Some biblical texts suggest that man consists of two parts—body and soul—whereas others seem to indicate instead three parts—body, soul, and spirit. This paper examines how the Church Fathers dealt with this apparent contradiction. It finds that although they generally favor the body-soul dichotomy, they did not see it as contradicting a trichotomous view, for “spirit” can be interpreted in a number of ways: as another term for the soul, or as the lowest imaginative part of the soul, or as (...) its highest rational part, or as the grace of the Holy Spirit. Different approaches can be found in different patristic authors depending on their theological interests and the biblical passages at issue. (shrink)

Within the Hebbian paradigm the mechanism for integrating cell assemblies oscillating with different frequencies remains unclear. We hypothesize that such an integration may occur in cortical “interaction foci” that unite synchronously oscillated assemblies through hard-wired connections, synthesizing the information from various functional systems of the brain.

Classical mechanics is empirically successful because the probabilistic mean values of quantum mechanical observables follow the classical equations of motion to a good approximation (Messiah 1970, 215). We examine this claim for the one-dimensional motion of a particle in a box, and extend the idea by deriving a special case of the ideal gas law in terms of the mean value of a generalized force used to define "pressure." The examples illustrate the importance of probabilistic averaging as a method of (...) abstracting away from the messy details of microphenomena, not only in physics, but in other sciences as well. (shrink)

We give an affirmative answer to the following question: Is any Borel subset of a Cantor set C a sum of a countable number of pairwise disjoint h-homogeneous subspaces that are closed in X? It follows that every Borel set \documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${X \subset {\bf R}^n}$$\end{document} can be partitioned into countably many h-homogeneous subspaces that are Gδ-sets in X.

The article is devoted to the phenomenon of interstate confrontation known as “hybrid war.” It attempts to consider this phenomenon in relation to pankration, the ancient Greek martial art with minimum limitations. The paper defines the philosophical and historical preconditions for hybrid war, its epistemological and ideological aspects. The author assesses the statement declaring Russia guilty of waging this type of war. Analysis of relevant sources allows us to answer the question of the theoretical prerequisites for the formation of the (...) concept of hybrid wars and to name the authors who first expressed ideas of the transformation of war into a new type of military confrontation. An attempt is made to perform a comparative analysis of various interpretations of the concept of “hybrid war.” The place of this concept among others that are related to the so-called “new wars” is considered. The author questions a negative connotation to the concept of hybrid war and the legitimacy of attempts by Western countries to attribute the conduct of this type of military action exclusively to Russia. A number of countries attempt to use Russia as a “scapegoat,” and this complex has been described by the French philosopher R. Girard. A broader interpretation of this mechanism leads to sacralization of collective aggression, but not in relation to an individual but in relation to a participant in international relations. Comprehension of the essential features of hybrid war, of its tendencies towards eliminating restrictions and regulating forms and methods of achieving military and political goals makes it possible to identify the possibilities of resisting aggressive aspirations of some countries trying to impose their scenarios for resolving international contradictions on other states. (shrink)

This article examines the siginifcant role that Romeplayed in the life of Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev. The author researches the “Roman” preferences of young Turgenev, who specialized in ancient literature and philosophy in Moscow, St. Petersburgand Berlin. Special attention is paid to the circumstances of 21-years-old Turgenev’s stay in the Eternal City in February–April 1840 and his relationship with members of Khovrins’ salon in Rome, espesially with the eldest daughter of Khovrin, Alexandra Nikolaevna, in marriage Bakhmeteva, whо became later a wellknown (...) writer on religious and philosophical topics. The author substantiates the version that it was young “Sashenka” Khovrina who became the prototype of Lisa Kalitina in the novel Home of the Gentry, started in Rome at the end of 1857. The author studies the “Italian traces” in the literary work of Turgenev: in early romantic poem Steno, poem Venus of Medicis, novel On the Eve, etc. The author notes that the “civilizational” contrasts between the “North” and the “South”, abundantly scattered in the works of young Turgenev, suggest that in his work has found a kind of continuation of the tradition of the “Russian Northernship,” deriving in Russian literature from G.R. Derzhavin, N.M. Karamzin, Prince P.A. Vyazemsky. (shrink)

This paper answers the question, what is Kant’s ‘Critical Philosophy’? The answer is not provided by a bibliography of Kant’s main works, nor by his transcendental idealism. The answer consists in Kant’s critique of our human capacity to judge and of those rational principles by which we can properly judge matters accurately and cogently. To show this, three key features of Kant’s critique of rational judgment are examined: Five constitutive characteristics of our human capacity to judge (§2), two basic theses (...) of Kant’s Critical Philosophy (§3) and a table of basic systematic questions and their Critical answers (§4). This conspectus is philosophically significant because it clearly identifies Kant’s Critical method and its key considerations, which continue to be widely neglected when considering philosophical method (§5). (shrink)

In On the Genesis of Thought and Language, linguist Alexey Koshelev explores fundamental questions of how human concepts arise in a child, why concepts appear in a child before words, the genesis of language, and why there are so many languages. Chapter One introduces the fundamental dichotomy "visual (exogenous) vs. functional (endogenous)" cognitive units; these units are used to give non-verbal definitions of mental representations of various objects, actions, and situations. In particular, definitions of such concepts as GLASS, CHAIR, (...) BANANA, TREE, LAKE, RUN, and some others are given. Chapter Two discusses how children form concepts, hierarchical relationships, and propositions (conceptual 'utterances'). It is shown that the initial units of the child's representation of the world are pre-conceptual cognitive units--mental representations of whole situations. In the course of two consecutive cycles in the child's cognitive development, these units transform into (a) primary notions--object and motor concepts, and (b) binary role relationships. Together, they constitute the elementary language of thought which, in the process of thinking, is used to build conceptual structures--propositions. It is further demonstrated that, immediately after the formation of thought, the child begins to develop his native language in which concrete and motor concepts become initial meanings of nouns and verbs, while propositions become the meanings of the child's expressions. The chapter concludes with a contrastive analysis of the proposed approach and Aristotle's and Chomsky's views on thought and language. Chapter Three analyzes how a community's culture affects its language. It is demonstrated that the progress of a community, the main constituent of the civilizational component of its culture, enhances the development of the content component of language by extending the range of its lexical and grammatical meanings. In the context of this analysis, Daniel Everett's (2008) hypothesis that culture affects language structure is discussed. In the subsequent sections, models of the development of human and social activity are offered. These models comprise three components: Activity (main component), Thought, and Language (auxiliary components that ensure the successful realization of activities). The models are illustrated with examples of some concrete societies. (shrink)

Xenophanes claimed that God is a ball, which means that he is a perfect body. This idea is well developed in Jagannatha worship, who is a central Deity in Orissa, India. It’s a round form of Krishna, who is usually depicted in a human like form. Jagannatha, his brother Baladeva and sister Subhadra are justified as round forms because of their specific manifestation of ecstasy, that, according to aesthetical theory (rasa tattva) happened to them. Yet there are many other explanations (...) of the Jagannatha’s roundness. Round form personifies unity and diversity principle in Jagannatha worship, whose image was dear in Orissa duringlong historical period to different religious groups: Vaishnavas, Shaivaites, Jains, Buddhists and even some Muslims. Orissa also has a blending of different cultures, sub-cultures and traditions. Even now, it has 62 distinct tribal groups, that makes a largest collection of diverse tribes in a single state. As the legend goes, Jagannatha made His first appearance in the tribe of Savaras thousands of years ago. Up until now, there are cooks in the Jagannatha kitchen that are called sauviras. In worship of Jagannatha we find the model of axiological globalism, when the difference in the vision of the reality does not obscure the interior mood of wholeness, unity. (shrink)

The article highlights certain aspects of the obscured structure of the number, which occur irregularly in the teaching of numeracy in Preschool Education. Its absence, as an effect, leads to the child's misunderstanding of the concept of number. In the presymbolic stage, the number is taught through the word. Structural particularities are found in the semantics and phonetics of the number word and are substantial in the processes of speech and listening. The objectives are to make known the obscured structure (...) of the number and its elements and to analyze the nature of the name of the number. It is justified that the basis of the word "ONE" are the first sound manifestations of the infant. It states that there is the same and equal relationship between the acquisition of knowledge of language and speech with the acquisition of knowledge of number through the development of tonal auditory balance. Methodology: the theoretical analysis of the structural parts (semantics and phonosemantics) of the number and the identification of reciprocal correlation between the constructions of the knowledge of spoken numeral word in Preschool Education through the implemented technology. Contribution: the development of the method for learning the concept of number. (shrink)

Some are attracted to the view that repeatable artworks, such as films, novels, plays, symphonies, photographs, and the like, are a particular kind of abstracta—namely, types. This view, however, is not unproblematic. One of the most serious problems it faces is the so-called "creation problem." The core idea behind this problem is that, on the one hand, it seems reasonable to accept the claims that (1) repeatable artworks are types, (2) types cannot be created, and (3) repeatable artworks are created, (...) but, on the other hand, these claims form an inconsistent triad. A popular solution to the creation problem is that (2) can be rejected because the justification for (2) is based on a false assumption—that no type can stand in causal relations. Although this solution looks promising, it can be accepted only if its proponent can refute what might be called the "paraphrasability argument." On this argument, types are not to be regarded as capable of standing in causal relations because any discourse implying the causality of types should be paraphrased into discourse that does not imply this. My aim in this essay is to show that there is good reason to consider the paraphrasability argument sound and, hence, that the foregoing solution to the creation problem fails. (shrink)

An analogy between the evolution of organisms and some complex computational problems (cryptosystem cracking, determination of the shortest path in a graph) is considered. It is shown that in the absence of a priori information about possible species of organisms such a problem is complex (is rated in the class NP) and cannot be solved in a polynomial number of steps. This conclusion suggests the need for re-examination of evolution mechanisms. Ideas of a deterministic approach to the evolution are discussed.

The paper considers Plato’s theory of language through the prism of the Timaeus’ metaphysics. It is argued that the apparent contradictions of Plato’s philosophy of language are the consequence of the two-fold nature of language, and that the metaphysical scheme proposed by Plato in the Timaeus can shed a light on his coherent theory of language. The linguo-metaphysical isomorphism of the Timaeus presupposes that (1) words and material elements have their own meaning and nature respectively; (2) they can be reduced (...) to an infinite variety of amorphic sounds and receptacle; (3) the participation in truth is possible only at the level of narrative and universe. According to this scheme the universe (κόσμος), as well as any speech (λόγος), can be explained by the reduction to its constituent elements, but it will be only necessary explanation. Whereas for Plato, the true understanding of cosmos and logos is possible only on the level of the coherent unity of the whole, which represents the ideal paradigm in the best possible way. (shrink)

Recently, a number of philosophers have defended a novel, materialist view on the nature of musical works—musical perdurantism. According to this view, musical works are a peculiar kind of concreta, namely perduring mereological sums of performances and/or other concrete entities. One problem facing musical perdurantism stems from the thought that if this view is correct, then virtually no musical work can exist in a continuous, non-intermittent fashion. The aim of this paper is to expound this problem and show that it (...) cannot be plausibly solved by a musical perdurantist. (shrink)

The article stresses that Georgy P. Fedotov's systematic reference to the Bible enabled him in his historical monographs to reconstruct the spiritual reality of past eras and symbolically perceive the present. Fedotov intended to know The Gospel in History, Russian religiosity, exploring it on the material of hagiographies of saints, spiritual poems, folk faith, apocrypha, and prologues. Fedotov considered the history of Russian culture in terms of a "living chain," an integral phenomenon existing due to the Holy Scriptures and Holy (...) Tradition. However, "The sacred tradition of the Church is included in the general stream of historical tradition, all complex, always muddy, human weaving truth and falsehood." Fedotov raised the question of the relationship between scientific criticism and biblical exegetics: how can we reconcile exegetics of sacred texts, which assume that the Bible is an inspired book, and historical criticism, which by its very nature cannot share such a position, being aimed at comprehending objective historical reality? He solved it convincingly practically through hermeneutic religious analysis of hagiographic monuments and spiritual verses. In his Spiritual Poems Fedotov explores folklore material compared to biblical texts, hagiographies, and apocrypha, to comprehend the peculiarity of religious "Weltanschauung" and popular orthodoxy. In spiritual verses, there was a transformation of biblical images under the influence of folk faith with pagan features. In folklore texts, Fedotov reveals how Christ, from savior and redeemer, turns into a king and dreadful judge. The image of the Mother of God merges in the popular consciousness with the image of the mother earth, suffering from people. Eschatological prophecies are based on impressions from icons, frescoes, and lubok pictures. Fedotov's historical monographs illuminate various aspects of Russian religious consciousness regarding Holy Scripture, considering dogmatic biblical exegetics and historical criticism. All the mentioned facts allow us to assert that Fedotov was the leading secular biblical scholar of the Russian diaspora. (shrink)

Quantum mechanics is one of the most successful theories of physics. But the creators of quantum mechanics had to reject realism in order to describe some paradoxical quantum phenomena. Einstein considered the rejection of realism unacceptable, since according to his understanding, realism is the presupposition of every kind of physical thinking. The dispute about the permissibility of rejecting realism has largely determined the modern understanding of quantum theory and even led to the emergence new quantum information technologies. Many modern authors (...) are sure that realism can be refute experimentally. Some authors are sure even that real technologies can be created on the basis of this refutation. The well-known GHZ theorem is considered critically in this work the authors of which are sure that realism can be refute experimentally. (shrink)

Gregory Savich Skovoroda (1724-1794) belongs both to the Russian and Ukrainian philosophy. His philosophical doctrine was only revivified at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries, which was caused by the affinity of the philosophical searches of the Silver Age (beginning of the 1890s-1922) with the religious and philosophical doctrine by Gregory Skovoroda. In the history of philosophy, Gregory Skovoroda can be considered «boundary figure» marking transition from the Middle Ages to the culture of the Modernity. The article deals with the (...) thinker’s ethical doctrine, particularly, with two interpretations of nature: essential and voluntary. Moralizing was the main aim and content of the most works by Gregory Skovoroda. Practical philosophy by Gregory Skovoroda immediately sides with his understanding of nature. Volition, wish (desire), affinity, true man are its basic categories. The main aim of Skovoroda’s moralizing is to show the way to the happy life. The essential topic of the Skovoroda’s creative work are concentrated in his ethics: ontology, or doctrine of three worlds (microcosm, macrocosm, symbolic world – the Bible), exegetical method of cognition and symbolism, doctrine of nature and category of affinity, the principle of self-cognition and doctrine of the «true man», doctrine of heart and anthropology, eudemonism and problem of reality of the evil and the good in the world. According to the canons of the symbolism Skovoroda criticizes material, corporeal side of the world and gives preference to its spiritual meaning. Nevertheless, Skovoroda remains a religious thinker in his practical philosophy; he meditates per religious canons. For the 18th century Gregory Skovoroda’s doctrine had been as archaic as it became relevant at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries. (shrink)

The paper discusses Norman Malcolm’s interpretation of Anselm’s ontological argument. Since Malcolm had shown no interest in religious or theological issues prior to publishing his article on that subject in 1960, the analysis takes clue from Malcolm’s earlier writings. By doing so, I revisit the assessment of the ontological argument as fallacious and the tendency to assess Anselm from the traditional framework initiated by Kant. As I demonstrate, Malcolm interpreted Anselm based on the method elaborated during the 1950s. That method (...) involved a synthesis between ordinary language philosophy and common sense philosophy, associated with the late Wittgenstein and Moore respectively. As I further argue, the usual objections to Malcolm’s approach ignore the main line of his reasoning: that Anselm’s ontological argument does not violate ordinary language. Indeed, the two concepts of God as “the greatest of all beings” and of the necessity of God’s existence both perfectly fit in how language works. The “God-talk” is therefore logical only in accordance with Malcoms definition of logical: an explication of the rules of ordinary language, whereas each and every argument against Anselm’s ontological proof violates ordinary language drastically. In his late works on the subject, Malcolm suggested that multiple proofs of God’s existence should be viewed as expressions of a specific philosophic pathology whose underlying drive is a justification of various forms of life. Instead of regarding this idea as “fideistic” (e.g., in K. Nielsen’s work), I propose that the very concept of ordinary language, as Malcolm developed it, makes a treatment of language games along the lines of dependence or independence obsolete. Rather, a crucial issue that Malcolm pushes to investigate is how religious statements correlate with ordinary language. (shrink)

We study uncertainty relations for a general class of canonically conjugate observables. It is known that such variables can be approached within a limiting procedure of the Pegg–Barnett type. We show that uncertainty relations for conjugate observables in terms of generalized entropies can be obtained on the base of genuine finite-dimensional consideration. Due to the Riesz theorem, there exists an inequality between norm-like functionals of two probability distributions in finite dimensions. Using a limiting procedure of the Pegg–Barnett type, we take (...) the infinite-dimensional limit right for this inequality. Hence, uncertainty relations are derived in terms of generalized entropies. In particular, the case of measurements with a finite precision is addressed. It takes into account that in any experiment an accuracy of performed measurements is always limited. (shrink)

The article is related to the revealing of the intent of Hegel’s “Science of Logic”. As authors take it, there is an attempt to imagine the fundamental level of reasoning, where there is no opposition between cognition and its object. In this dimension there is no need to substantiate compatibility between them — it is a level of primary foundation of knowledge. Consequently, any knowledge at this level may be characterized as “Ultimate”. That being said, place of such knowledge is (...) not taken by several specific statements, but by the certain way of organizing those “mental definitions” that are already used by common human sense. To organize these definitions, to arrange them into consistently deployed sequence of logical notions, there is need to abort the search for the primary foundation for knowledge inherent in philosophy from its very origins. This attempt was reflected in Kant's theory of knowledge, where the problem of the reliability of knowledge was solved due to self-limitation in the process of cognition — it was necessary to stop before a certain line, beyond which thought leaves “the limits of possible experience” and falls into the area of insoluble contradictions (antinomies). Hegel's Logic, which, according to the authors, is in a kind of “symbiosis” with the Kantian program, consists in considering these insoluble contradictions precisely as a “symptom” of achieving the primary foundation of knowledge. It is in the collision with an insoluble contradiction that the definitions are organized in the necessary logical sequence, and that fundamental level is reached where there is no opposition between cognition and its object. (shrink)

The article proposes to consider Hegel's “Science of Logic” as a project, where the most important thing is not to describe the “laws of thinking”, but rather to propose a more precise definition of the theoretical level at which thinking itself becomes the subject of its own description. Thus, on the one hand, Hegel reveals the paradox that lies at the basis of the logic as a philosophical discipline, and on the other, seeks to show the possibility of the existence (...) of the logic in the extreme conditions of this paradox. Within the framework of this approach, logic is inseparable from the theory of knowledge — it is assumed that the configuration or “form” of thinking cannot be “neutral” with respect to its content. Therefore, according to Hegel, in reality there is not the logic of isolated operations occurring in the mind, but the logic of “the object itself”, which shows and directly embodies itself in these operations. At this level, there is no gap between the thinking consciousness and objects of the external world separated from it. We are talking about a special — “pre-ontological” — dimension, where the subject's sensory experience is not yet launched and distinguished, and a subject of the thinking process and thinking itself form a single whole. Such a dimension is developed in the historical experience of philosophical thought, starting from Antiquity, and is captured by Hegel under the name of “Ultimate knowledge”. The article raises the question of why this dimension repeatedly eludes us, acquiring a “semi-mystical” status in the minds of Hegel's interpreters, and yet how it is still possible to infiltrate into it. (shrink)

The consensus is that repeatable artworks cannot be identified with particular material individuals. A perennial temptation is to identify them with types, broadly construed. Such identification, however, faces the so-called “Creation Problem.” This problem stems from the fact that, on the one hand, it seems reasonable to accept the claims that (1) repeatable artworks are types, (2) types cannot be created, and (3) repeatable artworks are created, but, on the other hand, these claims are mutually inconsistent. A possible solution to (...) the Creation Problem is to argue that claim (2) can be rejected because (a) the only motivation for it is that a type, being abstract, cannot stand in causal relations, but (b) this motivation is ungrounded, since types can, in fact, stand in such relations. Clearly, in order for this solution to be successful, it is necessary to substantiate the possibility of types to be causally efficacious. In this essay, I examine an attempt to do this with the help of Yablo’s principle of proportionality, which has been undertaken by Walters (2013) and, more recently, Juvshik (2018). Although the argument they advance may seem to provide strong support for the causal efficacy of types, I think it actually fails to do this. To explain why this is so, I first show that this argument commits us to the existence of widespread causal overdetermination involving types and then argue that this commitment is both epistemically and ontologically problematic. (shrink)

Il s’agit dans cet article de dégager une certaine disposition de la philosophie russe envers la traduction comme opération fondamentale de la pensée. On considérera les cas précis des trois penseurs jouissant d’un prestige européen – Léon Chestov, Mikhaïl Bakhtine et Valery Podoroga. Cette disposition, considérée dans le geste des philosophes face à l’intraduisible, se manifesterait tout simplement par la violence, faite à l’original, de la non-hospitalité culturelle. Cette dernière est masquée parfois par l’idée reçue de l’omniréceptivité de la culture (...) russe, exprimée naguère par Dostoïevski dans son hommage à Pouchkine. (shrink)

The questions of « why » and « how to » translate Deleuze are examined by way of considerations concerning the recent penetration of Deleuze in Russian philosophical culture and the effect this has had on the manner in which one translates philosophy today in Russia. Under the sway of a strange misinterpretation, Deleuze’s thought has been diffused as a sort of introduction to Capitalist life, by which philosophy can be « de-marxised » and Russian thought freed from the burden (...) of Marxism or, rather, pseudo-Marxism. At the same time, the translation of Deleuze has become a site of conflict between traditionalists who reduce Deleuze’s language to that of classical philosophy and proponents of new practices who defend the singularity of Deleuze’s language and style. (shrink)

Consciousness has been and will continue to be one of the central problems of philosophy. In written works the fact that the consciousness can sing is presented as one of the most interesting and enigmatic properties of consciousness. That consciousness can sing, and in fact does so, and to prove that this is the case is relatively easy. It is enough to say that “one is singing within oneself”, not loudly and only one or various simple sounds in a way (...) so that the Phonologic system does not take part at all. The arguments over whether or not the consciousness can sing are based on comparisons of paragraphs 15 to 27 from the first and second editions of Kant’s “Critique of Pure Reason” which were modified in the second edition, where no categorical statement about the similaritybetween reproduced representations and phenomenon is found. The problem between the similarity between the reproduced representations in the consciousness/brain and the consciousness/brain phenomenon were investigated by Kant in his first and second edition, where Kant reached his conclusion about the reproduced representations in the phenomenon. We are in agreement with Kant that there can exist in “the interior” of consciousness/brains of all human beings the state of similarity or difference between the represented and the perceived, but the unity of the consciousness can be found in only one state: the similarity between the represented and the perceived in the “interior”, of the consciousness/brain. In view of the similarity of the reproduced representations and the phenomenon of the consciousness/brain, the consciousness can sing and be united, or, if not, referring to the dissimilarity, the consciousness cannot sing and can be divided. (shrink)

In 1961, at the 22nd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, a new program of the C.P.S.U. was adopted. The adoption of the Third Program of the C.P.S.U. was accompanied by a “nationwide discussion”. People expressed their opinions regarding the draft of the new Program at meetings and lectures and in their letters to various institutions. Naturally, not all the women actively demanded changes; for some there was probably no such thing as “women’s communism”. However, the individual (...) and collective letters attest to the complex of expectations that may be analyzed within the conceptual framework of “women’s communism”. The body of letters to various publications illustrate the most popular measures which, according to the letter writers, should have been implemented during the period of the “full-scale construction of communism” and, therefore, were thought of as intrinsic elements of communism. (shrink)

The article is devoted to the analysis, and introduces the publication, of one of the texts of the documentary complex ‘The Verkhne-Uralsk Political Isolator Notebooks’ – the ‘Theses on Economic Policy’ of 1933. The article (DOI: 10.1163/1569206X-00002252) covers the history of the discovery of this complex of documents reflecting the ideological and political life of imprisoned members of the Opposition of the Bolshevik Leninists (Trotskyists) in the early 1930s, and discusses the context of their creation. On the basis of archival (...) materials, the biography of one of the authors of the Theses – the agricultural economist, and a member of the Siberian opposition centre, F.P. Sasorov – is reconstructed. It is noted that Sasorov held a special position among the Bolshevik Leninists, determined by his economic views. He belonged to the current whose adherents were called ‘neo-Nepists’ by their opponents. This current advocated not just a return to the NEP cancelled by Stalin, but also an expansion of its scope, and this position is presented and argued for in the ‘Theses on Economic Policy’. A comparison of the views of Sasorov and his co-author G.A., stated in the Theses, including on the explanation of the crisis and the liquidation of the NEP, the policy of out-and-out collectivisation and forced industrialisation, with the views of Leon Trotsky, allows us to conclude that the thought of the imprisoned oppositionists developed independently, and not always in accordance with the guidelines of their exiled thought leader. The article also examines the forecasts of the development of the economic and socio-political situation in the USSR presented in the Theses. (shrink)

This article gives a general characteristic of the publications of the Russian philosophers in the oldest Kantian Journal “Kant-Studien”. The study embraces the entire period of the existence of this magazine, from the very beginning down to our days. In general, after compiling all materials related to Russia published in “Kant-Studien”, I became aware of get a picture of a significant presence of Russian philosophers in this periodical. This gives me a good reason to conclude that even if the impact (...) of the Russian philosophical thought on the international Kant studies was not decisive, then, at least, it was tangible. This influence was due to the phenomenon which was later called the “Silver Age of Russian philosophy”, as well as the phenomenon of Russian emigration, arising as a result of wars and revolutions in Russia and the exodus of the Russian philosophers of the West, where one of their main initial shelters was Germany. (shrink)

The article comprises three parts. Part I contains an overview of the areas in the analysis of modern French philosophy that have been of the greatest relevance to Russian researchers over the last years. We conclude that numerous aspects of the French philosophical thought of the twentieth century are well represented in the research of Russian authors, who also point out the emerging trends in its development. Part II deals with the development of analytic philosophy in Russia within the framework (...) of such areas as “critique of bourgeois philosophy”, a purely ideological stand only nominally related to philosophy, logic, and the history of philosophy and theoretical research. Part III contains a periodization of the history of phenomenology in Russia, pointing out the most important achievements of the contemporary Russian scholars of phenomenology as well as their understanding of the essence, the problems, and the aims of phenomenological philosophy. We also indicate the tendencies within the development of the discipline in the Russian Federation. (shrink)

The immunoglobulin molecule is a perfect template for the de novo generation of biocatalytic functions. Catalytic antibodies, or abzymes, obtained by the structural mimicking of enzyme active sites have been shown to catalyze numerous chemical reactions. Natural enzyme analogs for some of these reactions have not yet been found or possibly do not exist at all. Nowadays, the dramatic breakthrough in antibody engineering and expression technologies has promoted a considerable expansion of immunoglobulin's medical applications and is offering abzymes a unique (...) chance to become a promising source of high‐precision “catalytic vaccines.” At the same time, the discovery of natural abzymes on the background of autoimmune disease revealed their beneficial and pathogenic roles in the disease progression. Thus, the conflicting Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde protective and destructive essences of catalytic antibodies should be carefully considered in the development of therapeutic abzyme applications. (shrink)

The king therefore went down to the village, since the Wise Men's rule did not permit him to spend more than a day with them, but Iarchas said to the messenger, ‘Damis too we consider worthy of the secrets here, so tell him to come, while you look after the others in the village.’ When Damis had come, the Wise Men formed their usual circle and gave Apollonius permission to put questions. So he asked what they thought the universe consisted (...) of, to which they replied, ‘Elements.’ ‘Four, do you think?’ he said. ‘Not four’, said Iarchas, ‘but five.’ ‘What could a fifth one be’, said Apollonius, ‘besides water, air, earth, and fire?’ ‘Ether’, said Iarchas, ‘which we must consider to be the origin (γένεσιν) of the gods. All that breathes air is mortal, but what breathes ether is immortal and divine.’ Next Apollonius asked which of the elements came into existence first. ‘All came together’, said the other, ‘since a living being is not born one piece at a time.’ ‘Am I to consider the universe living?’, asked Apollonius. ‘Yes, if you reason correctly’, said Iarchas, ‘since itself it gives life to everything.’ ‘Should we then call it female’, asked Apollonius, ‘or of the contrary, male sex?’ ‘Of both’, was the answer, ‘since it has intercourse with itself, and performs both the mother's and the father's role with respect to generation. It feels a desire for itself more intense than that of any two other beings, and this joins and unites it, and there is nothing unreasonable about its coalescence. And just as the action of the hands and feet in a living creature comes from mobility and the intelligence (διὰ τὸν ἐκείνου νοῦν) that causes it, so also we must suppose that, because of the intelligence of the universe (κατὰ τὸν ἐκείνου ϕοιτᾷ νοῦν), its parts accommodate themselves to everything that undergoes birth and conception. For instance, the sufferings resulting from drought arise from the mind of the universe, when justice is banished from mankind and treated with dishonor. And this being guides itself not by one hand alone but by many unseen ones that it uses; though too large to be restrained, it moves obediently and tractably.’The doctrine contained in this extract – the only passage ofThe Life of Apollonius of Tyanatreating matters of ‘cosmogony’ – could be summarized in the six following propositions. First, the universe consists of five, not four elements, the fifth being the ether, the γένεσις θεῶν. Just as mortals breathe air, gods breathe ether. Secondly, there is no ‘primordial element’; all five came into being simultaneously. Thirdly, the universe is a living being. In the fourth place, the universe is both male and female at the same time. In the fifth place, as the universe is androgynous it feels desire (ἔρως) towards itself and it is this desire that makes it whole and united. And finally, the passion of the universe for itself is governed by Intelligence (ἐκείνου νοῦς). (shrink)

A classification of the global catastrophic risks of AI is presented, along with a comprehensive list of previously identified risks. This classification allows the identification of several new risks. We show that at each level of AI’s intelligence power, separate types of possible catastrophes dominate. Our classification demonstrates that the field of AI risks is diverse, and includes many scenarios beyond the commonly discussed cases of a paperclip maximizer or robot-caused unemployment. Global catastrophic failure could happen at various levels of (...) AI development, namely, before it starts self-improvement, during its takeoff, when it uses various instruments to escape its initial confinement, or after it successfully takes over the world and starts to implement its goal system, which could be plainly unaligned, or feature-flawed friendliness. AI could also halt at later stages of its development either due to technical glitches or ontological problems. Overall, we identified around several dozen scenarios of AI-driven global catastrophe. The extent of this list illustrates that there is no one simple solution to the problem of AI safety, and that AI safety theory is complex and must be customized for each AI development level. (shrink)

The expression ‘an instance of an artwork’ is often used in philosophical discourse about art. Yet there is no clear account of what exactly this expression means. My goal in this essay is to provide such an account. I begin by expounding and defending a particular definition of the concept of ‘an instance of an artwork’. Next, I elaborate this definition – by providing definitions of the main derivatives of the concept of ‘an instance of an artwork’, namely the concepts (...) of ‘a well-formed instance of an artwork’ and ‘a non-wellformed instance of an artwork’. Finally, I examine the relation of the foregoing definitions to the existence and identity conditions of artworks and make some additional remarks concerning these definitions. (shrink)

This article examines the views of Latin American philosophers on the process of formation of the Latin American subject of history, its characteristic features, as well as the role of the intellectual in this process. The main objective of this paper is to demonstrate the position of the prominent Argentine philosopher A. A. Roig, and to compare his position with the position of another well-known representative of the philosophy of liberation (E. Dussel). In this paper therefore, Roig's works devoted to (...) the philosophical interpretation of the process of formation and development of Latin American national thought are analyzed. It is established that in the writings of this thinker the activity of Latin American people appears as the activity of a single collective subject of history. During the study, we conclude that both philosophers (Roig and Dussel), come to the same idea in different ways: the intellectual identity of the Latin American collective subject of history is based on the history of interaction between the people of Latin America and Europe, unique in its dramatic nature and same for the entire continent. The work uses mainly the historical and bibliographic method, as well as the method of comparative analysis. (shrink)

Cell interdivision periods (IDP) in homogenous cell populations vary stochastically. Another aspect of probabilistic cell behavior is randomness in cell differentiation. These features are suggested to result from competing stochastic events of assembly/disassembly of the transcription pre‐initiation complex (PIC) at gene promoters. The time needed to assemble a proper PIC from different proteins, which must be numerous enough to make their combination gene specific, may be comparable to the IDP. Nascent mRNA visualization at defined genes and inferences from protein level (...) fluctuations in single cells suggest that some genes do operate in this way. The onset of mRNA production by such genes may miss the time windows provided by the cell cycle, resulting in cells differentiating into those in which the respective mRNAs are either present or absent. This creates a way to generate cell phenotype diversity in multicellular organisms. (shrink)

Composition-nominative logics are program-oriented logics. They are based on algebras of partial predicates which do not have fixed arity. The aim of this work is to present CNL as institutions. Homomorphisms of first-order CNL are introduced, satisfaction condition is proved. Relations with institutions for classical first-order logic are considered. Directions for further investigation are outlined.

When discussing the French Revolution and Napoleon in his lectures from 1933 to 1939, Alexandre Kojève had in mind events in Russia. The clash between the “old order,” with its Masters, and the worker Slaves corresponded for him more with the images of pre-revolutionary Russian journalism than with the wigged aristocrats and French bourgeoisie of the end of the eighteenth century. In his lectures, behind Napoleon, as a revolutionary emperor, there exists, however secretly or openly, the figure of Stalin, with (...) his plans for the “building of socialism in one country,” his five-year plans, collectivization, and terror. Kojève’s ontology and anthropology diverge both from Hegel’s version of the two as well as with Marxism, incorporating different theses from Nietzsche and Heidegger’s Daseinanalytik. Just as in The Phenomenology of Spirit, terror plays a central role in interpreting revolution, yet it is conceived in the spirit of a Heideggerian “being-toward-death.” The relation between Master and Slave begins with fear of death, and it is destroyed by fear of death in the face of revolutionary terror. In this article, Kojève’s philosophy converges with the various versions of “left Nietzscheanism,” which were particularly widespread in prerevolutionary Russia. (shrink)