Ideas and Ideals

The article is devoted to the anniversary of the birth (370 years ago) and the date of death (300 years ago) of the outstanding German philosopher, mathematician, physicist, jurist, historian, linguist, and diplomat Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. Leibniz undertake a creative synthesis of science, philosophy and theology, producing a unique philosophical system. The foundation of this system is constituted by the doctrine of preestablished harmony. In all areas in which he worked, Leibniz made great discoveries. It inherited the gift of synthesizing the disparate views of different thinkers on the basis of the original methodological principle based on the universality and rigor of philosophical arguments in their logical sequence. Leibnitz is also a great theologian and originator of the profound ethical system. Ethical optimism of Leibniz's teleology has Christian religious worldview as its basis.

The article analyzes the stylistic and linguistic features of the so-called “Brezhnev’s diaries”. Within the framework of the “linguistic turn in the history” methodology, it attempts to identify the relationship between the specificity of Brezhnev’s writing and his personality. The authors pay special attention to the verification of the Brezhnev’s records genre which is defined as a "log book". The article analyzes the nature of the records in comparison with Brezhnev’s speaking. Brezhnev was known as a skillful, spontaneous storyteller, he had a quick reaction, a multiple choice of epithets – features, alien to the standardized, public-political vocabulary of Soviet newspapers and public speeches of party and state leaders. It was the other way round with written speech. It was totally different. There was no place for jokes and improvisation. Even in his personal diaries he used the standardized, stilted language, which he used to speak working as a party leader, commissar. The authors come to the conclusion that Brezhnev acquired the “Soviet newspeak”, which actually became his second nature. The absence of any signs of deliberate design of the text in Brezhnev’s personal records indicates that the text is really a reflection of the personality of the General Secretary.  

The article continues the earlier begun research in «Ideas and Ideals» (№ 19, 21, 23, 27). Now the author examines the aesthetic aspect of the function. The particularity of its study is to define the object of the transforming process, not the logic mechanism of action (like in other aspects). The object is music taste. Transforming of music taste implies the development of abilities to understand and to value the beauty in music. It is absolutely possible, Russian scientists have proved this thesis. Transforming goes either individually or with the help of more effective social means (enlightenment, education and mass media). The aesthetic aspect includes two subaspects – aesthetic (referring to music itself) and aesthetizing, which means “working” for the final purpose – to lead people to the world of Beauty through music taste development. Understanding of beauty in music morally transforms a man, who is perfecting the surrounding life. “Beauty will save the world” (Dostoyevsky). Aesthetizing subaspect is close to the ethical one – vectors of their functioning are parallel. Aesthetic subaspect represents the unity of means and purpose. The actions of two subaspects may be simultaneous and separate. In the final part of the article the author sums up the results of the research of the music transforming functions.

The XIX century is an era that gave birth to Genius not without a reason and praised him not without an intent. The article studies the phenomenon of Genius from the moment of formation and to the apotheosis point in Nietzsche’s works, he achieved in less than a hundred years.A starting point, is considered to be the aesthetic positions of Sturm and Drang era which signified artists’ interest to the human person and determined the difference of all 19-th century between ordinary people and chosen ones. The elite were seemed to be conducted by Christ’s prototype who was overestimated as a Genius living personification that is God’s and a person’s Oneness, or more precisely as a charismatic person. Finally, the Genius as the art creator and greatness as His representing point were “crowned” in Nietzsche’s philosophy, who raised up the Genius to the rank of a Superman. Christ’s prototype was rejected, God died and incarnated in the idea of a Superman. The Superman’s features which were endued by Nietzsche made Him just the idea which is incapable to exist in the real form of a specific person.

For this reason the Genius in Nietzsche’s philosophy transformed steadily into mythologem of his time.

The key issue of the article is the ability of Europe with all its post-Christian values and neo- liberalism handle the present situation that has been created due to “great migrations”. The aim of the article is to show the metamorphoses in the spheres of religion, ethics, and politics (started in the era of Reformation and Enlightenment) and to describe problem-solving scenarios, concerning migration and the EU migration policy. As a result of this process, the European countries created a union based on transnational secular values (peace, freedom, stability, prosperity, common economic market, multiculturalism and human rights). In this union all kinds of issues are presumably solved through dialogue and consensus, and not on the basis of the biological law – the right of the strongest. However, Europe is facing the problem of “great migrations” with terrorism as its possible implication (Paris, Brussels, Nice). The problem of migration and the ways of its solving remain unclear for the EU. Arguably, the current situation coupled with the present neo-liberal migration policy of the EU will most likely lead to drastic changes in the demographic and cultural face of Europe. As a result, in the coming decades, the European identity and the system of values inherited from Enlightenment will likely be gradually superseded by more conservative values of the migrants. The neo-liberal views of the European establishment can be considered the main cause of this coming transition. Only delicate migration policy will help find the way out of this dead end without lapsing into the radical right (nationalism) or the radical left (neo-liberalism).

Modern visual culture gives a wide variety of opportunities to represent values, characters, stories and images reflecting cultural diversity of the world and at the same time it is obligatory for the subject of communication to be tolerant, willing to participate in the dialogue, open to the perception of experience and appraisals of others. The authors consider issues of intercultural competence formation by means of animation. Special attention is paid to the animation as a part of modern visual culture. The article states that animation can form and develop cross-cultural competence. The authors define cross-cultural competence as a phenomenon actualized in the context of intensification of intercultural contacts in a globalizing society. Animation is a part of the modern visual culture providing various means for intercultural competence formation. Analyzing historiography data the authors consider the methods of portraying the ethnic element in animation as well as ethno-cultural values. The article presents the results of the conducted study of interpretations (made by high school students) of the animated images from other cultures, as well as their opinions on the ways of understanding other cultures in the context of intercultural dialogue and creativity. The authors point out the factors forming intercultural competence of high school students living in big cities and share the opinions of students (taken from their essays) on the opportunity of intercultural dialogue aiming at understanding people of other cultures.

The starting point for writing this article was a wide circulation of ideas about the identity of such notions as sobornost and collectivism not only at the level of mass consciousness, but also in the research literature. The purpose of the article is to show the fallacy of such beliefs. The original author's position is that sobornost and collectivism constitute two different traditions - if sobornost, being of a religious origin, is related to the Orthodox spiritual experience, collectivism originated from social and political experience. The author draws attention to the fact that this erroneous assertion is based on misunderstanding that sobornost refers to the metaphysical reality, not the social one. The article outlines the key points of the concept ‘sobornost’ in the interpretation of A. Khomyakov, and the development of this idea in the writings of S. L. Frank. If collectivism, absolutizing unity, makes a personality ‘smaller’, thereby destroying it, sobornost, on the contrary, makes a personality “bigger’, allowing him/her to fully develop. It is sobornost that helps self-actualizing of a person. It is emphasized that moving towards sobornost as the highest stage of human development is performed through strengthening of individuality. The author draws a conclusion that such a radical convergence of two concepts: sobornost and collectivism entails various scenarios for Russia's future.

The history of Koreans living in CIS countries shows the unity of regular processes of transformation of their culture in different periods of residence in the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union and today the CIS. The author distinguishes three main stages of the history of CIS Koreans, in accordance with the main areas of their residence in different historical periods. The current stage is characterized by the final formation of the Eurasian community of Koreans, scattered all over the CIS space. At the same time they preserve the unified cultural markers, as well as common historical memory. Eurasian identity implies prevalence of supranational factor over the national one in ethno-cultural identity. In the case with the CIS Koreans the national factor isn’t the cornerstone of their life activities, that is reflected, for example, in their position not to insist on the forming of national regions or creating other territories on the national basis. The article deals with the process of transforming the culture of CIS Koreans, the impact of important historical events on the loss of elements of their traditional culture. Today, in the context of the Eurasian reintegration processes in the post-Soviet space the developing a new concept of a supranational identity is becoming urgent. This concept would be able to fully reflect the current processes. CIS Koreans are an example of the formation of the Eurasian identity.

The article proves the thesis that the philosophy of company is one of the forms of existence of practical philosophy. The author considers the existing ways to formulate the philosophy of company and to define the main components in its composition, with examples from the practice of operating companies. The article argues the thesis about the existence of philosophical knowledge at different levels, determines the place of practical philosophy in the system of philosophical knowledge and reveals its main characteristics. It is shown that practical philosophy performs the basic function of philosophy and can exist as an individual philosophy, a philosophy of the collective subject and macro-groups. The fundamental needs of person and society, which necessitate the existence of practical philosophy, are identified; and the philosophy of company is described as the way to meet these needs at the level of the collective subject. The author concludes that the form and content of the company's philosophy as a whole exactly correspond to the format of the practical philosophy. On the basis of general philosophical ideas about the nature and methods of the philosophical knowledge (recourse to the ultimate ground of being, systematization, unity of different topics, appeal to the due) recommendations to the construction of the company's philosophy are offered.

The work of Alan Garner (b. 1934), one of the most significant contemporary English writers, consistently ranks the local myth of the writer's birthplace, Alderley Edge in Cheshire East. The evolution of the plot development can be seen well in the trilogy that began in 1960 (translated into Russian novel "The Magic Stone Brezingamena" and "Moon on the eve Gomrata") and completed in 2012 (untranslated novel «Boneland»). The story follows the adventures of a brother and sister who settled on a farm Alderley Edge. At an early stage story is built like a fairy tale, with contrasting humanized space truss wild woods and the hollow hill. Borrowing characters, motifs and themes of the epic tales leads to fragmentation and imposition of functions of heroes guarding different places. Chief among them, the magician fron the traditional fairy tale, Cadellin works within the boundaries of the Arthurian myth, protecting the cave with a sleeping king, the role of guardians of other places assigned to other heroes. In searching for the future integrity the author refuses to use ready-made fairy tale and epic models. In the final part of the trilogy keeper of the place becomes an "ancestral character" whose existence lasts until there is a race. The leading method of constructing the plot becomes a parallelism of events that occur with the personifications of the ancestral hero. Writer refuses to opposite locales (humanized and wild, positive and negative, and so on) and eras (ancient and modern, old and new magic, etc.), fusing them together and saying peculiar to primeval consciousness syncretism of perception, the only correct view of the world. Ancestral hero, shaman, guardian and creator of the myth controls all habitats, making all living space cultured at its mythological development. Bearing structures of the local myth becomes a kind of continuity, mastering the same place over successive eras.