Clarification of the essence of the mental reflection of reality means to reveal its most general and yet most specific characteristics, distinguishing it from all other phenomena and properties. It will be helpful to approach the solution of this problem from two sides. In the first place, this task calls for a consideration of the initial, elementary and genetically earliest form of the reflection of reality and the circumstances under which it arises. This elementary and lowest form may be understood (...) if, pursuing the method of Marx, we regard the lowest as a "hint" of the highest, when the highest is known . In the given instance, the developed forms of the mental reflection of reality are better known to us than their initial phases. In the second place, the question of the most general features of the property of reflection is closely related to a consideration of motion as the fundamental property of matter. Only a combination of these two lines of analysis will, in our opinion, make it possible, on the one hand, to keep in view the specific features of the process of reflecting reality in cognition and, on the other, to liberate us from anthropomorphic preconceptions ascribing to the elementary form of reflection of reality the characteristics of its highest form-conscious reflection. (shrink)

The problem of epistemological reflection has many aspects. Epistemology and logic are not the only disciplines in which it is studied. The life sciences, social sciences, and certain of the theoretical technological disciplines - all have a direct bearing upon it. In studying this complex problem it is desirable once again to seek a clarification of the fundamental features of the basic "unit" of reflection, employing the data of these sciences to this end. This is desirable not only with respect (...) to specialized studies of the reflection problem, but also because of the trend toward combining them, as, for example, in efforts to model mental functions in cybernetics. (shrink)

The concept of reflection has many complex aspects; it is by no means something that is self-evident in nature. The object of this article is to examine that which is specific to reflection, its fundamental aspects and characteristics, and to demonstrate, in the spectrum of these characteristics, the place of the special mathematical concept of information, which corresponds to the quantitative measure of information in the statistical theory of information . But the word "information" is employed in two other senses (...) as well. In works on the theory of automatic regulation and control one often finds the terms "ordering," "organization," and "structure" employed as a synonym for it. Finally, in scientific usage the word "information" is often employed in place of the terms "model," "image," "knowledge," and "data." Therefore, in our further presentation we shall employ, each in its place, three meanings of this word: "the mathematical concept of information," "information," and "information in the ordinary meaning of the word.". (shrink)