Kant’s dissertation for the Master’s degree Succinct Exposition of Some Meditations on Fire was written in Latin in 1755 as a sample (specimen) preceding a Master’s exam, but its first printing did not appear until 1838. What is the relevance of this Master’s dissertation for historical and philosophical studies? To answer this question I analyse the structure and give a brief summary of the dissertation, look at the history of its writing and try to identify the place of this work (...) among Kant’s other papers on natural philosophy. I then demonstrate that Kant’s concept of ether as an elastic matter of fire, heat and light containing the forces of attraction and repulsion originates in the dissertation On Fire. I identify the provisions in Kant’s early works which he later develops in the Master’s dissertation and establish continuity between the text of On Fire and the so-called Physical Monadology, draw parallels between the ideas enunciated by Kant in his first dissertation and the interpretation of ether in the printed works that followed. Finally, I put forward the hypothesis of the heuristic potential of the On Fire treatise for the analysis of Kant’s manuscript legacy. Perhaps this dissertation will enable researchers to clear up some tangled propositions in Kant’s Opus Postumum. However, a series of further studies is needed to verify the hypothesis. (shrink)

The separable hidden variables theory (Bhave [1986]) of Aspect's [1982] four single channel polarizers is developed further to consider possible modified Aspect's experiment with four double channel polarizers. It is shown that Aspect's commutator is not a truly stochastic commutator, and that until such a truly stochastic commutator is devised, experiments based on Bell's inequalities (like those of Aspect's) cannot be adequate experimental tests of quantum nonseparability.

Different conceptions on reality in physics and philosophy in the 20th century have been analyzed in the article. These approaches caused the necessity to study the multitude of the worlds. The author proved that multiworld interpretation of quantum mechanics and multitude of the worlds in the Goodman'€™s conception are opposite tendencies. Everett and his followers consider the quantum world as some universal reality whereas Goodman and his supporters do not believe in universal reality.

The article discusses the problem of the possibility of knowing the future, especially the future of social phenomena compared with the future of natural ones. This problem is formulated as a dilemma: the future can be explored or can be only constructed. The idea of constructive character of knowledge of the future is viewed in two possible interpretations.The first one is a special case of the constructivist interpretation of knowledge, according to which different pictures of the future are arbitrarily constructed (...) on the basis of information about the past and current state. The second interpretaion can be presented in the form of a praxeological question: what should be an action in relation to the future, first and foremost to the future of social phenomena - cognitive or creative. It is shown that, in the first case, there is an ability to interpret knowledge of the future from the point of view of epistemological realism, in the second case, both cognitive and creative types of activity as a pragmatic position in relation to the future are necessary and cognitive activity cannot be reduced to creative one. It is also shown that forecaster’s dilemma reflects the problematic nature of forecasting under the conditions of transformation of scientific rationality and point of view of common sense, which is observed in recent decades. (shrink)

The doctrine of idols is one of the most famous aspects of Bacon's thought. Yet his claim that the idols lead to madness has gone almost entirely unnoticed. This paper argues that Bacon's theory of idols underlies his diagnosis of the contemporary condition as one of ‘universal madness’. In contrast to interpretations that locate his doctrine of error and recovery within the biblical narrative of the Fall, the present analysis focuses on the material and cultural sources of the mind's tendency (...) towards error. It explains the idols in terms of Bacon's materialist psychology and his exposé of the debilitating effects of language and traditional learning. In so doing, it highlights the truly radical nature of the idols. For Bacon, the first step towards sanity was to alert people to the prevailing madness. The doctrine of idols was intended as a wake-up call, preparing the way for a remedy in the form of his new method of inquiry. The paper concludes by indicating how Bacon's method aimed to treat ‘universal madness’, and it suggests that his diagnosis influenced John Locke. (shrink)

In his two volumes on Intuitive Thought Professor Edouard Le Roy continues his idealistic interpretation of spiritual creativity, and turns from its ‘products’ manifested in biological and human evolution to consider its most intimate character, as it is ‘lived through’ or directly experienced in intuitive and inventive thinking. The whole plan and its execution are determined by two characteristic themes of Bergsonism—intuition and the dynamical schema—though these are repensès in a quite original way. “Intuitive thought” and “metaphysical thought,” M. Le (...) Roy affirms in the preface, are “one and the same”; the latter is condemned only by those who misconceive the former. So by correcting misunderstandings he seeks to. (shrink)

The purpose of the article is to reveal philosophical ideas in the mythology and folklore of the indigenous peoples of North America. An important question: "Can we assume that the spiritual culture of the American Indians contained philosophical knowledge?" remains relevant today. For example, European philosophy is defined by appeals to philosophers of the past, their texts. The philosophical tradition is characterized by rational argumentation and formulation of philosophical questions that differ from the questions of ordinary language. However, the problem (...) lies in the term "philosophy", which belongs to the so-called "philosophical untranslatability" and has many definitions. The question of whether philosophy is exclusively a phenomenon of European culture is still controversial. In the article, the concept of philosophy is used in a broad sense, which allows the analysis of the intellectual heritage of the culture of the indigenous people of North America for philosophical ideas. Theoretical basis of the study consists of primary sources, which are limited due to the "documentary horizon". It contains myths about the Twins, ritual rhetoric, examples of dream interpretation practices and the practical wisdom of tribal chiefs. The Chronicle of "Vallamolum", or "the Red List", testifies to the special idea of the Indians about history and their own historicity. Analysis of cosmogonical and cosmological ideas reveals the special features of the anthropological ideas of the North American Indians. Combined with the philosophical ideas of the Puritan philosophy of the settlers of New England, this analysis allows us to explore in more detail the processes of acculturation. The study uses critical literature from scholars and leading researchers of the wisdom and philosophy of Native Americans, such as Michael Yellow Bird, J. Baird Callicott, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Dennis H. McPherson, Lewis Henri Morgan, Thomas M. Norton-Smith, J. Douglas Rabb, Paul Radin, Jon Ewbank Manchip White. The views of early American philosophers: R. Williams, W. Penn, R. W. Emerson, on the problem of the relationship between the culture of settlers and the indigenous people of North America are noteworthy. Originality lies in the application of historical and philosophical methodology, identifying the features of philosophizing in the spiritual culture and worldview of the indigenous people of North America. Conclusions. In the conclusions, the obtained results complement the history of the origin and development of philosophical thought of the early American philosophy. (shrink)

We considered peculiarities of the evolution of a region with sharp boundaries that is filled with a partially ionized plasma and is a part of the volume of a condensed target. The creation of such a region in the near-surface layer of the target can be related to the action of an external impulse symmetric ionizator or to the action of an intense small-extension shock wave on the target surface. We defined the conditions such that their fulfilment during the establishment (...) of the equilibrium between the Coulomb attraction of electrons and ions with atom ionization multiplicity Z* 1 and the kinetic pressure of electrons causes both the compression of this region and its ionization to the state with Z* 2 > Z* 1. The last leads to a further additional compression and ionization. Under these conditions, the spontaneous avalanche-like ionization of atoms of the target to the state of ‘‘bare’’ nuclei occurs synchronously with the avalanche-like metallization and the self-compression of the target. We showed that the avalanche-like ionization and the self-compression of the target happen in the case where the gas of degenerate electrons has drift momentum. If the region with initial ionization has the form of thin spherical layer, the process of avalanche-like ionization and self-compression of the target in this region is accompanied by the accelerated movement of the plasma layer to the target center. One of the reasons for the accelerated movement is the surface tension in a bounded domain of the nonequilibrium plasma layer neutralized by ions of the target. With increase in the velocity of movement of this layer to the target center, the additional self-compression of the system of electrons and nuclei to the state of degenerate electron gas occurs. At the leading edge of the running layer with extremely high electron density which is neutralized by nuclei of the target, the formation of a collapse of the electron--nucleus system proceeds, and the binding energy maximum for the electron--nucleus system shifts from A≈60 to A ≫ 60. This result makes possible the fast synthesis of superheavy nuclei. The decay of the collapse state, a partial restoration of the target structure, its rapid cooling, and the condensation of a part of the products of nuclear reactions happen in the target volume at the trailing edge of the moving plasma layer. Upon such a scanning propagation of the wave with high electron density, all the target substance is involved, step-by-step, to the process of nuclear transformations. At the target center, the moving plasma layer is squeezed with the formation of the state of quasistationary collapse under inertial confinement. Then the collapse state decays irreversibly. (shrink)

Disjunctive Syllogism, that is, the inference from 'not-A or B' and 'A', to 'B' can lead from true premises to a false conclusion if each of the sentences 'A' and 'not-A' is a statement of a partial truth such that affirming one of them amounts to denying the other, without each being the contradictory of the other. Such sentences inevitably occur whenever a situation which for its proper precise description needs the use of expressions such as 'most probably true' and (...) so forth, is described (less precisely) by sentences not containing such expressions. (shrink)

A handy, inexpensive edition of the Stoic emperor's famous work, with a glossary of Greek terms and an index added.—T. S. V.

A handy, inexpensive edition of the Stoic emperor's famous work, with a glossary of Greek terms and an index added.—T. S. V.

Ideas used in the philosophy of science to describe the development of science (T. Kuhn, V. Stepin, K. Hübner) are analyzed in a context of their adaptation for educational purposes. It is shown that the most appropriate approach considers the science as a unique complex self-organizing system. This approach makes it possible to integrate any fruitful ideas from different models.

The relevance of the study has two sides — individual and general. In its essential aspect, it is the development of achievements of predecessors by consistently taking into account the latest data on trends and changes in the interconnected spheres of education, economics and culture. In the individual aspect, it is about improving the professional means of improving the efficiency of teaching foreign languages in order to form students with a high level of linguistic-professional competence. Public relevance is the goal (...) of educating young people in a new patriotic direction, because today, due to various global influences, the classical principles of life in the agrarian system, created in recent centuries, or in the industrial society, are devalued due to various global influences. The purpose of the study in a broad sense was to highlight the causes and consequences of the European religious Reformation as the main factor in accelerating the movement of the whole of Western Europe to the position of the world leader that previously belonged to China. We see precis e tasks in the integrated analysis on the basis of the latest discoveries of many humanities and exact sciences in the educational, economic and cultural systems of Germany and other successful European states. On this basis, we hope to fulfill the public task which is to make significant proposals in the plans and practice of higher education reform in Ukraine. The methodology of the study relies on the best classical means, on the principle of historicism and the continuity of the connection between the material and the ideal, a modern multidisciplinary approach. For the highest effectiveness of the research, we will use the latest scientific data and recommendations of the innovators who collect and use these data. The results of the study mostly follow from the mentioned new discoveries. They testify that in ancientt history, in the role of locomotives of civilizational progress in the western part of Eurasia, direct descendants of the inventors of agriculture acted, among which the especially great contribution belongs to the ancestors of Ukrainians from the territories of Trypillya and the Great Trypillya. It is indicated that during the existence of the Great Trypillya, future German farmers acquainted themselves with the technologies of the Great Trypillya, so the German language, through borrowed words, became part of the Indo-European family. It is noted that after the collapse of the Great Trypillya, the Germans and Slavs became neighbors along the meridian Elbe. In the age of steppe invasions, future Ukrainians and Germanic tribes did not get in contact, and the influence of the Roman Empire was mostly experienced by western lands. Emphasis was placed on the evolution of ideological, religious and other paradigms in the territory of Germany after the collapse of the Holy Roman Empire, which determined the development of the nation for the next hundreds of years. The religious and philosophical paradigmatic origins of those unique features of culture and education that during the nineteenth century were emphasized. brought Germany to the position of the scientific and technological leader of the world. The high role of German neo-humanism and the Berlin Research University were noted. In the final section, special attention is paid to religious issues and to the destructive impact on social and other processes in the German immigration flows of Islamists. The conclusions focus on the competition of several important paradigms in the education of modern Germany and the proposals made to incorporate German experience in legislation and the use of the Bologna process. An important caution is made regarding the choice of Germany's strategy for the development of the scientific and educational complex 'within the framework of the Lisbon project. This country has become a world leader not only in alternative energy, but also in the implementation of the fourth industrial revolution. We consider an example of this leadership like the regular world conferences in Davos, which involve the majority of influential politicians and economists. (shrink)

Efforts for better services are achieved by small steps such as analyzing data of the customer. What is significant for the customer should as well significant for the banking institution. Transparency and a better understand- ding of the pattern behavior of customers can be used for the good of both partners such as good relationships in the fu- ture eventually be beneficial for the customer as well as a banking institution. The responsibility of both sides is crucial to understand the (...) accountability of customers and banking institutions. The method of identification of user messages of the banking application proposed in the article involves the use of user data for information processing, taking into account the peculiarities of the use of mobile devices and the user's dialogue with bank messages. Also, the proposed method allows you to rank messages to identify the most important messages and get the desired result by providing ef- fective recommendations in favor of each of the participants in customer interaction with the bank. The introduction of modern educational programs "Information Control Systems and Technologies", "Artificial Intelligence Systems" and "Systems Analysis" in the field of information technology, allows users and managers to interact with the bank's custo- mers sufficient information to make informed recommendations for effective management decisions. The article consi- ders the conceptual model of interaction of users and managers on interaction with users of the bank, use of technolo- gies and algorithms of artificial intelligence, machine learning processes to formalize the process of dialogue, systema- tization and ranking of messages and notifications between customers and managers. The Conceptual model of inter- action of the user of banking services with messages is presented. The article also describes the features of the dialogue between the user of banking services and the manager for the implementation of algorithms for interaction with custo- mers. The example of the city block of bank users considers and takes into account the difference in the amount of in- formation received by the bank, which must be sent during different periods of the week and take into account the amount of information to be sent, which will be significantly less and, consequently, the number of necessary services. will also be smaller. In this example, taking into account the amount of information that can be consumed during differ- rent periods of the week, the number of services that can be provided to the user will also be much smaller. The reflec- tion of such interactions in the model is an important aspect, as noted in the article. (shrink)

In his Aquinas Lecture of 1964, Pegis contends that a dynamic Thomism for our time must avoid, 1) merely detaching and then recomposing separable philosophical elements from the theological whole in which Thomas cast them, and 2) simply protracting the medieval ancilla theologiae status of philosophy for such a "theologically managed philosophy" cannot speak to our times. A living Thomism must develop Thomas' basic insights in a living personalistic context, assuming all the risks that creative inquiry entails. Thomism thus appears (...) less a doctrine than a project, and the contemporary Thomist's aim can only be "to give a genuine philosophical life to the principles that St. Thomas used in another day and under the conditions of another culture." Pegis' discussion is lucid and its import cogent for those sympathetic to Thomism.—T. S. V. (shrink)

The author restricts herself to a biological and anthropological viewpoint to discover what it was that suggested to the primitive mind the concept of an "unseen overruling Power." She finds the answer in the primitive woman's experience of pregnancy and childbirth, in which some unseen Power was felt to bestow upon her the gift of a child. The book is absorbing, but contains little of distinctly philosophical interest.—T. S. V.

As a result of interviews with the students of the psychology department of Bashkir State university the set of everyday conflict situations has been picked up and a new situational judgment test of social intelligence was worked out. The positive correlations between social intelligence and the stability and harmony of relations between university students were discovered. The main purpose of our current investigation was to explore the correlations between the social intelligence of university students and the complementarity of interpersonal relations (...) between them and university teachers. The significant positive correlation between social intelligence and complementarity scores on the affiliation axis of the IMI-C test has been obtained. We may conclude that this fact implies that students with high social intelligence are able to self-control and affiliation in conflict situations. (shrink)

A realist separable hidden variables theory in conformity with Einstein's principle of causality is developed in this paper to explain the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen paradox, and the experimental results (including those in Aspect's four polarizers experiment) obtained so far with a view to test the non-separability of quantum mechanics.

The Yogārṇava is a Sanskrit compendium on yoga that has not been published, translated or even mentioned in secondary literature on yoga. Citations attributed to it occur in several premodern commentaries and compendiums on yoga, and a few published library catalogues report manuscripts of a work on yoga called the Yogārṇava. This article presents the results of the first academic study of the text. It has attempted to answer basic questions, such as the work’s provenance and textual sources. The authors (...) then discuss the importance of the Yogārṇava within the broader history of yoga based on their identification of citations and parallel verses in other Sanskrit texts and a detailed analysis of the Yogārṇava’s content. (shrink)

The idea of the constructed character of social reality implies human contribution to institutional arrangements and cultural patterns that determine the shape of collective existence. The article examines the specific features of social construction seen and studied in phenomenological approach by A. Schutz, P. Berger, Th. Luckmann. The concept reveals significance of daily cognitive style which enables people to structure and understand the world they share with others, escaping situations fraught with gaps of meanings and anomy. The author of the (...) article analyzes the process of social construction, distinguishing it from imaginary building of reality that goes beyond the existed order. Reality of daily life is compared with fictional society represented in J.L. Borges’ “Lottery in Babylon”. Telling about the social construction as it may be, the story demonstrates the similarities between the mental procedures that underlie real and antiutopian routines. The article also centers on peculiarities of phenomenological beholder’s attitude towards sociality. On the one hand, it tends to be free from any theoretical abstractions, imaginary constructions or critical destruction of reality, on the other - inclines to transcend the reified forms of social being and engenders a certain critical message. (shrink)

Purpose of this article is the historical reconstruction of the studies in philosophical anthropology in Soviet Ukraine. Theoretical basis. In the philosophical tradition of independent Ukraine, there is an opinion that at the intersection of the 1960s and 1970s, there was an anthropological turn in the national philosophical thought. The authors provide a holistic and comprehensive reconstruction of philosophical understanding of man in the works of Ukrainian thinkers of the Soviet era. Originality. It has been proved that before the emergence (...) of the Institute of Philosophy of the Soviet Ukraine Academy of Sciences and the restoration of the Philosophy Department at Kyiv State University, the writings of Ukrainian philosophers in the 1920s and 1930s emphasize specifically the "ideological" factor of human existence. Based on the materials of M. Maksymovych Academic Library and the library at H. Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, there have been revealed and traced the specific features and peculiarities of the transformation of main accents in philosophical and anthropological studies of Soviet Ukrainian researchers in the post-war period. Conclusions. The studied problems developed in Soviet Ukraine in two vectors. The focus was on man as a social phenomenon and a "product of ideology" on the one hand, and, on existential aspects of a human being with its internal contradictions, understanding of its nature and the sense of existence, on the other hand. It has been established that the anthropological problems were the focus of not only scientists of the Institute of Philosophy of the Soviet Ukraine Academy of Sciences, but also of teachers of Kyiv State University. The authors grounded the thesis that, unlike the 1940-1950s, when the focus was on philosophical problems of natural science and philosophical personology, the 1960s bring forward not only philosophical and anthropological studies but also ethical and aesthetic issues, logic and scientific atheism. (shrink)