To the memory of my mother ErnaThe axis on which art creativity revolves is originality. Any genuine piece of art must be original; otherwise, it boils down to a mere replication or imitation and is of little worth. A work is thought to be the more original the newer it is. But what exactly should be new in it and to what extent for it to get sufficient ground to claim originality still remain a riddle.What is meant by the new? (...) Usually, it is construed as what has not existed before and is just brought into the world. In other words, novelty should have no immediate precursor in the past. But such a treatment holds a serious inner contradiction. Where does the new come from if it does not grow out of the old? It... (shrink)

Many believe that organization is to be depersonalized far as possible. But can it be entirely rid of personal dimension? And should one consider the personal a mere impediment or it may claim also a wholesome part? The author sheds light on the personal “engines” of organizational management and reveals the mechanisms of its influence on the decisions and behavior of both rank and files and higher-ups by scrutinizing the relevant managerial practice and research findings. Are revealed in corpore and (...) presented in a systematic form the factors limiting depersonalization and the intimate features of personality – emotional, volitional, and subliminal – to be brought into play. It is argued that they are not merely requisites for effective management but also fundamental conditions of success in uncertain, diverse, erratic, tangled, and quickly changing environment. Depersonalization not so much raises the level of management as technicalizes it, ousting “pieces” with no need for personal involvement from the system of human relations. They cease to be organizational proper and turn into a technological appendage subject to technical control rather than management. The paper opens a new line of research aimed at discovering the intrapersonal drives as a run-the-organization resource. The findings and conclusions the author has come to is of use to practicioners who can employ them for increasing the effectiveness of their activity as well as to teachers wanting to give a more precise and comprehensive picture of human behavior within the courses of management and organization theory. (shrink)

To the memory of my mother ErnaShakespeare saw in the beauty and passion of young hearts "the irradiating glory of sunlight and starlight in a dark world." In contrast to Arthur Brooke, the dramatist shows not the omnipotence of merciless and inexorable fate but an inextinguishable image of "light, every form and manifestation of it: the sun, moon, stars, fire, lightning, the flash of gunpowder, and the reflected light of beauty and of love." All these are opposed to "night, darkness, (...) clouds, rain, mist and smoke."1 And that is not merely a radical turn as compared with Brooke but a breaking of the literary tradition that, until then, did not depict love in such a perspective. Shakespeare proposed, in fact, a... (shrink)

Sociological and philosophical analysis of the role of will power upon the moral development of individuals.

The bi-polar confrontation between the Soviet Union and the USA involved many leading game theorists from both sides of the Iron Curtain: Oskar Morgenstern, John von Neumann, Michael Intriligator, John Nash, Thomas Schelling and Steven Brams from the United States and Nikolay Vorob’ev, Leon A. Petrosyan, Elena B. Yanovskaya and Olga N. Bondareva from the Soviet Union. The formalization of game theory took place prior to the Cold War but the geopolitical confrontation hastened and shaped its evolution. In our (...) article we outline four similarities and differences between Western GT and Soviet GT: 1) the Iron Curtain resulted in a lagged evolution of GT in the Soviet Union; 2) Soviet GT focused more on operations research and issues of centralized planning; 3) the contemporary Western view on Soviet GT was biased and Soviet contributions, including works on dynamic stability, non-emptiness of the core and many refinements, suggest that Soviet GT was able to catch up to the Western level relatively fast; 4) international conferences, including Vilnius, 1971, fostered interaction between Soviet game theorists and their Western colleagues. In general, we consider the Cold War to be a positive environment for GT in the West and in the Soviet Union. (shrink)