Abstract

The breadth and ambiguity of philosophical concepts opens the door to the most diverse interpretations of these concepts and their manifold relations. Often the ideological use of philosophical concepts and ideas descends to the level of everyday meanings in which vagueness and even primitivism become a regular phenomenon of spiritual everyday life. The basic task of professional philosophers is to define clearly the subject of their science. This task is, of course, very difficult, as is evident from the multitude of different definitions of philosophy that have been offered by its many creators and, especially, by its lovers. Without claiming complete originality, the author of this article offers his understanding of this extremely important question. Further, the author considers it an elementary point to seek the answer in the two-thousand-year history of philosophy, which has developed its defining concepts and terms. On the other hand, a reliance on the principal facts of contemporary scientific knowledge of human evolution and our civilization is no less widespread. Thus, a retrospective view of the subject of philosophy through its history coincides with a prospective approach