Ideas and Ideals

Representatives of the Russian Neo-Eurasianism, trying to root this intellectual tradition, turned to the identification and analysis of the Eurasian motives in the Russian classical literature of XIX century. This research assumes the presence of the structural components in literary texts that correspond to the Eurasian vision of Russia as the "Middle World" in the East-West dichotomy. The author of the article, using the method of structural analysis, reveals the presence of such components in Nikolai Chernyshevsky novel "What Is to Be Done?" One of them is represented in the structural core of the novel in the form of clear anthropological oppositions using two narrative functions: appearance and character (temperament) of the heroes. Another component is Rakhmetov, one of the main characters of the novel. The author comes to the conclusion that Rakhmetov is the first image of a Eurasian in Russian literature. At the same time, the ideology of this image, imposed to the reader by the author, appears to be inconsistent with the art material used for its construction.This is due to the fact that Chernyshevsky himself was not a Eurasian, he was a typical Westerner, who believed that oriental components in Russian culture hinder the development of Russia and they have to be suppressed.

The paper analyzes issues of how regional studies and allied disciplines react upon each other, and what are the main objectives and principles of economic zoning and classifying regions of various sizes accepted in economic science. From the economic point of view, regions are classified mostly proceeding from the purposes of management and analytics. The paper discusses the reasons of economic imperialism, i.e. invasion of economists into the adjacent fields of science. The major feature of an economic approach in historical - economic studies and regional ones is application of economic models, quantitative methods, and their own definitions. The paper presents a brief analysis of the studies concerning Siberia and its regions made by the Institute of Economics and Industrial Engineering of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Science in the Soviet and post-Soviet time. Siberia has been an object of cross-disciplinary research at least for two hundred years. The paper also compares the key ideas and approaches of the recent Siberia case-studies carried out by specialists of various sciences. The concept of megaregion from the point of view of economical science is discussed, and the corresponding directions of further research of Siberia are set.

In the interview Professor S. D. Valentey talks about the importance and perpetual exigency of Marxism as a major scientific direction. He also speaks about the loss of our Marxist school and the related to this loss issues in economic science and economic education. The author analyzes the problems of thrifty production, the new quality of economic growth, sociology of population. He also points out the importance of the conducted studies in this field during the Soviet period and characterizes the specifics of Russian capitalism. The interview also touches upon the issue of the pseudo-education and purchase of diplomas. Professor highlights the necessity of a new generation of economists coming to office, free from neo-liberal and other clichés. S. D. Valentey argues that economic science cannot be based on the reading of books and journal articles only, though it is also very important, without it there is no science. Economics is based on field studies. The task today is a field research of the specific real economy, real economic processes.

The article considers the fundamental role of language in communication from the axiological aspect of communication theory. The aim is to show that speech, as the embodiment of the language, is a real value or a product of activities of generations of a certain culture in their phylogenesis as well as of an individual in ontogenesis. Language is a system of signs, which serves as a means of human communication and mental activity; the way of expressing self-consciousness; a means for storing and transmitting social information. Linguistic behavior is connected with the history of mankind, its culture, and the actual existence of the society. The process of individual and group speaking is embodied into the actions of people, modes of behavior, and phenomena of consciousness into the forms of thinking. Speech, undoubtedly, has value. To become an educated man, an interesting interlocutor, a partner worthy of love, a respectable friend, a professional – all of these is great work. To have a talent means to work, to be a genius means to work again and again. This is an axiological law: the dignity of a human personality is defined by joint efforts, made by a community and an individual him/herself, who have formed identity of a person and helped to self-actualize his/her accumulated spiritual wealth. The inner world of a person is only slightly expressed externally: in facial expressions, in the eyes as a mirror of soul, in clothes and demeanor. Mainly, a soul is revealed in the dialogue.

  The article is devoted to the problematic character of the relations of Christianity with other cultures as one of the brightest features of European civilization. Attempts to understand it were made throughout the History of Christianity. It is necessary to consider continuous penetration into Europe of the most diverse cultures from the other continents which entered into the existential conflict with this religion. At the same time it is necessary to consider the problem relations of Christianity with the European mental and cultural arrangements. They naturally came into conflict with Christianity which had been created outside the continent. It is especially vividly seen in the period of early Christianity when Christianity was more presented by a set of ideas, than the sum of artifacts. Besides, Christianity was formed not due to the evolution of a certain initial paradigm, but as a result of synthesis of elements of almost all known at that time cultures. The author gives a general characteristic of the history of interaction between Christianity and the European cultural streams, and also he considers some forms and methods of fight, which Christianity used against those cultural streams. The Church played a special role in this fight, and сhristianization might be presented as the movement of the Church, not a religion. At the same time сhristianization is an information gain of new space. Simultaneously, it is necessary to highlight the role of this religion in preservation of the European information unity and also in the fight against cultural interventions from the outside.

The article is devoted to the search of the hidden meaning of the Bible, and to the birth of the tradition of patristic hermeneutics and exegesis in the history of the early Christian Church. Actually, in the works of early Christian apologists, the five main methods of exegesis of the Holy Scripture were already used, including: literally-historical, moral, theoretical, typological, and allegorical. The author examines the influence of Philo of Alexandria, who identified two stages in the study of God – knowledge of God from the “created things”, and the ascent of mind to the understanding of the transcendence of deity. Clement of Alexandria, unlike his predecessor, didn’t try to turn the biblical text into a philosophical treatise, but sought to transform the philosophical ideas into the Christian ones, and with the help of the typological method he succeeded in it. The purpose of this study is to reveal the mechanism of interaction between two theoretical and methodological traditions: the tradition of the apology of the truths of Divine Revelation and the tradition of interpreting the text of the Scripture, which was systematized in the Alexandrian philosophical-theological school.

The round table participants discussed a number of interrelated questions: how can we evaluate the relationship between the Church and society in Russia at the present stage? What is causing the obstacles for the dialogue between the Church and other social groups in modern Russia? Is there a possibility for such a dialogue in modern Russian society? What is the actual and possible role of intelligentsia in the formation of a neutral space for such a dialogue? The participants discussed different aspects of the problem: the history of the church and society relations, the problems of these relations at the present stage, the role of the church in the life of modern Russian society, the problem of the dialogue between the Church and atheists. The participants also discussed the burning problems of the Church's participation in the formation and education of youth, issues of influence of the church on the processes of cultural development, the acute problems of the fight between the Orthodox church and religious extremism, the danger of which influence, especially on young people, is often underestimated. In the final analysis, there is a multi-dimensional picture of the relationship between the institution of the Church and civil society represented by different social groups.

The reciprocity between religion and culture is the key theme of the book by I. N. Morozova "Religion and Culture: the Cognitions of Acceptance and Reciprocity". In modern socio-humanitarian discourse there is an urgent need in elucidation of the logical-conceptual, thematic and content subject areas, where theology and a secular worldview can be the participants of the dialogue (keeping the distinction in their original spiritually-aimed orientations). The ideals and values of classical culture form one of the foundations for Christianity and secular culture. The origins of tensions are in the relations between religious and secular components in modern Russian education, the eclecticism of their combination. The author also introduces into the scientific circulation the original texts of foreign scientists-naturalists, who are speculating on cultural dimensions of the sacred; famous sociologists; religious scholars (S. Kaufman, H. Casanova, L. Woodhead, etc.), and theologians. The author considers post-secular culture at the stage of its denial of the rhetoric of confrontation with religion. The author collected and summarized the significant scientific and publicistic material, revealing the uncertain picture of the Russian society ̓ s searching for the necessary consensus in the relationship of religion and culture after Perestroika.

The specific images of man stand for any canon of values and for any behavioral code. They determine not only the desire to achieve certain public goals. In the end, any change in these images leads to revolutions, radically influencing the development of entire countries. The article highlights some of the linkages and concealed contradictions hidden behind the Ten commandments of the Old Testament, the Sermon on the Mount of Jesus Christ, the American Declaration of Independence of 1776, and related French Constitution of 1791, and finally, of the UN Declaration of Human Rights of 1948. The image of free and rightful man with innate dignity stands in glaring contradiction with the reality of modern humankind, which will reach the ten billion mark quite soon. The limited capacity of finite resources of planet Earth decidedly demands the change of our traditional ideas about man. The lives of our grandchildren will be determined by the new image of man and the way of when and how it will be developed.

The article considers the problem of de-socialization and alienation of an individual in the social space. The aim of the article is to conduct a socio - philosophical analysis of the conditions of the emergence and development stages of these forms and identification of types and forms of personal alienation in society. The article analyzes the complex of objective and subjective social conditions which lead to de-socialization of an individual. The buffer zone of alienation is examined in the article as a reflection of social exclusion processes. De-socialization of the individual is the result of social exclusion process which leads to alienation and its acculturation.