciplinarity, management based on anticipation, complexity and social significance of problems, connection with approaches and institutions that have developed in bioethics. The urgency of the humanitarian expertise orientation is clearly visible in those problems that arise in connection with the intensive development of biomedical technologies. In particular, the practice of “deferred motherhood” opens the prospects for an “individual foresight” - the formation of new options to manage individual health risks. The violation of natural cycle's trajectories of life is a way of calculating risks that expand the horizon of responsibility and try to insure against possible disappointment in the future. Precautionary strategies allow balancing between competing ways of mastering the future, and humanitarian expertise is an important component of building an effective decision-making methodology in a situation of uncertainty and finding adjusted coordinates for a sustainable future, which certainly confirms its relevance and prospects for further development.

A notion central to the original Freudian formulation consists of the claim that psychic drives, faced with the need to meet all the exigencies of life, are forced away from their desire for immediate gratification, and into subordination to the reality principle, which limits libidinal development. That is to say, civilization necessarily implies sublimation and repression- i.e. Das Unbehagen. In response, H. Marcuse argues that such a deadlock represents in actuality a historical fact, supported by the discovery that within the very Freudian text itself, psychic phylogenesis is already defined only insofar as it is related to the central role played by social factors. H. Marcuse goes on to argue that such historical Unbehagen today, in late-industrial society, takes the form of surplus, unnecessary repression, as laborers must work under conditions of wage-labor, even though capital “presses to reduce labor time to a minimum.” The current paper seeks to mobilize this Marcusian framework as a valid hermeneutic method for the reading of contemporary late-industrial cultures, exploring specifically in what ways the recent liberalization of sexual norms known as hookup culture could be considered as an example of “repressive desublimation”. It also examines how such systems of libidinal economy in late capitalism functions to further mystify and hide away authentic modes of libidinal cathexis behind the horizon of the possible.

The idea for this article originated from the O. A. Donskikh book “The Will to Dignity. The National Ideal in the History of Russia.” After perestroika the social situation in Russia is persistently raising the question of the principles of social construction, cultural and historical self-identification which determines the attitude of society to the past and to the future. The main question discussed by the author of this article relates to the compatibility of traditional Russian mentality with the construction of capitalism in Russia. Nowadays there is no clear idea of the Russian identity. Currently, the society lacks the apparent theoretically designed view of itself and its past, and this situation creates unhappiness and spiritual breakdown. The internal reflection is needed in order to overcome this state of affairs, and this is impossible without critical reference to the history. In the process of gaining self-identity the history of the formation of civil consciousness and the history of emergence of the intellectual layer of the Russian society, pretending for the role of its carrier, are of crucial importance. The continuity of the history of people is based on its cultural type, on the systemic structure of values, reproduced by culture. For this reason, a researcher has to raise the question of the fundamental values of Russian consciousness and the forms of its manifestation at different stages of social development. In particular, it is necessary to discuss the question of which mental attitude has been dominating in the society during the Soviet period of its history. The issue is the relationship between an individual and society, the relationship between solidaristic and egoistically individualistic attitudes in the culture. Social construction and cultural archetypes mutually determine each other, and the author believes that the mental basis of Russian society is poorly compatible with the capitalist ethics of the organization of society, focused on the success of an individual in the sphere of consumption. The traditional communal archetype is more in line with the non-capitalist form of development, which implies its own mechanisms of synthesis of the public and personal interests. Social science, reflecting the ethics of a solidary society, should play an important role in their implementation.

On August 6, 2017, Boris Grigoryevich Yudin, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Philosophy, member of the editorial board of our journal, died. Exactly one year he did not live up to his 75th birthday. The contribution of B.G. Yudin in the formation of the Russian philosophy of the post-Soviet period has yet to be truly appreciated. He started studying the newest trends of ethical problems of the development of modern science and technology in our country. Thanks to his works, authority, great personal charisma in Russia, bioethics was created as an educational discipline and practice of ethical examination of scientifi c projects with human participation. B.G. Yudin had high authority in international scientifi c associations, represented Russia in the Committee on Bioethics (DH-BIO) in the Council of Europe. Therefore, he tried to ensure that the level and subject of research of Russian scientists corresponded to the challenges of the latest scientifi c and technological innovations that induce philosophical refl ection to search for permissible limits of the human nature transformation and life and death manipulation. Boris Grigoryevich was always aware of current ideas in the fi eld of ethics of scientifi c research, actively introduced these ideas and a new thesaurus in communication of Russian scientists. He traveled a lot around the country, was the organizer and participant of a large number of various scientifi c events. He not only studied the scientist’s responsibility theoretically, but also implemented it into practice. B.G. Yudin initiated an interest in a new fi eld for us - the principles of bona fi de science, having devoted several articles and reports to this. In recent years, Boris Grigoryevich developed the concept of technology as a modern mode of combining science and technology, the main target of which is human nature. The problem of human improvement has become an ethical-philosophical theme of human transformation within the framework of technoscience. B.G. Yudin’s standpoint in the interdisciplinary assessment of the effects of the technology development is determined by the requirements of a strictly scientifi c analysis of ethical issues arising in the context of new technologies and the consistent protection of humanistic values, so it was far from the extremes and technological optimism and alarmism. Today, on this theoretical basis, it is necessary to develop the practice of humanitarian expertise, to integrate scientifi c achievements into our life through the creation of reliable institutions for the protection of an individual and thereby promote the development of sciences and technologies

The main purpose of the article is to study the features of neuroethics as an emerging scientific discipline claiming to be not only a form of applied ethics, but also an apology for morality within the framework of a naturalistic paradigm based on new data of neurobiology and cognitive sciences. The author considers neuroethics in several aspects. On the one hand, it is presented as a kind of bioethics, applied ethics, ethics of neuroresearch and neuroscience ethics. On the other hand, its manifestations were noted as an element of the technology and the variant of the anthropological transformations maintenance, called “human improvement” in the era of biotechnology. Thus, the disciplinary aspects of neuroethics are studied in the limelight of the critical analysis of the biotechnological improvement of a man, conducted by B. G. Yudin in bioethics. The theoretical methods of inclusion and exclusion were used and the grounds for inclusion and exclusion of neuroethics into bioethics were identified. It is noted that the naturalistic paradigm, in which the disciplinary ontology of neuroethics is formed, limits the philosophical content and dehumanizes it. The author points out that it becomes one-sided because of narrowing the neuroethics subject within the framework of applied and research ethics. Neuroscience ethics is represented as rethinking of the very nature of morality on the basis of new experimental data. In this respect neuroethics is developing a new view on the new neuro-improved society. Giving an example, the author refers to the neuroethics concept of T. Metzinger who proposes using these neurosciences to create a new ontology of consciousness and considers neuroethics as a tool in creating new “ethics of consciousness”. The key concept for such neuroscience ethics is cognitive improvement, so it relies not simply on the neurological explanation of the mechanisms of behavior, but on the ability to expand the possibilities of consciousness with the help of psychoactive substances and other technological possibilities discovered by neurosciences. Naturalistic reductionism in the understanding of morality makes a person vulnerable to his/her right of self-identification, opens the way for control over the personality. The author considers M. Gazzanigi’s alternative approach to neuroethics, who believes that it should be a part of the brain philosophy. Adhering to this position, the author concludes that neuroethics, in order to consistently develop bioethics and remain within the inclusive model, should introduce into bioethical discussions new dimensions of moral choice which arise in connection with new scientific data. Studies of the brain open up even greater complexity in the moral life of man and society, especially in bioethical incidents, and affect self-knowledge and self-identification of the individual.