Ideas and Ideals

This paper is a critical response to the article by professors P.A. Orekhovsky and V.I. Razumov “The Onset of Narcissistic Culture: Consequences for Education, Science and Politics”. The idea of treating Western post-war culture as narcissistic has been expressed in the United States since the 1970s of the XX century, but it will also be relevant in relation to the post-Soviet culture of Russia. Considering the ambiguity of the cognitive metaphor of Narcissus in relation to the described socio-cultural transformations caused by the possibility of an almost arbitrary interpretation of something as narcissism, the article presents its own interpretation of the foundations of narcissistic culture. Following the idea of opposing a narcissistic culture to a culture of service, modern narcissism is viewed not so much as an individual’s selfishness, but as a loss of an object and opportunity for service. Secularism, understood in the spirit of Charles Taylor as the loss of any higher, transcendent, hierarchical ontological concepts, deprives a person of a higher authority that legitimizes any service to something. This means a horizontal ontology of equivalent objects that do not have the highest value in relation to the individual. Post-traditionalism means impermanence, “fluidity” of any institutionalized forms of sociality and their perception, the dynamics of the emergence and decline of which does not allow the individual to find an object of service. A person remains in conditions of “minimal humanism”, which means that this person, having neither a higher reality that determines it, nor the constancy of social institutions, remains for himself the only possible value, a kind of “narcissist against his will”. We also believe that narcissism is not an external, but an internal factor of social processes that constitutes the motives and interests of the participants in these processes. While agreeing with the thesis about the connection between narcissistic culture and postmodernity, we believe that it is not a “young culture” opposite to mass society. On the contrary, narcissistic culture is the culture of a mass society that has gone further along the path of secularism, post-traditionalism and humanism, just as postmodernity is called late, far-reaching modernity by such sociologists as E. Giddens, U. Beck, Ju. Habermas.

This article continues the discussion of the phenomenon of modern culture published in the paper by P.A. Orekhovsky and V.I. Razumov “The Onset of Narcissistic Culture: Implications for Education, Science and Politics”. Arguments are presented for those consequences that lead culture to new states and guide thinking to explain the efforts needed to strengthen it in the role of developing us.

The judgments are based on a sense-genetic conception of culture that eliminates the naïve identity between the concepts of ‘cultural’, ‘civilized’, ‘cultivated’, ‘ethical’, ‘aesthetic’, ‘high’ and other assessments of specific properties of human behavior. The method of deriving consequences from judgments is based on the dialectical regularities of the development of living wholes and the products of their activity.

For the sake of continuing the semantic line of the original article, an attempt is made to rely on the phenomena of narcissism disclosed therein to see in them the signs of the future, the approach of which one could rejoice in without demonstrating its quite understandable experiences as an ugly form of the value landscape of modernity. In this sense, the idea, not developed but sown by the authors, that “narcissistic culture” brings to the world high diversity that can serve as a stimulus for the beginning of a new round of human development is supported here. There is a reason for this thought. They point to the approaching of gracious time when anarchic individualism will develop into another form of long-term sustainable coexistence of people under conditions of heterogeneity of values and interests. These conclusions make it possible to outline the contours of the tasks that need to be solved now in order to multiply this grace.

The article deals with the theme of mysticism in the works of Plato. The study begins with the concept of magic and comes to the conclusion that modern scientists do not know what the word μαγεία/magic really meant for the ancient Greeks.

However, Plato is considered to be the philosopher who laid down all the basic concepts of mysticism. The original ancient Greek definition of the word ‘mysticism’, derived from the Greek μυστικός, differs from the modern understanding of this concept and is directly related to the ancient Greek mysteries and the cult of the goddesses of fertility Demeter and Persephone. Very little is known about the mysteries, but it is obvious that for the ancient Greeks it was a way to gain immortality, a kind of action during which the soul descended to the underground world of the dead and returned from there. Many researchers note that such journeys of the soul among the Greeks are extremely similar to shamanic ones. But we are talking here about archaic views, and not about the shamanism that modern ethnography describes.

The most important part of the mysteries was contemplation. What exactly the participants of the mysteries contemplated, what the high priest showed them, remains a mystery. However, Plato in the dialogue “Republic” gives a lesson on how to reveal the ability to such contemplation with the help of mimesis, or imitation. This is not just an external theatrical imitation, namely, it is getting used to what is being contemplated.

Plato believed that actors and temples are not needed for a real mystery, it should unfold in contemplation, and therefore only you are needed for it. The author of the article finds confirmation of this idea in the dialogue between Socrates and Cephalus, which ends with the myth of Er’s travels to the world of the dead. Plato describes these journeys in such a way that his disciples, if desired, can enter the state of Er and, with the help of contemplative imitation, live everything that happened to him. These journeys are similar to the shamanic journeys of the soul to the underground world.

The author concludes the article with the assumption that Plato tried to create a kind of mysteries within his school for a philosopher who wants to master contemplation.

The article brings the analysis of Bacons’ ideas on war and political violence in general. Military activities of a state and military foundations of statecraft were of a particular interest for Bacon both from legal & bureaucratic and philosophical perspective. Both perspectives merged in his writings on colonization of Virginia and Ireland, military affairs with Spain, legal issues of union of England and Scotland and on the principles of policy-making. Bacon believed violence – organized, well-armed and successful – was a mighty factor uniting communities into a state. No one state in the world had been able to emerge without an oppression of the ruled by those who rule. The later stages of a state-building required something except mere force – a set of common habits and laws and a consent to be governed as well. The pursuit of common interest requires nowadays the use of an armed force. The reason for it is the contest between the rival states. The balance of powers, the colonial policy, the control of lands and populations are never available for a state lacking military power. Although a successful colonization, a proper use of lands and an effective government could never be achieved by such a means. These goals require a legitimate rule based upon a common consent, a respect for the law and a peaceful labor. A conquered population should be naturalized rather than forced to recognize a new government. A wise ruler will use armed force moderately even for such purposes like suppression of seditions and wrong religions. Analyzing war from a pragmatic, Machiavellian perspective, Bacon had escaped the aestheticisation of martial virtue and art of waging wars typical for Machiavelli.

May 7th, 2020, the wonderful philosopher Tatyana Borisovna Lyubimova died. Her final monograph “Philosophy and Countertradition” is a multifaceted study of the correlations between traditional culture and the current state of philosophy. This is also the last publication on the life path of Tatyana Borisovna, in her philosophical adventure, where Western sociology and categorical aesthetics, ancient Russian philosophy and metaphysics of a unified tradition became landmarks. Tatiana Borisovna always lacked topos and chronos, she wrote about Peter I and the sociology of Adorno’s music, the ontology of tragedy and the ecology of culture, about the dialogue of civilizations and the philosophy of life of Rozanov; she translated Böhme and Berleant, Sartre and Ricoeur. Particularly noteworthy is the participation of T.B. Lyubimova in grant research on the interaction of cultural models, the modernization of ideology and the globalization of cultures, where she expressed her non-standard opinion outside the ordinary field of consciousness. In short, Lyubimova’s system can be called a ‘strange philosophy’. This is a philosophy where self-discovery of the paradoxes of one’s own world takes place. This is a portrait of culture without its essence, made according to aesthetic guidelines. This is a worldview where a metaphysical thread stretched between unusual reference points: Kepler’s hexagonal snowflakes and the calendar rites of the farmers of Central Asia.

Tatyana Borisovna published the largest anthology of the works of René Guénon in Russian in her own translation. The French traditionalist remained for Tatyana Borisovna a transcendental magnet of her late work, he set the course of her inner time, bestowed metaphysical freedom, and clarified the increasingly complex world of quantitative relations.

The article deals with one of the particular applications of the concept of “simulacrum”. The article also shows under which circumstances there was a need to use the concept of “simulacrum”. In this case, the simulacrum is presented as a form of simplified and distorted perception of system objects. The main form of a system organization is a hierarchy. Hierarchical systems have the property of forming inverse relationships. Inversion occurs when a subordinate element of the hierarchy acquires dominant properties in it, but does not move to a higher position. This relationship is possible because there are several organizational principles in the system, and these principles collide with each other. A distorted perception of hierarchical systems occurs when inverse relationships are ignored. As a result, an image of the system is formed that is distant from reality (simulacrum). Over time, this image becomes less realistic, as changes occur in the real system caused by the development of inversions. Inversions are the cause of intra-system dynamics; they can lead a system object to decay and destruction. They also, under certain circumstances, contribute to the self-development of the system. However, if we consider only the simulacrum of this system, this ability to self-destruct remains unnoticed. The system’s ability to develop itself remains unrecognized. This concept has become relevant as a result of inversion in the hierarchical system of human activity. The subordinate level of activity that is responsible for subject actions comes to the fore because of the increasingly technical aspects of human activity. The highest, symbolic level of activity moves to a subordinate position. The activity level responsible for subject actions also operates with signs and is responsible for using language as a sign system. Hence, there comes the need for the concept of “simulacrum”, which is “the signifier without the signified”.

The article examines the paradoxical nature of G. W. F. Hegel’s biography and philosophical ideology. The essence of paradoxicality is substantiated by several factors – biographical, historical-philosophical, hermeneutical, and concrete-historical. The purpose of the work is to identify insufficiently known aspects of the personality and philosophical ideology of the thinker. Methodologically, the study is constructed using dialectical and historical-logical methods. The results of the study are to reveal the voluminous inconsistency of Hegel’s biography and thought; to clarify both the positive and negative aspects of his philosophical ideology.

The author shows a number of paradoxes of Hegel’s philosophy: first, the understanding of development as a ‘hard’ war against itself and inattention to the multifactorial and non-linear nature of many processes; secondly, focusing on a logical idea belittles or denies the value of everything else, including living and human beings; thirdly, the desire to raise a person to ‘the highest’ position and at the same time enslave him as a universal creature and a state citizen; fourth, Hegel’s essentialism is frankly anti-existential and merciless to everything private and subjective; fifth, Hegel’s seemingly flawless scientific system suffers from inattention to the complexity and unpredictability of reality; sixth, the Lutheran religiosity of the philosopher turns out to be almost anti-Christian – with the non-recognition of the Most Holy Trinity, without the desire to become a ‘servant’ of another, etc.; seventh, Hegel’s decency and philistine ‘kindness’ are radically different from his pejorative attitude towards the female sex, other peoples, races, and civilizations. Colonialism is justified. Hence, it was quite natural for the German Nazis to turn to Hegel’s ideas. Eighth, the great dialectic has too much belittled the reality of static things, unambiguity and invariance.

The novelty of the research lies in the recognition of the true causes and tasks of the thinker’s life and work; in the explanation of his main values, including his understanding of Christianity; in the clarification of the Hegel-German and Hegel-citizen positions.

The conclusions of the study are related to the antithetical comparison of the ideology and philosophy of Hegel and Hesse, Hegel and Shestov. The author highlights anti-existential and racial-nationalist motives of the philosopher’s work.

The article analyzes two approaches to explaining the American Revolution. The first belongs to Irina Zhezhko-Braun, who in her works examines the features and formation of social technologies created by the left in the United States, their application in the struggle for power, the transformation of the consciousness and behavior of social subjects, the emasculation of the original democratic principles and other social processes. Vadim Rozin, being not only a methodologist, but also a culturologist, outlines another explanation - culturological. At the same time, he puts forward a hypothesis according to which modernity is a complex double process of a parallel crisis of the culture of modernity and the emergence of “postculture”, which for the time being is manifested for researchers in the trends of sociality. The author of the article considers it necessary to consider the American Revolution by combining both approaches (from the point of view of social sciences and cultural studies), that is, to implement a sociocultural approach and discourse. For this, he first characterizes the social and cultural approaches separately. If the selection and characterization of culture presupposes procedures for comparing different cultures, analysis of the integrity of culture and an invariant vision of the world, then sociality is set by the processes of directed social change, management and power. Then, relying on the material of the reconstruction of the modern American revolution, which was proposed by I. Zhezhko-Braun, the author outlines a sociocultural explanation. In particular, he claims that the successes of the quiet and invisible for many “step-by-step American revolution” can be explained not only by effective social technology and the connivance of the ruling class, but also by the fact that guided social changes are taking place against the background of parallel processes of the completion of modernity and the formation of post-culture

The starting point of the paper is the three articles in the journal Ideas and Ideals by Irina Zhezhko-Brown who analyzes the formation of a new ruling class in the USA, which rests on racial and gender minorities. The values proclaimed by the elite are fundamentally different from traditional American values.

The paper shows that any attempt to bring them into life can have devastating consequences for American society and, ultimately, lead to its downfall. Considering the huge role of the USA in the world system, this can be compared to the fall of the Roman Empire.

The author shows that it is possible to escape such an outcome. The obstacle to this escape is the entire social and economic system that has developed in the USA. In the field of economics, the priority in recruiting personnel is given to quotas based on race and gender instead of qualification and business qualities, which will lead to a significant decrease in the financial performance of companies and the wages of employees.

The author analyzes such long-term macroeconomic defects of the American economy as the budget deficit, trade and balance of payments deficit, and the growth of government debt. In the near future, these defects may lead to a deep economic crisis, a stock market crisis, and the US dollar can lose its position as the key currency.

The paper considers economic and political premises and prevention methods of these destructive processes.