Ideas and Ideals

The article considers the theoretical views of French monetary economists of the second half of the XVI century in connection with the price revolution of the period. The usual explanation of this inflation is based on the quantity theory of money, which was first propounded by Martin de Azpilcueta Navarro (1492-1586) in Spain and by Jean Bodin (1529-1596) in France. According to this theory, the precious metals, arriving in Spain from the New World, increased the quantity of metallic currency in the state. This in turn led to the increase in prices in Spain and to a balance-of-payments’ deficiency, as the demand for foreign merchandise, including goods supply from Spain to America, exceeded the Spanish own export abroad. This deficiency was financed by metallic currency which, respectively, affected price increase in foreign countries. However, the French theorists, besides the increase of precious metals in circulation, emphasized also other reasons for the inflation, such as a population growth, the actions of monopolists and the increased demand for luxury goods. In their works, they also offered a number of measures for a stabilisation of national currency. Their conclusions promoted the preparation of the monetary reform which was carried out by the government of France in 1577.

The author analyses the tendencies of the discipline formation such as philosophy of economy. The author hypothesizes that it was impossible to form autonomous philosophical-economic knowledge in Russia of the 18-th century. The prerequisites of philosophical and economic trends in Russia were investigated in the article as well as the history of scientific rational thinking formation within the framework of religiously-utopian discourse in the 18-th century Russia. According to the basic thesis of the article the philosophical-economic discourse could not be formed in Russia of the 18-th century because of the absence of cultural pre-conditions. The economic aspect was included into the religiously-utopian context, the author states the fact, that cultural space was not prepared to accept the economic ideas and concepts. Nevertheless, there was a need in scientific economic thinking able to specify the way of modernization of economy inspired by historical transformations of Peter I, who generated competition with the European states in such areas as: trade, military business and shipbuilding.

In the article the author attempts to describe the phenomenon of the hidden meaning of advertisement as the object of understanding, special attention is paid to cognitive and information aspects. The author treats the term ‘implicitness’ as components that are not explicated in the external structure of the advertised message, but they embody the inner essence of the advertised message. The author identifies the components of implicit information comprising the advertised message: presupposition and implication. It was concluded that the hidden meaning of the advertisement may be goal-oriented (when it was purposefully generated by the subject of the advertising) and spontaneous (when it occurs independently of the will and desire of the subject of promotional activities, including the effect of associated and inducible images, which emergence in the minds of consumers has been unplanned). Another important feature of the advertised message, in addition to having a hidden meaning, is its repetitiveness. These features contribute to the fact that the recipient in the process of perception and decoding of the advertised message will generate new meanings because of the subjectivity of perception. In other words, due to the combination of these properties, it becomes possible to realize the full potential, concluded in advertising communication.

The paper aims to give an interpretation of the rejection of master-theory in the feminist epistemology within the contemporary pragmatism context. Within the feminist field, the rejection is guided by the fundamental “instability of the analytical categories of feminist theory”, which is itself the consequence of an attempt to copy the androcentric way to make feminist theory (S. Harding). The interpretation of the rejection within the contemporary pragmatism field gives a possibility to represent the “instability” not as the consequence of the relativization of the discourse within the feminist epistemology, but as the consequence of the pragmatic interpretation of the theory “as an instrument”, representing a complex social phenomenon.

The article is devoted to the problem of determination of the specifics of social and philosophical knowledge in comparison with sociology. Despite their genetic relationship and substantial similarity they have essential differences. For a philosopher the initial object of critical analysis is not a society itself, but the way of its description, while for a sociologist the main objective is to create a descriptive model of the social phenomena. The mentioned above distinctions don't cancel the possibility of effective synthesis of the approaches developed both within the frames of sociology, and social philosophy.

The Internet allows a huge number of people, including those living abroad to feel like a single community. Internet-based technologies represent a new social capital of migrants that has not existed before. Obvious aspect of computer-mediated communication (CMC) is that it goes beyond time and space. Virtual communities have the potential not only to bind the individuals, but also to unite them, creating an emotional connection. Internet-based technologies increase quantitative and qualitative indicators of communication, supplementing already existing structure of interaction, acting sometimes as a factor initiating the subsequent interaction in reality. A research devoted to the process of communication among migrants (including CMC), deserves special attention, since migration is global in nature and has increasing rates. We can select 4 categories of using Internet-based technologies: search tools, e-mails, forums and chats. Using Internet-based technologies may vary depending on the stage of migration, which can be divided into three: pre-migrant, post-migrant and settled migrant. CMC is used by migrants to build new relationships, maintain existing and restore the lost ones. Internet-based technologies almost allow migrants to be in a different reality. Sometimes the frequency and activity of virtual contacts making them for the individual much more real than those that do not take place "online". Internet-based technologies are an important resource in the field of communication of individuals and provide them with plenty of opportunities previously unavailable. Reality mediated by the internet-based technologies transforms, slowly becomes a new previously non-existed reality.

The subject of this article is the role of philosophy in the history from Antiquity till nowadays. Namely in Ancient Greece the idea of the omnipotence of speculative knowledge appears, which has found its particularly strong expression in Pythagorean doctrine. The idea of omnipotence belongs is common to great researchers who are prone to unjustified extension of the scope of their methods. In particular the harm caused to the scientific knowledge of Plato is analyzed. The success of science has brought to life the fantastic philosophy of rationalism, and this science was undoubtedly the Greek geometry. Under the influence of Plato and of Euclidean geometry theology arises in the Middle ages. Only in the eighteenth century science in our sense has become the catalyst of progress. The crucial role was played by Newton, who, by establishing differential and integral calculus, had substantiated the philosophy of empiricism, and had secure its historic victory. Communism as well as fascism grew out of the so-called "German classical philosophy", which was the continuation of the medieval philosophy of rationalism. Yet scientists, unlike priests of the past, do not undertake the attempt to build the unified worldview. The appearance of the objective science was a rejection of important types of previous knowledge. At the same time the humanistic weltanschauung of the New age stands in accordance with science and ready to take her new discoveries. It opens up the creative freedom to shape the future of humankind.

In the proposed article a comparatively novel concept of megaregion has been offered in modern analytical discourse, i.e. by economic, socio-cultural and geopolitical dimensions. The megaregion has been interpreted as the combination or constellation of the regions, close to each other by territory and history, i.e. Space and Time. Different concepts of the megaregion have been observed, i.e. a) geographical and geopolitical determination b) megaurban actual trends c) socio-cultural diversification, consolidated in the “frame” of the megaregion. First of all, and mostly, the work is correlated with the exact enormous by its space and resources the megaregion Siberia, which, according to the world classification spreads from the Urals up to the Pacific Ocean. Conceptual analysis of any megaregion suggests it to be carried put by the temporal (historical) and special (geographical) squares and along three axes — economic, socio-cultural and geopolitical ones. Without doubt, it’s important to investigate organizational, governing and legal institutions in the context of the megaregion, but this ought to be the subject of the next article.

This article investigates the parameters which allow to consider Siberia in the capacity of a megaregion. From the historical point of view the relationships are analyzed between the state and spontaneous mastering of Siberian territories from the geopolitical and managerial aspect. The role and place of the center of gravity of the Siberian territories is examined, and it is shown that none of the major cities has become such a centre, either economically or culturally. This question is considered also from the point of view of the concept of provinciality. It is shown that the most interesting developmental projects of the Siberian megaregion take it as a whole territory, stretching from the Urals to the Pacific and northward to the Arctic, and only such an approach (not dividing it to particular clusters) can fully reveal its geopolitical significance. Culturally, the difficulty of life in Siberia, as well as the usual diverse contacts of different ethnic and religious groups predetermined the original tolerance of the Siberian population.

“Scientific communism” was introduced into educational programs of all soviet higher education institutions in 1963/64. It is important to study the history of this discipline for it effectively displays transformation of social sciences into a coherent system of disciplines during “The Thaw”. This discipline emerged in the period of destalinization as a result of mass request for renovation and rationalization of social knowledge. During the period of its institutionalization, “scientific communism” was perceived by many specialists as a new, truthful Soviet sociology. In the 2nd part of the article the author shows how the discipline was influenced by the changes in the World socialist movement, in which the Communist Party of China challenged ideological leadership of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. This article shows that the discipline emerged as the result of changes in the official ideology, institutional changes in the Soviet higher education and in the global ideological rivalry.