__SERIES__
current
problems
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__TITLE__
Science
and Morality
__TEXTFILE_BORN__ 2008-03-23T16:50:30-0800
__TRANSMARKUP__ "Y. Sverdlov"
PROGRESS PUBLISHERS
MOSCOW
[4]Translated from the Russian~
HAXKA H HPABCTBEHHOCTb Ha
__COPYRIGHT__ First printing 197510507--797
H----------------113--75
014(01)-75
[5] CONTENTS INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................7-18 i..........................................................................:............................................19 A. Alexandrov. A SCIENTIFICAPPROACH TO MORALITY ..............21--49 G. Pospelov. MAN AND THE MORAL ASPECTS OF SCIENTIFIC PROGRESS............................................................50--64 II......................................................'................................................................65 V. Loginov. SCIENTIFICPOLITICS AND MORALITY........................67--87 E. Solovyov. KNOWLEDGE, FAITH AND MORALITY.......................88--129 A. Arsenyev. THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SCIENCE AND MORALITY (PHILOSOPHICAL ASPECTS)...............................130--187 O. Drobnitsky. SCIENTIFIC TRUTH AND MORAL GOOD.............188--218 III ..................................................................................................................219 V.Tolstykh. GALILEO VERSUS GALILEO........................................221--239 A. Gulyga. CRISIS---MORAL OR SOCIAL? .......................................240--257 E. llyenkov. HUMANISM AND SCIENCE...........................................258--277 [6] ~ [7] __ALPHA_LVL1__ INTRODUCTIONThe pertinence and vital import of the classic problem of science and morality are obvious not only to scholars but also to people whose occupations are far removed from science. Both scientists and laymen are concerned today with the interrelationship between science and morality. The situation determining the scope of interaction within the conditions set by the scientific and technological revolution is a unique and to a substantial degree ``unprecedented'' one. This provides us with the opportunity of looking at this traditional philosophical problem from a somewhat new perspective.
In our century' science has ceased to be the "private business" of the scientists. It is now entered into the ``budget'' of ``debits'' and ``credits'' of society as a whole. Science is silently and imperceptibly entering directly into production. It is modifying trie daily life and habits of human beings and winning an important position in the hierarchy of social consciousness. The further from the point of origin---- thefaster the motion. This proposition of Frederick Engels' is applicable not only to the development of production but to contemporary science as well. Much depends upon progress in science and technology: to no small extent trie progress of human civilization as a whole and the implementation of the vast plans for the communist transformation of society are predicated upon this progress.
However, other facts are just as indisputable. The growing interference of science in all spheres of human existence and, second, the scientific and technological revolution, having embraced within the last decades the basic production 8 spheres---have had the effect of making many moral problems yet more acute.
Modern science is developing under the influence of both internal and external factors and at times touching upon into the political world and the fundamental interests or millions of people. Under bourgeois society the increasingly `` technological'' profile of knowledge and the industrialization of science itself carries with it the danger of de-humanizing science; its achievements are perceived by many as bearing simultaneously both extraordinary good and evil. There is nothing surprising in the fact that more and more people are beginning to give serious thought to questions which at an earlier point in time were the privileged domain of a narrow circle of professional philosophers: what is the humanistic mission of science, what relationship does it have to the well-being and happiness of the human individual, is society capable of coping with the material and spiritual forces brougnt to the surface by science, is science ``controllable'', can we properly manage the utilization of scientific achievements?
These questions are being persistently posed, often in a dramatic form, by people of the most varied persuasions. Here for example, is now they are phrased in trie writings of an outstanding scientist, one of the leaders of the International Union for the Preservation of the Environment (L'Union Internationale pour la protection de la nature) Jean Dorst:
``We are quite justified in asking ourselves what is the value of a technological civilization. Each of us has at one time or another had the sensation that we are riding on a fast train that is out of control and from which it is impossible to disengage. We don't know where it is taking us, perhaps to a land of milk and honey, but perhaps to a dead end, to catastrophe in other words.... Man has played the role of sorcerer's apprentice and evoked life processes which he cannot control.''
Further on he writes:
``The degree of civilization is measured not only by the number of kilowatts of energy produced by energy sources. It is measured above all by a large number of criteria of a moral and spiritual nature, and by the wisdom of the individuals participating in a civilization ... in full harmony with the laws of nature from which man will never escape.''~^^1^^
Max Born, the eminent physicist, has stated the problem in a no less dramatic manner by touching directly upon the moral _-_-_
~^^1^^ Jean Dorst, Avant que nature meure, Neuchatel, 1965, pp. 11, 17, 18.
9 and ethical aspects of the problem. In his words, in our technological century science has acquired social, economic and political functions. Modern science and technology is developing at a constantly accelerating pace and has changed beyond recognition the profile of human civilization. Without denying the social, human usefulness of scientific and technological achievements, Born at the same time draws our attention to the process, accompanying the scientific and technological revolution, of the collapse of all ethical principles which had been created over the centuries and which 'had permitted man to preserve a dignified way of life even during the height of savage warfare and universal destruction. Born regards as most dangerous, threatening, and perhaps ``irrepairable'' the effects of the active intrusion of science and technology into the sphere of human life.Born and Dorst may be criticized for underestimating the social and class aspect of this problem which caused widespread concern---problem the resolution of which depends in the final result not upon science, or more precisely, not upon science alone. But the sense of unease conveyed by these scientists is indisputably widespread. The contradiction existing between a technological civilization and the spiritual culture of society, as well as between the level of ``knowledge'' and of moral ``consciousness'', is by no means a pessimist's stroke of imagination. It goes without saying that the conclusions drawn by Dorst and Born may seem insufficiently optimistic, particularly to those who see in the attainment of material wealth a panacea for social ills as a whole and an end in itself, who are inclined to turn the ``knowledge'' factor into a fetish, and who measure progress in terms of the level of comfort achieved and number of civilized ``toys'' accumulated. But if optimism is based upon the analysis of real factors, if faith in progress is to be freed from the fashionable illusion that science and technology are capable of resolving all of the fundamental contradictions of social existence, then these apprehensions must be recognized as well-founded and reasonable. Given the background of ``apocalyptic'' attitudes and views, which have been widely disseminated in the bourgeois world, the endeavour to defend the moral and spiritual criteria of progress, accumulated through the sufferings and triumphs of thousands of years of human history, takes on special value. This is true above all when the authors of the appeal to accountability before man are themselves scientists.
10Many scientists in the twentieth century, including Timiryazev, Joliot-Curie, Einstein and Wiener, insisted on the importance of providing a moral justification for further progress in science and technology. Helping lay the groundwork for modern science, they were also disturbed over the fate of human civilization. Far from considering the evolving situation in science as natural and normal, they emphasized, each in his own way, the dependence of scientific knowledge and activity upon social conditions and upon the moral state of society. With a feeling of trepidation and malaise Frederic Joliot-Curie wrote:
``Scientists are aware of the beneficial impact science has had upon society; they also know what could be achieved if only peace reigned supreme on earth. They wish that the phrase could never be pronounced that 'science is leading us to destruction by the atomic and hydrogen bombs'. Scientists know that science cannot be guilty. The finger of guilt should be pointed at those who employ the achievements of science to malicious ends.''~^^1^^
Scientific cognition---the accumulation of more and more profound knowledge---is a process carried out, as is well known, to subordinate reality to the power and interests of mankind. The authentic scientist, then, cannot avoid being disturbed by the human---and humanitarian---meaning of that which takes place behind the facade of the "drama of ideas''. The divergence between the true and the good is perceived by him as a social problem impossible to dismiss by references to ``professional'' impartiality. This was well understood by Norbert Wiener, who was disturbed by certain tendencies emerging in the evolution of cybernetics, the science he created, and by Albert Einstein, who more than once insisted upon the priority of moral criteria in the evaluation of the work and profile of the scholar.
Addressing their attention to the social-ethical side of scientific activity, outstanding scholars have in mind not only the feasibility of the inhuman application of the achievements of science and technology.
To be sure, science is a powerful weapon for the liberation of mankind, demanding from society responsible and competent application. But is it really possible to limit the humanitarian meaning of the problem to the sphere of application of scientific achievements alone, without touching upon the _-_-_
^^1^^ Cinq annees de luttes pour la paix, Paris, 1954, pp. 253--54.
11 modes of thought and methodology employed by the scientist? The striving toward a cognition of the essence of any given factor, subject, or phenomenon forces the scientist to remove himself from his individual human experience and to ``talk'' in the language of the object under examination. In other words the individual with his concrete interests and needs `` disappears'' from the field of vision of the natural scientist to be replaced by machines, algorithms, formulae, etc. When the epistemology of a given scientific approach to the world is turned into an absolute the result is an impoverishment and emasculation of the humanitarian content of the creative activity of the scientist, in turn engendering in the latter spurious conceptions concerning his social ``impartiality''.The history of science, including modern science, is rich in examples of selfless efforts made by scientists to defend the humanitarian import of their labours. Therefore we must separate ourselves from attempts to heap the blame for one or another social woe on science and scientists for it has become fashionable to represent them as the most probable cause of all conceivable human woes and misfortunes. The idea is not a new one---suffice it to recall Rousseau's reply to L'Academic de Dijon, casting blame for the decline of morals upon science and art. Much time as well as theoretical and practical experience were required before the guilt for social misfortune could be accurately located in the inhuman bourgeois system. Does it make any sense to repeat the errors of the past?
Without calling into doubt the noble intentions of Rousseau we wonder, however, whether it is necessary to argue that it is precisely the true opponents of human progress who are today above all interested in the advancements of similar exaggerated claims concerning the ``guilt'' of science.
It must be underscored that the pure subordination of morality to science (or the reverse) has little explanatory value concerning their interrelation in the contemporary world. The Marxist formulation of the question proposes the examination of this interaction as it applies to the fate of human activity as such. In this light we will clearly see the unbalanced nature of the extremely widespread train of thought, according to which scientific and technological progress exerts an influence on morality by engendering in moral consciousness and behaviour a given set of consequences, whereas morality serves merely as an object of encroachments on the part of science and technology. But isn't it possible that ethics has something 12 to say in answer, since it also makes a significant contribution to societal progress?
The myth of a scientific threat is one of the forms of a "substitution manoeuvre" which we encounter even today. In the capitalist countries the propagation of this myth, as a rule, provokes no serious objections on the part of the powers that be. The contemporary bourgeoisie eagerly supports the establishment of ``scientism'', that is to say, an abstract approach to scientific problems placed at a remove from real needs and interests of the real, concrete historical individual. It must be confessed, certain results have been achieved. The ideas stemming from ethical relativism have sunk deep roots in the consciousness of many bourgeois scholars, philosophers, and natural scientists today. Bearing an interest in the results of the scientist's labour, the contemporary bourgeoisie takes every opportunity to propagate its version of the ``immorality'' of scientific knowledge. In a time of unceasing assaults upon ``traditional'' morality which allegedly has not held up to the ordeals of our ``unstable'' "illogical century (at this point allusions are often made to Auschwitz and Hiroshima), bourgeois theoreticians by means of a not very skillful argumentation try to bring us to the conclusion that science and scientists can consider themselves free of moral concerns and obligations before society. Thus the dispute over science and morality acquires a clearly articulated ideological character.
Among scientists living and working in bourgeois society there are many who find themselves in agreement with Joliot-Curie, Einstein or Wiener in the effort to maintain rigorous humanitarian standards in scientific activity. However we must not forget that other types exist---those natural and particularly social scientists who have quite consciously and candidly placed themselves at the service of the ruling class. We refer to people like Edward Teller, the physicist, or William Vogt, the neo-Malthusian philosopher, who make no effort to conceal their reactionary and anti-humanitarian views. We refer to those whom Lenin pitilessly defined as the scholarly bailiffs of the capitalist class. For them naturally, the question of the moral responsibility of science does not even arise. Karl Marx; evaluating the principal difference between the classic writer of English political economy, David Ricardo, and the reactionary ideologue, Thomas Malthus, spoke of the "utter baseness" of the latter's thought, about the fully justified loathing felt by the English working class towards Malthus; "the people's instinct was correct here, in that they felt that he 13 was no man of science, but a bought advocate of their opponents, a shameless sycophant of the ruling classes.''^^1^^ Baseness of thought is an inevitable result of ``scientific'' activity directed against the interests of the individual and mankind as a wnole. A decisive pre-condition for the disappearance of such people from the sphere of science, wrote the founders of Marxism-Leninism, is the fundamental transformation of society on communist principles.
Underscoring the transformative force imbedded in science in contemporary society, Marxism-Leninism, nevertheless, avoids the extreme of overestimating this force. To be sure, science enjoys a certain autonomy and is free to ``dictate'' its conditions. But, incorporated in the system of concrete historical and social relations, science itself is subject to the ``dictates'' of reality. Its sphere of competence is by no means unlimited, and its own development is in obvious dependence upon the social and class structure of society and the dominant ideology. The tragic situation in which the modern scientisthumanist can---and often does---find himself is inexplicable from the point of view of the laws of the development of knowledge as such. The explanation must be class-based, and the resolution---socio-political.
With the victory of socialism the social conditions underlying the development of science are fundamentally altered. The well-being of man, the satisfaction of the material and spiritual needs of the working people, the expansion of the creative capabilities of the individual---these are its basic goals and social import. In this sense socialism is the turning-point in science, the beginning of the re-orientation of its social functions, from the "production of things" to the "production of the human as such''.
The Report of the Central Committee of the CPSU to the 24th Congress states that "under socialism the fullest possible satisfaction of the people's material and cultural requirements is the supreme aim of social production".^^2^^ This fully pertains to science as well since it is becoming to an ever greater extent a direct productive force in society. Its place in social life and role in the resolution of the most pressing tasks in the building of communism is expressed not only in enhanced efficiency and in progress achieved in socialist production, but also in the creation of the necessary conditions for the harmonious _-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx, Theories of Surplus-Value, Part II, Moscow, 1971, p. 120.
~^^2^^ 24th Congress of the CPSU, Moscow, 1971, pp. 50--51.
14 development of the creative activity and capabilities of the Soviet people. Science---this was emphasized at the 24th Congress of the Party---is emerging as a powerful social and cultural force in the implementation of one of the major tasks in the building of communism, namely, the transformation of social relations, the moulding of a new man. This communist orientation given to science and determining the social and humanitarian meaning of scientific creativity under socialism, decisively alters the character of its interrelations with other forms or human activity---including, morality.Might it be argued then, as far as socialist society as a whole is concerned, that the question under discussion loses its relevance, that the proolem of the moral responsibility of scientist for the social effect of his own creative activity is in general erased from the agenda?
As matters stand the belief in the indifference of science to moral questions has its advocates among certain Soviet scientists as well. The motives of a technocratic ideology, the turning of scientific knowledge into a fetish, and the underestimation of moral factors find support among scientific and technological intelligentsia. ``Knowledge'' is sometimes identified with ``consciousness'', and'contrasted with ``faith'' and ``convictions''. Attempts are made to interpret the domain of the moral in the individual and society from the position of an abstract and one-sided rationalism. Even in those instances when the connection between science and morality is recognized, as indisputable, we may encounter many dubious and simplistic judgements which in fact require a more critical evaluation.
Thus, for example, the question of the relationship between science and morality touches upon essential aspects of the process of educating and bringing up the younger generation. Experience has demonstrated that the individual's level of education by itself does not guarantee a high level of moral consciousness, that an identification of the cognitive and the moral-educative aspects in personality formation is just as erroneous as is the juxtaposition of these two aspects. Consequently, no matter how important the notion `` knowledge'', it must not be turned into an absolute. The direction and object of this knowledge, in other words the ideological and moral orientation, are the most important considerations.
In this connection the proposition advanced by Lenin in the well-known speech "The Tasks of Youth Leagues" is extremely pertinent. In his words: "The entire purpose of training, educating and teaching the youth of today should be to imbue 15 them with communist ethics.''^^1^^ Does it follow that Lenin underestimated the significance of professional training for future specialists? It goes without saying, no. The question at hand is of another nature, the necessity of organically linking general education and instructions per se, on the one hand, and the tasks and goals of communist transformation of society on the other. This teaching and training should be free from one-sidedness and narrowness and contribute to the development of the truly creative individual clearly aware of his place and social role in society. Lenin posed the question of the moral underpinnings for education in the broadest sense: as not only the most important condition for the correct---full and harmonious---formation and development of the personality, but also as an essential condition for the implementation of the final goal---the building of communism. A developed moral culture and high ethical consciousness are not merely supplements to or embellishments on the ``basic'' profession of the individual but rather the expression of the authentic humane meaning of creative activity in a collectivist society. In reference to the system of ``instruction'' as such, Lenin proposes the organic unity of education, essential in both a professional and social sense.
Another aspect of the same question is connected with the state and character of the development'of scientific knowledge itself. Max Born refers to the serious gap in "style of thought" between representatives of the humanities and natural sciences. As a result civilized society is, in his words, fractured into two groups: the one guided by traditional humanist principles and the other by ideas derived from the natural sciences. Born is sceptical about hopes for overcoming this gap by a "rationally balanced education''. He is without a doubt correct, since the latter is not capable of altering the "style of thought" as such, a style which reflects the objective state of science in a society dominated by alienation. The outstanding physicist is very close in his thoughts to those precisely formulated by Karl Marx. Describing science in the future communist society, Marx wrote: "Natural science will in time subsume under itself the science of man, just as the science of man will subsume under itself natural science: there will be one science.''^^2^^ We observe that this implies not the mechanical joining of the natural and social sciences (``humanities''), or the absorption of _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 31, p. 291.
~^^2^^ K Marx, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844, Moscow, 1974, p. 98.
16 one by the other, but rather the appearance of a science of a new quality, in which an orientation towards humanist values finds clear expression in the very subject matter of scientific cognition and activity In the theme under discussion, the formative process of this ``umbrella'' science, already under way in socialist society, must be conceived as a process reflecting ongoing changes in the object-activity of the personality and as a process of intensification of the active creative attitude of the human, both to the outside world and to himself.The points we have outlined above suggest the motivations which led the authors of the present work---natural scientists, philosophers, historians---to gather together to express their views on one of the most urgent problems facing the modern world. The book gives an impression of the nature and level of discourse centred upon this problem and conducted by Soviet scholars. Further, the authors made an effort to overcome certain shortcomings and misperceptions, connected, in particular, with our understanding of the notions ``science'' and ``morality'' as such. We often include in our conception of ``science'' only the natural, so-called ``exact'' sciences, and leave out of consideration the social (``humanist'') disciplines. Such a notion of the range of science, excluding from its boundaries those disciplines which study directly man and social relations, is in no way justified. It undermines in advance the substantiation of points of view derived therein. The same may be said of the various understandings of the notions ``morality'' and ``ethics'' which have left themselves to a wide range of interpretations. The authors of the present work take into consideration the complexity and imprecision of the theme under discussion and endeavour to the extent of their abilities to make a contribution to its further clarification.
This collection of essays contains an analysis of the nodal points in the problem of science and morality. What correlation may be established between the truth and the good? What is the moral significance of science, its role in forming and perfecting social ethics? Where may we locate the moral factor in scientific knowledge and creativity and what are the boundaries describing the influence of morality upon the development of science?
How do we define the moral responsibility of the scientist for the social effects of the application of the discoveries and achievements of science? The connection between science and morality is not limited to simple coordination, it bears an internally coordinated stamp---such is the central idea of the 17 book, the unifying thread of the articles. Differences in points of view are often quite substantial and extend to the very interpretation of the complex dialectic of the relationship between the two spheres of human activity within our concern. The book is written in such a fashion that the reader may, pursuing the development of the central idea shared by all of the authors, in so doing discern differences in attitude.
This book is intended to stimulate discussion, it is polemical. The authors do not make any pretensions to possess the "ultimate truth''. On the contrary they believe that the problem in question stands in need of further discussion and theoretical elaboration. They hope that the proffered level of discussion will serve as a stimulus for further reflection and inquiry.
The choice of a polemical form of presentation was necessitated not only by the (not unimportant) circumstance that the scientific yet lively approach avoids the danger of ``academicism''. The writers were concerned not only with widening the circle of potential readers. In truth it is impossible, to paraphrase Lenin, to present a new view in other than a polemical form. This means of presentation is employed by the authors in disputing individual points and propositions of their colleagues as well.
[18] ~ [19] __NUMERIC_LVL1__ I __ALPHA_LVL1__ [Natural Scientists: mathematicians, physicists, chemists, geologists, etc.] __ALPHA_LVL2__ [introduction.]The problem of the relationship between science and morality is discussed on these pages by natural scientists: mathematicians, physicists, chemists, geologists, etc. In discussing this purely philosophical theme, the participants simultaneously avoid a narrow or ``discipline-bound'' approach to the question of the social aspects of the progress of knowledge, instead considering this theme as it pertains to the humanist significance of science. Expressing a wide spectrum of attitudes these representatives of the so-called "exact sciences" give voice to the originality of the personal experience accumulated in the practice of science.
The authors of the given section of the book are Academician A. D. Alexandrov (mathematician) and professor G. L. Pospelov, D. Sc. (Geology and Minerology).
[20] ~ [21] __ALPHA_LVL2__ A. AlexandrovIf a person has done some harm, he is likely to be asked: "How could you do such a thing?" He might justify himself: "I wanted things to turn out better.'' To this the retort is bound to follow: "It doesn't matter what you wanted---you should have thought about it!''
In this demand to "not only wish, but also think" is expressed that which we call the scientific approach to morality. It concerns morality inasmuch as our focus is upon moral evaluation (``I wanted things to turn out better'') and is called ``scientific'' because it is necessary to think not in a random fashion but so that thoughts correspond with reality and lead to effective solutions. In moral questions, that about which it is "necessary to think" concerns not only the external situation surrounding the person making the decision and acting, but also the authentic meaning underlying his intent to act so that "things turn out better''. It might seem somewhat bombastic to raise to the level of ``scientific'' the simple requirement that "one must think''. But the scientific approach is only a more developed form of such an approach to a subject which leads to understanding, guides practical activity and offers the possibility of prediction.
Given the various possible shadings one may give to the notions ``ethics'' and ``morality'', the most important meaning remains to give guidance to the behaviour of a person. Remaining in the sphere of judgements, evaluations and intentions alone and not finding embodiment in real activities, ethics in substance remains empty, unreal. One's intentions are not enough. The moral intent becomes real only when something is done for the better. But the recognition of this fact leads logically to the necessity of giving a scientific approach to morality.
22In point of fact intentions are materialized as a result of the activities completed by a given individual. The ensuing material process is dependent not only on the wishes of the individual. There are real conditions underlying such a process and the possibility of action by the individual. Further, there is the logical and necessary inter-connectedness of events, limiting the range of the possible and determining the inevitable consequences. If all of this remains unknown, there . are no guarantees that even the best of intentions can be carried through. To insure a correspondence between intent and result, knowledge and understanding are required. But in any complex situation, knowledge and understanding are not immediately accessible; they have to be sought out. The search for true knowledge is precisely the path of science. Consequently the necessary prerequisite for a true morality is a scientific approach to the problems of morality.
A scientific approach means, fundamentally, nothing more than to endeavour to investigate, learn about, comprehend and take into consideration that which makes up the reality. In the final analysis, this is simply conscientiousness. There is no gulf between the actions of a scientist and those of a conscientious layman. The only difference is that science operates with a whole arsenal of specialized methods and theoretical constructions while in everyday life people are forced to be guided by worldly observations, common sense and their past experience.
Thus a scientific approach presupposes a developed sense of moral responsibility which does not allow an individual to restrict himself to subjective opinions of "what is best''. Rather it demands that he come to terms with objectivity, with that which does not hinge upon the opinions and desires of the individual.
Of course, people are often forced to make decisions and act without being given time to reflect or investigate the circumstances. In these instances a conscientious person will at least try to understand the implications of given actions and decisions, to take mistakes into account and, if possible, to correct them. In this manner we accumulate moral experience which in the future permits us to guess the correct decision even when we lack the necessary knowledge or time to examine in full. We might call such guesswork "moral intuition''. But just as scientific intuition devoid of verification doesn't give reliable knowledge, so moral intuition requires verification and develops on the basis of comprehension of life and social experience.
23In speaking of a scientific approach to ethics we take for eranted the existence of at least some morality. In those instances where the choice of decisions is dictated by unmediated feeling or when this choice requires no more than experience, common sense, tradition, the example, or directions provided by someone else---in a word, in the most simple of situations---it is sufficient to follow elementary ethical prescriptions without any scientific approach. For the immoral individual the scientific approach is just as useless as it is for the ignorant who does not want to know and evinces no desire to make use of knowledge.
In the contemporary world a scientific approach to morality is of particular import since the individual is often confronted with complex moral questions. The requirement to "not only want but also think" becomes ever more important as the volume and depth of the problems facing the individual grow. If an individual makes a judgement without full understanding---for example, if an innocent person is convicted without the proper evidence---this judgement could be in direct contradiction to his personal moral principles. In acting without adequate knowledge, one may in all possibility not achieve the desired result and his moral intentions will remain unrealized. What is worse, he may come to regret the consequences of what he has done. People who give instructions without the necessary expertise or interfere blindly in what they don't understand, often bring about great harm despite their good intentions. Objectively speaking, they place themselves in a position of moral irresponsibility (as, for example, the manager who doesn't take the time to examine the task at hand, or the instructor who doesn't want to understand his students).
What events are taking place in the world? What is the meaning of these events? What is the meaning of our life activities? These questions are posed, in one form or another, by everyone who leaves the confines of daily routine and tries to define his own moral position. If an individual doesn't accept everything on faitn, he inevitably confronts these Questions and looks for the necessary knowledge. If the demand for information is not dictated by simple curiosity, it is always underpinned by a moral inquiry. However information in itself yields little, it must be comprehended. In turn, comprehension without serious conceptualization and thought is inconceivable. For this reason factual knowledge and scientific understanding are imperative for the truly thoughtful individual who tries to come to grips with important moral 24 problems. It would be naive to demand that science "explain everything" and provide answers for each and every problem. Nevertheless, science is capable of much and, what is more important, it is the only way to a profound understanding. Without it one is left with only subjective opinion and unfounded assumptions.
It could be objected that the question of the meaning of life does not fall within the domain of science. But if the answer is not to be sought in the "other world" it must be looked for in the world of reality. It is only through knowledge of the real content of life that a reasonable answer can be given to this question. Thus, even if science does not resolve ethical problems, it does give the individual support and guidance in his quests and his decision-making.
When we speak of science, we often have in mind mathematics, physics, chemistry and seem to forget the sciences of society and of man. But it is precisely these sciences which are of overriding importance for ethics inasmuch as they study human and social problems and unveil, in particular, the nature of morality itself. These sciences bear upon the inner world of man and, endeavouring to live up to the ancient philosophical maxim: "Know thyself'', they examine man in the unity of his internal and external, objective and subjective, individual and social being. The metaphysical juxtaposition of these aspects of being serves as a source of the gap between science and ethics (when the first is regarded to be directed at the external and the second, at the internal world of the individual). However, since man maintains conscious control over his actions, by virtue of this he becomes an object to himself, not to mention that in the eyes of another person he is something ``external'', that the subjective is founded in the objective.
Those who object against the ties between science and ethics generally point to the fact that science can engender evil and calamities. This, however, is imprecise. Science only discovers that which exists---be it good or bad---or establishes what is possible or impossible according to the laws of nature. New scientific discoveries turn out to be evil or menacing not ipso facto, but only as a consequence of their application when people either fail to foresee or comprehend the results, or consciously utilize the achievements of technology as a source of profit, repression, extortion or murder. Therefore the only possible means to combat the ``dangers'' of science are a higher :vel of knowledge and an effort, based upon this knowledge, directed against those social forces which would exploit 25 science. Moral indignation must be supported by knowledge to become effective and purposeful.
When the significance of science for morality comes under discussion, it sometimes happens that misunderstandings arise because science is often regarded as strictly a system of knowledge. Scientific knowledge emerges from the cognitive activities of people who are guided by their efforts to ascertain the" truth. These efforts are submitted to the dictates of experiment and logic and are in fact at the heart of science, without which the latter could not exist. The scientific spirit, with the demands that it entails, namely to examine the facts objectively, to hunt out and to pursue the truth, is important for morality.
Explanations of the significance of science for morality sometimes are regarded as attempts to ``reduce'' the latter to a science. But the spirit of science striving towards the truth is incapable of exhausting morality if only because the choice of decisions and actions depends not only upon knowledge and not even upon moral principles in isolation. It happens that people bring harm upon themselves; they are completely aware of this but unable to restrain themselves from such actions. Narcotics control, for example, would be impossible without an explanation of the harm wrought by drugs. To deny this by referring to the insufficiency of explanation by itself would be absurd. It would be just as absurd to deny a scientific approach to morality by declaring that this approach in itself cannot ensure a high level of morals.
Again, it would be no less absurd to accuse of trying to reduce morality to knowledge alone those who underscore the importance of science for the resolution of problems of morality. Indeed, knowledge states that which is, was and will be; correspondingly, it speaks in the indicative mood. Ethics, on the other hand, command. But from a simple statement of facts no imperatives can be logically adduced. For example, from the statement "you are sick" the imperative "cure yourself" doesn't necessarily follow. Therefore the reduction of ethics to knowledge or the deduction of ethics from the latter is quite impossible. They are organically interconnected. These interconnections, incidentally, are evident in the example of the sick man, for there is an obvious connection between science (medicine), the instruction to recover and the possibility of effecting a cure.
Ethics is also expressed in evaluations bearing the form of a statement (for example, "theft is evil''). But in this context an 26 imperative is always taken as a given (``don't steal''). Thus in the example above the reduction of morality to knowledge is logically impossible, just as it is in the case of a direct moral imperative.
Thus the actual dependence of ethics upon science is not to be located in the reduction of the former to knowledge. The "scientific approach" would not be scientific if it placed its claim over the entire realm of ethics, in a word, if it tried to reduce the latter to a science. It merely emphasizes that a striving towards the knowledge of truth is essential for morality, that without it morality runs the risk of remaining simply that which is desirable, but not real.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ THE SCIENTIFIC APPROACHMany accept without any doubt the significance of knowledge and of a scientific approach as a precondition for the realization of moral intentions. But do knowledge and a scientific approach exert An influence on man's moral principles and goals themselves or does science merely determine the means rather than'the goals?
We will find the answers by examining the specific question---why is it that atheists do not set as their goal the salvation of the soul and eternal bliss in heaven? Because, apparently, they regard the salvation of the soul, heaven and hell as inventions; many maintain this position proceeding from scientifically-based convictions. Here the dependence of moral principles and goals upon science is obvious. Of course, the notions ``ends'' and ``means'' are relative: a given goal might be a means to a more general goal. In turn a means, considered as that which must still be implemented, is in fact a goal. However, incorporating a given goal within the framework of more general ends, and the latter within still more general ends, we might come to the conclusion that the moral goal is good "in general'', i.e., something abstract. In order to avoid this conclusion good and evil must be given definition. But as soon as we pose this question, we are forced to turn to human needs, to problems concerning the development of society, in a word, we are forced to adopt a scientific approach to examining phenomena. Thus the scientific approach turns out to be a necessary condition for the rational definition not only of the means of achieving moral goals, but 27 also of these goals themselves, of moral conceptions and principles.
Philosophers and religious thinkers have from ancient times proclaimed moral ideals and high ethical principles and have seeked moral perfection. Christianity proselytized the love of humanity; the ancient teaching of Hinduism argued that a disdain for property and a refusal to acknowledge the very notion of ``mine'' were virtues. The Jacobins preached freedom, equality and fraternity. But none of these ideals were brought into reality.
So, it is essential to choose real ideals and to find real means to implement them. The task of clarifying the reality of an ideal and of searching for real means of achieving them is a scientific one. Only proceeding from a scientific position, incorporating all of reality, is one capable of discovering the reasons underlying the moral malaise of mankind and of finding effective remedies.
Precisely such a scientific formulation for the problem of ethics was articulated by Marxism. Communism as an ethical and social ideal was in existence long before Marx and Engels. Their contribution consisted not so much in the clarification of this ideal as in pointing out the ways of achieving this ideal on the basis of scientific theory.
Lenin wrote: "Communist morality is based on the struggle for the consolidation and completion of communism.''^^1^^ The first proposition of the moral code, formulated in the Programme of the CPSU, states: "devotion to the cause of communism''. Clearly, this proposition will acquire a precise meaning only once it is understood exactly what is meant under the "cause of communism'', and how "the struggle for the consolidation and completion of communism" can and must be carried out. In this instance simple references to communist ideals will not suffice, because we are concerned not only with these ideals but with the cause of communism, i.e., with the actual ways of implementing these ideals. A serious answer to this question can be given only on the basis of scientific theory. Therefore the notion of communist morality, if isolated from science, is lacking in precise meaning and, bereft of scientific understanding, turns into a slogan which can support a wide range of content. To vote "for communism" is a question of moral choice, but this choice is seriously comprehended only when it is understood precisely what an individual is choosing _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 31, p. 295.
28 when he relies upon a scientific concept of communism. It was not for nothing that Lenin called to learn communism, for without comprehensive knowledge, without a serious intellectual effort communism could turn into a "mere signboard'', and "such superficiality would be decidedly fatal.''^^1^^The question, consequently, becomes that of defining on what an individual bases his convictions. Does he find his premises in a blind faith in the dogma of any given teaching, in authority, in personal infallibility, or does he try to think through his convictions rationally to verify and strengthen them with serious knowledge? Of course, one can never be omniscient, nor can he predict the future in full. But this does not imply that one is left with faith only, as the unconditional acceptance of any given and unverifiable proposition. In contrast to faith, the scientific position accepts nothing unconditionally, without demonstration or foundation. With faith an individual rejects his own essence as a rational being: on the other hand, he affirms this essence if he endeavours critically to apprehend reality (including his self). Such a position does not deprive him of the solidity of his convictions but provides him with another, firmer basis than that given by faith, for in this case the convictions are well thought out and rest on solid ground. The objective meaning of the propagation of faith is often reduced to converting people into a ``flock'' which the shepherd can guide in any convenient direction. For this reason Lenin took an uncompromising stance towards religion and any other blind faith. He wrote: "To accept anything on trust, to preclude critical application and development, is a grievous sin....''^^2^^ When communists declared that their ethics was a class one, this was an expression not of their faith, but of the scientific understanding of the class nature of morality in a class society.
The world outlook of an individual includes not only his general view of the world but also his over-all moral position. Therefore an integral scientific world outlook necessarily links up this position with a scientific understanding of the world and apprehends it proceeding from the same general scientific approach. Rejection of this would signify if not a general denial of the scientific approach to ideological problems, then at least a dualism: science remains science, and ethics remains _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 31, p. 288
^^2^^ Ibid., Vol. 3, p. 630.
29 ethics. But then ethics is inevitably transferred to the sphere of pure subjectivism or of religious faith. It is not for nothing that the standard-bearers of faith take up arms against those who defend the idea of a link between science and morality. The question is posed as follows: either an integral scientific world outlook or a hodge-podge of science, dogmatism and faith in God or in earthly ``infallible'' gods.The scientific world outlook advocates a scientific approach to all phenomena. This excludes a division into "spheres of influence" according to which external being belongs to science whereas good and ideals belong to faith. This is how the question of the influence of knowledge and a scientific approach upon morality is to be resolved.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ MORAL CONSCIOUSNESSMorality is formed of moral consciousness and moral sentiment; it would be inconceivable without governing the emotional sphere. But in order to govern his feelings, desires and interests, the individual must initially apprehend them. This is not always a simple task, especially if one moves from strictly personal to social and class interests and feelings. The class feeling must develop into the class consciousness^^1^^; its high level is assured by a certain sum of knowledge achieved by means of education.
Socialist consciousness was introduced into the workers' movement by the intelligentsia. Marxist political education revealed to the proletariat its authentic class interests and its historical role in the liberation of society as a whole from all forms of exploitation. Proletarians, in mastering the scientific conclusions concerning the development of society, recognized themselves not only as fighters for their individual interests or the interests of their collective alone, but as fighters for their class interests, for socialism and for a better future for all mankind. This consciousness morally elevated the proletariat to the level of heroic achievements. Thus scientific knowledge became a moral factor..This occurred, no doubt, not independently, but rather because knowledge merged. with moral sentiment and gave the latter form and direction.
_-_-_^^1^^ This (class, revolutionary---A. A.) instinct must be transformed into political awareness'', wrote Lenin. (V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 24, p. 268.)
30The effectiveness of one's intentions depends on his character, on his moral strengths (conscience, will, etc.). If the individual is lacking in these, he, though possessed of the highest principles and the best intentions, will be incapable in difficult situations of acting in an authentically moral fashion. However moral strengths of themselves are not goaloriented---only through focusing them upon moral goals do they become precise and definite.
If an individual is wholly lacking in conscience (there exist such pathological cases) no appeals to his conscience will have effect. But since conscience in and of itself is only a moral strength or a form of moral consciousness, and since form must also have content, the determining factor is that of the content given to this form, that which the individual considers to be compatible or incompatible with his conscience. "The Republican has a different conscience than that of the Royalist, the rich---than that of the poor, the thinker---than that of he who is incapable of thought.''~^^1^^ But as soon as we turn to the content of conscience, we are forced to consider not only feelings but also reason. It would seem that the conscience of a patriot would not permit him to hope for the defeat of his homeland. But Leninists in the period of the imperialist war were ``defeatists'': their patriotism was socialistic. This was dictated not by feelings alone, but to no less a degree by a scientific understanding of the requirements of the moment: the defeat of Russia in the imperialist war would weaken the position of the autocracy and bring nearer its collapse and the victory of the working class. It follows from a scientific approach to morality that a refusal to comprehend the objective situation in and of itself must be considered unconscionable. Only a scientific approach permits the discovery of authentic truth. And where is conscience left if bereft of a persistent striving towards and uncompromizing respect for the truth?
Quite the same may be said for the other moral strengths: there can be no morality without simple compassion, honour and will. However one can feel compassion for different people, honour can be understood in many ways, the will can be employed to achieve a wide range of goals.
Then there is a degree of interaction between feelings and reason: knowledge influences the feelings and moral forces not only in that it gives rational definition to their content. The _-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx, F. Engels, Werke, Ed. 6, S. 130.
31 personality is moulded as a result of the assimilation of experience and consequently of knowledge. His moral strengths are being foi.nulated simultaneously. Thorough knowledge, by engendering decisiveness, consolidates the will. If an individual recognizes the baneful consequences of his action he will perhaps judge himself severely and his conscience will become more penetrating.Reliance upon the feelings in disregard of reason, the neglect of knowledge and understanding in asserting faith---these are the typical features of all forms of-- irrationalism, which reached its apogee under fascism. The fascist idea of a "superior race" shared no common ground with science. Hitler, providing the foundations for his views, referred not to science out to the "will of Providence'', to the ``creator'' and so on. The Hitlerian method consisted of the influencing feelings, hypnotizing people and suppressing their ability to take a critical stance towards reality, thus evoking in them "the general will''.
Some opponents of the connection between science and morality observe that the nazis also employed science, and even call them enlightened people. Indeed, it is difficult to accept as enlightenment the dissemination of fascist theories and the methods employed by Hitler of "evoking the general will''. This is not enlightenment, but rather the most flagrant obscurantism. The example provided by fascism in fact confirms the existing ties between science and morality. Correspondingly it confirms the connection between antiscientific sentiment, irrationalism and immorality.
Appeals to reason, understanding and science stand in opposition to all forms of irrationalism. It was precisely for this purpose that the human being was given a reason, this is what makes him specifically human, namely, that he not succumb to emotions alone, but rather act in accordance with the dictates of his heart and his reason. Science and reason must not be exploited simply as means for the achievement of goals determined independently of them. But general goals and moral principles themselves must be submitted to critical examination in the scientific spirit and must find support in a scientific understanding of social life.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ THE NOTION OF MORALITY AND THE ACTWe continue to outline our conclusions drawn from an analysis of the notion of morality itself. Making no claim to make a precise definition of morality, we will focus only upon 32 those features of the individual's morality which to us would appear to be essential.
First, morality presupposes not only the conscious act (including a judgement), but also its evaluation or at least the possibility of evaluating it, that is to say, the apprehension of a relationship between the completed or intended action and a corresponding system of values (the notions of good, necessary, norms, and goals). Otherwise, even given the consciousness of one's action, the individual does not know what he does, just as a child may not understand that he is behaving poorly. A she-animal heroically defends her offspring; heroism was also displayed by primitive savages. But a complete moral evaluation of an act requires an apprehension of the goal to which it was directed.
Second, morality presupposes a correlation of values, judgements and actions with the consciousness borne by others; it is a social phenomenon. The notion of a moral code held by an isolated individual is lacking in content.
Third, morality presupposes at least a minimal fulfilment in corresponding activities. Limited strictly to the sphere of moral consciousness, it would remain a "thing in itself'', devoid of reality. Even expressed only through speech it already acquires reality which can be assessed as either moral judgement or hypocrisy.
The fourth feature of morality consists in the possibility, of choice (If only a conceivable one). If this possibility be lacking, it is impossible to speak of morality.
Finally, a particular feature of morality resides in what we may call the axiomatic or unconditional imperative. As long as discussion is underway and arguments as well as opportunities are being weighed, moral consciousness does not emerge in a pure form. But there comes a moment of decision and action, when an individual may even act in defiance of reason, obeying moral dictates which have a more profound justification. This internal moral conviction rests upon feeling and is above all the result of having mastered the experiences proffered by one's life in society.
The ``cellule'' in which morality emerges in the unity of consciousness and action is the act---conscious and completed action or activity of the individual. The act is formed of the following: the goal or intentions; the plan of their implementation; the inducement or will which transform one's intentions into actions; the comprehension of the latter by the individual. Goal, plan and will refer to the consciousness; activity completes the transition from consciousness to results and 33 consequences, and the latter return to react upon the consciousness. We have before us, in a formal sense, the usual feedback system.
Besides the entire complex of external conditions, the subject of morality remains outside the confines of the given scheme, i.e., the individual himself performing the act (he is also a condition of his own activity), the considerations prompting him to advance the given goal, his value orientation, his subconscious strivings, his abilities, character, and sheer physical capacity. Behind all this, of course, stand the social conditions influencing the personality of the individual, but they ``act'' here through him. This is often ignored and frequently, complaining of circumstances, one overlooks the possibility that it is precisely oneself that is the ``condition'' interfering with the completion of one's good intentions; through indolence, cowardice, incompetence or, as it happens, stupidity.
In the scheme of the act which we have presented morality is directly incorporated in the goal. The plan determines that which must be done to achieve the goal. Correspondingly, action emerges as an imperative defined by the goal. The imperative posited by morality is called the duty. In the moral sense action is duty-bound. In the realm of inducement to action appear those which we call moral and volitional qualities, by which we indicate the ability to transform intent into action (or conversely, into restraint). Action includes the subjective (determining consciousness) and the objective (the external action itself), through which the subjective intention ``transforms'' into its result. Therefore the moment of transfer to action (the moment of will) occupies a special place: it resembles a switch, releasing the current of moral intentions into external matter. The results and consequences themselves in their objectivity are located beyond the confines of morality. But they return through perception: the individual sees what he has done and reacts in one way or another to the results of his act.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ GENERAL CONCLUSIONSThe scheme for the action, outlined above, may be isolated from morality: it describes any purposeful activity. The given scheme, therefore, depicts the elementary process of cognition 34 and of verification through practice, in a word, the most simple of experiments. Further, the goal of the experiment is knowledge: for this reason it is important to follow the results of the experiment and to draw from it the corresponding conclusions. In the instance of the moral act, this aspect is of a secondary nature. In any case the results and consequences are apprehended if not by he who initiated the act, at least by other people. Thus the moment of cognition is unavoidable.
The original unity of the moral and cognitive aspects of practice is reflected in words such as ``truth'' which expresses the notions of objective verity and moral rectitude. The same may be said of the meanings of the words ``law'' and ``obligation''. In this original unity we may also locate the source and foundation of the connection between science and morality, they are both the outgrowth of the development of two interrelated aspects of human practice~
The same original interconnection is located in the goal---the initial point for activity. The goal represents the unity of two aspects: the subjective and the objective. On a subjective level there is that which is desirable, that, in other words, which appears to the individual as good and that which he wishes to achieve. On the objective level there is that which is possible; that which may be implemented, or which at least appears feasible to the individual. An assessment of possibility is determined by knowledge. When an individual determines a goal for himself he regards achievement of this goal as possible. He would not set as a goal that which he firmly knew to be unattainable.
Our idea of what is good is also conditioned by knowledge. The satisfaction of hunger is undoubtedly ``good'' but it may turn out to be harmful for the hungry person if he eats too much too fast. It is important to know this. The examples could be multiplied.
Therefore, links are contained in the striving for good on the one hand, and knowledge on the other; contained in the very purposeful nature of practical activity and in its role for cognition. Activity is directed towards the good, but the very notion of good or evil, the assessment of the feasibility of a goal and of harmfulness or usefulness depend upon the knowledge which one has acquired. Cognition, that is science, is prompted by the same striving for the good which stimulates morality; both are directed to identical notions of social usefulness. Thus the intrinsic connection between science and morality lies at their very roots. The core of this connection resides in the 35 unity of subjective-objective and desired-possible which is inherent in the notion of a goal.
Morality presupposes consciousness. It evolves as people become aware or the effects of their actions and develop sanctions against that which brings about harm as well as work out measures to encourage that which is useful. The origin of ethics lies, therefore, in the perception of consequence---in the last link in our scheme of the action, the link including cognition (it goes without saying, cognition not only by the individual performing the act, but also by other people). The first link in the scheme---the goal ana the phenomenon of goaldetermination in itself---developed from instinctive and reflex strivings, from guiding elements which focus the activity on the achievement of an external object. The awareness of these strivings also provides the most elementary conscious goal. .
But indeed ``awareness'' is simply the transition from perception or emotional experience to knowledge. "The way in which consciousness is, and in which something is for it, is knowing.''^^1^^ Therefore in a trivial fashion moral consciousness begins with knowledge. Morality is developed in accordance with the degree of the individual's consciousness of activities and the ensuing results, in accordance with human mutual interrelations and individual needs. Morality reflects their being. That which distinguishes morality from science therefore does not consist in the assertion that science reflects reality whereas morality does not.
The difference resides in the nature of this reflection. Knowledge---the statement of objective being---is the product of science. In turn, morality, through knowledge, develops imperatives. For science, being is presented only in the form of an object. Morality, on the other hand, gives expression to the subject itself; it reflects his drives, interests, etc. Consequently it addresses its imperatives to the subject, to his consciousness, through which it guides his behaviour.
The reflection of reality in ethics is often distorted by false and fantastic notions. In the same vein knowledge is distorted and continues to be distorted by spurious theories and opinions. The movement of cognition from mythological explanations of events to quasi-scientific and later, to fully scientific explanations is continuous; the principles of science are in a state of development. The same process marks the _-_-_
^^1^^ K. Marx, Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, p. 159.
36 liberation of morality from religioi s and mythological thought patterns.However the scientific self-knowledge gained by man trails behind his knowledge of the world about. When the laws of mechanics were discovered no science of man and society in the true sense of the word existed. But in the last hundred years man's self-knowledge has been firmly grounded in the soil of science. Consequently, morality is to an ever greater degree derived from this scientific self-knowledge (of both the individual and society). This connection is not a simple one; the process referred to does not proceed smoothly. But this does not serve as a basis for a denial of the fact that the progress of science and the related development of a scientific view of the world inevitably engenders a scientific approach to the problems of morality, the more so when science exerts an ever more active influence upon public life.
We must further take into account that one of the conditions giving definition to the notion of morality is the opportunity for choice (both the awareness of the opportunity for choice and the actual opportunity). To bring about this choice a correlation between consciousness and real possibilities is essential. Otherwise the choice may be aborted or may lead to undesired effects. To put it in other words, actual freedom of choice is ensured by knowledge. The role of knowledge as the condition for real freedom has been long known: freedom is indeed the capacity and opportunity to act intelligently. Extensive knowledge is afforded by science---the knowledge of conformities and regularities. Therefore an advanced morality providing a pre-established approach to activity in any given complex situation would be inconceivable without science.
Knowledge, by establishing the possible and the impossible, thereby defines when a conceivable good is realistic or unrealistic. Thus although knowledge does not define good and evil as such and does not strictly determine the choice made by the individual, it nevertheless does define the boundaries of the possible within which choice is confined. The expansion of knowledge widens the frontiers describing that to which an individual may approach consciously and, consequently, the range of conscious choice. In other words, knowledge expands the perimeter of morality. At the same time that cognition expands the real opportunities it dismisses imaginary possibilities. This in turn exerts its influence on the realm and the content of morality. Thus religious and Utopian 37 aspirations give way to more realistic and science-based perspectives. The direct influence of knowledge on the moral sphere is supplemented by that exerted through the embodiment of scientific results in practice, by alterations in human life with the consequent reflection of these changes in new moral problems ana notions.
In real life the individual often takes into account only superficial opportunities, thereby risking overlooking real possibilities. Avoidance of these extremes is possible only given the guidance of that which directs the scholar; namely the bringing to bear of existing knowledge, the attempt to expand this knowledge and to avoid the creation of absolutes.
Science, by uncovering the laws of reality thereby describes that which is in principle possible as that which is in agreement with these laws. Conversely, it describes that which is in principle impossible as that which stands in contradiction to these laws. To hope to achieve any given result in defiance of the laws of nature and of social development is in effect to hope for a miracle. To advance goals of this type, when the corresponding laws are already known, is absurd, and from our point of view, immoral.
Before a science of society had been developed, the laws of human relations and behaviour were expressed in moral precepts such as "sow the wind and reap the whirlwind''. The science of man and of society provides---and in the future will provide---more precise and profound imperatives, but the substance of the ties between knowledge and ethics remains the same as that expressed in the folk wisdom of old.
To conclude, knowledge exerts a very considerable influence on the sphere of morality for it widens the boundaries of that to which an individual may consciously address himself, it gives focus- to real, and dismisses imaginary possibilities, demonstrates possible consequences and provides new means for the achievement of goals; unreal goals are dismissed but new goals appear and are shown to be realistic. As an offshot the depth and content underlying the notion of good is changed as is the system of values pertaining to the definition of morality. It is sufficient to juxtapose the value systems of the Christian believer anci the Marxist to understand the scale of the changes introduced in this sphere by scientific knowledge.
38 __ALPHA_LVL3__ THE CONNECTION IN PRAXISWe have thus come to the conclusion that choice and the implementation of ends are primarily dependent upon knowledge in that it renders possible the distinction between real and unreal ends. In addition knowledge permits consideration of the conditions within which an action is to be carried out. The direct transition to activity depends upon will, which may be amplified by the pertinent knowledge or, on the other hand, attenuated by'lack of certainty brougnt on by insufficient or unreliable information. Next comes the ability to act: here the role of knowledge is obvious. Finally, the result is the apprehension of the outcome and consequences of the deed. The final moment must not be isolated from morality. The deed completed by the individual represents not only that which he wanted or did not want to do, but also that which in actuality took place and which thereby has its own properties and consequences quite independent of the individual's intentions. It is precisely in this, its objective state that the deed is presented to other individuals. The act of cognition, finalizing action, is essential for morality. Its importance is underscored by that significance given to conscience as the ability of the individual to evaluate the results of his own actions.
As matters stand, although individual intentions are directed at the achievement of results (otherwise they would be devoid of sense), between intentions and results there may often exist less than full correspondence. This real contradiction is resolved when one, having ascertained the lack of correspondence between intentions and ends, endeavours to explore the conditions and methods which could ensure the necessary correspondence, or to alter the ends themselves once convinced that the original ends have proven unattainable. The sequence of activity outlined above is not always feasible for the individual in question, but it may be for others who may rely on the experience of their predecessors.
The process of cognition is carried out in precisely this manner, the individual becomes aware of the result of his action and the latter is assimilated; if the necessity arises further research is conducted, the results of which are also assimilated and, together with the preceding experience, are taken into consideration in praxis. Cognition, uncovering possibilities unknown at an earlier date, engenders new ends, desires and intentions, and provides incentive for further 39 activity. The latter brings to the fore new tasks, and the process continues. The contradiction between goals and results does not disappear, but is renewed in each instance at a higher stage. This contradiction is in fact the driving force impelling cognition. Indeed would there exist a necessity for cognition if all human desires were satisfied, all intentions met and ends attained?
The same applies in the case of morality; given a lack of correlation between results and intentions the individual endeavours to correct the situation, draws out'lessons for the future or even alters his goals and principles if he perceives them to be unreal or leading to undesirable consequences. In a word, the individual comes to know the world and draws in the process the corresponding moral lessons.
Thus, the contradiction between the evaluation of a deed differentially in terms of intent and consequence is resolved by the development of morality proper. But such a resolution entails the renewal of the very same contradiction at a higher stage. New moral intentions, just as earlier ones, are not realized in toto, goals are not achieved in one fell swoop, and the search for better paths continues. Stagnant, immobile and dogmatized morality no longer takes the consequences of its application into its purview, no longer takes life into account and thus ceases to be a real morality. Rather it remains a relic of the phenomenon of cognition.
Returning to the question of the moral evaluation of the deed, we may conclude that it is necessary to make an evaluation of intent, but with the necessary stipulation that one takes into account to what extent the individual came to grips with objective reality in his intentions and in the actual implementation of the latter. To what extent did he assess the reality of his goals and plans? To what extent the results and effects? Repentance in trie event of deplorable results must be accompanied by the gleaning of lessons from this experience and by the search for better solutions. This is the requirement of the reasonable conscience, which needs not only agony but also perfection. This is the negation of moral complacency and the affirmation of an unceasing search for the better. Authentic morality exists only in a state of development. The latter is stimulated, on the one hand, by a relentlessly changing objective reality and on the other hand, by a persistent lack of fit between results and goals, overcome through the process of cognition. Morality, initiated by knowledge and growing in pace with the latter, is in a state of constant transition from the delineation of knowledge to moral imperatives, from these 40 imperatives to action, and from action once again to knowledge....
Contributing with knowledge both to external circumstances and to his own life, man determines the moral path.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ THE SCIENTIFIC SPIRITKnowledge and the conceptions based upon it we may call the matter, the content of science; the form given to the movement of science is its method---that totality of approaches, criteria, and techniques which direct the search and determine the verification of the truth. The latter may be described as the scientific mode which in turn may be concisely stated as that approach to a subject matter which provides specific knowledge of it. It is common knowledge that without the corresponding methods and criteria it is impossible to evaluate the reliability of observations, the correctness of conclusions, or arrive at a thorough knowledge of the subject matter. Without these criteria it is further impossible to distinguish science from information collected at random or from pseudo-sciences such as alchemy. The criteria and methods pertaining to the phrase "scientific mode" are intrinsic to science itself. For example, mathematics encompasses methods for achieving results---the methods of mathematical proof and conclusions.
Scientific criteria and methods exist, of course, only to the extent that people accept these criteria and rely upon the corresponding methods. At the core of science lies the striving to know the truth and to understand the activities of man. Therefore the word combination ``pseudo-science'' is as absurd as is "black whiteness''. The scientific spirit epitomizes the quest for the truth; it is the scientific approach with its criteria and methods, converted into a search, a discovery and an affirmation of the truth by the striving towards knowledge, a striving directed in principle at the entire world (both nature and the internal world of the individual).
Unfortunately, there are those who write of science and, in particular, as it pertains to morality, who overlook precisely the essence of science, expressed in the search for the truth. In these instances science is considered in its external aspects; in terms of its applications, quantitative growth, etc. Science in their hands is turned into a force to all appearances external to humankind. It appears in this light to those who do not understand the substance of science, but see only its technical 41 applications. The particular role played by science in the contemporary world has also resulted in the frequent attracting to its ranks of those who are more interested in a career than in truth. But to make judgements concerning the whole of science on the basis of these facts would be the equivalent of confusing prostitution for love.
The distortions mentioned above block our view of the authentic spirit of science, characterized by a passionate, uncompromising and tightly controlled search for truth. The essential connection between science and morality also disappears from the field of vision. Given these distortions we also overlook the fact that science includes human self-awareness. The fact that self-awareness---both of the individual and of society---is a condition determining the development of morality has been understood since ancient times.
Many feel that the feature distinguishing the moral from the scientific consciousness may be located in the axiomatic imperatives yielded by the former. This is however incorrect, since we may find axiomatic imperatives at the heart of scientific consciousness as well: the striving for and respect of the truth, the adoption of scientific norms, the unconditional acceptance of that which is demonstrated by facts and logic. The individual well grounded in science, accepts its arguments and conclusions, but others may ignore these arguments and conclusions and in fact show little interest in clarifications of the truth. They may for example turn to authority rather than to an examination of the facts. On a general level, outside the realm of specialized scientific problems, the question may be posed as follows: is the striving for and respect of the truth an unconditional imperative for the individual?; do its deductions serve as an imperative for him? A positive answer indicates the scientific approach to morality. But since the achievement of objective knowledge is difficult and since, secondly, taking this objective knowledge into account is not always a pleasant task, the call for an approach in the scientific spirit often provokes protest. In this vein a moral position is advanced which excludes from the realm of morality the striving to know the truth and to come to grips with it. The fact that people will accept falsehoods only underscores the importance of a scientific approach to morality with its inherent rejection of credulity and its demand for proof.
The first and foremost demand of the scientific approach is objectivity. To examine an object, putting to the side, to the degree possible, all that is personal; to try to investigate and to understand "as it is in reality" and not as it appears at first 42 glance or as one would prefer it to be; to take account of the facts and of logic rather than of one's preconceptions or of the opinions of the authorities---this may serve as our definition of objectivity. No matter how much a physicist might wish that an experiment confirm his hypothesis he may not alter the data yielded by the experiment even by an iota. Scientific objectivity presupposes unwavering honesty, unconditional acceptance of the truth and that degree of personal modesty which would restrain one from placing his wishes and opinions above the arguments presented by the facts and by logic and from subordinating these arguments to the opinions of the authorities. Therefore the scientific spirit excludes from its domain all forms of accommodation.
Scientific activity presupposes receptivity to criticism and self-criticism. The scientist is always prepared to accept well-founded objections and recognize demonstrated error, no matter how unpleasant the fact of recognition. He verifies his own work by attempting to incorporate possible objections. Scientific creativity always combines hunches, hypotheses and fantasies with the strictest critical edge. Science conducts a search for conformities and for the essential; it never rests content with the surficial. Therefore the scientific spirit excludes superficiality and demands the most penetrating examination of the object in question. It demands persistence and thoughtfulness in the quest.
It may be observed that all of the features enumerated above have been borrowed from the domain of morality, and do not belong to science proper. Such a remark is spurious. The scientific approach does not argue that to garble or to juggle with the facts is bad, it states merely that such activity precludes the possibility of establishing the truth. In certain instances concealment of the truth may be regarded as a moral act (for example concealing from a sick person the terminal nature of his disease) but by such a choice the action forfeits its claim to being scientific. It follows that the demands for truthfulness, self-criticism, etc. are integral to science---they are internal conditions necessary for its development.
A scientist engaged in the search for truth finds himself in the position of waiting for results and decisions which are made quite independently of his will. The position of the applied scientist is somewhat different: by manipulating nature he strives to achieve the desired result. The confusion of the practical, engineering and technical position with science may be listed as yet another reason for the loss of the moral element in the scientific spirit.
43Scientific truth expresses that which exists (independently of our will); it does not depend upon moral choice; to deny the truth would be absurd, although one may in fact try to conceal it. For this reason it holds precedence over morality and must be the concluding factor to be taken into account by the latter. But the activities of the individual depend upon his choice, for this reason morality of necessity precedes the engineering position. The differences between these two positions are brought into sharp focus when we move to the analysis of social phenomena. Science endeavours to apprehend the objective tendencies and possibilities for social development. The "social engineer" sets to work to transform society. The activity of the latter may be effective and moral only given reliance upon science; it is immoral if the engineer aspires to change life, relying,only upon his preconceived opinions and neglecting objective tendencies and opportunities (the latter is typical of the politics of voluntarism, for all ``left'' deviations, for putschism, etc.).
Reliable and established knowledge serves as the firmest foundation for one's convictions. The physicist, for example, does not doubt the existence of molecular structure. But the scientist's respect for the truth must not be transformed into idolatry. It must be combined with a readiness to reconsider one's conceptions on the accuracy of any given scientific proposition, to render more accurate and develop this proposition if so demanded by the facts and by the laws of logic. Thus the tenacity of a scientific conviction is nevertheless incompatible with dogmatism and fanaticism. Similarly, the critical attitude of science, always prepared to subject to doubt any given proposition, has nothing in common with scepticism, because the former leads to more sophisticated and more precise knowledge. A readiness to reconsider existing propositions and theories and a receptivity to the most unexpected things that one may stumble upon in nature make the authentic scientific approach revolutionary. But even given a large quotient of boldness, such a revolutionary approach inexorably submits to the criteria of science.
In sum, the scientific spirit brings together perseverance in the search with the modesty of the searcher. It unites the wish to attain the truth with the strictest control, certainty with a critical stance, conviction---with doubt, unconditional respect for existing knowledge---with a readiness to reconsider and review and constantly to press forward in an indefatigable and unremitting search for tne truth.
44 __ALPHA_LVL3__ THE SCIENTIFIC APPROACH TO MORALITYThe scientific approach may be defined as a system of norms of "scientific behaviour'', that is to say, of sensory and mental activity leading to a cognition of the truth. Morality is in fact a system of norms guiding the behaviour of the individual towards moral action and the achievement of the good. To the extent that the establishment and shaping up of morality entails a cognition of the truth, the scientific approach must be followed by ethics. Further the scientific principles are always present in morality although it may be distorted and suppressed by dogmatic, religious or subjectivist views.
This conclusion is supported by the analysis of yet one more determined feature of morality, namely, with human interrelationships. Morals begin with an act; the human steps out of the bounds of individualism and turns to other individuals, relating to them as subjects and not purely objects. The simple expression of this relationship may be found in the question; what do people need?. In a developed form it is expressed as follows: what is necessary not only for isolated close friends but also for distant acquaintances? What is necessary for society as a whole, not only today but for the future as well? It may be inferred from the above, first, that morality calls for an attempt to look at people from the objective positions offered by the norms of science (that is to say, that one endeavours not to see that which "one would like" or "seems to be plausible" but rather to understand "what is the true state of affairs''); and second, that any serious answer to questions concerning human needs requires a specific of research.
If an individual does not try to comprehend human needs his pretensions to morality are in fact vapid. At the same time to try to come to a serious understanding of anything without following the scientific spirit is quite impossible. Conviction, faith and intuition devoid of substantiation by science are in reality simply various manifestations of subjectivism, dressed up in the garb of a ``teaching''.
Once we ask "what do people need?" the question arises: what is it possible to do? Determining what is in actuality possible also calls for a scientific approach. Without such an approach all good intentions are sooner or later revealed to be devoid of content or even hypocritical. The choice is between morality incorporating the scientific approach to human problems and immorality, taking no account of humans---a third alternative, given the contemporary state of the science of man and society, is implausible.
45The elementary demand posed by the scientific approach with which we began our discourse, consists in the striving to examine the circumstances, to take the given conditions into account, to judge and to act with knowledge and understanding, calculating one's actions and the possible consequences therein. The opinion has received circulation, however, that such a requirement is not sufficiently elevated. This opinion posits the existence of the following dilemma: either nobility of character without calculation, or calculation without nobility of character. The real problem, however, lies not in the abstract juxtaposition of nobility and calculation in general, but rather in their interconnection in any given concrete situation. To leave out or to overlook pertinent facts when even the slightest opportunity is provided to include them is, speaking plainly, sheer stupidity. To ignore that which affects other people is irresponsible and even immoral. Everything depends on the goal, the circumstances, and the orientation. An individual, responsible for the welfare of others in a given situation (be it a flignt in space, mountain climbing, a battle or an uprising) and not planning for contingencies or in general not taking into account circumstances---is a criminal.
The moral approach to serious matters is initiated when the demand for calculation and situational analysis with the objectivity of the scientific spirit is first advanced, when the persistent search is conducted for optimal paths to the achievement of moral ends. How many sacrifices have occurred because people didn't bother to consider this demand! Estimation in the scientific spirit, the demand for a comprehensive stock-taking of the conditions and opportunities pertaining to the implementation of the change under consideration, and likewise of the consequences of such a change---such an approach is connected with the awareness of personal moral responsibility. Such a calculation stands, in direct opposition to the calculation of the schemer or time-server. The morality founded upon such calculation was given clear expression in Lenin's activities, whose work was characterized by an uninterrupted unity between the striving for scientifically grounded goals serving the good of humanity and, on the other hand, the strictest scientific calculation of how to move towards these goals.
The scientific orientation requires not only the scientific determination of ways and means towards the attainment of moral ends but also an agreement between these ends and moral principles, on the one hand, and objective laws on the other. Rejecting reliance upon sheer will, faith or fanaticism, 46 the scientific approach encourages an individual position to moral convictions identical to the relationship between the scientist and scientific convictions. In contrast to all forms of hypocrisy the scientific approach to morality requires objectivity from the individual in nis awareness of self, and honesty in regard to his principles and goals; it demands that one face the facts squarely and a strict examination of one's principles, convictions and goals. Just as the mathematician gives precise formulation to his axioms and draws strict inferences from them, so any conscientious individual will try to clarify his own principles and to draw the corresponding conclusions from them, avoiding the conversion of moral axioms into smokescreens for his conclusions and activities which in fact have nothing in common with these axioms.
Science does not accept anything on faith, rather it demands arguments and rejects unsubstantiated assertions. Calculations based on assertions of faith lacking in proof, these are violations not only of the scientific spirit, but also of the individual and his inalienable right to make conscious judgements.
The alternatives are sometimes posed; either nobility or calculations, either the absence of any connection between science and ethics---or the reduction of ethics to science. These alternatives stem from a lack of understanding of the dialectic. But it is precisely this dialectical approach which is important for morality. Its first feature---objectivity---is also the first demand posed by the scientific approach, with which, as we have demonstrated, authentic morality also begins. Further, the dialectic presupposes the examination of the object in all of its ties and mediations, in a state of development. The moral significance of these demands is enormous. One-sidedness is a constant source of moral error, just as is the disregard of development and, consequently, of the question of effect. Comprehensiveness implies as a given the estimation of the material and the spiritual, both external and internal, and of those subjective moments and factors inherent in human nature as such. A thorough understanding of the notion of use implies not only materiafbut also moral benefit as well as the moral effect of the deed.
Let us take another element of the dialectic, namely that of "concrete truth''. It should be obvious that it is of the utmost importance to avoid judgement and decision "on the whole" concerning moral questions and to examine the concrete aspects of the given situation.
47The basic feature of the dialectic, its essence, lies in the objective flexibility of concepts, reaching for the unity of opposites. Not the subjective flexibility of the sophist, but the flexibility reflecting the comprehensiveness and internal complexity of the object as such. The complexity and contradictory nature of life renders this feature of the dialectic an essential condition determining the morality of a decision already made. The metaphysical approach to moral problems inexorably leads to moral miscalculations and anti-humane decisions.
The dialectic considers everything in a state of development and refrains from absolutes. Even the absolute imperativeness of morality is only a moment in its development: moral imperatives are also subject to constant review and extension, just as the axioms of mathematics, for example, are reviewed and extended. Life is a process, a process created by humans. Therefore the good can oe apprehended only in the process of establishing it, in the process of ascent to a good of broader scope---in the same manner that questions of truth are resolved in the unfolding of knowledge. Consciousness lacking in intrepidness loses its bearings once it catches a glimpse of the perpetuity of motion. It would prefer, that here and now something could be given a fixed definition and presented in the form of a ready-made answer; what is true and untrue, the proper and the improper. There are however no final and conclusive answers, they are given formulation in the process of human activity as such, in the apprehension and creation of life, in the unending ascent to higher forms of morality.
Metaphysics merely juxtaposes the truth and the good, science and morality. In fact what is important is their interrelationships, the unity of cognition and praxis, the constant transition of the idea of truth to that of good, of theory into practice and back to theory again, as Lenin pointed out in his Philosophical Notebooks. In these writings we find the relevant extracts from Hegel as well, in particular, that "the Idea of the Good can find its complement only in the Idea of the True".^^1^^ We note that practice is directed to the attainment of the good and is thus connected with the "Idea of the Good'', and that theory, cognition, and science are linked with the "Idea of the True''. It is instructive to compare Lenin's statements concerning the necessity of unifying these elements with Kant's juxtaposition of ``pure'' and ``practical'' reason.
_-_-_~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 38, p. 216.
48The good is primary for the individual. Truth is necessary to him not in and of itself, but as a means of achieving a higher good. But since truth in its objectivity does not depend upon the will of the individual, it is in this sense primary in relation to morality and must be taken as its condition, as an inalienable element of the determining not only methods but also moral ends in themselves. Without truth morality is devoid of foundation.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ IN LIEU OF A CONCLUSIONIn a complete state, moral consciousness, as we know it, is built on three pillars: humanism, responsibility and the scientific approach. Responsibility requires a scientific position but in turn only the latter permits the precision necessary for an understanding of humanism and the responsibilities vested on the human being. Humanism signifies humaneness, a respect for the human personality, the recognition of the principal equality of all humans as self-aware beings with a capacity for creation and self-development and, correspondingly, with a pursuit of freedom. This above all presupposes the recognition of the material needs of the individual; otherwise selfdevelopment and freedom remain empty phrases. From such a general perspective humanism remains an ``abstract'' entity. But it is an essential precondition for a moral attitude towards other humans. However the scientific approach does not allow one to rest content with this point of view alone, but requires further progress in pace with the understanding of the social nature of man and in accord with historical conditions and social contradictions. Thus we arrive at the concrete historical understanding of humanism and of human responsibility. The latter is rooted in the fact that each individual is in one way or another a co-participant in all that which takes place in society, that he is not only a product of circumstances but also an active participant in the creation of these circumstances. Because of his creative abilities the individual is also capable of altering these circumstances.
The humanistic ideal of society is that association, in the words of Marx, in which the free development of each is the precondition of the free development of all. Responsibility summons one to work for such an ideal; the scientific attitude determines the path to travel to reach this ideal and serves as a guide in this journey and struggle.
In the contemporary world this signifies above all the struggle for man, the struggle against a social order in which 49 one's life is fully in the power of others. Vitally important for the success of this struggle are a profound understanding of human needs, of objective processes and the conditions governing further development, and an ability to search out optimal solutions and the ability to predict---in a word, an authentic scientific stance.
A relentless drive to acquire knowledge of the truth concerning society and the self is important for every thinking individual. To be human, and not simply the plaything of circumstances and external power; the subject and not merely the object of life; to be morally responsible rather than a philistine; to make a conscious contribution to the contemporary struggle---creativity, understanding and knowledge are as necessary as the air we breath. Morality requires knowledge of the meaning of human life and activities which runs deeper than that directly provided by the stream of the quotidian. This is only possible nowever with a scientific understanding of social development and of the place of the individual in this process. Only in unification with science and by incorporating the spirit of searching for the truth can morality carry through its mission as the conscious regulator of human activity. Therefore the isolation of morality from science, whatever the terms and regardless of intentions, is in reality the negation of authentic morality.
[50] __ALPHA_LVL2__ G. PospelovContemporary science is becoming an organic part of the life of mankind. By accelerating all societal processes it is forcing people to give more thought to the question of their future in terms of the relationship between the personal and the social.
I find it impossible to refrain from relating a conversation concerning people and science which I became engaged in with a casual acquaintance made during a trip---an ordinary working fellow. Among other things ne said:
``You can't escape from science today any more than you can from fate. It's gotten involved with everything. If you ask me, an ordinary fellow off the street, what I think of science I've got a three word answer: respect, hope, fear. You understand... I'm afraid because I want to keep on living and I feel sorry for people. Now it can be done so scientifically ... one big blast and curtains. To make it worse, you get the feeling that science could make people redundant; it seems to me that we won't have to worry so much about where we're all going to live so much as what we'll have to do with our time. People won't feel they're needed for anything. And then you also tnink, would it really be rosy to live in a scientifically-run society ... that is, it everything were scientific. Do you think people would feel respect when they looked each other in the eye.... I'd feel sort of naked, I tell you''.
It occurred to me then: the time has surely come to an end when one could take up science and pay no attention to the question of the social effects following upon scientific research. I have in mind not only those consequences wrought by 51 technology, biology, medicine and other natural science disciplines, but also those connected with the evolution of human psychology and with the general moral aspects of society.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ MORALITY AS THE SPIRITUALThe formation of the individual as a personality was initiated with the emergence of collectives of thinking beings mutually connected through social labour and through common spiritual interests. This was one of the conditions ensuring the relative stability of the human collectives as distinct from the herd, and further providing for the emergence of a specifically human feature, the need for affirmation as a personality.
The spiritual commonality of humans is a social necessity. Material and social causes are of overriding importance in establishing this necessity. However this unity emerges as a result also of the human striving for cognition of the surrounding world and for confirmation of the supremacy of the human over nature. Thus it may be said that broad and universal human demands contribute to the emergence of spiritual unity. In substance the demonstration of the human propensity for collectivism also lies at the basis of morality.
Concrete forms of morality are determined by the forms of human association and by the level of the social consciousness of the members of a given grouping. Since one and the same person simultaneously belongs to several interlocking yet highly divergent (in terms of the nature of the ties) social groups, each individual is the bearer of an entire complex of moral principles: class, national, religious, to name a few. These principles are sometimes in harmony and sometimes in conflict depending on the circumstances for they are influenced by the vagaries and peripetia of his social existence. Nevertheless, seen as a whole these principles form not a conglomerate, but rather a complex system of interacting moral principles, among which in class society the dominant role is performed by those which are determined by the class status of their bearer. Marxist-Leninist science of society has demonstrated that the moral principles of the ruling class of contemporary society---the working class, offer the most coherent solutions to universal human problems, that communist ethics and morality embody those principles imperative for the harmonious 52 spiritual unity in the future of all individuals on the basis of voluntary service to society, posited as the highest spiritual need of its members.
The universal elements of morality emerged during the early stages of social development---when people became cognizant of the fact that there is a human race and that, independent of the vagaries of individual life, each person remains a member of the human race and is therefore called upon to bear spiritual responsibility for its continued existence. This responsibility before society came to be expressed in terms of individual moral responsibility, for example in the form of responsibility before God---quite fully reflecting, however, earthly relations and human experience.
Science brought the question of the spiritual responsibility of man before the human-species down from heaven to earth. Confirming the objectivity of truth, the equality of all before the truth, and the appeal of scientific truths to all thinking people, science and conviction based upon knowledge became one of the pillars supporting human spiritual unity. Science proclaimed specific moral principles having an all-pervasive nature and universal significance.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ THE ESTABLISHMENT OF MORALITYFrom ancient times the answer to the question "what is truth?" has been sought with the same vital significance given to the quest for the "philosopher's stone" in the realm of alchemy. In the eyes of many this answer was to demonstrate the meaning of human life and point the way to the highest forms of morality.
The very same question "what is truth?" is posed by science, only with a different format, for truth is indeed the primary goal and fundamental result of scientific research and discovery.
An idea, once adopted as a given truth by a collective, thereby becomes an element unifying this group, since through its affirmation individual inclination is given expression as collective opinion. This also occurs when misconceptions receive wide circulation and masquerade as the truth, to be exposed only over the course of time. Thus truth contains, in potentiality, elements of moral principle. In substance this pertains to all truths, including those which determine the 53 actions and judgements made through ideological channels and those whicn are remote from ideological problems. Therefore the struggle for the victory of each given idea advanced as the truth and capable of becoming collective opinion has a definite moral impact. The nature of the latter is conditioned by the type of truth to be affirmed and defended and by the role exerted therein by both faith and doubt.
For science the apprehension of a truth "on faith" does not suffice. Verification and confirmation both in practice and through intersecting theoretical constructions are a sine qua non. Religion does not leave room for doubts to be cast on the truth of its dogma. Science, on the other hand, forces all truths to pass through the prism of doubt. Through doubt it finds reinforcement and locates more correct solutions. This represents the impressive moral fiber of science. It is this strength which appears to be capable of liberating humankind from the fetters of ignorance and of inspiring man to struggle against the gods and the elements, of reinforcing the sense of individual strength in man's consciousness, and of turning his efforts to the service of people.
The uncompromising nature of science distinguishes it from all other spheres of human activity and endows it, in the eyes of many, with a unique capacity for generating authentic truths and force mercilessly exposing falsehoods. By itself this is capable of facilitating the unification of humans around the ideals of science. The collective recognition of the reality of scientific truth is imbued with the collective expectation of the realization of these truths and engenders the conviction that if something is carried out in a scientific manner this indicates that it is being performed correctly.
Not all types of scientific truths are directly correlative with morality. If the moral implications of truths derived from the social sciences are self-evident, the same may not be said of the truths offered by the natural sciences. To cite one instance, what impact in the area of moral relations can be deduced from the assertion that two times two equals four rather than three? However in actual life a knowledge of the multiplication tables does expedite the conclusion of proper decisions and encourage honesty in determination of behaviour.
It is possible to set aside morality in the process of discovering social and natural laws. But to apply these laws and to side-step collisions with moral questions is impossible, for these questions pervade all life situations. Therefore the intrusion of science in whatever form into life has definite moral effects (which will be more direct if the given intrusion is 54 connected with the realization of ideas from the social sciences, and indirect when connected with the realization of those from the natural sciences).
__ALPHA_LVL3__ THE MORAL ASPECTS OF KNOWLEDGEMorality is a social phenonemon. Therefore the moral profile of an individual is determined by a wide spectrum of influences exerted on his spiritual world by various aspects of his activity. In this context an important role is playea by the interrelation of faith and knowledge.
faith is a powerful moral factor capable of engendering in the individual both moral uplift and fanatic barbarity, the two being capable of co-existing in one and the same person without arousing in him a sense of internal contradiction. History is rich with supporting evidence. This may be explained by a variety of reasons, among them by the form of conviction engendered by faith and characterized by the close dependency of judgement upon the internal thought system. The latter may be disjunctive with reality and may contain logical contradiction and absurdities, but since it corresponds to the idea of faith, even a falsehood may be accepted by a believer as the truth.
Knowledge gives birth to a completely different form of conviction. As distinct from faith, knowledge is not internally confined. It may be verified at any given point. A lack of correlation between knowledge and reality leads to the replacement of conviction by doubt. Conviction founded on blind faith sooner or later collapses together with the ethical system based upon it as it collides with reality or with scientific logic. Conviction founded upon true scientific knowledge is reinforced as it encounters reality and is submitted to logical control as knowledge itself expands. This form of conviction contributes to the creation of a sense of harmonious balance between thought and reality. The latter is the basis of an elevated moral spirit and forms a fertile soil for moral perfection as a whole. Does it follow that knowledge is destined to oust faith (in the broader meaning of the word) in the future and that the morality of the future society will be founded solely upon knowledge having no need of faith as such?
First of all we must observe that there are elements of faith in evolving knowledge, for it is impossible (and quite unnecessary) to deduce knowledge from its initial propositions in each case. Without faith in the truth of initial scientific propositions, 55 without a modicum of trust, it would be impossible to make headway. But at the same time, every scientific inquiry contains in one form or another an element of scepticism concerning previously accumulated knowledge. It is through doubt that the scientist moves to new discoveries. In this sense ``heretics'' often form the cutting edge of science. Such is one of the feature contradictions impelling science forward. But it does not exclude faith in the truth of scientific knowledge and in the omnipotence of science, a faith which is one of the motive forces stimulating scientific progress. Such faith is founded upon the fact that the conclusions of science are constantly being tested and confirmed in practice.
The relationship between faitn and knowledge may seem to be a simple one if we analyze the essence of the former without delving into those aspects touching upon its human origins and significance. If we take into account its real human ties, however, this mutual relationship acquires a very complex character. It is sufficient to note that the entirety of the experience gained from the socialist revolution and the building of socialist society have demonstrated that a powerful motive force for man may be found not only in a concrete knowledge of the laws of social development but also in a faith in the verity of the laws discovered by Marxism-Leninism. Such a faith is inseparable from the recognition of the greatness of man and mankind as a whole and an acceptance of the role and possibilities offered by science. It is inseparable from an internal striving for personal verification of these possibilities through participation in the life of society. Just as knowledge, it is the bulwark maintaining an uncompromising high moral standard on the part of man.
However, since acquired knowledge separates the individual from the crowd, it contains the seeds of other possibilities, namely that of the moral impoverishment of the arrogant specialist. The feeling of superiority over one's compatriots sometimes leads to the separation out of the scientific elite into an isolated caste. On the other hand the untrained anarchic mind is capable of employing knowledge to justify a cynical stance towards the world. Like the crazed anatomist who sees in his lover above all an anatomical object, so the cynic begins to see the world in gray, manifesting thereby his limited purview and the poverty of his perception of reality. The number of cynics who, from "scientific position" ridicule everything and everybody is fairly sizeable, especially among those who have acquired specialized analytical tools before assimilating the wisdom gained from life itself.
56The scientific approach to the analysis of any given phenomenon is inevitably a rationalist approach. But rational thought, without which the notion of a specialist is inconceivable, may in psychological terms turn into the baneful habit of adopting a rationalist position to every aspect of life. Such a person oegins to demonstrate a cynical attitude towards nature, towards generally recognized human and cultural values if their application does not coincide with his conceptions concerning rationalism.
Having rapidly multiplied the channels for disseminating information science has today strewn an avalanche of information upon the population. This is a positive good---but only within definite limits. Forcing the brain and nervous system of the individual to work beyond their normal limits, the sea of information becomes a narcotic with detrimental effects upon the psyche and nerves of the individual. Many people today eagerly try to accumulate every conceivable titbit of information, not so much because they are collecting data on a given question but rather because this information has become like alcohol or cigarettes, and acts either as a stimulant or depressant. Having developed the habit of absorbing an enormous volume of printed, audio and visual information, we have begun to carry this habit beyond the limits necessary for education, in a number of cases facilitating the emergence of vicious mores, a certain information mania. In the future, or so some assert, it will be possible to establish direct link-ups to the brain of the human so that educational and other forms of information will be directly ``fed'' to the brain cells, by-passing the organs of sight and hearing. It is not difficult to imagine that these new methods, if employed unwisely, could in fact ``help'' society "blow itself up" through mass schizophrenia.
The most important safeguard against the negative effects wrought by science on the formation of society's moral principles is the maintenance of a high level of culture. It can even be said that to a certain degree science is connected to morality through culture and that high moral standards are achieved through a high cultural level.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ MORALITY AND A CULTURE OF ROBOTSIf we evaluate science independently of the process of verification and of the dissemination of scientific truths among scholars we may catch a glimpse of science in isolation from 57 moral categories proper. This will offer a perspective on science as such, in its `pure'' form and in abstraction from its human origins.
Given such an approach science and morality represent only potentials for activity and in this sense possess a measure of mutual independence. Such mutual independence may be preserved even given activity, but only that which remains within the confines of mental activity. Both scientific analysis and moral evaluation of one's own or of others' activities may be carried on independently of each other, offering the scientist the opportunity of finding gratification or torment in the search for truth, and the moralist the same possibility in his reflections of morals. But even at this point we may observe the outlines of the field upon which science and morality may meet. Testimony in support of this is offered by the life of the scientist, tor whom scientific truth serves as the source of moral tribulations stemming from confrontations with the dogma of faith which arise as he becomes aware of the truth. Another example---the activities of ideologues and of those who apply ``scientific'' barbarism, occupied with the development of scientific methods for mass extermination. Examples of the opposite type may also be cited, when the search for truth exerts an ennobling influence upon the scientist by evoking in him a sense of revulsion towards evil and tyranny in any form.
Emerging from the "intellectual incubator" to the sphere of practical activity science and morality acquire a particular position. Activity turns science into a productive force and the moral elements of consciousness into moral codes. These codes are powerful factors in the spiritual unification of a society.
At the core of the activity which actualizes morality lies human interrelations. Moral factors are demonstrated only through people and have vital import only in terms of human interactions.
At the core of the activity which carries scientific truth into life we may also locate direct human interrelations. This latter, however, is not an indispensable condition. Truth, codified in the corresponding fashion, is also realized in activity without the participation of the living brain. Truth (in the form of information) may be deposited in machines which in a number of instances have successfully replaced thought processes and duplicated the specialized labour of the individual. Scientific truth as such is not necessarily the product of the human mind; it may be the product of the thinking machine" which imitates the subconscious and intuitive mechanisms underlying human 58 thought processes. These inanimate store-houses of knowledge are capable of drawing upon their own ``knowledge'', accumulated in memory banks, in the search for "scientific truths'', and capable as well of borrowing from each other, from accumulated ``knowledge'' and from the solutions founded upon this knowledge. A system of cybernetic computers has already been operationalized in which the units are mutually complementary and provide each other with information and mathematical solutions. Further, robots, proceeding from the ``knowledge'' deposited in them, are capable of producing things, that is to say, of being an active transforming force. Their possibilities in this sphere are quite substantial, and robots will probably be employed by mankind on a wide scale in the future, in particular in research far under the crust of the earth or in the ``colonization'' of planets presenting formidable barriers to human habitation. For this purpose we will create entire complexes of self-programming and selfregulating robots capable of simulating researchers and "workers and of reproducing themselves and the necessary ancillary installations.
Such an instance would seem to bear witness to the fact that science is in principle capable of "tearing away" not only from humans but also from human society and might thus be examined in isolation from these ties. Indeed, let us propose the following chain of events: humans with the aid of science and social labour create robots and then complexes of robots. These complexes with the aid of the information deposited in them and of "social labour" develop new scientific truths and create new productive forces as well as ... organic matter capable of evolution and the transformation over time into thinking beings, discovering scientific truths and producing ... robots.
In this entire chain of suppositions, elaborated not only by science-fiction writers but by scientists as well, there is one detail which bears directly upon the problem of science and morality.
No matter how unlimited the possibilities suggested by robots, they are in fact artificially organized matter which can originally emerge only as a result of the efforts of the living mind and in response to us needs. As far as the living mind is concerned, it emerges spontaneously from either ``inanimate'' or animate---but in no case thinking---matter. This mind is a specific feature of life, its highest manifestation.
Thus truth is manifested in activity in both an unmediated fashion---through human interrelations, and indirectly, 59 through certain devices implementing the connection: man---machine---man. In distinction from the living mind the electronic brain, in carrying out a normal function, may remain free of conflict with living intelligence. On the other hand it may, as a result of the capacities for free activity embedded in its mechanisms, provide recommendations which would have the effect of disunifying, oppressing or intellectually impoverishing human beings---in sum, objectively antihumanistic projects. However, this arbitrary behaviour on the part of a machine would not bear an immoral character, for morality defines only conscious relations between human beings. It is another matter if the "immoral actions" of the machine are pre-programmed by a human individual, that is to say are consciously directed by him. The fact that the executor of these activities is a machine does not divest the individual of moral responsibility for the consequences. Thus emerges the problem of moral responsibility for activities implemented by the tools of technology but governed by human beings.
At first glance the thought is a trivial one. When an automobile under the control of a reckless driver runs over a pedestrian, it is the driver rather than the car's engine who is judged by the laws of the courts and of morality. In a more complex situation, however, when a cybernetic machine exerts pressure on the psyche of the human individual, the question loses its triviality. It turns into the massive and complex problem of the moral principles underlying the progress of civilization.
The reproduction in practice by the machine of certain features of the human being as a unique biological entity has permitted science to open the door to the world of human ``doubles'', capable of immeasurably enriching human life. Drawn into the spinning gyre of new problems by rapid scientific and technological progress, man is no longer in a position to get by without these ``doubles'' not because of laziness but simply because his own biological capacities are limited. Although the ``double'' is but an assistant in complex tasks, an ``appliance'' added to the human intellect, it is capable" of competing in a number of spheres of human activity which are accessible, customary and dear to humans as ``human'' activities.
Having opened the door to human ``doubles'', science has also closed some doors giving access to certain types of production and professions, labelling them objectively unnecessary. These occupations only recently seemed to be 60 permanent features of the landscape and provided work tor many people.
At first glance this would seem to constitute no particular danger since new professions and new opportunities for the application of one's energies are emerging. However, the current developments in science and technology are demonstrating that professional ``obsolescence'' is in fact gaining speed. In turn the prognosis for the augmentation of professions by means of increasingly narrow specialization does not present an optimistic picture. The narrower the specialization the more rapidly obsolescence sets in. Also directly connected with the narrowness of specialization are the possibilities, of substituting a machine for the given specialist and the dwindling distance separating the life span of a given profession and the period of training required to learn it. We observe the beginnings of what may be called the pursuit of disappearing professions. The employee is beginning to experience a feeling of being "perpetually late" for the tram of time. In an antagonistic society we even note the emerging problem of the "superfluous man''. Such a perspective is not merely the play of science-fiction writers but has become the theme of sociological research, a theme offering no easy solutions.
To this stew has been added the spice of reflections on the feasibility of displacing the activities of large segments of the population with robots.
This fare naturally suggests to the unsophisticated mind a rather disturbing question: why after all is such progress on the part of civilization necessary, to whose benefit is it directed?
At this point we observe that people lacking a strong background in scientific philosophy and a firm grip upon reality begin to cast suspicious glances at the promises made by scientists concerning the wonderful long-range prospects for the future and to look uneasily back at the past: wasn't it much better then? We hear the nihilistic utterance being whispered: "Apres moi le deluge."
Of course we have deliberately applied the paint a bit thickly, but, we think you'll agree, the canvas is not entirely remote from reality. Indeed if we were to look more closely at the current of barren nihilism confronting progressive forces in the world today, couldn't we pinpoint as its source not only social causes but also a certain contribution stemming from the negative spinoff of insufficiently thought-out progress in science?
61 __ALPHA_LVL3__ THE FREEDOM AND LIMITATIONS OF SCIENCEThe world of scientific truth is the sphere of free human thought. But, although the thought is paradoxical, the human significance of science, connected with the social aspects derived from the application of scientific results, has a somewhat limiting effect upon this freedom.
Contemporary science possesses enormous potential for moral impact. Its moral authority is so great today that even obscurantists are compelled to assert that they rely upon science and to doctor their fantasies with a scientific profile and presenting these fantasies as the fruits of scientific investigation.
However, an evaluation of the moral authority of science must not overlook that amazing duality of feeling which it evokes among many people who try to give a philosophical assessment of the scientific path and of the consequences of scientific development. This duality was clearly demonstrated when the results of the physicist's, and in our day, the biologist's intrusion into the micro-world, were first made known. These explorations offered to science the keys to doors over which is inscribed the warning: "DANGEROUS TO THE WORLD!''. Even a simple awareness that certain of these keys have been located and that the discovery of others is imminent, provokes widespread pessimism, particularly when the historical stage is cluttered with political adventurists and half-mad fanatics who have also seized these keys in their tenacious grip. Belligerent and ignorant philistines have already drawn up a formula for salvation: get rid of all the physicists, then we can live peacefully!
That scientific achievements may be employed not only for the good of society but for its detriment has been known for a long time. Today, however, it has become especially clear that science can serve not only the well-being of mankind but also to bring about catastrophe. Therefore at no earlier point did the scientist experience such moral responsibility before mankind as he does today; responsibility for the biological, material and moral effects stemming from the results of his searches.
The fact that the massive scientific and technological revolution unfolding before our eyes has encountered human society in a socially-heterogeneous condition adds particular significance to the question of what exactly contemporary science is concerned with and what progress it expects to make in the near future. For us this is, without exaggeration, a question of life and death. It is simultaneously a question of life 62 and death for science, for it touches upon one of the basic principles essential for its development---the freedom of scientific inquiry and of scientific thought. This is the most important moral pre-requisite for the existence of and progress in science. The wheel has come full circle.
The freedom to think is guaranteed by the laws of biology. In this sense the problem of free scientific thought does not exist, for in reality and for the time being at least no one has devised a means of preventing people from thinking, although direct intrusions in the thought processes are in principle possible. But it is one matter to think in general, and another to conduct a scientific inquiry.
Science's drive to find the truth requires freedom of research and the exchange of opinions. In this sense science---in its struggle for the completion of the tasks facing it---is uniformly hostile to limitations advanced both by dogmatists of any given faith (as for example, in the pitiful spectacle of the "monkey trial" when, with the help of the civil courts, an effort was made to condemn Darwinism, to accuse it of offending human dignity) and by vulgar and dogmatic philosophy, as for example when tne theoreticians of the Chinese "cultural revolution" condemned the whole of world culture as useless rubbish. The resistance to limitations of this type represents a fight for a high level of morality, and the position taken by a scientist in this struggle does much to define his moral stance.
The problem of unrestricted scientific thought, however, is not confined to the unhindered search for the truth. The question is much broader and more profound. Freedom of scientific inquiry and of judging the truth is not to be equated in terms of moral content with that of freedom of choice of the aims of research. If we wish to locate the main difficulty, it is to be found precisely in the choice of research goals.
Objects for research are unlimited, whereas research possibilities are restricted. It would be quite impossible to study everything----one must make a choice of goals. Reflection may be centred on any convenient topic. Research demands definite methods and conditions. The less significant the moral and social component in the scientific results achieved and the greater the role played in obtaining these results by "thinking proper" the more there will be in common between the freedom of choosing a research subject and the freedom of inquiry. For the student of pure mathematics the decision to study or not to study a given theorem depends above all on individual choice, on his scientific interest. This however is true 63 only so long as paper and books are the only research tools in demand. When a calculating machine is drawn into his work, the question of the expedience of allocating machine time for the given goal arises. When the solution of a mathematical problem requires a concerted effort by a large number of scientists, when research is inconceivable without the employment of powerful technological facilities, the choice of assignments is no longer dictated by the "free will" of any given mathematician.
The applied sciences present even more restrictions in the choice of subject and research methods. Here individual choice is at times totally excluded and the scientist is forced to subordinate this choice to the dictates of social needs, to conduct research along lines consistent with society's more urgent tasks. This creates certain moral limitations in research and requires that the scholar make his own decision concerning a number of ethical and moral problems connected with the goal-orientation of the scientific inquiry. Some of these are relatively simple, as for example, the posing of tasks connected with certain infringements upon individual scientific interests. Others are more complex and indeed at times tragic. Such problems are most often confronted by people in the field of medicine, but also by physicists and biologists working on projects which might lead to beneficial results for given individuals or for society as a whole ... or to equally baneful effects.
The concern with truth and with the well-being of society defines the moral wellsprings of the scientific inquiry and contributes to the moral authority enjoyed by science and the scientist. The latter is often endowed with this authority for the simple fact he is a member of the scientific community, in the form perhaps of an ``advance'', for it is widely assumed that he will work to advance the welfare of society.
In this connection the scientist is from time to time confronted with a complex question: does he have the moral right to conduct a given scientific inquiry? Such, for example, was the dilemma of many Western physicists when confronted with the task of developing the atom bomb during World War II. Aware of the possible consequences if such a weapon fell into the hands of the fascists, some scientists declined to participate in the elaboration of the corresponding physical problems. Others, on the other hand, took active part in this project, for they sided with the camp fighting fascism. Both the former and the latter were guided by a sense of high moral responsibility for the fate of mankind. Although the bomb, as a result of the moral position taken by scientists, was in fact 64 developed in the countries belonging to the anti-Hitler coalition, it was certainly not applied to this struggle, as it had been assumed. This was the source of a deep moraltragedy for many atomic scientists, in particular for such a humanist as Einstein, who had cast his support in the decisive moment and wielded his authority before the financing organs in the USA to promote the decision to begin work on the atom bomb.
As is well known reactionary forces employed the new forms of weaponry against a peaceful population. The threat of the atom bomb became a permanent political trump among imperialist circles. These circumstances cast a new light on the moral problem of the task carried out by Soviet physicists at this point in history. Their work on the atom bornb led to the consolidation of the defence capacity of the socialist countries, which forced proponents of a new war to clip their wings. Thus in the given instance work on the development of a threatening type of weapon had a humanitarian goal, for it contributed to the cause of peace on earth.
[65] __NUMERIC_LVL1__ II __ALPHA_LVL1__ [Properly Theoretical Aspects: philosophical, socio-historical and ethical.] __ALPHA_LVL2__ [introduction.]The second section is concerned with the properly theoretical aspects of the problem: philosophical, socio-historical and ethical. The authors include: Doctor of History V. T. Loginov, Doctor of Philosophy, O. G. Drobnitsky, Candidates of Philosophy, A. S. Arsenyev and E. Y. Solovyev. They endeavour to clarify the complex dialectic of the interrelationships between the true and the good, between science and morality in society and history, as well as the class and epistemological nature of the contradictions arising in these interrelationships.
[66] ~ [67] __ALPHA_LVL2__ V. LoginovThe emergence and formation of authentically scientific policies is connected with the appearance of Marxism on the historical arena. The awareness of the laws of social development for the first time created the preconditions for utilizing these laws for the achievement of specific goals, for prognoses and for the regulation of socio-economic processes. Marxism was the first scientific doctrine to become the property of the masses and the ideological weapon in the struggle to transform the world.
The entire span of history is connected with the struggle of the working people against their oppressors. This struggle gave birth to profound social and moral feelings, a striving for freedom and justice. The goals of the struggle in each instance reflected real social requirements, but bore a predominantly negative character, for they expressed the moral indignation of the people with unjust social relations. Negation of the old was a way of expressing a striving for something different, something the direct opposite of that which existed in reality.
The dreams of a just society, although they were associated with notions of freedom, equality, and brotherhood nevertheless remained unclear and undefined. The diffuse nature of such notions comes quite rapidly to surface, as one form of exploitation and inequality is simply replaced by another. Even the most glittering revolutionary victories of the past by no means led to the full liberation of man. It proved impossible to embody the moral ideals of these fighters against the old world in a new social order---for economics turned a deaf ear and dictated its own conditions. If an ideal did not coincide with these conditions, then sooner or later the illusory nature of the ideal was made clear and disillusionment set in. Once again the contradiction between moral ideal and reality was enacted.
68Marxism was the first to introduce human goal-directed activity stemming from a scientific awareness of the objective long term prospects for the development of society. Engels observed that Marx had approached the analysis of the capitalist social order in a scientific manner. He wrote:" According to the laws of bourgeois economics, the greatest part of the product does not belong to the workers who have produced it. If we now say: that is unjust, that ought not to be so, then that has nothing immediately to do with economics. We are merely saying that this economic fact is in contradiction to our sense of morality. Marx, therefore, never based his communist demands upon this, but upon the inevitable collapse of the capitalist mode of production which is daily taking place before our eyes to an ever greater degree; he says only that surplus value consists of unpaid labour, which is a simple fact.''~^^1^^
Marxist science decisively rejects moral judgements which cannot be determined to have their foundation in necessity. Even the yearning to serve noble causes cannot determine or correct the results achieved by science.
In 1884 Engels wrote to Paul Lafargue: "Marx would protest against the economic, 'political and social ideal' which you attribute to him. When one is a 'man of science', one does not have an ideal; one works out scientific results, and when one is a party man to boot, one fights to put them in practice. But when one has an ideal, one cannot be a man of science, for one starts out with preconceptions.''~^^2^^
Lenin also firmly opposed the replacement of the scientific analysis of social life by moralistic critique and the substitution of trie subjectively desired for the objectively real. "Marx treated the question of communism,'' he wrote, "in the same way as a naturalist would treat the question of the development of, say, a new biological variety, once he knew that it had originated in such and such a way and was changing in such and such a definite direction.''~^^3^^ In other words Marxists study the birth of a new society from the old as well as its transitional forms, etc., precisely as an inevitable natural historical process conforming to laws.
In this manner the ideal of a just society was brought down from the world of dreams and anchored to the ground. The _-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, The Poverty of Philosophy, Moscow, 1973, p. 9.
^^2^^ Frederick Engels, Paul and Laura Lafargue, Correspondence, Vol. 1,
Mosccow, lyas, p. ijj.
^^3^^ V. 1. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 25, p. 458.
69 dream acquired a socio-economic foundation as well as real perspectives. This ideal, further, did not lose its moral excellence, since the analysis of the laws of social development demonstrated that in the process of this development there is created the objective possibility of such a society in which authentic equality and justice, peace and happiness will reign supreme. Having defined the moral ideal as a concrete goal Marxist science added to it a truly purposeful nature.Marxist scientific analysis helped give a correct moral assessment to a number of highly complex social phenomena. To cite one example: in 1914, one of the most outstanding Russian Marxists, G. V. Plekhanov, shaken by the barbarity of the German army, which had turned Belgium into ruins, tried to give an evaluation of the World War from the point of view of simple laws of morality and justice. In this context Plekhanov justified the "natural right to defence" proceeding from a statement of which nation may be considered the ``aggressor'' and which the "defending side''. This position led G. V. Plekhanov to the conclusion that Russia which at that time had suffered a number of major defeats and from the military point of view was a defensive country, was no longer an imperialist plunderer and hence was conducting a just war. A mistaken initial premise made Plekhanov in this question the confederate of chauvinists and social-patriots, that is to say, it placed him in the camp of those against whom he fought throughout his life.
Lenin provided a Marxist evaluation of the war, thereby laying the foundations of the doctrine of the two types of war---the just and the unjust. Although in the very definition of types of wars there is contained a moral assessment Lenin did not proceed from "simple laws of morality" and was not guided by moral and ethical categories. Lenin's moral feelings were also offended by the bloody carnage. He wrote: "Socialists have always condemned wars between nations as barbarous and brutal.''~^^1^^ But the object of his research did not become those horrors which are the inevitable accompaniment of war in general. Lenin analysed the causes for and trie nature of war---as an historian and economist, viz., a scholar.
He defined the wars unleashed by the imperialists and directed at the re-division of the world and spheres of influence as unjust. Such wars are profoundly inimical to the interests of working people as a whole and to the class struggle _-_-_
^^1^^ Ibid., Vol. 21, p. 299.
70 of the proletariat for socialism in particular. Quite another matter is civil war as well as war for social and national liberation. These wars are not only historically inexorable, but also profoundly just. In the final result such wars lead to the liquidation of war as a whole.Thus Marxist scientific analysis provided the opportunity of classifying wars, of determining their origins, class nature, feasible tendencies as well as effects. The stance toward and moral evaluation of wars as just and unjust were for Lenin founded upon objective scientific data.
Marxist science determines the policies for the revolutionary party of the working class as well as the strategy and tactics for its struggle. The victory of the Great October Socialist Revolution crowning an entire era of battles for the liberation of the working peoples, represented the triumph of MarxistLeninist theory. Having liquidated private ownership of the basic means of production and turned them into the property of the entire people as a whole, the Soviet Republic became the first country to introduce on a state level scienific planning and management over social and economic transformations.
Soon after the October Revolution, in April 1918, Lenin wrote an article entitled "Draft Plan of Scientific and Technical Work'', In this article the task was set before the Academy of Sciences of drawing up in the shortest possible interval a plan for the economic growth of Russia. The necessity of conducting a series of scientific investigations was also mentioned in the article. Inviting the most outstanding scholars to the task of the drawing up of an economic plan, many of whom it was impossible to classify as even ``sympathizing'' with Soviet power, Lenin tried to involve them in the working out of the higher sphere of communist policies, for these policies are "the most concentrated expression of economics".^^1^^ Further, the first long-range plan for socio-economic transformation in the history of mankind, namely the State Plan tor the Electrification of Russia, was also worked out with the participation of major scholars and specialists and embodied in concrete tasks the general Marxist proposition concerning the planned creation of the material basis for socialism. Lenin called this plan the second Party programme.
The Soviet Republic, said Lenin, stands in need of plans of broad scope drawn up by science. They are necessary "in a visual, popular form, for the masses, so as to carry them _-_-_
^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 32, p. 32.
71 forward with a clear and vivid perspective (entirely scientific at its foundations)....''~^^1^^In the experience of the building of socialism and communism in the USSR the purposeful nature of historical creativity has emerged in such an unambiguous manner that for the first time it is possible to speak of the conscious creation of a new socio-economic formation. History has confirmed the effectiveness of Marxist policies, which rely upon scientific knowledge.
The bourgeoisie has also attempted to rely upon the social sciences. We are not concerned here simply with a change in the "system of phrases" employed by bourgeois political figures who have replaced the old words and slogans with terms and notions in scientific guise which were once the exclusive property of a narrow circle of specialists. Capitalism, it is observed in the Report of the Central Committee of the CPSU to the 24th Congress of the CPSU, "...is trying to adapt itself to the new situation in the world.... Hence, the bourgeoisie's striving to use more camouflaged forms of exploitation and oppression of the working people, and its readiness now and again to agree to partial reforms in order to keep the masses under its ideological and political control as far as possible.''~^^2^^ But on the basis of imprecise initial data no more or less fruitful policies can be devised. If in the contemporary world advanced economic life is impossible without the employment of the latest achievements of natural sciences, for the same reason contemporary bourgeois policies long ago began to avail themselves of the services of the social sciences.
Why has this been possible? Let us try to delve into the matter.
In our everyday language we are accustomed to use the expression "science requires''. In point of fact the scientific truth attained by the scholar carries no intrinsic requirements. People set their own demands before science, it only speaks to the possibility and necessary conditions for the fulfilment of these demands. In this sense the results achieved by science can no more be categorized as moral or immoral than can be necessity itself. To speak in the given instance of the morality or immorality of this or that objective scientific conclusion is just as irrelevant as it would be, on the basis of any given law of _-_-_
^^1^^ Ibid., Vol. 35, p. 435.
^^2^^ 24th Congress of the CPSU, p. 20.
72 physics, to render a judgement on the immorality of nature itself.The chemist's conclusions concerning the inevitability of an explosion given the combination of certain substances can neither be classified as moral or immoral. The same may be said of Marx's discovery of the laws underlying recessions and crises in the capitalist economy, although these crises do bring hunger and unemployment to working people.
The effect of gas upon the human organism is a scientific problem, not a concoction of "evil people ' who have designed gas warfare. The problem was posed by life itself from that point in time when men began to descend into mines and work in chemical enterprises. The conclusions reached by scientists from their work upon this problem establish only conformities. These findings can be employed equally for working out security measures in these very same mines or for the construction of gas chambers.
The objective conclusions arrived at by the social sciences likewise merely place before man the problem of choices. Marx, for example, gave theoretical foundation to the assertion that the victory of socialism and the collapse of capitalism conform to historical laws. He demonstrated that this victory will be achieved as a result of the class struggle waged by the proletariat against the bourgeoisie, whose resistance is just as inevitable. Can it be considered that this conclusion provided some sort of ``universal'' maxim? Of course not. It placed man squarely before the problem---to struggle on the side of the working class for socialism or together with the bourgeoisie for the prolongation of capitalism. Such a formulation of the question is by no means scholastic, even given a knowledge of the final result of this struggle. For a moral assessment and corresponding choice of position will depend not upon knowledge itself, but rather upon the class approach to the problem.
The independence of the scientist from society and from the dominant views held by that society is extremely relative. He lives and works precisely in this society and is bound to it by thousands of visible and invisible strings. In this context the position of the social scientist is complicated by the fact that he as distinct from the naturalist is incapable of setting himself at a remove from the object under investigation.
The object of study for the social sciences is human society. Its laws of development are objective. Therefore in the analysis of a given process or processes, representatives of the humanities, holding a variety of class positions, cannot each 73 attain "his own'', identically objective (and thereby mutually exclusive) truths. Despite the existence of bourgeois and proletarian philosophy or political economy, history or ethics, the objective truths for each concrete problem number not two, three, or a multitude, but one. And objective, viz., authentic conclusions from science are of equal value for all.
At the same time any new truth attained by the social sciences in an antagonistic society will always find a hostile reception from someone or another. There have never been problems in these sciences which in one manner or another did not touch upon the interests of definite classes, social strata or groups.
In problems touching upon the ``foundations'' of society the striving for a stability of views often reflected nothing other than the striving of the ruling classes to stabilize their position. The attempt to overturn these views unfailingly brought the scientist into conflict with those for whom precisely the given views were an underlying condition of their comfortable existence. Therefore those who saw the imperfections of the existing social order and propagated the necessity of radical changes were accused of immorality by the supporters of the power structure and sent to prison or the gallows.
But alongside those, whom the search for truth led to the gallows, there were others as well. We have in mind those for whom the dominant social relations became not an object of scientific research but the subject of bombastic apologetics. Such thinkers, as a rule, were given recognition and provided with an abundance of material benefits.
But no matter how strenuous the efforts of bourgeois ideologues to present an ideal picture of capitalism, no matter how much they speak of a "new era" in its history, the laws of social development delineated by Marxist-Leninist science operate independently of these judgements. Not only bourgeois political figures but also scholars are to an ever greater degree forced to take this fact into consideration.
Without denying the existence of certain contradictions characteristic of the capitalist mode of production and observed by Marx, many of these figures (witness, for example, John Maynard Keynes) view their mission as follows: utilizing a knowledge of the mechanism of these contradictions they are to try to deform, and facelift them, to ward off a deepening of these contradictions and fend off the effects. The spread of Keynesian economic policy in the developed capitalist countries and the penetration of bourgeois theoretical economic 74 thought into the practical day by day policy of ``regulation'' has become an established fact.
Clear testimony of the fact that the opponents of Marxism relate seriously to certain objective conformities of the class and national-liberation struggle is offered by the bourgeois policies of social manoeuvring and the system of neocolonialism created in accordance with new ``scientific'' recipes. In both instances an understanding of certain aspects of the objective process is utilized only in the attempt to impede it, to channel it in a different course. But one way or another, the ruling elite in the capitalist countries is compelled to resort to the services of the social sciences.
Thus perhaps the ancient dream of the philosophers has come to fruition: scholars have begun to be drawn to the task of administering society. Indeed, each significant political act carried out in the developed capitalist countries today is as a rule preceded by a stretch of research and study of corresponding problems. In preparation for the moment of decision concerning a given problem the conclusions of experts and leading theoreticians as well as the opinion of specialized institutes and research centres are assembled.
But from under the professorial cloak we more and more frequently catch a glimpse of the bureaucrat's briefcase. The apparent independence of our scholar turns out to be just as illusory as the independence of the bureaucrat. The `` freedom'' of the scholar who has been caught up in the bourgeois machinery of state consists in the fact mat he may think as he wishes. This is his personal affair. But any attempt to bring his deeds in line with his convictions is cut short.
In this manner under capitalism the result turns out to be the direct opposite of the dreams entertained by the greatest minds of the past. It is not scholars who make power the tool of science. Rather it is power which makes science and the scientists themselves its instrument: from the scientists the authorities demand the means, but do not permit them to participate in the working out of ends---the goal-setting decisions are taken without them.
When the bourgeois scientist suggests variants toward a solution of this or that timely problem all his variants may stem from only one "rule of the game" lying outside the framework of science itself, viz., a solution on the basis of the existing capitalist order. It is evident that "scientific policies" of this hue have no authentic social perspectives. They are not capable of eliminating any of the contradictions of capitalism since these contradictions bear an objective character and are 75 inherent in capitalism. "...Adaptation to the new conditions,'' states the Report of the Central Committee of the CPSU to the 24th Congress of the CPSU, "does not mean that capitalism has been stabilized as a system. The general crisis of capitalism has continued to deepen.''~^^1^^
Thus in the social sciences truthfulness and fruitfulness are directly conditioned by "party spirit'', that is to say, by the given class with which a scholar or branch of social research implicates its fate. The objective long-range prospects for social development, in brief, socialism, and a scientific understanding of social processes are feasible only from a socialist point of view, i.e., from the class position of the proletariat.
The proletariat has no need of political speculations. It is interested in receiving from science only the truth. Speaking of the working class as the only class capable of attaching social force to an idea, Jean-Leon Jaures called it the true intellectual class, for it never needs resort to lies. Serving the class struggle of the proletariat is not detrimental to science, it does not infringe upon its interests: more than this, science can serve this cause only as long as it does not swerve from the search for the truth.
For precisely this reason Marx once wrote: "When a man seeks to accommodate science to a viewpoint which is derived not from science itself (however erroneous it may be) but from outside, from alien, external interests, then I call him `base'.''^^2^^ In reference to the analysis of political and social phenomena Lenin always demanded resolutely that we "...face the truth squarely. In politics that is always the best and the only correct attitude".^^3^^
__ALPHA_LVL3__ POLITICS AND CERTAINHowever it is not only the principally distinctive character of its own scientific underpinnings that distinguishes Marxist from bourgeois and all other ``scientific'' policies. Those who assume that the sole criteria of any scientific policy are the criteria and categories of science as such (rationality, _-_-_
^^1^^ 24th Congress of the CPSU, p. 20.
^^2^^ K. Marx, Theories of Surplus-Value, Part II, p. 119.
^^3^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected. Works, Vol. 20, p. 275.
76 expediency and effective results) often recall Engels' words: "...for me as a revolutionary all means serving the end are suitable, both the most violent and those which seem the most moderate.'' In this context the introduction to his phrase is for some reason dropped. It reads: "Passing by the question of morality---about this we are not here concerned, and I therefore leave it to the side....''~^^1^^ But, moving from theoretical scientific analysis to social practice, Marxist policies never are distracted from questions of morality, never leave these questions to the side. Marxist policies are organically connected to the ideals of humanism and social well-being.Marx's humanism does not proceed from the metaphysical essence of man. It is above all connected with the scientific discovery of the historic mission of the working class. Uncovering the objective content of proletarian demands, Marxists have established that the working class is incapable of freeing itself without simultaneously freeing all oppressed peoples and society as a whole. In other words it represents the class which is striving to implement the social and moral ideals, a striving stemming from its objective historical situation.
As Lenin wrote, communist morality is closely bound to the interests of the class struggle of the proletariat and serves to elevate human society to a higher level.
The moral thrust of Marxist policies is given definition by its ultimate goal. Communism represents the pinnacle of humanism for precisely communist society will create the most adequate conditions for human nature. It is precisely communism that guarantees the fullest and freest development of the personality and of the human faculties, which, according to Marx, represents an end in itself.
History teaches that politics is that sphere of human relations in which not only general principles and final ends are important. Of great import also are the precise means and methods by which day to day political practice is carried out.
In this connection particular significance is attached to the question of the stance taken to the object of the investigations conducted by the social sciences and to the object of scientific policies---the masses, their interests, historical initiative and creativity. This question has decisive importance for the moral foundation of politics as well.
Politics, from the time it began to rely upon the social sciences, acquired certain of the characteristics of a scientific _-_-_
^^1^^ K. Marx, F. Engels, Werke, Bd. 37, S. 327.
77 experiment. If we understand by experiment (literally: proof, trial) not only as the method of studying phenomena, but also as the mode of influence exerted by an individual over an object, a mode of practical mastery over reality, then scientific politics may be considered in a certain sense as a distinctive social experiment. In any case, like the experiment of the naturalist, politics in one way or another relying upon science, has become an effective means of verifying proposed ideas.Incidentally, although there are a number of features approximating the social experiment with that of the natural scientist, the differences between them are also evident. The experiment conducted by the naturalist takes place as a rule in simulated conditions, and not for the satisfaction of the practical needs of mankind but rather with a scientific end in mind---the investigation of an object. The social experiment takes place in ``natural'' conditions and, as a rule, pursues specifically a practical goal. The experiment conducted by the naturalist represents a distinctive practical abstraction. Abstraction in the social experiment (particularly abstraction from the basic object---man) is extremely dangerous.
The direct tie with politics and social practice places special requirements upon the social sciences. The study of social conditions encounters moral problems throughout the entire conceptual and investigative process---from the choice of object to the attitude of the scholar to the results achieved. For the natural scientist some discoveries bring social changes in their wake---and others fail to (at least for the time being). For the social scientist it is "human destinies" which represent the subject matter of science. The conclusions of the social sciences are in one way or another projected and applied to human relations. This is why a causal explanation of social phenomena does not replace moral evaluation and does not eliminate moral responsibility. In addition, people must not only know and understand the meaning of a social experiment, but must also have the opportunity of intruding upon its passage.
In the contemporary world any given policy is implemented in the final result through the participation of the bulk of the people. But while Marxists regard the people to be the moving force of history, the bearer, voice and creator of the historical process, bourgeois political figures see in them only an object of manipulation. Trying to utilize the people for their own selfish aims, they quite willingly resort to the use of social mimicry by trying to present themselves as the ``voice'' of the "people's interests" and at the same time as the "brain of the 78 nation'', whose mission is to do the thinking for and to manage society. The participation of the people in the political actions of the bourgeois state (we are speaking here of forms as widely divergent as election and wars) is today often the result of their "scientifically founded" ideological softening up. From the tribune of the Second All-Russia Congress of Soviets Lenin stated: "...it is time to cast aside all bourgeois cant when speaking of the strength of the people. According to the bourgeois conception, there is strength when the people go blindly to the slaughter in obedience to the imperialist governments. The bourgeoisie admit a state to be strong only when it can, by the power of the government apparatus, hurl the people wherever the bourgeois rulers want them hurled. Our idea of strength is different. Our idea is that a state is strong when the people are politically conscious. It is strong when the people know everything, can form an opinion of everything and do everything consciously.''~^^1^^
The view holding that political management of society is the sphere of activity of only a limited group of professional politicians, that is, handing functions of government to a narrow circle of ``competent'' figures---appeared long before the time when the bourgeoisie began to maVe utterances about ``scientific'' policies. In 1917, when the Bolsheviks demanded the transfer of power to the hands of the working people, bourgeois ideologues opposing the Bolsheviks referred to the inability of the masses to conduct conscious political activities. The immense complexity of management and of social ties in contemporary conditions is utilized by bourgeois ideologues to provide a foundation for the same conclusion concerning the incompetence of the masses" in the sphere of politics. Such an understanding of "scientific policies" Lenin labelled as an extremely detrimental superstition.
From the recognition of the people as the driving force of history, as the subject of the historical process, for the Marxist it also follows that not only science as such, but the masses themselves as well are capable of expressing the needs of social development.
Marxist policies are designed to encompass the experience provided by history---the collective experience of mankind. But "collective experience" is reflected not only by science but also by the so-called ordinary consciousness. ``Unreasonable'', ``irrational'' or ``sentimental'' demands from the people can _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 26, p. 256.
79 from time to time embody certain essential aspects of reality, which find no reflection in scientific and logical schemes. An important component part of collective experience is that time-honoured experience gained by the struggle of the working people and accumulated in the consciousness of the leading revolutionary class.The necessity of struggling for their own life interests, viz., for a change of the existing social order is experienced and formulated by the broad masses as the necessity of struggling for justice. It would seem that such an understanding of the goal has very little in common with scientific policies which base their decisions upon sober objective analysis of concrete socio-economic circumstances. However, working people's conceptions of justice stem by no means from an abstract "ahistorical justice" but from the fully concrete and real conditions in which they live. For broad sections of the population, wrote Lenin, justice "...is not an empty phrase, but a most acute, most burning and immense question of death from starvation, of a crust of bread".^^1^^
The moral consciousness of the people apprehends in the given reality even the most remote signals of forthcoming historical change. Engels wrote: "If the moral consciousness of the mass declares an economic fact to be unjust, as it has done in the case of slavery or serf labour, that is a proof that the fact itself has been outlived, that other economic facts have made their appearance, owing to which the former has become unbearable and untenable.''^^2^^
Marxism discloses the objective content of proletarian demands and establishes that trie striving of the working class to the realization of its vital interests, driving to the heart of the matter, signifies in fact the striving to eliminate the historical injustice of capitalism. In this manner a Marxist party does not foist upon the proletariat specific normative conceptions of ``happiness'' or desired goals imposed extrinsically "from science''. It establishes the objective necessity, in other words, ``legality'' (conformity to laws) from the viewpoint of scientific substantiation of the strivings and hopes of the proletariat itself and of all working peoples, who in fact make up the majority of mankind.
Among Russian Social Democrats there were those who at one time also assumed that one may take into account the _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 26, p. 129.
^^2^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, The Poverty of Philosophy, p. 9.
80 requirements of the masses only by conducting agitation, but by no means through drawing up a serious scientific programme for the party. During the discussion of the Party Programme at the Second Congress of the RSDLP (1903) one figure proposed the question: "Is the programme a direct conclusion from our basic notions of the economic evolution of Russia, the scientific forecasting of the possible and inevitable result of a political transformation.... Or is our programme a practical agitational slogan...?" In answer Lenin replied: "I must say that I do not understand the distinction.... If our programme did not meet the first condition, it would be incorrect and we could not accept it.''~^^1^^For the Marxist in fact "the contradiction between ... two alternatives is only a seeming one; it cannot exist in fact, because a correct theoretical decision guarantees enduring success in agitation".^^2^^
While presenting a critique of the Bolshevik agrarian programme (which envisaged the transfer of gentry land to the peasantry) certain opponents of Lenin asserted that he and his supporters were being misled by peasant superstitions, were retreating from Marxism and were adopting an ``ethical'' viewpoint, since they allegedly wanted to become concerned with the rectification of an historical injustice rather than proceed from real conditions in the countryside. In their opinion the transfer of genry land into the hands of the small-scale producer with his backward techniques and crop systems would result in a decline in agricultural production.
Objecting to the position of his opponents, Lenin recalled Marxs words to the effect that the peasant is the bearer not only of superstitions, but also of reason. The peasant demand for the return of the land which the gentry has taken from him is perceived by the peasant as a struggle for justice. In this demand we may locate a fully concrete content. "Hence it is not a ghost we are fighting, but a real evil,"^^3^^ Lenin said.
As far as the struggle for justice is concerned one must proceed from the concrete content of the injustice. This content differs. "There are such,'' Lenin wrote, "which, as it were, keep aloof from the mainstream of history, do not check that stream or hinder its course, and do not prevent the proletarian class struggle from extending and from striking _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 6, p. 492.
~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 492--93.
^^3^^ Ibid., p. 494.
81 deeper roots.''~^^1^^ There are other examples of historical injustice of the kind which directly hinders social development and the class struggle. In relation to injustice of the first type no party will refrain from its duty of protesting and lambasting the ruling classes for it. Still more important is the struggle for the abolition of injustice of the second type, for the refusal to rectify, when possible, such injustice would signify "defending the knout on the ground that it is a historical knout''.Thus, in supporting certain peasant demands Lenin proceeded from the acknowledgement of the fact that in these demands were expressed the requirements of social development. "...We do not make any plaint over a historical injustice the motivation of our demand,'' Lenin wrote, "but rather the need to abolish the remnants of the serf-owning system and to clear the road for the class struggle in the countryside, i.e., a very `practical' and very pressing need for the proletariat.''~^^2^^
Marxist scientific policies are always a concentrated expression of the fundamental interests of the people as well as the realisation of their strivings and just demands. In this sense, speaking of the policies of Soviet power in October 1917 Lenin emphasised that this was riot a Bolshevik policy, not a ``party'' policy, it was the policy of the workers, soldiers and peasants, that is, the majority of the people.
In a revolutionary era millions of people, at an earlier point politically somnambulent, vegetating in the torments of need and despair and divested of faith in the fact that they as people have the right to life, that the entire weight of the centralized state might in fact serve them, are now awakened to conscious political activity. This awakening flows over into the revolutionary creativity of the people. "...The revolutionary initiative of the masses,'' wrote Lenin, "it is the awakening of the conscience, the mind, the courage of the oppressed classes; in other words, it is a rung in the ladder leading up to the socialist proletarian revolution.''~^^3^^
Lenin mocked those political figures who drew their wisdom only from scholarly tracts and textbooks. He said that "...the minds of tens of millions of those who are doing things create something infinitely loftier than the greatest genius can foresee".^^4^^ Further, the task of the policies of a proletarian _-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibid., pp. 134--35.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 135.
^^3^^ Ibid., Vol. 24, p. 318.
^^4^^ Ibid., Vol. 26, p. 474.
82 party and proletarian state as a whole consists in attracting the broadest sectors of the population into direct participation in the management of the state. The striking feature of Marxist policies, directly connected with its overall humanist orientations, consists in the fact that these policies are not only conducted in the name of and for the people but are also implemented by their conscious and creative activities.It was just this mass revolutionary initiative which created a new form of statehood---Soviets, implementing the dictatorship of the revolutionary people and principally distinct from dictatorship over the people. "We see the meaning and content of socialist democracy,"said Leonid Brezhnev at the 24th Congress of the CPSU, "in the increasingly broader participation of the masses in the administration of state and social affairs... This sort of democracy is vital to us and it is an indispensable condition for the development and consolidation of socialist social relations.''~^^1^^
According to Lenin politics is that sphere of human relations which is concerned not with individuals but with the millions. But this has never signified a disdainful attitude to the role and interests of the isolated individual. Marxism proceeds from the unity of interests between society and the individual, defining man not as an ``historical'', ``isolated'' individual but instead as the individual in society. Communist social relations by no means presuppose a faceless and gray crowd, but rather an association of personalities, where the free development of each truly becomes the condition of the free development of all. In particular, in reference to politics, this signifies that the subject of the historical process is not only the broad masses of the people as a whole, but each individual citizen as well.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ THE HUMANISM OF REVOLUTIONBourgeois ideologues often upbraid Marxists for relying exclusively upon force and armed coercion in working out the strategy and tactics of the proletarian struggle.
To be sure the founders of Marxism often repeated the idea that violence is the "midwife of history''. However in giving formulation to this thought they by no means expressed their personal inclination to violence. They were merely stating an objective law of the development of society at that stage at _-_-_
^^1^^ 24th Congress of the CPSU, p. 99.
83 which the exploitation of man by man is preserved, a stage which they called the ``pre-history'' of mankind.In 1914 in connection with the view then current that war would ``hasten'' revolution, a journalist asked Lenin the question: did he hope for a military conflict in Europe? Lenin answered: "No, I do not want it ... I am doing, and will continue to do all that is in my power to oppose mobilization and war. I do not want millions of proletarians to be forced to kill one another, paying for the insanity of capitalism. There can be no misunderstanding concerning this. Objectively to foresee war and to endeavour in the event of this calamity to make the best use of it, is one matter. To want war and to work for it, is something quite different.''~^^1^^
From the very first steps taken to create the Soviet state the worker-peasant government proclaimed the slogan of peace. It did everything then---and continues to do now---everything in its power to liquidate war and ward off military conflicts."Our policy has always combined firm rebuffs to aggression with the constructive line of settling pressing international problems and maintaining normal, and, wherever the situation allows, good, relations with states belonging to the other social system.''~^^2^^
For the same reason Marxists not only do not reject the peaceful path to socialism but even consider it the preferable alternative. "Insurrection would be madness,'' wrote Marx, "where peaceful agitation would more swiftly and surely do the work.''^^3^^ Lenin, too, considered that the working class would prefer to take power peacefully. He emphasized that the proletariat "...would grasp with both hands the slightest reformist possibility of effecting any change for the better.''~^^4^^
But in history the circumstances have often arisen in which the alternative in fact boiled down not to a choice between peaceful or non-peaceful means of struggle, but to a situation in which any change for the better could only be accomplished by the method of revolutionary, armed violence. We are not concerned with turning either one of these paths into an absolute, but rather with the precise analysis or the situation and in deriving the methods and forms of struggle from this analysis.
_-_-_^^1^^ V. I. Lenin. A Biography, Moscow, 1970, p. 226 (in Russian).
^^2^^ 24th Congress of the CPSU, p. 29.
^^3^^ Woodhull and Claflin's Weekly, Aug. 12, 1871, p. 12.
^^4^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 19, p. 327.
84Speaking in opposition to those who tried to accelerate or export revolution, Lenin wrote that "... a revolution cannot be `made', that revolutions develop from objectively (i.e., independently of the will of parties and classes) mature crises and turns in history''.^^1^^
Analyzing the lessons of history Lenin established that at the moment of maturation of revolutionary crises the question of violence arises as an alternative---either violence will DC applied by reactionary classes against the people or the revolutionary masses will take the initiative in their hands.
Just so in 1917 in Russia a concrete historical situation unfolded in which the people of the country faced a dilemma---either the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie and the prolongation of internecine imperialist warfare, daily snuffing out thousands of human lives, or the dictatorship of the proletariat, the first working people's state in the world and a revolutionary withdrawal from the war. Such were the objective possibilities for choice.
Of course, even in this situation the peaceful path of revolutionary development would have been painless and preferable. Lenin wrote: "In my opinion, the Bolsheviks, who are partisans of world revolution and revolutionary methods, may and should consent to this compromise only for the sake of the revolution's peaceful development---an opportunity that is extremely rare in history and extremely valuable, an opportunity that only occurs once in a while.''^^2^^ But when peaceful channels were exhausted, when the bourgeoisie itself put "the bayonet on the agenda" peaceful illusions came to signify betrayal of the revolution.
Communists ideally stand in opposition to any form of coercion. Unlike petty-bourgeois extremists who even today endeavour to turn armed violence into a universal skeleton key opening every door, Marxists regard it merely as a temporary and extraordinary measure, nor do they `` romanticize'' violence, tor they understand the limited nature of its functions. In a tense moment in the Civil War while drawing up an official instruction for the employees of the Cheka (All-Russian Extraordinary Commission) concerning the procedures for conducting search and arrest operations F. Dzerzhinsky wrote that the intrusion of armed men into a private apartment and the deprivation of the liberty of the _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 21, p. 240.
~^^2^^ Ibid., Vol. 25, pp. 306--07.
85 guilty is an evil to which it is necessary to resort in order to ensure the triumph of justice and gooa. But it must never be forgotten that this is evil, that our task is to utilize this evil to root out the necessity of resorting to these means in the future. There has never been and there could not be similar instruction in any bourgeois punitive organ in existence.``Coercion,'' wrote Lenin, "is effective against those who want to restore their rule. But at this stage the significance of force ends, and after that only influence and example are effective.''~^^1^^ This idea of Lenin's explains specifically why in carrying out their policies among the masses Marxists employ as a basic method not coercion but precisely influence, persuasion, example.
The question of the humanist orientation of politics would be much simpler if the demands of the masses always coincided in full with the decisions dictated by a scientific analysis of the situation. However, history has more than once created the situation in which the people as a result, for example, of insufficient consciousness (to name but one reason) advanced demands differing from the science-based Marxist programme.
Such, in particular, were the demands for "egalitarian land-tenure" contained in peasant decrees and included in October 1917 in the famous Decree on Land. The peasants themselves considered that such a solution to the agrarian question was the final embodiment of justice although it was completely clear that small landholding could not prevent inter-peasant or class differentiation and poverty. Openly criticizing the Utopian nature of such views, Lenin further said: "As a democratic government, we cannot ignore the decision of the masses of the people, even though we may disagree with it. In the fire of experience, applying the decree in practice, and carrying it out locally, the peasants will themselves realize where the truth lies.''^^2^^
The corresponding explanatory and educational work and, in the main, the experience of the masses themselves would help to overcome the contradictions which had arisen between scientific and most expedient (from the point of view of the interests of the peasants themselves and of the fight for socialism) resolution of the agrarian problem and the demands of the peasants.
_-_-_^^1^^ Ibid., Vol. 31, p. 457.
^^2^^ Ibid., Vol. 26, p. 260.
86Marxists have often encountered analogous situations in the resolution of the nationalities question. During the First World War which sharply intensified this question there arose among those who considered themselves Marxists a heated discussion around the slogan, advanced by Lenin, on the right of nations to self-determination.
Lenin at the same time provided a theoretical foundation for the superiority of a large centralized state over a number of small states.
Many of Lenin's opponents saw a contradiction in this. They believed that since a large state would create more propitious conditions for the development of the economy and the class struggle, the slogan of self-determination could subvert the trust of the proletariat in the scientific foundation for the Party programme for this slogan, which rests upon notions such as the "will and sympathies of the population" is "an historically unjustified sentimentality" and marked by an "illusory character''.
In point of fact Lenin did attach overriding importance to ``sentimentality'', the ``sympathy'' of the population. The reluctance to take account or the "will of the people" in such questions has nothing in common with Marxism or Marxist policies and in fact represents nothing other than " imperialistic economism''.
But what is to be done with a truly science-based conclusion concerning the advantages of a large centralized state? How can this be coordinated with party policy? In each given instance, Lenin replied to this, the question of the expediency of secession is decided upon the basis of the interests of both social development as a whole and of the class struggle of the proletariat for socialism. If secession is inexpedient, then, not denying the right of nations to self-determination, and offering the given nation the right to secession, Marxists reserve the rignt to carry on agitation against secession and to convince the masses of its inexpediency.
If the people are not successfully persuaded of the justice of the policies being carried out it is impossible to win their conscious participation in the social movement. In this instance the masses coula even function as a negative force dragging great ideas into the mud if their conceptions of the ideal and of justice do not coincide with these ideas.
For the Marxist government is possible only through the masses themselves, that is to say---oy bringing mass conceptions concerning goals in line with the approaches leading to these goals.
87A classic example of such a solution is represented by Lenin's definition of the paths and forms of the transition from an economy of smallholding peasant farms to large-scale socialist agricultural production. If we abstract the problem from the object itself---the peasantry with its consciousness and particular conceptions of desirable goals, then such paths and forms are numerous. But Lenin ``chooses'' precisely cooperation to make the transition to a new order---through the simplest, easiest and most accessible path for the peasantry.
More than two thousand years ago Aristotle called man a political animal. For the first time in the history of man Marxist policies set as their direct goal the creation of conditions under which each individual may truly become a political being. The authentic democratism of Marxist scientific policies as well as their orientation toward the interests of man and mankind make up the moral foundation and justification of these policies.
[88] __ALPHA_LVL2__ E. SolovyovThe question "what does science give to man?" is likely to draw the response: "It arms him with knowledge and with new means for mastery over the world, at the same time augmenting his confidence in his own powers.'' This assertion would seem to be incontrovertible but, as is the case with any elementary truth, it expresses the substance of the matter in a crude and therefore inadequate manner.
Science's influence over man is two-fold. Before presenting him with the true facts it mows down rows of fictive conceptions which for a long time paraded as true knowledge. Before bringing to life new means of practical mastery over the world, it mercilessly discredits instruments maintaining a fictive influence over reality, the reliability of which for a given period of time provoked no doubts. Science crushes false and naive confidence while it often itself is in no position to offer an immediate substitute marked by the same stability, breadth and subjective certainty. A discussion of the relationship between science and morality should begin, in our opinion, with the establishment of just this fact.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ SCIENCE AS THE DESTROYERAlmost every student of antiquity notes with surprise that in the so-called ``pre-scientific'' era man did not feel that he was surrounded by an unknown, problematic world. On the contrary, the further we retrace our steps in history the more 89 demonstrative is our view of imaginary omniscience. Such diverse both in methods and points of departure scholars of primitive society as Heinrich Schurtz, Edward Burnett Tylor and Lucien Levy-Bruhl have stood in accord in their recognition of the amazing "epistemological conceit" of the ancient peoples.
The aborigine "knows all": there is no question which could throw him into a state of doubt or lead him to an impasse. The surrounding world may seem hostile, insidious and replete with evil intent to him, but it does not exist for him in the category of an unknown. The primitive often fears that which in reality should be no cause for alarm (and in this sense his reaction to the world is irrational) but he is a stranger to fear before the unknown. Faith in the fact that the world as well as one's personal fate are already known and that one need only find-a means of acquiring this knowledge---this faith forms an essential aspect of superstition (the occult world view). In systematic form a faith in the existence of a pre-established universal knowledge forms a necessary component of any developed religious perception of the world.
Science by no means emerges in the atmosphere of a deeply felt dearth of knowledge. Quite the opposite, it everywhere intrudes into the domain of previously evolved certainties, comforting semblances and artificially smoothed-out contradictions.
Science brings not knowledge as such but logically and empirically established knowledge which at any given point encompasses a rather narrow cluster of phenomena. The volume of the explanations which it provides falls far short of the volume of pseudo-explanations which it refutes. This situation describes both the emergence of science proper, and of each major discovery. A solid scientific achievement may be compared with a small but durable building surrounded by the ruins of the "speculative city'', by fragments of "make-shift thoughts" of various types (naive confidence and false hopes) within the framework of which one could feel oneself quite comfortable.
The correlation of scientific knowledge and imaginary omniscience is well expressed by the conception which regards any fundamental theoretical proposition as a type of interdiction imposed upon certain practical expectations (such as the establishment of a new area of unresolved tasks). The basic laws of science, both natural and social, may almost always be translated into the negative norms, demonstrating what it is impossible to do and what activities merit no hope of success.
90Classical mechanics imposed a veto on a broad area of practical dreams (for example, on the hope of creating a perpetual motion machine). Chemistry forced man to withdraw his optimistic hopes from experiments in alchemy. The scientific theory of society placed an interdiction on Utopian blueprints for the overnight reconstruction of the existing social organization.
The development of science is in this respect a sobering-up process for the human mind, involving the discovery of an ever mounting number of facts pointing to the objective resistance of the surrounding world, of more and more regions of the inaccessible at the present state of knowledge and practice.
To be sure scientific research is providing man with instruments for practical dominance over certain spheres of reality. But this mastery is obtained at the price of disillusionment with former instruments of direct and instant influence over the wider reality in any meaningful sphere, instruments which were consecrated by the occult world view, religion and social utopianism.
The interrelation between that which science gives and that which it takes away may be clearly imagined with the aid of the following parable.
A certain merchant, let us say, has one thousand coins which he assumes to be made of gold. One day a wanderer, the "legendary guest'', experienced and generous, arrives at the home of the merchant. The wanderer is able, first, to distinguish authentic gold coins from counterfeit, and secondly, to produce artificial gold.
Having looked over the merchant's wealth the wanderer informs him that of the thousand coins only five are in fact true gold, the remainder one counterfeit. Being not only experienced but also of generous cast of mind the wanderer produces and presents as a gift to the merchant yet another five authentic gold coins (he is not capable of more).
Did the real wealth of the merchant increase? Undoubtedly. To be exact, it doubled. Previously the merchant was in possession of only five authentic gold coins, now he has ten. But it is also certain that previously the merchant felt himself to be 100 times richer. The wanderer who has twice rendered a good deed to the merchant (once when he informed him that his wealth was unreal, and the other time, when he increased the real holdings of the merchant by five gold coins) has also impoverished him, for the fictive wealth of the merchant had 91 in his mind been completely real. It gave him a consciousness of his own strength and power, and allowed him to embark upon risky undertakings, to be persistent in his claims, etc. Thus, despite its fictive nature, the wealth could have been the source of quite real accomplishments in life.
The merchant has every justification for bringing suit against the wanderer: "I believed that I had one thousand gold coins---you took this faith from me; take back your gift and return the confidence which helped me live!" To this the wanderer will be forced to answer: "I don't know how to do it. I still don't know how to produce gold fast enough to replace in full your counterfeit coins with real ones, and I am not able to transform your lost illusions to their prior state.''
The scale of the dispelled illusions always greatly exceeds that of the certainties and real possibilities offered by science at a given moment. Moreover the "wrecking operations" carried on by science against existing pre-scientific knowledge vary directly with the significance of the creative and constructive contribution made by science to human conceptions of the world. To understand this dependence more precisely we must take into account the fact that there is no pre-established correspondence between those problems, concerns, and hopes standing at the forefront of the quotidian (that is, of priority for the quotidian consciousness) and those problems which are first to be resolved by science (i.e. which come to the forefront through the immanent logic determining the development of scientific knowledge). For many a century the highest human priority has been to obtain nourishment with no great exertion. From this has stemmed the eternal hope for cheap (free) bread which found its parallel in religious vows, expressed in the legend of the "manna from heaven" and the "feeding of the five thousand''. However human society even today is far from possessing the scientific means to enact the radical restructuring of the food chain which would be required to bring about an abrupt cheapening of the costs of foodstuffs. The history of science begins not with the question of bread but with that of mechanisms and engines---with the foundation of technological civilization.
It is conceivable that people would relinquish all of the numerous accomplishments of this civilization in exchange for "three miracles": a preparation to cure or ward off all diseases; an enterprise synthesizing food products out of non-organic substances, and a teaching method guaranteeing the full development of the natural abilities and inclinations of the 92 child. But it is precisely these hopes, nearest to the human heart, which are for science the most remote and difficult to fulfil.
Scientific research inexorably comes up with answers to vital practical questions. However, it has not come up with answers to those questions connected with the basic needs of individual existence and to the fictive satisfaction of which pre-scientific techniques of "influencing reality" (incantations, prayers, etc.) were directed.
But there exists a sphere in which the ``discord'' between science and the ordinary consciousness is even more marked (strictly speaking, absolute). This is the field of individual vital decisions and choices. From generation to generation millions of humans are confronted, each time in the unique individual context of daily experience, with questions of the following type: "Will I die of this disease or will I survive?'', "Is it worth marrying this woman?'', "Should I bring this case to court?'', etc. To these questions (and at given points in one's life they consume all or the individual's energies and are elevated by him to philosophically significant alternatives) scientific research will never be in a position to provide the answers. The reason for this does not lie in the unique content underlying each of these questions. For science the universal form of these questions is unacceptable, a form derived from an occult and religious world view; to be precise: "What is my fate?" and "Is it worth me taking the risk...?''
In the first instance it is automatically assumed that the path followed by an individual in life may in some fashion be determined independently of his freely-made decisions. The second gives expression to the hope that the consequences of a decision yet to be made (or, perhaps, to be rejected) may be conjured up "before one's eyes" as a deed completed. Science has no right to answer a question in which this assumption and hope are perhaps indirectly incorporated. Science not only cannot, but categorically refuses to satisfy the need for prophecy, a need which over the centuries has been met by fortunetellers, soothsayers, astrologers and interpreters of dreams. Science leaves empty the spot for this fictive knowledge which helped man escape from his own freedom.
Thus, science, no matter how paradoxical it may seem, renders life difficult precisely for the judicious and prudent individual, for it confronts him with the indeterminateness of concrete situations and voices the demand that he make his decisions freely and autonomously without waiting for the help of earthly---or ethereal---promptings.
93Thus science brings man not only new knowledge and opportunities but also his first awareness of the limited boundaries of his knowledge, a recognition of the fact that there exist objectively impossible events, tasks allowing of no resolution in practice, and indeterminate life situations.
This by no means indicates, however, that the recognition of ignorance immediately becomes the property of the many.
The ordinary consciousness spreads its roots in the soil of pre-scientific experience; its general structure evolved in an era when man regarded himself as a being under the protection of a celestial force, for which there existed no insurmountable tasks and no unforeseen events. From the consciousness of this state of wardship, corresponding to definite socio-historical conditions, emerged the habit of phrasing questions in a form which calls for an instruction, prediction, or warning (in a word ready-made knowledge, provided as if through revelation).
This habit outlives faith as such in the supernatural and persists in people's minds long after they have ceased seriously treating religious mythology, miracle workers, soothsayers and diviners. The demand for miracles and prophecy is now foisted on science itself. Similar expectations (in type of knowledge) which once were placed upon mystics, astrologers and practitioners of black magic are now pinned on science. We refer to hopes for "making the unbelievable seem possible'', for comforting predictions, recommendations which would remove the danger of personal choice and so on. The extrapolation to scientific research of the epistemological expectations which evolved within the occult and religious world view, forms the basis for the ideology of scientism (faith in science as man's shepherd).
Spontaneously evolving scientistic mass consciousness finds support in maximalist conceptions advanced by the philosophy of science and sometimes by scientists themselves---in theoretical scientism.
Born in the womb of Enlightenment ideology and elaborated in the positivism of Comte, T. H. Huxley, Lester Frank Ward and other contemporary Western philosophers, theoretical scientism conceives of science as the propelling force of progress, as a new demiurge, whose tools social organization and its members are gradually becoming. It is supposed that considerations of prudence will sooner or later lead every individual to an understanding of the fact that questions unsupported by theoretical instruction do not merit investigation, that any problem not submitting to the competence of 94 science must be considered a pseudo-problem. Only once humans have escaped the confines of the inevitable subjectivity of their personal concerns, fears, and expectations will that state of epistemological saintliness and blessedness have been attained, in which every question may find a ready scientific answer and in which every enterprise is planned on the basis of estimations of its success.
It is not difficult to observe that the programme of theoretical scientism and the expectations of spontaneous scientism stand in sharp contradiction, on the one hand, and are surprisingly harmonious on the other. The spontaneous scientistic demand of the individual consists in an expectation that science take him under its aegis as religion once did. His position is that of he who lacks self-confidence and wallows in deep subjective fears and concerns. The theoretical scientism, on the contrary, asks of the individual that he adopt it as the monk does religion. It will answer only those questions posed by a novice. But spontaneous and theoretical scientisms agree on the central point. They each recognize that science must be the shepherd, and people---the flock; both assume that an individual problem becomes a problem only when there is hope of solving it with the help of available knowledge; both would like human choice and decision-making to lean unwaveringly upon reliable cognitive guarantees.
The false unity of science and the ordinary consciousness within the framework of scientistic ideology can be ruptured only if science rejects messianism and if the ordinary consciousness accept the cognitive situation, which scientific research really encounters. The latter presupposes the readiness of the individual to act upon his fears, to take risks, to move decisively even when the circumstances are unclear, when in the external world there lack signposts to determine the essential value orientations.
How can a person develop such a readiness?
Man has the ability to "avoid stumbling into behaviorial indeterminateness in the face of cognitive indeterminateness'', because as an individual he has an internal gyroscope, so to speak, the axes of which retain a constant direction regardless of alterations in the external conceptual context of life. These axes are the moral consciousness, lasting internal convictions tempered in the severest trials through history. Science free of scientistic superstitions presupposes the presence in the individual of this consciousness and, what is more, makes an appeal to it.
95 __ALPHA_LVL3__ THE KANTIAN FORMULATIONThe fact that science is the destroyer of fictive omniscience (that scientific knowledge simultaneously is the pitiless awareness of the limits of cognitive authenticities), and that a condition for preserving this intellectual honesty is the moral independence of those to whom science addresses itself---was profoundly understood in the philosophy of Immanuel Kant. Having no intention of tackling the task of writing an historical-philosophical work on Kant, we do consider it possible to attempt conscious improvization, the general direction of which we would like to clarify from the outset.
It has often been mentioned in Marxist philosophical literature that the teachings of Kant are interesting in terms of their internal contradictions. Many of the latter were consistently and honestly recognized by Kant himself. But in the summary formulations of his works, the issues were sometimes presented in such a way that it appeared as if the proposed and tautly drawn alternatives of human thought concerned not Kant himself but an alien, objectively chosen subject. In the attempt to free the Kantian analysis of this imposed `` aloofness'', we have resorted to a certain dramatization of Kantian concepts. The use of situational methods toward this end does not, we believe, do violence to Kantian thought, for the latter itself inclines toward situational and historical clarifications and illustrations.
Kant often called his teachings "authentic enlightenment''. Its accent (separating it from "naive enlightenment'') was placed on the effort not only to free man from the power of traditional superstitions, but also to purge him of superstitious reliance on the strength of theoretical reason, of faith in the ability of reason to resolve any problem emerging in the context of human life. Above all Kant demanded that "theoretical reason" (reason as it is realized in science) itself gave no stimulus to the emergence of this reliance and faith.
The Kantian teaching on the limits of theoretical reason (as distinct from the superficially sceptical agnosticism of David Hume) was directed not against the investigative boldness of the scientist but against his unfounded pretensions to prophecy and to govern individuals' personal decisions. The question of the limits of true knowledge for Kant was not only a methodological but also an ethical problem (the problem of 96 ``discipline of the reason" to restrain science and the scientific community from a scientistic conceit).
``That natural dispositions and talents...'' wrote Kant in his The Critique of Pure Reason, "require in many respects the corrective influence of discipline, everyone will readily grant. But it may well appear strange, that reason, whose proper duty it is to prescribe rules of discipline to all the other powers of the mind, should itself require this corrective. It has, in fact, hitherto escaped this humiliation, only because, in presence of its magnificent pretensions and high position, no one could readily suspect it to be capable of substituting fancies for conceptions, and words for things.''~^^1^^
Kant considered as a typical form of such a game the attempt to ``scientifically'' construct various types of general regulative principles which could minister the human being up his fundamental life-choices. Kant opposed the basic form of scientism in his time, the scientific foundation of the idea of the existence of God and the idea of the immortality of the soul (to which not only theologians devoted their energies). The Critique of Pure Reason exposed the fact that these substantiations did not meet the requirements for theoretical verification, that honestly pursued, they led to a higher manifestation of indeterminateness---to antinomies and metaphysical alternatives.
Kant (and this was not totally unfounded) began to be accused of standing in opposition to the spiritual guidance of mankind. It was argued that his critical philosophy (and this was totally unfounded) leaves the individual face to face with unresolvable doubts and in so doing brings him to the border of despair. A few years later Kant in The Critique of Practical Reason demonstrated that the developed personality stands in need only of knowledge, but not of knowledge's protection, for in terms of ``goal'' and ``meaning'' the personality already possesses an internal reference point---"me moral law within us''.
Providing a foundation for individual moral independence, Kant decisively rejected the vulgar postulate that human behaviour is unavoidably based on ``expedience'' (`` practicality''). In the works of Kant the notion of ``practicality'' has a distinctive meaning differing strongly from that' usually imparted to the words ``practice'' and ``practicalness''. By _-_-_
~^^1^^ The Critique of Pure Reason (Great Books of the Western World, 42). Encyclopaedia hritannica. 1952, p. 211.
97 ``practical activity" Kant understood not "productive activity" marked by an orientation towards a given expedient result, but simply an action, that is to say, any event stemming from human decision and intent. This action is a manifestation of human activity which is not necessarily connected with a certain ``positive'' material completion (such as the erection of a building, the derivation of a new formula, the writing of a book). "Practical activity" in the Kantian sense can also consist in the rejection of practical activity in the ordinary sense (in the refusal to build a house of a certain type or the refusal to write a book with a prescribed content). The individual acts when he declines to carry out any given activity, when he maintains a distance. Examples of such self-disengagement sometimes merit no less praise than do models of the most inspired creativity and most zealous labour. Individuals earn praise not only for the products of their hands and mind, but also for the determination with which they refused to participate in an unworthy undertaking, refused even when this undertaking promised to be entertaining and tempted with a wealth of creative tasks.Many things, Kant loved to repeat, are capable of arousing surprise and admiration, but authentic respect is only evoked by the individual whose sense of what is proper remains constant, in other words, he for whom there exists the impossible: who does not undertake that which must not be done and chooses himself for that which must not be left undone.
Denial and personal fortitude may also be present in practical activity in the usual sense of the phrase. Creative activity often includes them in the form of self-limitation for the good of a consciously chosen calling. However the final material product of creation frequently conceals from us the fact that it was the result of a human action, of a personal choice signifying the rejection of an alternative and internal deprivation or external prohibition. What meets the eye in this product is the play of capabilities, effort, endurance, etc. The facts surrounding the rejection of an action demonstrate more clearly the structure of the action than does the simple action itself.
Kant from the start defined the uniqueness of the second Critique as the fact that in it "practical activity" is categorically and uncompromizingly contrasted to prudently-calculating activity (that which is oriented toward success, happiness, survival, empirical expediency, etc.) and illustrated precisely by examples of rejected unworthy causes. Correspondingly the intellectual capability upon which "pure practical activity" 98 relies turns out to be radically different from those intellectual tools employed by the "pragmatic worker''. If the latter relies upon "theoretical reason" as a means for calculating expediency or success, then the subject of "practical activity" proceeds from indications of reason, demonstrating the impossibility of specific decisions and the events stemming from them.
From this follows the important conclusion that structure of a truly human deed is independent of the cognitive faculty of the individual. The individual would remain true to his obligation (to the consciousness of the unconditional impossibility of carrying out---or not---specific actions) even if he could know nothing in general about the objective long-range prospects bearing upon his life situation.
Beyond the domain of indeterminateness and multiple alternatives to which The Critique of Pure Reason led, unfolded the domain of clarity and simplicity---the self-sufficient world of personal conviction. "Critical philosophy" demanded the recognition of the limitations of human knowledge (it is limited to scientifically verified knowledge), in order to make room for a purely moral orientation, for trust in unconditional moral axioms.
Kant himself, however, formulated the basic content of his philosophy somewhat differently. "I must, therefore, abolish knowledge,'' he wrote, "to make room for belief.''~^^1^^
In our opinion, this oft-repeated aphorism from the second foreword to The Critique of Pure Reason is an example of laconic but inadequate philosophical self-accounting. In the first place Kant had in reality no intent of "eliminating knowledge''. In the second place, ne would have been much more faithful to the objective content of his own teachings if he had spoken not about faith but rather of moral conviction, of the recognition of responsibility and the necessity of moral decision.
Why did not Kant do just this? May we call accidental the circumstance that in the summary formulation of the essence of "critical philosophy" which has acquired the significance of a signature of Kantianism, the notion of faith replaced that of morality?
__ALPHA_LVL3__ FAITH AND MORALITYIn Kantian doctrine there is no place for a faith replacing knowledge, filling in the knowledge gaps in a system of human orientation; in this sense Kant is an opponent of fideism. He _-_-_
~^^1^^ The Critique of Pure Reason, p. 10.
99 subjects to criticism all forms of faith derived from the need to reduce the indeterminateness of the surrounding world and to eliminate the sensation of uncertainty from human life. In so doing Kant---wittingly or unwittingly---entered into conflict with theology (both his contemporary and future) as well as with non-religious forms of blind faith.It goes without saying that Kant was a deeply religious thinker who took an uncompromizing stance toward atheism. At the same time it must be recognized without reservation that he was one of the critics and dismantlers of the religious world view. Kant demolished religion not as an opponent but as a serious and honest adherent, who had declared that religious consciousness was incapable of meeting moral demands and who had presented a passionate defence of a God, faith in whom would not have limited human freedom nor divested the individual of human dignity.
Kant draws attention to the fact that faith, as it was revealed in the overwhelming majority of instances in history---in superstitions, in religious (confessional) movements, in blind obedience to prophets and leaders---is an irrational variant of prudence. The internal conviction of the fideist under closer examination always turns out to be void of internal independence, faith in revelation (in that someone somewhere possesses or possessed reason superseding the actual capabilities of reason). The faith of the fanatic, the holy fool or the authoritarian is excluded by both The Critique of Pure Reason and The Critique of Practical Reason: by the first because faith places its hopes in the "superior reason" of certain chosen representatives of the human race (the attempt to find in the experience of others that which in general cannot be given in experience); by the second because it provides the individual with the opportunity of fleeing from a categorical moral decision. Nevertheless Kant retained the category of ``faith'' in his doctrine and tried to establish a new, specifically philosophical meaning of the term, distinct, on the one hand, from me theological and on the other, from the social psychological. Kant wrote that underlying his three major works were three fundamental questions: "What am I capable of knowing?" (The Critique of Pure Reason), "What must I do?" (The Critique of Practical Reason), "On what do I dare to place my hopes?" (Religion Within the Bounds of Mere Reason). The third question outlines precisely the problem of faith as it was posed in Kant's philosophy. Kant would have acted consistently if he had excluded the category of ``faith'' entirely from his doctrine and replaced it with the notion of ``hope''.
100 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1975/SAM277/20080323/199.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2008.03.24) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ top __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+The latter differs from faith in that it is never an internal inspiration preceding an action or determining a choice. When hope becomes a source of practical decisions it is either expectation or blind confidence, illegitimately replacing thoroughly relative knowledge. Hopes are forgivable to the extent that we are speaking of comforting factors, but as forces summoning forth an action they call for a wary and critical attitude.
The three fundamental questions, with the help of which Kant subdivided the content of his philosophy bear a binding (irreversible) sequence. A necessary precondition of conscious orientation in the world is not only an honest formulation of each of these questions, but also the order in which they are posed. The problem "What must I do?" can be correctly dealt with only once we have found a convincing answer to the question "What can I know?'', for without an understanding of the limitations of true knowledge it is impossible to evaluate the independent significance of an imperative or of an absolute moral choice. A still more serious mistake (what we might call a "misdemeanor in orientation'') would be the transformation of the answer to the question "What may I hope?" into a condition prior to the resolution of the problem "What ought I to do?'', in other words to preface faith with duty.
This is the decisive point in the Kantian (philosophical) understanding of faith. The object of faith (be it God or let us say, meaning in history) cannot be an object of calculation, a reference point to which the individual may in advance adjust the thrust of his actions. In practice the individual is wholly obliged to rely upon that consciousness of the moral law which exists in him. Faith as a condition of individual choice spoils the purity of the moral motive---Kant insisted on this categorically; if faith has a right to existence then only in the capacity of comforting mood for the individual after he has taken his decision at his own risk and responsibility.
The demand for authentic faith arises, according to Kant, not at the moment of choice but after it has been made; then the question is posed: is there a chance for success (for confirmation in the future) for that maxim of behaviour which had been followed unflinchingly, that is to say, without consideration of success.
The postulates of religion (faith in the existence of God and the immortality of the soul) are necessary to the Kantian subject not to become moral (they can only hinder this process) but in order to be aware of oneself as morally effective.
101Kant himself felt that this distinction is hard to draw in a psychological sense. Faith in the existence of God and in the immortality of the soul, since they are inseparable from the sense of divine omnipotence traverse the boundaries set for them by pure practical postulation. Instead of being consoled by faith (that is to say, to use faith only as hope) the individual unwittingly transforms it into the basis for his decisions: he begins to feel himself a soldier in a holy army, the ecumenical success of which is guaranteed by providence; he is transformed into a religious ascetic, blindly believing in the inevitable favourable outcome of the struggle between good and evil, etc.
Kant's evaluation of the religious hopes of the just man is an ambiguous one. It is difficult to establish whether he considered these hopes mandatory or only forgivable for the individual with moral standards; whether he saw in these aspirations the source of moral tenacity or, on the other hand, a moral crutch on which people are forced to lean because of their weakness. This ambiguity stands in obvious contrast to the categorical nature of Kant's denial of the supremacy of faith in terms of moral decision. Religion is founded upon morals rather than morals upon religion.
The philosophy of Kant brings into focus a remarkable fact: the prudent (calculating) individual and the individual confessing faith in divine revelation, are, in substance, one and the same subject. Wisdom is transformed into superstition wherever it experiences a deficit of knowledge. It is precisely these circumstances that expose the inability of the prudent ( calculating) individual to endure his own freedom and show his irresoluteness and self-abasement which since ancient times have provided the natural soil for "divine religion''.
The essence of Kantian philosophy of religion may be expressed in the following brief formula: God smiles upon human moral independence; he is disgusted by any demonstration of timidity, humility or cajolery. Correspondingly the true believer is only he who has no fear before God, who never slights his own dignity before Him, nor passes on his own moral decisions to God.
Whether Kant so desired or not, this idea served to corrode existing religion like an acid. It confronted the believer with a crucial question which had faintly shimmered through many heresies in the past: To whom after all, am I addressing myself when I am seized by fear, when I hesitate, search for instruction, beg, fawn, bargain? To whom have millions of people turned in entreaty, expressed in wails of impotence?
102If God frowns upon spiritual weakness, timidity and humility (exactly the state typical of people who believe that they are in communion with Him), then is this all to the liking of the "prince of darkness" as well? If this be so then (as Luther once presented the question to the Catholic Church) is not the city of the devil a temple in which each evinces a state of fear, shame and fawning?
Kant himself never formulated the alternative in such bold relief. However, he did speak sufficiently precisely to the fact that all known forms of religion (including Christianity) are forms of idolatry to that extent to which they allow of human abasement, cajolery, an indulgent understanding of divine mercy, comforting lies, faith in miracles and ritual sacrifices.
Kant placed religion and theology in opposition to the most profound contradictions of the religious consciousness. In so doing he set not only religion and theology, but also himself (as a religious thinker) before problems which yielded no solution. The central question troubling the religious conscience of Kant may be phrased as follows: Is not a belief in God a temptation along the road to individual moral independence?
Indeed, as an all-powerful being, God could not but tempt the believer into a search for His grace.
As an omniscient being God leads astray, encourages prayers in search of advice or guidance when the individual is in fact obliged to make his decision freely when confronted with indeterminacy.
As the permanent creator of the world He leaves the believer hope in the miraculous transformation of any set of circumstances.
The highest manifestation of moral strength is the stoic courage of the individual facing a situation he recognizes to be hopeless (``to struggle without hope for a successful outcome''). But the believer finds this position quite inaccessible, for he cannot avoid hoping that God is capable of allowing even that which is unbelievable---to happen. Belief removes the opportunity of rigorous behaviour and internal purity of motivation, a possibility placed directly before the non-believer.
As mentioned above, the philosophical notion of faith, according to Kant, differs from a vulgar faith in divine revelation as hope differs from blind confidence and expectation. But God, no matter how He is depicted in a variety of religious and theological systems always has such a power over the future that one cannot just hope in Him. He dooms one to elevated expectations, to a providential optimism, in the 103 atmosphere of which authentic morality is incapable of development or even existence.
Kant considered selflessness to be the essential feature of moral activity. But for selflessness to come to light, somewhere in the course of events the situation must arise in which a wager on the profitability and success of a venture is rendered problematic and even impossible for the participants.
One of the basic contradictions of Kant's philosophy may be located in the quite clear acknowledgement of the genetic tie between selflessness and the devaluation of self-interest in critical situations---juxtaposed to the assumption that morals could only emerge from and within religion (the question of the origins of ethics for Kant was identical to that of the development of Christianity from Judaism).
But morality could not ripen within religion precisely because religion masks the desperate nature of critical situations, and guards its adherents from confrontation with the ``vacuum'', with the "world without a future''. Providing insurance from despair, it also insures against a crisis of prudence.
With all its contradictions the moral conception advanced by Kant stripped to its basis stands in closest accord with the ethics of stoicism. At first glance this may seem strange. Indeed, what could be the source of a stoicist attitude at the end of the eighteenth century, in an epoch of expectations and hopes, of pre-revolutionary animation and faith in the triumph of reason?
The basic works of Kant in which his moral doctrine is stated (The Critique of Practical Reason and Religion Within the Bounds of Mere Reason) appeared in 1788 and 1793, respectively. Between these temporal signposts we find the French Revolution.
Kant's ethical teachings are suffused with an awareness of the tragedy of the revolution, a sensation emerging first as a premonition and then as bitter recognition of the events both taking place and completed. At the same time Kantian philosophy is not only quite removed from the pessimism which was rampant after the Jacobin terror and the days of Thermidor among those who were inspired by the hopes of the Enlightenment. It was in fact quite inimical to this pessimism. The authentic pathos of the Kantian ethic is that of the stoic personal fidelity to the Enlightenment ideals, a fidelity holding firm even as the tide of history turned to discredit these ideals. It was not the ideas of personal independence, of justice and of the dignity of the individual as such which fell into disrepute 104 but rather the hope of building a society founded upon these ideas.
After the collapse of the revolution it was possible to retain one's fidelity to the Enlightenment ideals only through a decisive rejection of the utopianism and the naive faith in progress with which these ideals were merged in the currents of the eighteenth century. It was precisely this point that determined Kant's stance to the philosophical message of the Enlightenment. Kant endeavoured to demonstrate that as a revelation of reason as such these ideals are indisputable; their dictates are unalterable and mandatory for any reasoning being and cannot be erased by any social experience or by the ``lessons'' of history. Kant also took a decisive stance in opposition to the historicist spirit of Enlightenment ideology, against its characteristic faith in the imminent triumph of Reason. He opposed the depiction of the ideal state of society in terms of a hidden "human nature" which was ``destined'' to prevail over the form of community not compatible with this nature. He objected to the depiction of individual obligations in terms of "reasonable demands" and of his moral needs in terms of "authentic interests''. The list could be extended.
But the Kantian critique of historicism was from the beginning weakened by his providentialist conception that the human community in the extremely remote future (or, most likely, beyond the confines of earthly history) would achieve, with the aid of the creator, a state of "moral Weltordnung''.
Liberal Kantianism in the second half of the nineteenth century tried to ascribe to Kantian ethics an " uncompromizingly secular character'', regarding as of paramount importance precisely that element which was the most closely connected with his religious pattern of thought---the expectation of the kingdom of justice at the close of history. Kant's ethics began to DC called a conception of "an infinitely distant social ideal'', placing its hopes on the temporal infinity of human existence. The ``scientific'' and ``secular'' interpretation of the Kantian moral doctrine turned out to be, in other words, a scientific and secular reinterpretation of the postulate of the immortality of the soul.
It seems to us that quite the opposite formulation in Kant's philosophy is of primary importance, namely, the striving (granted not carried to its conclusion) to differentiate the obligatory (that which is unconditionally binding for the individual) and that which is bound to take place in the future (a specific dimension of being).
105In this sense the understanding of moral action exclusively as activity in the name of the future (self-limitation in the present moment solely for gain in the long range, injustice today in the name of justice in the future, the flouting of personal dignity in the interests of the future, at which point it will be respected) is, from the point of view of Kant, morality within the framework of calculation and profit. He sought an ethical conception which would reduce to a common denominator both the cynical bourgeois pragmatism which stands remote from any internal orientation upon ideals and, secondly, historicist fanaticism. This twofold critical-polemical thrust explains the uniqueness of the Kantian moral doctrine, which links anti-historicist stoical fidelity to the unconditional with an anti-bourgeois pathos of selflessness and the idea of fidelity to the law with that of the spiritual autonomy of the individual.
Here, in our view, lies the key to an understanding of the scheme of universal history inserted by Kant in the works The Idea for a Universal History, The Conjectural Beginning of Human History and a number of lesser articles. The motivation for the working out of this scheme was the philosopher's hostility to the two characteristic manifestations of incipient bourgeois society: to the more and more cynically revealed selflessness, on the one hand, to the juridical arbitrariness which emerges under the mask of legality, serving the future, on the other hand. Both of these phenomena merged for Kant into a certain unity, and specifically into a panorama of an impersonally just legal order, molded into a tool of private interests and external expediency.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ THE BASIC CONTRADICTION UNDERLYINGFor Kant the social process is a fluid (mobile) natural-- historical environment within which (and in dependence upon changes marking it) the individual, through conscious decision moves to confirm his personality and personal ties with other humans. In schematizing this process Kant employs two basic categories from the Enlightenment theory of the formation of society: "the natural state" and the "legal civil community''. In his rendering of these two categories Kant stood closest to Hobbes, who most pitilessly and uncompromisingly formulated thf basic task confronting the social thought of the epoch 106 of the Enlightenment---that of deducing social order and social awareness, and correspondingly moral awareness of the agent of this order through the interaction of human individuals driven only by the need for happiness and the instinct of self-preservation. For Hobbes more than for any other Enlightenment figure the "natural individual" is anti-social and immoral (that is to say, to the utmost degree purged of those qualities, which remain only to be deduced and clarified).
Kant draws to its extreme precisely the theoretical cynicism which we noted in Hobbes' construction. In the beginning there was the state of an uncompromizing helium omnium contra omnes. The human individual wages this struggle, submitting only to the pleasure principle and to reason as a means of weighing conceivable opportunities and threats. All other qualities ascribed to the "natural individual" in the works of the Enlightenment such as "innate social leanings" or `` ppenheartedness'' were decisively eliminated. The individual in the "state of nature" is a "thinking animal" in the litera, unsparing sense of this phrase.
As an animal the human cannot avoid carrying this bellum omnium contra omnes to the crudest level of antagonism, but as a thinking animal sooner or later he must realize that this antagonism forms a universal threat to individual existence, under which misfortune becomes the rule and happiness and success---the exception. It is precisely this animality (social unsociableness), brought to an intolerable pitch, which forces humans as thinking (reasoning) beings voluntarily to impose limits upon their biological arbitrariness of will and to form a "legal civil community''. The "social state" does not arise from "natural state" spontaneously (through evolution or through a ``leap''). It is instituted by humans by means of conscious decision-making in a critical situation. "The legal civil state" emerges because each individual---regardless of the path followed---agrees to the limitation of his arbitrary will and relinquishes the right to carry through this limitation (as well as relinquishing that force at his disposal to be used against the arbitrary will of others) to an arbitration set above all individuals within its jurisdiction. This is in fact the law and the power which administers it, with its various instruments for judgement, investigation, punishment, etc. The obligation of the given instance consists in the employment of all available means to defend the freedom of each within those boundaries which do not intrude upon the personal freedom of all. The powers administering the law must treat human relations as if 107 they were instituted by mutual and voluntary agreement (Kant unlike the Enlightenment figures did not insist that the "social contract" should be interpreted as a literal historical event).
Kant wrote that "... a society in which freedom under the protection of external laws is combined in the highest degree with insuperable constraint, that is to say, the completely legal civil order, should be the supreme task of nature for the human species...''~^^1^^
Why did Kant write "should be'', why did he not speak of it as "representing a natural task placed before the human species and already realized in human society"? There was in fact a reason.
The powers administering the law are in fact people, and people, as Kant repeatedly emphasized, are a priori neither good, honest, nor just. These qualities may be fostered only within the "legal civil community''. But for this community to take roots and exert an ennobling influence over individuals, there must be an honest administering of the law. However, this in turn requires the existence of people who are by nature just, incorruptible, capable of withstanding any pressure and of breaking the arbitrary will of others. Thus we have the emergence of a vicious circle, the antinomy of the "legal civil community''. Kant wrote the following on this subject: "... man is an animal... and if he, as a reasoning being, openly desires to have laws which would precisely define the boundaries of freedom, then his animal, selfish leanings provoke him, where necessary, to exclude himself [from the law and from norms limiting arbitrary will---E.S.]. He thus stands in need of a master to break his individual will and force him to submit to the universally recognized will which prevents no one from being free. But where can man find such a master? Only within his own midst. But this chosen one is also an animal standing in need of a master. Thus, no matter how he [the individual---E.S.] acts in the given instance, it is impossible to envision how man can create a sovereign figure to administer public justice in an impartial fashion.... The inferior clay which makes up man cannot be molded into a perfect form.''^^2^^
But if just (adequate to the law as such) law enforcing agencies cannot be formed within the framework of the "legal civil community" then this community itself is not, as was _-_-_
^^1^^ Immanuel Kant, Sdmtliche Werke in 6 Ba'nden. Erster Band, Leipzig, MD CCCCXXI. S. 229.
~^^2^^ Ibid., S. 230.
108 assumed by the Enlightenment figures, the antithesis of helium omnium contra omnes. To the contrary it represents this war elevated to a new and higher level of cruelty and refinement, because the law itself as well as the instruments of coercion attached to it are now employed as tools of arbitrary will. In this situation the accessibility of power to humans opens up to the strongest, the most cynical and the most artful tne possibility of turning against the rest not only the individual weapons of the competitive struggle, but the might of the state itself.The figures of the Enlightenment reasoned that the transition to the "social state" would simultaneously represent the transition to "moral order'', that is to say, to such an organization of human life in society within which the individual would gradually, by force of adjustment, be transformed into a moral being. Kant emphatically asserted the contrary: the "legal civil community" as a state marked by the unjust application of the law, is a forge of radical evil. Given the condition that arbitrary will has the opportunity of circumventing and applying the law with the aid of those who administer it, the severity of the law as such represents a force sponsoring immorality, and at that a contrived, sociallycontnved immorality.
In the natural historical process there arises a second critical situation, which must be confronted by the individual through conscious decision. The essence of this situation consists in the following. The "legal civil community" is a contradictory form of human life. On the one hand, there exists a law which guarantees the human commonality and is becoming more and more strict and impersonal. On the other hand, there is no arbiter of justice adequate to the law. Instead we have a magistrate to whom, as a prudent-calculating being, the individual tries to accommodate. He desires to insure himself against the arbitrary will of this magistrate by means of cunning, cajolery, and disguising of individual selfishness. But the further along the road this accommodation born of expediency travels, the more vulnerable in fact the individual becomes, and the more defenseless he is before the law as such, for there exists no way of life providing insurance against the threat of judicial abuse. When the unfortunate dissembler falls into the clutches of justice, the magistrate receives the opportunity in this instance of being just, of dealing with him justly.
For the prudent-calculating consciousness the contradiction offers no solution. It is a dead end leading to despair. But for the reason (that is to say, for the human facility for recognizing 109 what are in fact unresolvable tasks for what they are) this contradiction signifies a situation requiring an internal restructuring, a fundamental reordering of personal priorities. As a reasoning being the individual rejects the nope for the reasoned attainment of success, and instead concerns himself with the preservation of his individual dignity, which given the circumstances, is the only justifiable recourse.
The individual now sees his mission in appearing before the magistrate not as one standing in fear before an anticipated random social verdict, but as a free personality who has already voiced one's own verdict, but a just verdict corresponding to the very spirit of the law and to it alone. Thus arises the paradoxical, yet internally incontestable individual position---that of respect for the law as such. If the individual being a typical member of the "legal civil community" employs every available means (persuasion, complaint, reference to the frailty and general imperfection of numan nature) in an attempt to convince the judge of his innocence, the free personality, to the contrary, acts resolutely against judicial malpractice specifically through this admission of personal guilt before the law. He is in agreement (and perhaps even wishes) with the imposition of a penalty which was in actuality deserved.
In this internal affirmation of the right to a just ruling and of the possibility of a just court of law lies the substance of the Kantian notion of "free morality" or "the moral way of thought''. The position of the moral subject represents for the individual as such the bringing to bear of a solution to the basic antinomy of the "legal civil community": in the moral individual the social norms which he applies only to himself exist in unity with their just observer of the law.
Kant contrasts the moral individual (personality) not with the arbitrary judgement of the natural individual (in the state of nature) but precisely with the social individual subjected to fear of public exposure and nevertheless tempted to violate the very spirit of the law. The social individual feels himself to be free only so long as circumstances permit him to be unaccountable for his actions. The setting giving shape to the moral individual (personality) is quite the opposite. Kant considered the basic definition of the free personality to be located precisely in his responsibility, that is, in the awareness of his unconditional subjection to the law. Only on this basis does the personality receive the internal right to reject the unjust court of law, in opposition to which he institutes an internal, rigorous and severe, but nonetheless just court. This court is the 110 conscience, the internal defence mechanism against external illegality cloaked by the law.
The entirety of the paradox contained within the Kantian idea may be expressed in the following form: personal freedom is possible only through radical submission to the law. It was precisely this submission that for the first time and exhaustively excluded for the individual any possibility of social obedience expressed through servility, toadyism or flattery before the arm of the law---before the powers that be. The refined legal consciousness makes the ``sovereign''---needed by man as the "thinking animal"---both superfluous and insulting. The "internal conversion to obedience of the law" makes possible a final parting with the slave consciousness.
To oe a radical law-obedient subject signifies respect for the law not in the accidental expression which it finds in the articles of various statutes and codes but in the spirit of its fundamental declarations.
The latter (composing the ``impractical'' part of the law and regarded as an abstraction by those who administer it) speak directly to the legal interpretation of society, its members and the relations among them. This interpretation is given expression in a series of formulations which maintain a close semantic resemblance and are included either explicitly or implicitly; the definition of society as a voluntary association of humans, the charter for which is based on civil regulations; the recognition of the legal capacity of each individual as a mandatory condition for the administration of the law; the obligation of protecting only those relations between individuals under which no human may be utilized as the means for the achievements of ends determined by another, etc.
As distinct from the practical individual, who never takes such assertions seriously, the moral individual turns them precisely into the basic postulates both of his way of thought and his actions. The maxim of the preservation of human dignity (never treat another human as a means for your own purposes, but only as a goal in itself), which is implied by any code of laws here acquires decisive meaning.
The radically obedient subject of the law affirms by his behaviour the human community as it defines and must define itself and rejects the alternative definitions rejected by society itself. The moral individual does not contest the validity of these reasons and does not level accusations against society for a disparity between the word and the deed (he, in fact, does not at all concern himself with condemnations of society or with the elaboration of critical programmes concerned with the 111 reconstruction of society). He simply takes the matter at hand, individual practical situations, and carries out those declarations upon which society has reneged. Acting in this manner, the radical subject of the law inevitably comes into conflict with the existing legislation as it is enforced. In so doing he compels the person of the magistrate to oppose the spirit of the law as actuated. Making no attempts whatsoever to subject himself to legal prosecution, he nevertheless forces society to embark on such proceedings sooner or later, proceedings which cannot be justly won. This in turn forces the magistrate to divest himself of the mask of legality.
The act of the moral individual is not an activity which is first subjected to the law only as it encounters legal proceedings. It is in fact brought within the realm of the law in the act of completion itself, the Kantian categorical imperative states: "Act so that the maxim of thy will can always at the same time hold good as a principle of universal legislation.''~^^1^^ Proceedings against the moral individual inevitably become, by the logic of events, proceedings against the "universal legislation" to which .is counterposed existing legislation of a transient nature, muddied in the waters of historical expediency and in the interminable mutual accommodations of private interests.
The stark contrast for Kant between the ``moral'' and ``external'' (statutory) law must not be confused with the often discussed distinction between morality and law. The Kantian "moral law" has no connection with morality as the concrete totality of norms and sanctions regulating ordinary human relationships. This law represents, no matter how strange it may seem at first glance, precisely the internally ingested foundations of the law as such. The Kantian moral subject takes a direct stance not against human perversity and depravity, as would the ordinary moralist, but against lawlessness masquerading as legality, against violations of the law posing as the just administration of the law. He is not the advocate of a "strict morality" but an unflinchingly severe defender of those relations based upon mutual recognition of personal dignity (or, ideal legal relations). The struggle against human degradation and the decline of morals is possible only, according to Kant, on these grounds. "Harmful leanings" can fade away only to the extent that respect toward the law is _-_-_
~^^1^^ Immanuel Kant, The Critique of Practical Reason and Other Ethical Treatises, Chicago, 1952, p. 302.
112 fostered, as are the awareness of duty, obligation and personal dignity.Kant accepted as a pure moral act only that activity the motives for which were not an inclination hut a duty. Many interpreters of Kantian philosophy have spoken of the ``severity'', ``rigorousness'' of this proposition. In reality it is directed precisely against the excessive claims and demands which people set for themselves.
It is commonly thought that to carry out a good deed a person must have a good heart, to wit, he must eliminate all unrighteous inclinations and tendencies within himself. The pure moral act is recognized therefore as that action, and that alone, which is motivated by a noble sentiment.
This version of moral behaviour may be encountered in the works of many Christian thinkers. If, for example, one gives to the needy only because he considers such a deed to be just, then he, in the opinion of the ordinary religious moralist, is by no means completing a moral act. This moralist is prepared to recognize as a moral ``dole'' only that act which is accompanied by a feeling of love for the needy (love understood by no means in a figurative sense). In turn, each good deed by the individual must be accompanied by this "evocation of feeling" for this act to be qualified as a good one. Such a practice of uninterrupted moral mockery of one's own sensibility, it is clear, is beyond the reach of each and every one of us. It is impossible to force oneself not to wish that which one wishes, or not to feel that which one in fact feels; it is not only impossible, but also unnecessary.
Kant considered that it was fully sufficient not to permit the inclination to turn into the action, if this deed would contradict one's awareness of one's duty. This was all that he demanded. No one surpassed Kant in resoluteness in the act of removing from the feelings and inclinations the chains hung on them by moralists and hypocrites and no one acceded quite so graciously the imperfections of human nature. The individual can be a moral creature even in the presence of the most baneful inclinations and predispositions if the stipulation is met that, recognizing the incongruity of the moral way of thinking with his predispositions, he does not give the latter nourishment in the realm of conscious deed and, in so denying them, offers them the opportunity of dying away on their own account.
Kant took a firm stance against the confusion of the ideal of moral behaviour with the ideal of ``holiness'' (the dream of elevating our own nature and sensibilities to a state of moral 113 perfection). The importance of this question for Kant may be measured by the fact that he, a deeply religious thinker, dared to offer a forthright criticism of the Gospel commandment to "love thy neighbour''. The "affection towards men ... cannot be commanded, for it is not in the power of any man to love anyone at command....'' Love cannot be decreed, even if it is given the quite figurative interpretation of practical love (``to love one's neighbour means to like to practise all duties toward him''), for "a command to like to do a thing is in itself contradictory".^^1^^ To complete this discussion Kant says: "...and this proper moral condition in which he can always be is virtue, that is, moral disposition militant, and not holiness in the fancied possession of a perfect purity of the disposition of the will.''~^^2^^
An evaluation of an individual, to be just, must be applied only to the result of this struggle, only to that aspect of the individual internal world which was carried into the actual deed. Those making the moral verdict are not concerned with other factors.
In its evaluations (and self-evaluation) the Kantian moral subject is the ideal student of law, who judges the individual only through his ``deeds'' (although, of course, these deeds are not understood in a behaviorial sense, not as a physical event in the physical world, but as completed designs). He neither tolerates nor accepts (if rendered by another party) judgements concerning the "moral constitution'', mat is to say, concerning perversity as a whole or potential moral untrustworthmess, etc. For the righteous judge (and by implication, for the judge of one's own conscience) the unfulfilled internal world of the individual is his "private affair''.
This psychological tolerance, stemming from the position of juridical impartiality, allows the moral individual to above all "tidy up one's own ship'', that is to say, to free oneself of fear of "immoral inclinations" and of pathological inner suspicions as well as preventive self-flagellation. In addition this psychological tolerance opens up the path to unprejudiced relations with other humans.
The Kantian moral subject is imbued with the deep conviction .that the moral action is within the reach of any _-_-_
^^1^^ Immanuel Kant, The Critique of Practical Reason, Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1952, p. 326.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 327.
114 individual regardless of his inclinations. Consequently no prior knowledge of the ``nature'' of the individual can serve as the basis for prophesying the range of his possible actions. The division of humans into those ``worthy'' and ``unworthy'' of trust in essence is an operation of the reason falling outside its proper limits, A knowledgeable decision in the given instance is impossible, we may speak only of a practical postulate (or formulation of one's duty) which could be expressed as follows: trust must be granted to each and everyone.^^1^^It is not difficult to arrive at the conclusion that this postulate is simply a juridical "presumption of innocence'', transposed to the sphere of personal relations.
The above maxim has nothing in common with the assertion that everyone can be trusted. The substance of the moral readiness to grant trust rests precisely on the fact that it does not ask for guarantees and exists despite empirical knowledge of the frequency with which the trusting person is in actuality deceived. To the extent that the existing moral and psychological constitution, whether noble or debased, does not determine an action through consciousness and free choice, to that extent there can be no irrefutable knowledge of the future actions of the individual to whom trust has been extended. Every act of trust is a risk.
For the member of the "legal civil community" and for the moral individual an act of trust differs in meaning (and correspondingly their understanding of the risk involved in trust also differs). The first subscribes wholly to a utilitarian view of mutual human relations and regards each individual as a means for achieving his ends. In trusting another person he simply extends credit, and the worth of another is understood as a condition of the return of a loan.^^2^^
For the moral individual trust has the significance of an appeal to the very worth of the other party, and the ``loan'' which he risks, bears testimony to the seriousness and honesty of this appeal. The moral individual can lose that with which he took a risk, but not that for which he took the step: there is no _-_-_
^^1^^ The formula "trust must be granted to each and everyone" is not to be found in Kant's works, but it may be logically deduced from the body of his judgements (in particular, from the maxim concerning the preservation of human dignity, for trust is the recognition of the dignity of the second party). Therefore in the following discussion we will regard the given formula as Kantian.
~^^2^^ Karl Marx, Okonomisch-philosophische Manuskripte, Leipzig, 1968, S. 259--62.
115 act of trust which could avoid altogether exerting an influence upon the moral state of the individual to whom the trust was extended. Quite often this "investiture with trust" evokes true character in the individual for the first time, fractures the cruellest inner cynicism and the most persistent awareness of personal insignificance as well as innate "moral inferiority''. When this occurs, the moral consciousness (even if its bearer makes no attempt to recruit like-minded people) puts individual loneliness to rest, and this iSjin fact the bearer's only need. Through the act of trust he arouses in other people a faith in the law and brings into being authentic relationships, based upon a mutual recognition of dignity.Within the confines of the "legal civil community" arises a commonality of humans, whose relations are structured on corresponding but unrealized principles. This commonality has no definition in a sociological sense and in no way resembles an ``organization'' or "social organism''. Nevertheless it represents a true human unity.
This "legal civil community" now acquires the meaning of a natural historical environment, within which there exists an "invisible moral community'', and modifications of the given environment are evaluated from the point of view of the needs ensuring simple preservation of this "moral community''. The moral individual acknowledges membership in the existing community, but only in that sense, in which the social individual acknowledges his affiliation with nature. Internally he includes himself within the community which stands under the moral law.
Treason against this community, against those who trusted, trust, or are willing to trust is for the moral individual a far more abominable offence than is the violation of the requirements posed by social and historical expediency, custom or existing legislation (horror before treachery, before selfbanishment from the "moral community" may in general be regarded as the psychological analogue of the awareness of duty). If the individual faces the alternative: the norms of the moral community or the interests of society, he will choose the first. Society as such (a social whole, with its requirements and objective tendencies) does not represent for the Kantian moral subject something inwardly meaningful, worthy of compassion, effort or protracted investigation.
116 __ALPHA_LVL3__ THE LIMITSKant's ethical conception of society strikes one with its clarity and sharpness of definition, with the unwavering nature of a personal conviction molded in a crucible of doubt and despair. It maintains a purity born of suffering and confirmed in experience: not the purity characterizing naivete, but the spotlessness of mature judgement achieved at a high cost.
Still, the Kantian moral subject is marked by something which arouses one's caution and even fright. Its inner concentration imperceptibly undergoes a transformation into "epistemological seclusion'', into the illusion that the drama of cognition has already been exhausted and brought to a conclusion.
Kantian philosophy is alien to the conception of the morally-motivated cognitive interest. The passion for cognition (and in general, an interest in the world) for Kant appears as a forgivable weakness peculiar to the human spirit, as a distinguishing feature of the pre-moral, prudent-calculating consciousness, which endeavours to apprehend and reconnoitre a situation from the point of view of possible success or failure. The moral consciousness appears for the first time in Kantian philosophy as the captious intellectual censor of this passion (in the form of a critic of the exaggerated pretensions of the "theoretical reason'').
The moral subject as such (the subject of Kant's second Critique) experiences no need for surveying the surrounding world; the place occupied by cognitive interests is now held by stoical imperturbability, by a readiness to accept and endure even the very worst. Through this the world is pushed aside and ceases to be a captivating question worthy of one's interest. This world---with all its indeterminacy, elusiveness and all (the exact amount is irrelevant) the disheartening unexpected twists that might occur in the future---is taken into account in advance. Objective reality (including socio-historical reality) enters simply as a source of trials and tribulations which must be endured with dignity and without inquiry into their origin and character.
The Kantian moral subject is receptive to people experiencing the burden of history and society, but not to history and society as such. He is capable of rapidly distinguishing between good and evil, and justice and injustice to that extent to which 117 they have been actualized in direct inter-personal relationships. But he lacks the capability or impulse to develop a more penetrating vision of social injustice in the root sense of the word, that is to say injustice stemming from the objective relations of larger social groupings, in the "things and circumstances" surrounding the individual.
This limitation in the Kantian ethics stands out the more boldly the sharper the definition of the specific moral aspect of social problems. As early as the first half of the nineteenth century the rapid development of economic and historical knowledge, complex fluctuations in the class struggle rendered urgent the question of the manner in which the moral subject (the individual, selflessly dedicated to the principle of justice) should turn to the "fundamental objectivities" of social reality.
A highly important role in the resolution of this problem was played by the creation of a scientific theory of society which conceived of the social entirety as an object external to, yet internally significant for the individual.
In the 1870s the question of the relationship between ethics and science was given expressive and precise personification, articulated in the theme "Kant and Marx''. Relegating to the background the quite incidental motivations which determined the initial rendering of this theme in the works of the neo-Kantians and of certain German Social Democrats of a philosophical bent, we will try to clarify this theme, underscoring that which was in fact most important and timeless: the question of the relationship between the internal axioms of the moral consciousness and scientific theory, fuelling and presupposing the morally-motivated cognitive interest in society.
Kantian practical philosophy in a certain sense summarized the consciousness of an entire era: it established that the significance of the historical movement contemporary to the elaboration of this philosophy rested in the stripping of all forms of personal dependence from the individual. The formula of the categorical imperative "never treat another person as a means, but always as an end in itself"---is one of the clearest anti-feudal and ``anti-arbitrary'' philosophical assertions to be worked out in the eighteenth century.
In our opinion the authentic enthusiasm of the early bourgeois revolutions is expressed more sharply in The Critique of Practical Reason than in the Enlightenment doctrines inspiring these revolutions. The fundamental slogan of the Enlightenment, of the "unfettered natural individual'', was an ideologically inadequate formulation. Indeed, the actual movement stimulated by this slogan defended not the "authentic 118 nature'', but rather the personal freedom of the individual, the formal right to express his will and independently to dispose of his energy and the fruits of his labour. Kant was the first to give this a corresponding philosophical formulation by advancing to priority positions such categories as ``autonomy'', "personal dignity'', ``formalism'' and "causality through freedom''. The figures of the Enlightenment were ideologues of the bourgeois revolution, Kant its confessor.
But precisely for this reason anyone who approaches the human community through the prism of Kantian categories snags upon the fundamental and profoundly honest illusion of that era---the political and juridical illusion of society. The substance of this illusion may be found in the fact that the lack of respect for personal freedom was treated as the final source of all evil, that the elimination of the variety of forms of personal dependence and of the arbitrariness inescapably characterizing the feudal-monarchist state was equated with the elimination of all oppression and injustice. The depth of selfdeception marking these most elevated of human expectations is well known. The newly-established world of political and juridical freedoms was destined to become the kingdom of impersonal class oppression.
The new type of social injustice characteristic of capitalism came to the surface of social life in the form of an unprecedented polarization of wealth and plundering of the productive force of the individual as well as massive demoralization. These disheartening manifestations were observed by numerous social thinkers, however for a prolonged interval no one succeeded in providing a clear and uncontradictory legal qualification of these phenomena. The capitalist system of exploitation turned out to be invulnerable to social criticism which had developed in the current of the Enlightenment and Kantian thought. The cries of reproach grew louder and louder but never could quite turn into a verdict of condemnation. This is in fact no surprise, since capitalist society was deft enough to utilize and thoroughly to rob the individual without having to resort to personal violence, without trampling on his right to express his free will or his right to private property. Your eyes tell you that injustice is on hand; your mind tells you that this is not so.
For social thought to be supplemented with moral-juridical sharpness of vision, it was necessary (no matter how paradoxical this may seem) to overcome the heritage left by the earlier moral-juridical approach, its stubborn concentration on the issues of personal freedom and personal dependence. Into the 119 field of vision of critical analysis, oriented to the problem of justice, it was necessary to introduce phenomena which had never before interested "pure moralists" and theoreticians of private law---the fundamental objectivities of the capitalist process: the exchange of commodities, the hiring of labour, the organization of production at the capitalist factory and such characteristics of the world of wealth as price, value, profit, etc.
The thinker to carry out this task was Marx. In his works he was the first to demonstrate that a basic condition for the elaboration of an accusatory verdict against bourgeois civilization is the study of the objective (independent of will and consciousness) social ties and their material embodiment. In relation to the moral and juridical critique of capitalism (and before Marx's most important works appeared this critique could be located above all in the currents of socialist and revolutionary democratic ideology) his scientific analysis of the capitalist system emerged not only as a tool for objective social orientation, but as a means of increasing the depth of ethical insight and of deepening its morally exposing pathos.
In the study of the classic Marxist legacy this side of the question often remains in the shadows. We will focus precisely upon this, turning above all to those sections of Capital in which economic analysis is subsumed to the task of reformulating a number of legal problems. The main thrust of these chapters is to provide a foundation for the right to the expropriation of capitalist private property under capitalism.
The basic empirical data with which Marx begins his analysis is the terrifying spectacle of the plundering of live labour power in the capitalist economic system and facts demonstrating the existence in society of organized mass murder through overwork and referring to the transformation of the working population of the capitalist countries into " generations or human beings, stunted, short-lived, swiftly replacing each other, plucked, so to say, before maturity".^^1^^
By the time that the first volume of Capital had been written these facts had already become the object of social indignation and had attracted the displeasure of hundreds of liberal and socialist writers. It is indicative, however, that this indignation was overlain with a film of sentimental haziness and had by no means crystallized into a juridically substantiated verdict or clear conception of guilt from which could be derived the right to definite decisions and actions.
_-_-_^^1^^ K. Marx, Capital, Vol. I, Moscow, 1971, p. 269.
120Marx was the first to demonstrate that the legal impracticability of the moods and sufferings engendered in every unprejudiced observer by the capitalist factory system was preconditioned by the habit of inevitably regarding guilt to be personal guilt. This stance encouraged the search for the source of capitalist exploitation in the legal abuses committed by one person (the owner) against another (the employee).
Capital brought into focus the fact that the owner-employee relationship within the commodity-capitalist economy is in reality the result of the imposition, one upon the other, of three different strands which can be separated and isolated only through theoretical analysis. This is first of all the relationship of the capitalist and the worker as free and equal private individuals on the labour market, in the sphere of commodity exchange. The second strand concerns their conflicting (antinomical) juridical relations as far as the consumption of the commodity purchased by the capitalist is concerned (labour power). The third strand is their antagonistic relationships as representatives of two social classes standing in opposing positions, as ``personifications'' of capital and labour.
The relationships between the capitalist and the worker on the labour market (expressing the only actual personal tie between them) are so built that the most rigorous ethic or private code can find no fault with these relationships (the object of reproach can only be modifications of these relationships brought forth by the influence of the corresponding class-social conjuncture). "The owner of labour power and the owner of money,'' writes Marx, "meet in the market, and deal with each othe"r as on the basis of equal right ... both, therefore, equal in the eyes of the law.''^^1^^ The capitalist purchases labour power with the voluntary consent of its owner and pays for it in accordance with its actual value. Marx dismisses from the start those attractive but juridically unfounded suppositions concerning the mandatory nature of this deal and suggesting that capitalist profit can arise from market deception or from the infringement upon the rights of the worker as a commodity-owner. Mocking attempts to portray the capitalist as a private individual making ill use of nis rights, Marx wrote: "This sphere that we are deserting, within whose boundaries the sale and purchase of labourpower goes on, is in fact a very Eden of the innate rights of _-_-_
^^1^^ K. Marx, Capital, Vol. 1, p. 168.
121 man. There alone rule Freedom, Equality, Property.... Freedom, because both buyer and seller of a commodity, say of labour-power, are constrained only by their own free will. They contract as free agents, and the agreement they come to is but the form in which they give legal expression to their common will. Equality, because each enters into relation with the other, as with a simple owner of commodities, and they exchange equivalent for equivalent. Property, because each disposes only of what is his own.''~^^1^^But can it be that the abuses of the capitalist and the violence employed against the person of the worker begin behind the gates of the factory? Yes and no, replies Marx, for in reality we find there not the realm of open illegality, but the world of legal antinomies.
The capitalist has purchased labour power for a definite length of time, in the course of which he is its full owner. This latter fact signifies that the intensity of the productive consumption of labour power is the indisputable private right of the owner of capital. At the same time labour power is the means of existence for the worker, and as a result of the excessive consumption of this labour power it is the worker himself, not an object separated from him and handed by him to another, who is worn out.
The right of the capitalist to the intensive consumption of labour power is something distinct from the right to the life of the worker as such (that is to say a right over its duration). But it is from excessive work that this life is in fact shortened. The worker thus has every justification to declare to the capitalist: "To you ... belongs the use of my daily labour power. But by an unlimited extension of the working-day, you may in one day use up a quantity of labour power greater than I can restore in three. What you gain in labour I lose in substance. The use of my labour power and the spoliation of it are quite different things.... That is against our contract and the law of exchanges.''^^2^^
To the claims of the worker, however, the following answer may be forthcoming:
``The owner of the money has paid the value of a day's labour power; his, therefore, is the use of it for a day; a day's labour belongs to him. The circumstance, that on the one hand the daily sustenance of labour power costs only half a day's _-_-_
~^^1^^ Ibid., p. 176.
^^2^^ Ibid., p. 234.
122 labour, while on the other hand the very same labour power can work during a whole day ... is, without doubt, a piece of good luck for the buyer, but by no means an injury to the seller.''^^1^^Summarizing this mutually just and mutually fruitless altercation Marx wrote: "... the nature of the exchange of commodities itself imposes no limit to the working-day, no limit to surplus-labour. The capitalist maintains his rights as a purchaser when he tries to make the working-day as long as possible, and to make, whenever possible, two working-days out of one. On the other hand, the peculiar nature of the commodity sold implies a limit to its consumption by the purchaser, and the labourer maintains his right as seller when he wishes to reduce the working-day to one of definite normal duration. There is here, therefore, an antinomy, right against right, both equally bearing the seal of the law of exchanges [my emphasis---E.S.]. Between equal rights force decides. Hence is it that in the history of capitalist production, the determination of what is working-day, presents itself as the result of a struggle, a struggle between collective capital, i.e., the class of capitalists, and collective labour, i.e., the working class.''^^2^^
Let us dwell at first upon the content of the proposition, underlined by us, concerning the conflict between two rights which are equally sanctioned by law.
In Marx's Capital the legal conflict is usually conveyed in the language of interests, that of mutual solicitation. But it can also be presented as a collision of obligations, as moral competition.
The capitalist could easily have presented his position as that of an obligation, he could justifiably say to the worker: "The extraordinary exploitation of your labour power is my obligation, is my duty---before my father and grandfather, who accumulated the money with which I am now purchasing this labour power. If I am incapable of utilizing it to its utmost, if I am sentimental with you, I will succumb to the competition and become a squanderer of the wealth earned by others. This would mean that I would commit a crime against my ancestors who bequeathed to me the duty of increasing capital resources, of expanding production and of providing work for an ever growing number of your kind.'' These conclusions are quite convincing on that level of understanding promoted by the moral-juridical approach to the problem.
_-_-_^^1^^ K. Marx, Capital, Vol. 1, pp. 193--94.
~^^2^^ Ibid., pp. 234--35.
123Just as convincing however would seem to be the position defended by our hypothetical worker, be he a moralist or a Kantian: "I demand a shortening of the working day not for reasons of self-preservation. I have no obligation to live fifty and not thirty years, but I do have a duty which drives me to this demand, a duty before my family and children. They will perish if I die or lose my ability to work prematurely. What is your duty before your ancestors in comparison with mine before my descendants? And whose employment are you guaranteeing if my children and those of people like me are to perish from the consequences of poverty?''
Where right clashes with right, morality clashes with morality. And the further the moral analysis of the conflict proceeds, the more rigorous the defence of juridical roles (those given by historv rather than chosen), the stronger is felt the impact of situational compulsion to openly illegal and immoral decisions---to action "from the position of strength''.
It is often asserted in contemporary bourgeois literature concerned with Capital that Marx saw in the conflict of antinomies (between two equally sanctioned rights) a sanction for a resolution of the conflict through sheer force, as if his critique of the traditional juridical approach to the problem of exploitation was suffused with an enthusiasm for "might makes right''.
In reality that section of Capital dedicated to an analysis of the conflict of rights between the seller and purchaser of labour power, is least of all an exposition of Marx's final conclusions, of his credo. This section was written in the critical and ironic manner, when the author conditionally adopts the roles of the agents of the conflict and carries them through to the end. Employing the given method Marx demonstrates to what results the moral-juridical idealism leads if it is consistently utilized in an analysis of the relations underlying exploitation. These results, as we have seen, are quite paradoxical. The moral-juridical consciousness, suffused with respect for the contract, for the amicable reconciliation of contradictions, unexpectedly admits that it has no reasons to object to the "internecine war" which arises spontaneously and which is so shocking to its consciousness.
This does not mean, of course, that Marx himself rises to the defence of spontaneous class resoluteness, that engendered by the resistance of the legal conflict to a reconciliation between the purchaser and seller of labour power. For Marx the problem of a just, legally justified violence, to which the working 124 class receives sanction from history itself, is precisely what is fundamental in this matter.
What in fact is this sanction?
Marx demonstrates that even before the moment in which the individual capitalist and worker meet on the market and conclude as free parties a contract they already stand in a mutual socio-historical relationship represented in the social nature of things, located in their free disposition---in the social nature of capital and labour power.
Both capital and labour power, separated from all the conditions of labour, arose at some point within the same historical process, in the act of "primitive accumulation"---the forcible plundering of the independent small-scale producer. They were the result of the "polarization of the commodity market" carried out through recourse to the most flagrant illegality. The absence of means of production at the one pole and the concentration of these means at the other---a dependency which those generations born under developed capitalism find as o priori precondition of their existence---is in fact a result of what can only be called usurpation. If this is taken into account (if we glance at the relationship of the seller and the purchaser of labour power in a historical context) we become immediately aware of a change in the sense of the above moral-juridical conflict.
The owner of capital now emerges as a person disposing of property attained through criminal means: the seller of labour power as the descendant of a people who have been forcibly robbed. Behind the antinomies of two equally sanctioned private rights is exposed the historically sanctioned right to the expropriation of capitalist private property.
The capitalist speaking in the name of capital itself (rather than in that of his familial responsibility for capital) can only be the open defender of the unremunerated appropriation of another party's labour. The worker speaking in the name of labour power separated from all the conditions of the implementation of labour (and not in the name of his familial responsibility for the reproduction of this labour power in new generations) emerges as the accusator of this plunder which remains invisible in the individual act of exchange (capital for labour) but is visibly manifested in the history of their mutual relationships.
As irreconcilable and juridically unequal opponents capital and labour power come into conflict not on the labour market and not in the individual enterprise, but rather in history, on the arena of the development 01 the capitalist social system as a 125 specific internally contradictory whole. This whole is not yielding to ordinary perception. It may be brought into bold relief and studied only with the aid of scientific investigation. Concerned with events on a mass scale, enduring and recurring relationships which are observable only on a larger historical scale, science discovers the special life of the social organism, on the basis of which we may pose the question of the responsibility accruing to various social groups and concerning the historical justification underpinning their claims.
The original contribution made by the scientific theory of society to human orientation as a whole consists in the fact that this theory points to the social whole as a being enduring suffering and torment which appeals to us for the resolution of its unsolved contradictions, unhealthy disproportions, obstructions in the path of development, etc. Society is for the first time characterized in this context through tendencies (dynamics of change) and objective requirements. The implementation or non-implementation, satisfaction or non-satisfaction of these tendencies thus emerge as a criterion for the determination of the merit or guilt of those social forces organizing the life of society, economic, cultural and other policies determining either mass prosperity or calamity, phenomena to be experienced not solely by the generation contemporary to these policies.
The social whole is not a ``personality'' and to speak of ``respect'' for it is to render literal a metaphor. Nevertheless it must be admitted that without responsibility before this whole the idea of true responsibility before humans is also inconceivable. Society is an object ``impersonal'' in nature, in relation to which the morally-developed individual is compelled nevertheless to take a position which is directly appropriate only in relation to ``people''.
Scientific social theory was the first to uncover society as an end in itself and it demands an unconditional recognition of this independence of ends. It is precisely because of objective scientific analysis that the awareness arises that people may suffer from the abuses permitted in relation to the social system (such as voluntarist actions, artificial attempts to preserve the status quo, etc.) no less, and perhaps even more than they suffer from juridical abuses, and further that these abuses themselves are often only the accompanying symptoms of organized violence against history.
Society in whose contradictions and unrealized possibilities are invisibly represented the suffering and ordeals of present 126 and future generations---such was the new object of moral responsibility discovered by science and unknown to the earlier Enlightenment-Kantian, moral-juridical reflective mind.
One of the outstanding representatives of neo-Kantianism, Wilhelm Windelband summarized the content of the Kantian categorical imperative in the following manner: "All things may be used as means for one's ends [my italics---E.S.] but the individual must never be utilized only as a means, on the contrary his absolute worth must always be rendered its due.''~^^1^^ Desirous of underscoring the basic pathos underlying Kantian ``practical philosophy" Windelband in passing let slip its fundamental limitation, divulging its discretely concealed sanctioning of selfish, cynically utilitarian attitude towards any and all ``things''. But indeed for Kant "thing is everything which doesn't fall under the category of personality, that is to say, any reality with the exclusion of the human individual; any reality which can be understood as possessing an independent and purposeful existence separate from other realities. That which is recognized to be the rightful object of selfish attitudes turns out to be, in other words, not only wood or stone, but also natural resources in the widest sense, the economy, the social organism, etc.
As a result we discover, that the materialist historical theory of society is on a higher moral level than are purely ethical conceptions; this theory extends the principle of respect for the "end in itself" to a number of ``things'', ``objects'' that are not human beings. It was no accident that in the work of Marx the pivotal moment for the criticism of capitalism was the exposure of it as a social system practising "all-encompassing, universal exploitation" and having transformed the accumulation of social wealth as such into a process marked by the barbaric plundering of that wealth already accumulated by nature and history (the fertility of the soil, the mineral resources of the earth, the productive force of the population, etc.).
With the emergence of Marxism the enthusiasm of the struggle against illegal forms of social actions is supplemented by the enthusiasm of the struggle against its anti-social forms (utilitarian, voluntarist, unfounded utopianism, etc.)---against _-_-_
~^^1^^ Wilhelm Windelband, Die Geschichte der neueren Philosophic in ihrem Zusammenhange mil der allgemeinen Kultur und den besonderen Wissenschaften, Zweiter Band, Leipzig, 1911, S. 124.
127 the defiance not so much of juridical as of economic and socio-historical laws.Applying the notion of ``law'' to extend beyond the sphere of legal relations the scientific theory of society for the first time makes properly social relations and facts accessible to moral analysis. A new category of interdictions is placed alongside the moral commandments, the former bearing directly upon the actions of large social groups, but touching also the individual, as the latter chooses between these groups, and identifies himself with them. In formulating such an interdiction, science for the first time creates the possibility of evaluating a number of objective incongruities in social life as the consequence of the offences and criminal deeds of class groupings. It creates the opportunity of crystallizing indignation at the most massive of human woes into stern social verdicts. It is only owing to this fact that society and the forces active within society (and not solely the actions of isolated individuals) fall within the range of comprehension for the moral subject.
``The radical law-obedient subject" as we earlier named our hypothetical character, orients himself quite well to events if they unfold in the direction of private rights. If somewhere the freedom to express one's will is trampled upon, or if someone is calumniated or unjustly convicted, our subject responds promptly and with the full measure of self-sacrifice characteristic of him. He reacts accurately in a manner juridically certified---not simply with indignation, but with a clear awareness of the legal foundations of his indignation.
However, this very same subject conducts himself quite differently in the face of mass calamities which persist despite the observance of the conventions of private law. As a morally sophisticated individual his indignation is aroused, but despite this he finds no strictly moral-juridical foundation for any practical actions whatsoever.
In order to come to an awareness of the nature of his personal duty in the face of phenomena such as mass poverty, malnutrition, cultural backwardness, oppression, growing crime rates, etc., he would have to be in possession of a knowledge of the norms and interdictions, the violation of which gave rise to the given phenomena. However, the moral-juridical consciousness is in no condition to come independently forth with such knowledge. It is attained by science together with a conception of objects which are completely new and unprecedented in terms of normal experience. By such objects we have in mind "society as a whole'', economic relations, classes and social substrata 128 (``layers''). Science, consequently, does not simply give supplementary information on subjects already within the field of Knowledge but also discovers entire new continents in terms of social reality, which the individual must take into account when he first thinks over his choice of paths in life.
We have arrived at the most essential point in our analysis.
Science as it is revealed in the scientific theory of society influences in the most direct fashion the value orientation of the individual to reality. It provides the individual not only with a "knowledge of the facts and circumstances" but also with new objects falling within his responsibility and with respect for the end in itself, justified condemnation, etc. It not only renders more precise vital life decisions which have already been made but, strictly speaking, renders possible for the first time certain of these decisions as such.
Does this not signify however that science in the given instance has quite stepped beyond the bounds of its actual capabilities, and so subscribes to the scientistic demands of the ordinary consciousness and offers its counsel in those instances where in fact one should be thinking in terms of free choice and a clear moral position? The answer is no, this is not its significance.
The scientific theory of society from the outset presupposes the moral maturity of the individual whom it addresses.
The knowledge proffered by scientific theory is meant not for the individual confronting alternatives which are equally advantageous (or unprofitable) but for the individual who has run into an antinomy of rights. He has already passed through the crucible of indeterminate and virtually unresolvable situations. He has already been disillusioned with individualistic wisdom (in the prudent-calculating search for success and happiness). He has come to self-sacrifice and selflessness, based upon a strict order (hierarchy) of motives and values (on a clear awareness of the fact that duty must predominate over inclination, good over gain, truth over expediency, etc.). Finally he has arrived at an understanding of justice as the meaning of human existence.
If this has not yet taken place, if ethics have not become the formal structure of the individual consciousness, the basic theme of the scientific theory of society---that of social justice---cannot be fully apprehended by the individual, to whom this theory is addressed.
Theoretical research answers those questions about society which confront the individual who discovers that the existing social organization deprives him not only of the opportunity of 129 satisfying his individual needs (well-being, happiness, selfexpression, etc.) but of the opportunity of fulfilling his obligations, of living "according to the law''.
Scientific theory is a tool helping the moral individual find his bearings in society, and not a means of guiding the ordinary consciousness apart from ethics. Marxism endeavours to make the subject more realistic and far-sighted in a social sense, a subject who has alreadv reached the level of self-sacrifice, of wholehearted effort in the service of justice. But*Marxism's construct by no means consists in an effort to debunk this subject and replace him by the sober, prudent-calculating individual, standing in need of science as an instrument for the deduction of optimal paths to individual profit. The substance of the matter is by no means located in the reduction of the moral consciousness to the consciousness of the notorious "economic individual''. (This latter is one of the most widespread interpretations of Marxism in contemporary bourgeois literature.) The substance of the matter, in fact, lies in the elevation of the moral consciousness itself by means of science to the vantage point of the ethico-social and ethicohistorical view over society.
130 __ALPHA_LVL2__ A. ArsenyevChairman of the Commission: "You read several languages, are familiar with higher mathematics and can carry out some jobs. Do you consider that this makes you a human?''
Otark: "Yes, of course. Do you mean to say that people have other knowledge?''
(From the sdeiKe-fktion story Day of Wrath, by S. Gansovsky)
The problem of the interrelationship of science and morality has been widely discussed in popular and literary publications and fiction as well as in the statements and works by figures in various fields of knowledge, from sociology to mathematics.
In this discussion the most varied opinions have been expressed. We meet the assertion that genuine science can only be moral because it will help man eventually resolve all problems plaguing his existence. At the other extreme the opinion is voiced that a scientific education is harmful to a moral upbringing, since science engenders the world of the contemporary machine civilization in which individuality is dissolved and overwhelmed along with the effacement of the personality and of the actual human relations. Because of this, it is said, mankind is suffering what may be called moral degradation.
There are many intermediary opinions between these two. For example, some say that scientific and technological progress does in fact unify culture and level out individuality but this process is one that is beneficial for humanity; others _-_-_
^^1^^ TBO «riporperc». 1975
131 argue that although the scientific attitude is not identical with morality the "scientific principles" or bases for morality are indeed necessary. Finally, still others maintain that since science and morality are different, but both are necessary, each must be given to the individual in small doses.The problem arises as to how can we correlate the moral development of the individual with scientific and technological progress. Does this progress simultaneously signify moral progress, as many think? Or is the opposite true, namely that science and technology are actively ousting morality from the realm of human life, replacing moral consciousness with scientific thinking and the moral motives for actions with scientific calculations?
These questions are more and more frequently discussed in the press, but the disputants often give diametrically opposite answers to them, adducing a large body of ``facts'' and ``examples'' to support their own versions of the truth. This should already put us on our guard against reference to ``facts'' as proof in the area under discussion. Apparently another path must be found to the resolution of the problem. In this article we will attempt to outline its contours within the framework of philosophy, assuming that this framework can place the analysis within a definite, historically evolved and objective system of thought, which will enable us to argue from the standpoint of theory rather than adopt the subjective "common sense" approach of one or another student of the problem.
Making no claims for the formulation of categorical ``propositions'', judgements or decisions, we wish only to present a possible (and apparently not the only) path to a philosophical analysis of the given question, drawing the reader's attention to the method of reasoning as such.
Theoretical thought differs from common sense above all in its systemic nature. Any theory represents a system possesing a base, an initial reference point for logical-theoretical movement, a fundamental concept of theory (the concept of essence) which is developed into a system called a theory.^^1^^ From this viewpoint for example scientific theory is a specific aspect of theory. It differs from philosophical theory in its premises, the methods through which it is systematized, and, as we shall see later, in its object of research.
_-_-_^^1^^ See A. Arsenyev, V. Bibler, M. Kedrov, An Analysis of the Developing Concept, Parts I and 111, Moscow, 1967 (in Russian).
132A. ARSENYEV
From the standpoint of philosophy, the basic drawback of the numerous discussions on science and morality lies precisely in the lack of systematization and the argumentation "from the facts''. Any set of facts may be collated to another set opposed to the former. Therefore the disputants risk remaining rooted to their subjective points of view, to each his own. This occurs because facts per se do not exist.^^1^^ The choice of empirical events, the formation from them of a scientific or philosophical fact, is a complex process, based on the individual's mode of thinking, logic and attitude to reality---that which in studies of science is often called a paradigm.
The failure to apprehend these premises forms the positivist illusion that science can be built solely on the basis of ``facts''.
But the apprehension of these premises outside the framework of history, outside the self-development of the individual as an historical subject, leads to the opposite assertion defending the a priori nature of theoretical foundations, for these premises, as well as moral principles, are not to be found within empirically given existence. Neither science nor morality can be understood without apprehending these historical foundations. One can only state the antinomic nature of science and "human values" and try to find out which is better (and what in the given instance does ``better'' signify?), knowledge taking values into account or values larded with knowledge.
Man's continuing becoming in our day and age is the environment and basis analyzing which we can try to understand science, morality, and the relations between the two.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ SOME INITIAL PREMISESSchools of philosophy offer widely differing conceptions of the essence and the evolution of man. In this article, theoretical argument is based on Marx's fundamental ideas concerning man as an object-acting and historically developing entity.
Strictly speaking, the problem of object-activity, approached in a dialectical manner, turns out to be that of the origin of _-_-_
~^^1^^ This circumstance gave rise to the entire body of literature, both in the natural science and humanities. We refer the reader, for example, to Louis de Brouglie, Sur les sentiers de la science (Paris, 1960); Albert Einstein, Physic und Realitat; P. F. Preobrazhensky, Ancient Ideas and Images, Moscow, 1965, pp. 663--65; Istochnikovedenie, Moscow, 1964, pp. 59--101.
133 man as homo sapiens, viz., as a socio-historical subject.^^1^^ However, contemporary theoretical knowledge (philosophy, anthropology, ethnography, psychology, history, paleontology, etc.) is still incapable of rendering a satisfactory theory for the question. Therefore we must begin with a statement that in one way or another man emerged. From the point of view of our problem, this signifies that nature split into subject and object. Instead of a direct expression of the need through action there arose the goal as the satisfaction of need, mediated by the production of tools and removed to the future. But, then, the goal is something which though not existing in material reality in some manner exists in the subject. At the same time this is also peculiar to objective reality (taken, according to Marx, as a human reality), though not of its actual but of a future condition. The manner in which potential reality exists in the subject is in fact thought, while in its actual being it emerges as objective reality. Simultaneously it is a manner in which the subject of necessity exists for itself (reflects, to use the philosophical term). At this point many complex questions come to the fore, of which we will mention only the following:a) Object-activity expresses the identity of the subject and object. At the same time at each moment in this activity the subject and object are determined by opposite means. The state and movement of the object, considered in its opposition to the subject, depends upon its directly preceding condition, that is to say here the past determines the present. In the subject the goal, that is the future, determines his activities in the present. These two counterposed manners of determination lead to the fact that activity is a developing contradiction which is uninterrupted by being solved but is never resolved as a whole.
b) The instrumental nature of object-activity makes the individual independent of the limited character of his natural organs of action (hands, teeth, etc). When the individual utilizes the objects and forces of nature as tools, he thereby makes nature act upon itself, and such a mode of activity has in principle no limits except nature as such. For this reason Man _-_-_
~^^1^^ "The individual is the social being. His life even if it may not appear in the direct form of a communal life carriea out t6gether with others---is therefore an expression and confirmation of social life" (K. Marx, Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, pp. 104--05). It should be mentioned that the overwhelming majority of theories on anthropogenesis are unsatisfactory precisely because they are incapable of explaining the origin of the collective, social essence of man.
134 is potentially a universal and infinite being. Actually he is always limited because at any given moment his tools and sphere of activity are not universal (only recently he had no knowledge of atomic energy, he had not reached the Moon, while today he has no effective cure for cancer, does not know and cannot do much which is even difficult to imagine). His universal substance is conditioned by potentialities as a goal and in turn determines them in the form of incompleteness, that is to say, of the historical process.^^1^^ History consequently appears as a process resolving the contradiction between the potential universality of Man and his actual limitations at any given moment.Man, however, according to Marx, is a creature whose generic essence cannot be considered a part of his biological heredity. He must become a personality through individual development, actively assimilating the historical forms of material and spiritual culture through his inclusion in the world of human relations. This clarifies the role of all forms of human intercourse. For example, in certain historical epochs the main forms of culture and intercourse through which the individual acquired his generic essence were systems of mythology or religion. The European of the Middle Ages in worshipping the deity thereby communicated with man in his universality albeit in the distorted form of religious alienation. It was only in this sphere that he felt himself to be a human, equal (to be sure in the form of ``insignificance'') to all other humans, to humankind (``before God all are equal''). This feeling of insignificance was expressed in self-humiliation and abnegation---the primary virtues of a Christian. But since this insignificance was a form of closeness to and communion with God, to that extent the Christian believed that he belonged to a higher spiritual realm, extended to him and existing within him (the blessing). Therefore, feeling himself to be the slave of God, he could simultaneously look down at the infidel with pity and superiority, as at one not having received the sacrament.
c) History functions as a complex and contradictory process bearing upon the development of the individual. The latter _-_-_
^^1^^ ``The individual's universality, not as a perceived or imagined one but as the universality of his real and ideal relations. Hence also the understanding of his ideal own history as a process and the cognition of nature (as a practical power over it) as a real body in a way" (K. Marx and F. Engels, Works, Second Russ. ed., Vol. 46, Part. II, p. 35). Counterposing man's universality as a future task to his limitations under the capitalist division of labour, Marx calls him a ``partial'' individual in the latter case.
135 may be regarded as a goal-oriented subject determined by his own ends rather than by external expediency. In a word, he is a free subject. But the development of the individual into a unique universal personality is possible only given unhindered social intercourse with all other unique and free personalities making up the society of the future. The richer and more universal this intercourse, the richer and more universal will be the individual and the wider will be the opportunity for him, through his existence and free activity, to facilitate the formation and development of other individuals in the collective. In such a collective the value of the human being is internal, it lies in the uniqueness and originality of his personality rather than in the external products of his activity.From this point of view history may also be represented as a process bearing upon the development of forms of communication.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ CONTEMPORARY SCIENCEA widespread schemata used to describe the development of science is as follows: antiquity---the origins of scientific development; the European Middle Ages---stagnation and even retreat; the Renaissance---an awakening of interest in science; Galileo and Newton---science already stands on firm ground and begins its triumphal march, an exponential growth continuing to this date. Its future is unlimited, unless it accidentally leads to the self-annihilation of mankind.
In our opinion this schemata is lacking in historicity. The culture of each epoch as well as the corresponding mode of thought is not incorporated as an historically evolving and distinctive whole. The dominant form of scientific thought is adopted uncritically (or ahistorically, which amounts to the same thing) and made an absolute basis and measure for judgements on past epochs and for propositions concerning the future.
Therefore, considering for example the European Middle Ages, the historian of science finds "elements of science" among the ``debris'' of religious mystical ideas, magical incantations, etc. These ``elements'' are chosen simply for their resemblance to contemporary scientific forms of knowledge and often seem to be ingenious insights anticipating later 136 developments in science. In point of fact these ``elements'' were part of an entirely different cultural and thought system and played a different role. It is quite possible that progress in the life and thought patterns in this system was fuelled not by these elements but rather by those which the researcher is inclined to call the ``debris''.
As a self-activated and organic system science could not emerge from elements or fragments. We could make, perhaps an analogy with a building made of bricks. This is the manner in which only the so-called mechanistic systems come into being. Contemporary science was born as a whole, granted that initially this whole was insufficiently defined and differentiated. In addition the new in an organic system arises initially as a function which subsequently acquires (in a certain sense ``forms'', constitutes) the corresponding structure. Therefore to derive the origins of modern science from antiquity, referring to the Euclidean system, to Archimedes, etc., is just as absurd as it is to search for the origins of capitalism in antiquity, basing oneself on the ``facts'' of the existence of manufactories, commodities, money capital, legal system, etc.
We regard contemporary science as a social system carrying out in present-day society the function of producing theoretical knowledge. The word ``theoretical'' signifies that the result of cognition---knowledge---is fixed in science in the form of theory. Theory is an abstract model of the process under study. As distinct from the mental subject produced in the imagination, theory is a logical model.
Theory incorporates, on the one hand, logical relations in their generalized form and lacking direct ties with the specific of the given object. On the other hand, it incorporates relations which fix in an ideal (mental) form certain ties and relations pertaining to the object of cognition (to be more precise, its mental ``model''). These ties and relations remain constant despite changes in the object within the sphere of its practical utilization. These are like logical invariants of the motion of the object, through which it may be described in a static, that is to say, actually given form. Fixed in an ideal form these invariants are the laws of science. Thanks to this constancy relative to real time the motion of the object can be ``modelled'' in theory, outside real time, so that the result of this motion in theory is always actually given in implicit form. This circumstance forms the basis for scientific prevision and consequently for the possibility of applying science in practice.
We will not dwell here on the evaluation of science as a system of scientific institutions, as a sphere of professional 137 activity, or as a productive force. Science appears all these just as it is the totality of theory, the sum of knowledge and the form of social consciousness. The author only wishes to provide a brief description of science as an integral system.
Contemporary science was given form in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in connection with those revolutionary advances in the sphere of material production which led to the development in Western Europe of the commodity capitalist system of social relations.
While production served the natural-type economy of the Middle Ages, its product preserved the individuality of its producer and consumer. The technology underlying the manufacture of the product also varied to a considerable extent although as a whole it followed a general design worked out over the centuries. Under these conditions it was not connected with logical systems reproducing material processes; indeed no demand for such reproduction (in form both objective and universal as well as adequate to these processes) arose. The theoretical form of knowledge did not stand out on its own; rather it remained contiguous with the forms inherent to art. Knowledge accumulated in production, but it did not take the form of science. Rather it existed as practical recipes, methods and skills, in part accessible to all, and in part making up the secrets of the artisans guilds.
The emergence and development of the commodity capitalist mode of production had transformed the entire system of material and ideological relations in society. Above all the nature of labour changed fundamentally. In the new conditions specialization was required for the manufacture of one type of commodity, but now in mass quantities. The operations and their succession were repeated unendingly in the production of each unit of a commodity, and acquired the character of an algorithm, permitting the introduction of the division of labour according to operations and the beginnings of the widespread application of machines. Given the above the special skills of labour became more and more abstract, indifferent to individual contribution which had in an earlier period required virtuosity and artistic mastery. Labour was increasingly becoming an abstract activity which was purely mechanical and therefore impersonal and indifferent to its specific form. It was turned into formal or, much the same, a purely material activity.
We believe that precisely this nature of production (and labour) had led to fundamental changes in the forms of knowledge pre-dating it. The goals of cognition were changed 138 as well as the form in which they were fixed. For the first time in history the socially set goal of cognition became the search for and investigation of the properties, relations and forces of the natural bodies and processes for their inclusion in an artificial system created ny humans---production. Observation and experiment, which came to be regarded as the most important starting points in cognition, began to expand.
The commodity capitalist mode of production and the system of the social division of labour endemic to it brought into life a new form of knowledge---science.^^1^^
But can we deduce from concrete practical needs and tasks of developing commodity production the emergence of that form of thought which we call science and, consequently, the scientific forms of knowledge? Were the emergence and development of scientific knowledge a direct answer to the needs articulated by this production? Even a brief look at history forces us to give a negative answer to this question. In the course of the seventeenth, eighteenth and the larger part of the nineteenth century production, on the one hand, and science on the other, operated as more or less independent spheres of activity. The situation changed and science began to be transformed into a productive force only in the 1870s and 1880s. We may note modifications in the relationship between science and practice by comparing, for example, the creation of the steam engine (first half of the nineteenth century) and of the atom bomb (middle of the twentieth century). Only after the steam engine had been designed and widely applied did Nicolas Leonard Sadi Carnot establish a full scientific explanation for it. On the contrary, the atom bomb was first ``exploded'' in a scientific theoretical sense, and only then was the explosion enacted in real life.
By all appearances the emergence of science was determined not by the direct and specific goals of commodity production but by the result of its development as a whole. It seems to us that such a general result, determining the transformation of the social process of cognition into that form which we call scientific cognition and, correspondingly, scientific thought, _-_-_
~^^1^^ Marx often discussed the problem of the genetic ties between science and capitalist production. We refer here to only a few of his remarks. See K. Marx, Economic /intl Philosophic Manuscripts oj IH44, pp. 100-1 1, K. Marx, Capital, Vol. Ill, Moscow, 1971, pp. 81, 268; K. Marx, Theories of Surplus-Value, Part I, pp. 390--91.
139 was the world of object relationships engendered by the human activity as something independent of, and even dominant over, the man.This dictatorship of the material elements of labour over live labour is realized and established as a result of its capitalist organization. It is precisely the latter which engenders a specific mode of thought as well, the dominant element of which is the thing elevated over man. Concerning such a converted thought-mold, Marx wrote: "Since the economists identify past labour with capital---past labour being understood in this case not only in the sense of concrete labour embodied in the product, but also in the sense of social labour, materialised labour-time---it is understandable that they, the Pindars of capital, emphasise the objective elements of production and overestimate their importance as against the subjective element, living, immediate labour.... The producer is therefore controlled by the product, the subject by the object, labour which is being embodied by labour embodied in an object, etc. In all these conceptions, past labour appears not merely as an objective factor of living labour, subsumed by it, but vice versa; not as an element of the power of living labour, but as a power over this labour. The economists ascribe a false importance to the material factors of labour compared with labour itself in order to have also a technological justification for the specific social form, i.e., the capitalist form, in which the relationship of labour to the conditions of labour is turned upside-down, so that it is not the worker who makes use of the conditions of labour, but the conditions of labour which make use of the worker.''~^^1^^
In the natural economy of the Middle Ages the product was put out in the main only as a use value. This signifies that it only existed vis-a-vis a man. If in fact there arose relations between products they did not bear an independent character and were not transformed into a system of materialistics standing independent of humans. Therefore medieval thought only conceived of the relationship ``human-thing'', but not of the independent ``thing-thing'' relationship, for the entire world of things was considered to be but a shadow, a ``projection'' of the spiritual world.
The development of commodity production begins with the emergence of a universal market, on which the relations between products function as independent entities regulated _-_-_
^^1^^ K. Marx, Theories of Surplus-Value, Part III, Moscow, 1971, pp. 275--76.
140 by the market laws independent of the commodity producer. It is only through the relationships of things (commodities) that their relationship to man is enacted as are the relationships of people and social groups to one another. Man is enslaved by the world of things and accumulated (past) labour dominates over live labour. As a result of this process uncovered by Karl Marx human activity and the human world appear as the world of things, in which things enter into independent, objective, properly material relationships.The reader might say that there is nothing extraordinary in this, since the discussion concerns the real physical world of nature. But according to Marx, thought is given form only through activity. Therefore the physical world of things, being independent, becomes the object of thinking and the goal of cognition only when the relations in the realm of activity function independently of the human and man himself functions as a thing. Until that time the entire physical world has been perceived as a symbol of the spiritual world. When, however, the activity is centred on the production of things of the independent material world, the world of nature is also apprehended as an entity independent of man. This world can be mastered only through understanding it, through discovering its properties and relationships existing independent of man. As Marx demonstrated this world of material relations dominating man is an alienated form of the world of man per se, just as the goal of human activity turns out in the end to be man himself rather than things. But for the member of bourgeois society this activity is directly subordinated to the relations between things. Following the logic of these relations activity itself becomes variously alienated from man in the form of algorithms, formulae, technology, etc., i.e., it begins to be regarded as something ``thing-like'', mechanical.^^1^^
But after all this is a fundamental change in the mode of thought! To us today the authoritarian and ``bookish'' nature of medieval knowledge is astonishing. When the scholastics discussed a natural phenomenon they referred to the Holy Scriptures, the church authorities, the ancient philosophers; but they never turned to experiment, they never inquired of _-_-_
~^^1^^ We shall not dwell at length on the problem of the materialization of activity, its interrelations and objectifications as well as its multiple social consequences. All this was worked out in detail by Marx. His arguments on this subject are especially numerous. We refer the reader to the summary article by G. S. Batishchev, "The Active Essence of Man as a Philosophical Principle'', in The Problem of Man in Contemporary Philosophy, Moscow, 1969 (in Russian).
141 nature itself. This was, by the way, quite consistent with medieval thought. Independent existence was granted only to the spiritual world while the world of things remained a dependent, determined aspect of the former. Therefore there was nothing to "inquire of nature''. It made more sense to inquire of religion which precisely represented a form of spiritual communion. Thus alchemists and astrologists saw behind the real relations of things secret and mystical ties governing these things, and resorted to rituals and magic in the nope of exerting an influence on these ties.It is only once man's own activity appeared to him to be the activity of things that the material world was isolated in his consciousness from the spiritual world as an independent entity; the doctrine of the duality of truth arose and the protracted struggle waged by natural science against the church was initiated. At this point experiment becomes both possible and necessary, as a means of investigating the relationships between things as such. The study of nature gradually acquires the form of a science, and philosophy witnesses the emergence of materialistic notions based on mechanistic natural science and sharing the latter's historical limitations.
The mission and meaning of cognition now begin to be understood as the discovery of the laws governing the interactions of things in the form of abstract and universal relationships. With this goal in mind experiments are drawn up, the results of which are then ``generalized''. The laws of science accumulated allegedly through the ``generalization'' of the sensual empeiria are interpreted as a direct representation of the "laws of nature" independent of man, of his history and modes of thought. Since the "limitations of human nature" somehow blur the picture received, they are of course an alien element in scientific knowledge, which must be got rid of as far as possible; in other words "knowledge must be purged of subjectivity''. Hence the distrust of fantasy and hypotheses and the homage paid to the ``objective'' empeiria and to the methods of adjusting it.
Material production proper and the production of knowledge are now separatee from each other. Knowledge participates in production not as a process but as a "finished product" drawn from another sphere. Since this result must be transferred trom the sphere of cognition to that of practical application, it must be expressed in an informative and general form. In the world of material relations unmediate universality is expressed as an abstract, formal and mechanistic one, both in 142 material production as such and in logic. For that reason there exists the tendency to express knowledge in formal logic and symbolic structures. This is also facilitated by the division of labour which in any given sphere (with the exception of art) leads to a division into leaders and executors. In such a system knowledge acquires effective practical force only if it is articulated as a formalized system convenient for the elaboration of unambiguous and precise algorithms guiding behaviour. Finally, knowledge considered as a system embodying general results ready for application (viz., as a formal system: formulae, equations, projects, the technological process, etc.), becomes the product of theoretical production, while the materialization of intellectual labour becomes a thing, albeit a special one, in virtue of its universal character and the particular form of its consumption, which is connected with the fact that knowledge is the result of universal intellectual labour. This thing becomes a part of the general system of material relations.
All of this leads to the situation under which precise natural science based on mechanics becomes a model ofsorts for other spheres of knowledge. Its research methods and theory constructs (including the relation to empeiria, formalization and mathematization) gradually pervade all spheres of cognition, imparting to them the specific form characterizing contemporary science.
The completed revolutionary transformation of West European culture as a whole could be presented as a unique `turnabout'' in consciousness, thought and the human psyche.
In the Middle Ages knowledge of the subject, of the spirit (in the form of Christian religion, metaphysics, etc.) made claims to universality and endeavoured to explain all of nature, including its objective, material side (this explains, for example, the magical rites and incantations accompanying the alchemist's production of chemical reactions).
In modern times science becomes the predominant social form of knowledge as material relations oegin to dominate strictly human relations, and so the knowledge of the object, of matter (in the form of science and various materialist or "common sense" schools) lays claims to universality, encompassing all nature, including its subjective, spiritual side. This explains the idea of "man as machine" in its various (and in fact little differing) historical modifications, from seventeenth-century mechanics to contemporary cybernetics. It further explains the attempts to scientifically manipulate man.
143The medieval world looked upon nature through the prism of the spirit; spirituality tinged the whole resultant picture. Consequently explanation was considered to be given to that which agreed with a certain spiritual goal (in the form of a ``heavenly'' goal). The contemporary European looks upon nature through the prism of matter; materiality tinges the picture of the world (world as matter in motion). That for which a material cause is found is to be explained. Endeavouring to explain something or other, the medieval thinker (and the medieval layman) tried to answer the question "what for?''. The scientist of today (and the man of common sense) accepts as explanation that which answers the question "why?''.
Science rejects goal determination as unfounded teleology, mysticism and idealism. Its rationalism conciously relies upon experiment and upon that logic which represents a formally general scheme of material relations, relations of causality deprived of their dialectical correlate and opposition, i.e., goal relations. Such one-sided causality inevitably degenerates, in theoretical and scientific terms, into a quasi-spatial relationship, that is to say, into a structure in which temporal relationships are reduced to sequential relationships within some logical space.
This leads to a ``geometrization'' of science and, on the one hand, is the basis for scientific prevision and practical might, and on the other, replaces explanation with description, investigation of process with analysis of structure. Therefore, for example, biology which is concerned with self-developing systems, i.e., with processes and expediences, is a difficult nut to crack for contemporary science.
Engendered by the development of commodity capitalist production, science itself becomes a sphere of the division of labour and functions as a particular field for the professional activity of a narrow circle of people. It stands in opposition to the mass of individuals as an "external force" completely independent of their will and consciousness, as a "materialized force of knowledge" the plenipotentiaries of which are the scientists, who personify and thus monopolize this general force of knowledge, although in the final analysis it turns out to be a force for capital itself, standing in opposition to labour.
At the same time, since science is a social institution, a system of social theoretical production, it is also opposed to each scientist as an "external force'', the more so because the division of labour and specialization penetrate more and more deeply into scientific production. We note the appearance ot divisions into theoreticians and experimenters, into creative 144 thinkers and functionaries. Science is more and more differentiated into specialized spheres and the scientist himself becomes more and more a narrow specialist.
At the same time we observe a process of integration, a synthesis of separate specialized branches of science through both the elaboration of Dreader theories and the appearance of ``generalizing'' scientific disciplines (cybernetics, for example, aspires to the latter role). However, such integration does not eliminate the growing division of labour in science nor does it liquidate its effects, since, on the one hand, specialization continues within each branch of science and, on the other, ``synthetic'', ``generalizing'' scientific disciplines bear the same abstractly universal nature, which also tends to turn the scholars engaged in such disciplines into narrow and one-sided specialists.
All of this, together with the formalization and mathematization of science, leads us to conclude that in and of itself a professional concern with science is insufficient for the formation of the versatile individual. In fact scientific work itself begins to resemble industrial production in terms of its functional division of labour. Utilising the newest research techniques (e.g., accelerators) and data processing methods (e.g., computers) major scientific research centers work on the resolution of a given cluster of problems, while within this center there also exists a ``technical'' division of labour. In this fashion a professional concern with science forms the person as a "partial individual" with all the resulting consequences.
A professional concern with science gradually leads the thought of the scientist to a formal system somewhat alienated from him and ultimately corresponding to the system of material relations, and forces him to act in accordance with its laws, to submit to it. On the contrary, creative ability and its corresponding aspect in the development of knowledge is expressed in the substantive movement of reflection. It can be formed and alienated only after it has led to a definite result and so after it has been subtracted, that is to say, when it is actually absent. This aspect represents the creation of the new, the development of new ideas and principles which can serve as the basis for new theories. Therefore in order to be innovative in science the scientist must free himself not only of old theory restricting his horizons and hardened into a formal system (in which the resolution of a theoretical problem is embodied in a collection of definite methods necessary for the realization of the given problem) but also from that mode of thought which seemed to him to be the only scientific one.
145Movement within the framework of a formal system seems natural and normal for thought (the more so because within this system it is precisely the formal apparatus of theory which is applied in practice). Only a limited number of scientists succeed in overcoming this hurdle and in operating as the creators and inventors of new ideas, while the creative act itself turns out to be inexplicable within the framework of the accepted formalism. Therefore, this act is not brought to completion at the moment when, say, the scientist devotes his energies to the particular problem forcing himself to concentrate within the confines of logic, which he considers to be scientific. This is why the "scientists find out things first and then rather ineffectively muse on the way they were discovered".^^1^^
Scientific discoveries and theories within the system of commodity capitalist production are utilized for the improvement of this system, for its further standardization and automation. This leads to increments in labour productivity and in the volumes of goods, and consequently to further enslavement of live labour by accumulated (past) labour. The might of the social subject is intensified while the individual becomes more and more impoverished and standardized. Simultaneously all the negative sides of the division of labour grow more pronounced. Marx characterised this process in relation to science as follows: "...natural science has invaded and transformed human life all the more practically through the medium of industry; and has prepared numan emancipation, however directly and much it had to consummate dehumanizaticn".^^2^^
In connection with this mass production and science (as the mass production of theoretical knowledge) launch an offensive, as it were, on the "eternal human values" (moral, aesthetic, etc.). A situation is created in which scientific thought develops to the detriment of morals.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ SCIENCE AND COMMUNISM.If we look at contemporary science as a sphere of the social division of labour, a system bearing the function of producing theoretical knowledge, then the conclusion is inevitable that _-_-_
~^^1^^ J. D. Bernal, Science in History, London, 1954, p. 11.
~^^2^^ K. Marx, Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, p. 110.
146 such a system is peculiar to a historically limited stage in the development of mankind.Science itself prepares its own liquidation as a historically limited form of the production of theoretical knowledge. It functions as a necessary factor in the formation of man, his liberation from all aspects of uncreative activity. The development of civilization begins with the emergence (as a result of the social division of labour) of conditions under which the inactivity of a few is "the condition for the development of the universal strength of the human mind'.'' (Marx). The inactivity of the few is made possible through the hard labour of the many, who are transformed into "talking tools''. Such an initial and crude division demonstrates the actual historical limitations of man---the potentially universal, creatively active and thinking being. Human activity itself turns out to be largely inhuman, and, for ensuring free creativity of the few (in the given instance embodying the spiritual progress of the whole) it becomes necessary to transfer to the shoulders of the many the unfree and uncreative activities. To add to this, such a division ``projects'' direction to the further development of mankind.
This direction consists in the development of the material body of civilisation as the inorganic social body of man (it is built by man as an inorganic system with specialized functions). Man unremittingly transforms nature into his inorganic body. It is precisely in this way that he can gradually free himself from uncreative aspects of activity. In other words the separation (and consequently the formation of ties) of the intelligent being---man (who himself is nature in its universal potentiality)---from the unintelligent nature, the splintering of nature into subject and object, continues even today. The subject must become in actuality what he is in potentiality--- intelligent, purposeful universal being. In the future the material body of civilization, the developing inorganic societal body of man, will take upon itself all mechanical, repetitive, uncreative aspects of labour, having freed each and every individual for spiritual, i.e., human and not material activity.
The entire history of the social division of labour may be regarded in this sense as the history of the separation and splintering from human activity of uncreative aspects of work, or in other words, as the formation of human activity as such, the formation of the human being himself.
The world of material relations and mechanical, formal activity developed by capitalism on the basis of machine 147 production and the division of labour, is the necessary condition for the separation of the uncreative types of activity from human activity proper. The evolution of society as an organic system here also follows the general law of the development of organic systems: at first function is separated---material activity, but the corresponding material structure is still lacking, and the function must be carried out by the human. Then man himself creates the corresponding structure in the form of an inorganic body, a structure capable of carrying out the given function.
This structure operates in the form of machine civilization. The ever more complex and independent system of machines takes over a larger share of the work functions of the partial man. The development of cybernetics and automated production demonstrates that in principle any repetitive operations, be they physical or mental, may be formalized and transferred to a machine. Such operations are not creative, and so they are not human forms of activity.
Karl Marx and Frederick Engels in their criticism of Max Stirner, observed that "what Sancho [Stirner---the author] here calls human labour is, disregarding his bureaucratic fantasies, the same thing as is usually meant by machine labour, labour which, as industry develops, devolves more and more on machines".^^1^^ One hundred years later our contemporary, the founder of cybernetics, Norbert Wiener, wrote: "...most of the human labour which the automatic factory displaces is an inhuman sort of human labour....''^^2^^ In this context it is revealed that the inhuman nature of machine civilization (which is often portrayed in contemporary literature and in scientific essays as an assault by the world of machines on man, as the divesting of human functions from man by the machine, and finally as the enslavement of man by the machine), exists only so long as machine functions must be carried out by man transformed into a specialized tool in a specialized machine. Such an enslavement of man is eliminated when he transposes to his inorganic body (in the form of machine civilization, i.e., the developed automated system of machine production) all uncreative operations. Labour then becomes free, creative activity.
It becomes clear that the evolution of the world of material relations is the formation of a structure which must take upon _-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, The German Ideology, Moscow, 1964, pp. 429--30.
~^^2^^ Norbert Wiener, I Am a Mathematician, Garden City, N.Y., 1956, p. 311.
148 itself the functions of formal material activity (both in the material and ideal expressions, both in physical and mental work). It is also clear that this world itself is a necessary but a subsumed moment in the human world. In this manner that which so often emerges in contemporary literature as an assault by machines upon man is in reality a complex and dual process. On the one hand, the actual social being of man acquires an increasingly ``inhuman'' character; the system of automated machines strips him of a variety of work and social functions, extending even to that of management. If we are to believe certain cybernetics experts when they assert that man is a machine and promise that the creation of an artificial intellect is imminent---this really is a catastrophe. But if it is true that what bears a machine character in the activity of man is forced upon him by the actual historically transient form of his social being, then this very same process may be seen in a different light. By divesting the human of a number of functions, the on-going scientific and technological revolution ``explains'' to him that these are not properly human functions, and prepares him for a comprehension and implementation of that activity the goal of which cannot be a thing, but only per se. This prepares the liberation of man from all machine elements of his activity and at the same time from its reified, alienated nature, that is to say, it sets the ground for the ``humanizing'' of man.From this point of view contemporary science is a necessary historical stage in the mastering of the material side of reality, which is independent of man. But in the final result this mastering bears on human reality and can be nothing else but the theoretical expression of the object-activity of the human (see, for example, Marx's first thesis on Feuerbach). As a result of the socio-historical conditions discussed above (the commodity capitalist system of production), the objectively material side of reality operates in thought as the entirety of activity and, consequently, formal knowledge---as all rational knowledge. Moreover, the expansion of the formalized methods of science seems to be of deep socio-historical significance. Formalization in these conditions turns out to be a powerful tool and a theoretical criterion for inquiry and for the division of the contemporary historical form of object-activity into the human activity proper and machine activity (which man is engaged in for the time being considering it a truly human occupation). The latter also, of course, remains a human activity, but not an unmediated one. It is mediated by the material body of civilization and represents that fragment of reality which man 149 in principle can, and in the future must transfer to the shoulders of his inorganic body.
All knowledge and all forms of labour which are amenable to formalization must therefore be so constructed. Any information and any process can be formalized if they have taken on a certain structure (or, in philosophical terms, if they are expressed in a certain ``measure'', and represent this measure). But since there is no unstructured knowledge or processes, everything may in principle be formalized. The formal theoretical model itself of any phenomenon also represents a measure, considered from the aspect of its spatial-logical relationships---that of the elimination of quality by quantity. Not amenaole to formalization is only the moment or substantial creative movement to new knowledge, connected with the transcendence to the sphere of the immeasurable through the development of a concrete-universal contradiction.
When this new knowledge arises as a new measure it is of necessity formalized and, as such, is utilized in practice. As a consequence formalization becomes a tool and a criterion for the division of activity into creative (which is both properly human and properly spiritual) and uncreative, algorithmic (material, the laws of which are those of the functioning of the inorganic system, and which therefore may be transferred in toto to the inorganic body of man).
All social production is marked by a tendency to bifurcate into the sphere of the object-spiritual, creative and the sphere of the material, properly speaking, the latter being gradually transferred to the system of machines, demanding less and less direct participation by man in uncreative repetitive operations. We note from the start that the devolution of production into spiritual and material by no means corresponds with a division into mental and manual labour. The types of labour, as social categories, pertain in equal measure to the sphere of material production as such (multiplying that which has already been created), and so the elimination of the existing contradiction between them is possible only as the liberation of man from the power of material production through the transfer of this production to the automatic system of machines. Thus, for example, from this point of view, a solution of a mathematical equation, according to the known algorithms is a material activity while the sculptor, molding the clay for his work, is occupied with spiritual labour. Spiritual labour is also the creation and the search for new algorithms.
But indeed even the search itself may in the ultimate result be formalized. It is possible to find and use some algorithms 150 for the search for new algorithms. We have arrived at a notion of that activity and production in which there is no fixed boundary between the creation and the production of formal material activities (mass production), viz., in which in principle it is impossible to draw up a list of operations which are amenable or non-amenable to formalization. Any result achieved through spiritual production efforts is formalized and ceases to be a direct end of human activity. It enters into the sphere of the strictly material, mass, automated production. That which yesterday was the goal of creativity, today becomes the standard of mass production and a cause in the relationships of things, a tool of utility. The mechanically structured---unfolded in space---division of labour among social groups (the social division of labour) is in this manner replaced by the dynamic---unfolded in time---system of the division of labour between man per se and his inorganic body in the form of the machine system. Thereby we observe the elimination of the conditions for the existence of social groups (including classes), the conditions for the alienation of labour and of man; activity sheds its reified form, its direct goal becomes the production of forms of human intercourse, i.e., the development of man himself as a creative universal being. Man stands "beyond the sphere of actual material production".^^1^^
These changes in activity and the elimination of social division of labour must be accompanied by the disappearance of the historical mode of the production of theoretical knowledge connected with these factors. It will be converted into a higher form just as medieval knowledge gave way to modern science. Marx retains the name of science for this _-_-_
^^1^^ ``In fact, the realm of freedom actually begins only where labour which is determined by necessity and mundane considerations ceases; thus in the very nature of things it lies beyond the sphere of actual material production.... Beyond it [the realm of necessary and actual material production---A. A.] begins that development of human energy which is an end in itself, the true realm of freedom, which, however, can blossom forth only with this realm of necessity as its basis.'' (K. Marx, Capital, Vol. Ill, p. 820.)
``Within communist society, the only society in which the original and free development of individuals ceases to be a mere phrase, this development is determined precisely by the connection of individuals, a connection which consists partly in the economic prerequisites and partly in the necessary solidarity of the free development of all, and, finally, in the universal character of the activity of individuals....'' (K. Marx and F. Engels, The German Ideology, p. 483.) See also K. Marx and F. Engels, The German Ideology, pp. 87, 91; K. Marx, Theories of Surplus-Value, Part III, p. 122; K. Marx, Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, pp. 106--07, 159.
151 future form of knowledge: "History itself is a real part of natural history---of nature's coming to be man. Natural science will in time subsume under itself the science of man, just as the science of man will subsume under itself natural science: there will be one science.''~^^1^^ For Marx the science of man is not anthropology in the contemporary meaning of the word, but the science of the development of the social subject and individual, of the development of humanity, the latter of necessity being understood as a natural historical process. Consequently, according to Marx the future united and universal science of man will absorb all---natural science, social science and philosophy. It will correspond to the universal nature of labour wnich will be directly aimed not at the production of material objects but at the development of man himself.Thus, it must be kept in view that the science of the future, of which Marx speaks, represents a different form of knowledge in comparison witn that which is commonly called contemporary science. At this point it is still difficult to describe it in some detail. It is clear, however, that it will differ substantially from contemporary science both in subject (its direct subject will be the world of man as the objectivized man, not as the alienated world of things) and in its internal logical structure, in its social organization, relations to production and in its role in the education of man.
The formally logical and abstract side, which in contemporary science forms the basis for the practical application of knowledge and is turned into a fetish, is often taken to be the sole scientific and even only rational aspect of science. But it will cease to be the end in itself of theoretical work; rather it will become more machine than directly human activity. On the contrary, the dialectical movement of knowledge which is the foundation of creativity and which contemporary science regards as something irrational, transgressing its boundaries, win become the immediate rational activity of the social subject, and consequently of every individual since the latter will reflect in a universal form, being the subject of the social process as a whole.
Since there will be no grounds for the emergence of formal-symbolic fetishism, there will be no need for ``insane'' ideas, for that which transgresses the boundaries of the existing formalism. Apparently the ``dynamic'' division of labour between man and the machine system cannot be _-_-_
^^1^^ K. Marx, Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, p. 111.
152 ultimately completed. It is simply a new form of the uninterrupted life activity of the social man, a new form of ongoing human history. It tends to transform all nature into an inorganic body, which, naturally, cannot be completed in finite time. From the philosophical point of view this is the continuing process of the dichotomizing of nature into subject and object, the formation of man as a subject, i.e., progressing anthropogenesis.We shall refrain here from entering into a detailed discussion of this question. We must note only that the modern form of scientific education must yield to a different mode of upbringing including an equal measure of logic and aesthetics. For this new form of knowledge the connection between theory and practice is not a problem, since this form is not a sphere of the division of labour or a professional occupation isolated from other aspects of social production. The means of research here are simultaneously the means of production and objects of consumption, since man stands in need of them for his human development just as he stands in need of food, clothing, etc.
At the same time the basic aspects and features of this future form of knowledge are contained within contemporary science. To wit, science, and physics in particular, is already prodding many scholars to a recognition of the fact that scientific theories reproduce the thing not only as pure object but also as man's manipulation with this thing. Werner Heisenberg wrote, apropos of this subject: "If we take another look today at the various closed systems of concepts which were created in the past or will be possibly created in the future for the purpose of scientific research, we will readily see that these systems are disposed, to all appearances, in the direction of increments in tne contribution of subjective elements to the system of concepts" [or, more precisely, in the direction of an increased awareness of these contributions by scientists themselves---the Author].^^1^^
We could give other examples demonstrating the contradictions in the development of contemporary science, in which the tendencies of the new form of knowledge are given expression and which could be named the science of the future. Generally speaking it is a purely terminological question whether or not to designate as science the modes of spiritual-theoretical production of antiquity and the medieval world, as well as the form of direct universal spiritual production of the future. It is _-_-_
^^1^^ Werner Heisenberg, Physik und Philosophic, Stuttgart, 1959, S. 95.
153 only important to distinguish between the historically determined, transient form of production of theoretical knowledge, called contemporary science (or the science of the new age) and the qualitatively different forms, peculiar to other epochs and comprising different cultural systems. Many scholars in our opinion mistakenly consider the features of modern science to be characteristic of theoretical knowledge as such.The same mistake is committed by scholars who endeavour to clarify what percentage of people possess creative abilities and even declare the derived figure to be a ``natural'' or " biological ceiling''. The generally accepted figure is rather low, usually fluctuating around 6-8 per cent. But it must be taken into account that man and his abilities are shaped through object-activity. Under capitalist production this activity ( including education) is such that the formation of mass creative abilities is excluded (or at least rendered purely fortuitous). What is more, this activity is quite vigorously utilized, in the appropriate phrase of C. Wright Mills, for the cultivation of "cheerful robots''. The question then must be formulated in the reverse fashion: how great are the creative potentialities of man, if, despite the entire system of upbringing and education he undergoes, a limited number of individuals nevertheless succeed in developing these innate potentialities!
The extrapolation of contemporary man's features to man in general and the similar extrapolation of the parameters of contemporary science and the logic of contemporary thought to forms of knowledge and thought in other epochs reflect an uncritical attitude to existing empirical reality and are a manifestation of the antihistorical tendencies in scientific thought (as material thought it is capable of depicting structure, but not process in the logico-rational way). From the point of view of these tendencies those elements of the knowledge of antiquity and the Middle Ages which are at variance with knowledge in the form of contemporary science seem to be exclusively ``mistaken'' and ``insufficient'', stemming from the lack of adequate experimental data, imperfect techniques, the imposition of religious ideology, the oppression of the church, etc.
The notion that science evolves gradually through the accumulation of scientific knowledge is ordinarily underscored by references to the "science of antiquity" or, more cautiously, to the "scientific knowledge of antiquity''. In this context we meet with particular frequency tne Euclidean system and Archimedes' law of floating bodies. In our opinion tne epithet ``scientific'' applied to this knowledge is a 154 projection upon the past of the customary conceptions of the present. In the era in which it evolved the Euclidean system did not play the role both in theory and in practice, which it does in the system of contemporary scientific knowledge. Indeed it was created without the intent of clarifying the spatial relations of the material world, but was rather research into the ability of man to build analogous systems. Therefore in the eyes of its contemporaries it had not an objective but primarily a subjective and even individual, personal meaning: it was an astonishing example of the subtlety of its creator's wisdom, both amazing and worthy of homage.
Archimedes' law is another case in point. It is said that Archimedes found a practical application for his discovery by determining the admixture of silver in a gold crown. However, the legend describing this incident does not regard it as a universal, impersonal technological method, and we search in vain for signs of interest in the Taw itself or in the technological opportunities for applying it. This comes as no surprise since the goal of the legend was to praise the wisdom of Archimedes as an aspect of his astonishing personality. The same goal is served by the legend surrounding his death, when Archimedes would not permit a soldier to step on his draughts in the sand. Both these stories were of equal value to his contemporaries since they related to the same subject and depicted one and the same personality.
The "spiritual production" of every epoch, including the production of theoretical knowledge possesses fullness as a qualitatively unique concrete-historical system. Only after examining this system as a whole may we grasp it as a dependent element in a system of a higher order---- objectactivity as a whole, incorporating spiritual production and thought.
Thus, contemporary science and contemporary scientific thought with its logic, its specific understanding of man's attitude vis-a-vis the world of things, with the extension of exact methods to all spheres of spiritual activity, with the corresponding form of organization of scientific institutions and scientific work---all this is a historical form of production of theoretical knowledge. It arose with the emergence of commodity production, a necessary element of which it became. Its terminal point is located in the abolition of the social division of labour and the development of communist production. Its historical mission lies in the liberation of man from uncreative material activity, his transformation into the master of material relations, the assimilation of the entire 155 world as a human world and the preparation for the emancipation of man as universal being.
It goes without saying that the development of science is not the sole factor in the emancipation of man. It fulfills its mission only given the transformation of the entire system of social relations. But the development of science itself is a necessary condition of this transformation, a powerful instrument for remaking the world (in this article we shall not discuss the other factors).
The historical process marking the branching off of positive scientific knowledge from philosophy may be regarded as the separation of knowledge of things from knowledge of the suoject (and consequently, of thought, of man as the subject of knowledge). The possibility of this separation is inherent in the contradictory nature of object-activity itself. The subject can only transform the object by de-objectifying it, that is to say, by transforming the thing-form of the object into the form of its strictly subjective movement, into the form of thought. This movement of necessity incorporates a moment of passivity, contemplation in the form of knowledge of the object in itself, independent of the action of the subject, knowledge of the causal determinacy of the object as an externally independent thing. The subject, in this fashion, must subordinate its activity to external material necessity.
At the same time activity remains on the whole active; the moment of passivity turns out to be but the expression of its universality, its ability to reproduce any form. Thought, as the universal reflection of activity, turns out to be movement capable of reproducing any conceivable form, this form being each time simultaneously the mental reproduction of thought itself in a specific form. This is expressed in the knowledge by the subject of itself as an active subject, transforming the material world into its object-world, into its inorganic body, implementing its aim. It is consequently expressed in the knowledge of the goal-determinacy of the world as human world.
These two sides of activity and knowledge are transformed by the social division of labour into independently existing functions attached to different social groups and representing professions as such. Positive science and philosophy operate in such a capacity.^^1^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ "The natural sciences have developed an enormous activity and have accumulated a constantly growing mass of material. Philosophy, however, has remained just as alien to them as they remain to philosophy.'' (K. Marx, Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, p. 110.)
156The first participates in actual material production, in the production of the world of things.
The second should take place in the formation and development of man. But because contemporary production is directly and predominantly concerned with the production of things and does not aim to ``produce'' man, and because of the social division of labour, philosophy turns out to be outside the sphere of the social organisation of this production. From the point of view of positive science, philosophy is a ``parasite''.
Whereas the professionalism or science (under commodity capitalist production) is the inherent characterisation of science, the condition of its actual practical strength, professionalism of philosophy is an indicator of its actual practical impotence in the given conditions, and of its only potential possibilities.^^1^^
Since knowledge necessarily reflects, each of the separated sides relates to its object-sphere and to itself as to an all-embracing and confined whole (a whole in itself). Therefore, putting at a distance its own reflection, science gives birth to various forms of ``scientific'' philosophy. For example English empiricism of the seventeenth century, French materialism of the eighteenth century, positivism, neopositivism, contemporary "science of science are all theoretical constructions which endeavour to depict the development of science, scientific cognition and thought in logical forms practised by science itself, that is, within the framework of material relations. Within this framework rational reflection cannot grasp determination in terms of the whole; for it the sole scientific mode of determination is that proceeding from the part to the whole, from the past to the present---cause. Hence the numerous attempts to treat cognition simply as the generalization from the sense date derived from empeiria. Consequently, here the general cannot serve as the basis for reasoning, and these forms of the reflection of science as they emerge are opposed to philosophy as metaphysics, as science of man, as the reflection of knowledge considered in its direct universal form, treating it from on high and ridiculing it as reactionary, outmoded, unscientific and useless, and boasting of their own ``scientific'' origin. But in point of fact this so disdained ``metaphysics'' is the historically universal reflection _-_-_
~^^1^^ "The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point, however, is to change it.'' (K. Marx and F. Engels, Selected Works, Vol. I, Moscow, 1969, p. 15.)
157 of knowledge, and is the real foundation for scientific self-consciousness in the broadest sense of the word.Thus knowledge turns out to be split into the knowledge of things (ordinary consciousness, practical keenness of wit, common sense, science) and the knowledge of man (morality, religion, art and philosophy).
Let us specify our understanding of this split relative to science. The fact of the matter is that both in the Russian and in the German the term ``science'' (nauka, Wissenschaft) has a rather vague meaning. Hither it is customary to refer any knowledge which is considered objective and authentic. Therefore we find listed as science the widest range of knowledge---in terms of content, mode of derivation and mode of definition which results in confusion and misunderstanding. To wit, having looked over the essential differences between the natural-scientific and humanitarian knowledge, the neo-Kantians had to divide Wissenschaft into the science of nature and the science of culture. Such a division leaves unclear the position of psychology, philosophy and political economy. The partition of nauka into the natural and social sciences practised in several countries suffers from the same insufficiency. For instance, the social sciences come to include aesthetics and economics which differ sharply in terms of tasks, methods of research, definitions and the application of results.
In this context the methodology and logic of the so-called exact sciences remain the model and criterion of scientificity for all spheres of knowledge. We tried to demonstrate that these exact sciences represent the consistent development of adequate knowledge of the world, seen as the world of things separated from and opposed to knowledge of man. In this sense to regard the exact sciences as the model and the criterion of aesthetics or history means in the final analysis to reduce personal relationships to material relations between things, man to a machine, etc. On the other hand, political economy---a traditional social science---in that part in which it regards man as labour power, bears the character of knowledge of things. When, however, it is concerned with an inquiry into the conditions tor forming the individual and relations between individuals it must borrow all the initial parameters for these relations from without, in particular from philosophy. The same may be said of sociology in so far as it endeavours to objectively investigate man as a thing, as an object.
Therefore, calling science the concrete-historical form of knowledge of things, we have in view not only its genesis but 158 also a contemporary understanding of the methods and logic of science, the model for which remain the so-called exact sciences. In this context we feel that a more accurate rendition of the substance of the matter is given by the English ``science'' than by the Russian ``nauka'' or the German ``Wissenschaft''.
In the context of material relations scientific inquiry (medicine, anthropology, psychology, etc.) treats man as only an object in its material, causal form. But indeed he is also a subject, and it is this which is most important about him.
Man is a material being and in this sense operates of course as a thing. Such a conception of man allows one to see, abstractly speaking, what he has in common with other things (including cybernetic devices) but not what distinguishes him from these things and makes him specifically human (e.g., will, freedom, creativity, morality, etc.). Thus positive science is incapable of analyzing man- from the point of view of his ``humanity''.^^1^^ And once again we find above all a recognition of this not in the special sciences but rather in philosophy and art. In support of this we might cite the following statement by Samuil Marshak: "Scientists use a yardstick which does not reach the full height of man; they measure man physically, physiologically, etc., i.e., they measure the higher with the lower. Here there is always the danger of reducing the higher to the level of the lower. I consider myself an enemy of idealist philosophy. But I do think that sometime they will arrive at another, the most perfect yardstick, that of spirituality, poetics and the poetic imagination. The lower will be measured by the degree of the higner existing within it. And much will be discovered along this path.''~^^2^^
__ALPHA_LVL3__ THE ETHICAL CONSCIOUSNESSEthical doctrines have been in existence since antiquity. Ethnography, and the history of culture, religion and _-_-_
~^^1^^ The limits of the possible for science in this sense are recognized by scientists themselves. Here is what, for example, Max Born wrote on the subject: "It seemed to me then [in 1921---A. A.] that the scientific method was more preferable than other, subjective methods of forming the picture of the world---philosophy, poetry or religion.... Now I regard my former belief in the superiority of science to other forms of human thought and action as self-deception....'' (Max Born, Physik in Wandel runner Zeit, Braunschweig, 1957, S. V.)
~^^2^^ Quoted from the notes of V. Berestov, Yunost, No. 6, 1966, p. 83 (in Russian).
159 philosophy have uncovered a multiplicity of ethical doctrines and systems both practical, determining the forms of human intercourse and education in a given society, collective or social group, and theoretical, making claims to an explanation of one or another form of ethical consciousness.The problem of ethics (conscience, duty, etc.) in philosophy is one of the most complex. The ethical consciousness turns out to be contradictory and when attempts are made at analyzing it on a formal demonstrative-logical level it splinters into an endlessly diverging series of antitheses. Therefore we find in the history of philosophy numerous attempts to present ethics in a contradictory and splintered form (to wit, Kant in the form of an inner dialogue between intelligible and empirical characters).
In the present article we have set ourselves a modest task: to present in its most general framework a possible scheme for discussing the ethical consciousness in the context of Marx's theory.
It must be mentioned from the outset that ethical relations were not a direct subject of research for Marx. Nevertheless his fundamental ideas on man, society, and history, as well as isolated statements encountered in his writings give us a basis for a general discussion of the ethical consciousness in the framework of his theoretical conception.
We recall that the historical dialectical conception set forth by Marx had its origin in the process of the critical reworking and ``inversion'' of the corresponding conception advanced by Hegel. We shall try to briefly delineate Hegel's position in the sphere of ethics. Hegel attached a historico-dialectical meaning to the splintered and anti-nomical nature of the ethical consciousness (exposed and presented in theology and philosophy) and distinguished ethics from morality, presenting the epochs of the development of self-consciousness of the Absolute Spirit as differing, in particular, either in the dominance of ethics or of morality. Further, according to Hegel, these forms coexist---given the dominance of one or the other---in each historical epoch in complex dialectical interrelationships. As distinct from many philosophers and in particular from Kant, for Hegel ethical forms are not only forms of individual consciousness, but also objective characteristics of actually existing social structures ana relations (the state, law, the family, etc.).
According to Hegel, the meaning of the terms ``ethics'' and ``morality'' in their historical modifications correspond to the general scheme of development of the Absolute Spirit, passing 160 through, in particular, the stages of subjective and objective spirit and being elevated to the ever greater fullness and concreteness of self-consciousness.
Correspondingly Hegel first considers the state which may be signified as the existence of the objective spirit "in itself'', and calls this the state of ethics. In history this corresponds to the absorption of the individual, his (dissolution) in the tribe, and the absence in him of an individual consciousness as opposed to the collective.
The next stage was signified by Hegel as the moral: it consists in the development of the subjective, individual (and therefore accidental) spirit. Here the individual isolates himself from the collective, apprehends himself as personality and, on the one hand, finds within himself conscience, duty and other ethical motives underlying his behaviour and relations to people, and on the other, detaches these motives from himself, ascribing to them the general .form of necessity which he, although he found it within himself, now must submit to. This universal self-apprehending form, serving now as a criterion for the evaluation of intentions and behaviour (both one's own and that of others) is in fact morality. Here the spirit is fragmented and dispersed in the mass of individuals comprising civil---bourgeois---society.
But, apprehending himself as a free moral subject, a personality, the individual must make the further step, viz., he must recognize the higher (viz-a-viz his subjectivity) necessity of the objective spirit in its universal form and must submit to it. Now the spirit becomes integral once again, subsuming individualities, absorbing the personalities, and thus bearing within itself morality as its form. It once again becomes ethical, but, in comparison with the primitive unreflected (and therefore internally undifferentiated) form of ethics richer and internally differentiated. The objectified form of primitive ethics turns out to be, according to Hegel, the family, the tribe, the objectified form of morality---the civil society; and the supreme universal objectified form of the moral spirit---the state with its institutions (law, the bureaucratic apparatus, the police, courts, etc.).
Since the morally free personality must now freely and consciously submit himself to a supreme necessity, the Hegelian formula emerges that "freedom is cognized necessity''. The new and higher moral state is regarded to be the objective spirit, which having passed through the stage of morality has apprehended its own ethical content (and now exists not only "in itself" but also "for itself'') and 161 implemented it in the form of the state. Thus "the fact of the matter in no way depends on the wishes of separate persons, on whether or not they want for law and justice to be effectuated ... law and justice derive their force not through this agreement of the individuals. The universal does not need the approval of separate persons and when its laws are violated it shows its power in punishment.''~^^1^^
The individual is offered as a sacrifice to the universal which appears in the form of necessity and external expediency. There exists one superpersonality (iibermensch)---the Absolute Spirit. The individuals form its tools and material and can never become a "whole in itself" that is, personalities. The awareness by the individual of the necessity of submitting to this universal force is declared freedom and ethical consciousness.
Ludwig Feuerbach's proclamation of humanism in the form of an anthropological principle was a direct reaction against this anti-humanist concept of Hegel's. Here the centre of attention and the sole value is declared to be the human individual as a natural, sensuous being. His free strivings to self-fulfilment and happiness become the foundation of ethics. However, having rejected the Hegelian absorption of the individual in the universal, Feuerbach overlooked the complex dialectical relationship between the individual and the collective, a relationship which ensures the reproduction of human generations and thereby ensures the historical being and development of the individuals as such. For Feuerbach man is an abstract natural individual, and for this reason his humanism and ethics remain abstract. Analysing the Feuerbachian position, Engels remarked that his theory of morals is "...designed to suit all periods, all peoples and all conditions, and precisely for that reason it is never and nowhere applicable".^^2^^
In opposition to Hegel and Feuerbach, Marx believed that the problem consisted in explaining whether and how it is possible for the individual to develop into a free and universal personality. As distinct from Hegel, Marx regarded man as a whole within itself, as a potentially universal and free being, developing into a personality. As distinct from Feuerbach, for Marx the individual can become a personality only in society and _-_-_
~^^1^^ Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Asthetik, Bd. I, Berlin and Weimar, 1965, S. 182.
~^^2^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, Selected Works, Vol. Ill, Moscow, 1972, pp. 359--60.
162 only in the process of the historical development of this society.The dominance over man by an external abstract universality is connected with the existence of the social division of labour, social groups and, in the final analysis, with the definite, historically limited level of the productive forces. This must be overcome through historical development. (One of the most important means for this overcoming, as we saw above, is scientific and technological progress.)
In the opinion of Marx the existence of certain universal interests, submission to which is demanded from the individual by morals, is an illusion. Under the mask of general interests there always operate the interests of real single individuals, making up social groups, classes, etc. "Communist theoreticians,'' wrote Marx and Engels, "the only ones who have time to devote to the study of history, are distinguished precisely because they alone have discovered that throughout history the general interest is created by individuals who are defined as private persons.''~^^1^^
In affirming the social being of man Marx has in mind not the subordination of the individual to the universal interest, which is a historically transient and limited form of his being, but rather the circumstance that society is the natural environment for man, where in comprehensive contact with other individuals he is formed as a human and can stand apart as personality. "The man is not only a social animal, but an animal which can isolate himself only in society.''^^2^^ However, as a result of the historical development of the social division of labour, human activity as the sphere for the self-molding of the individual turns out to be divided up among social groups---estates, classes, professional and other amalgamations, the tie between which assumes a material form. Consequently activity (becoming the abstract labour of the abstract individual) and its aims also take on a material and abstract form. To the extent that any social group bears a definite (and thereby a partial, limited) function of social being, to this extent does the formation of the individual as a member of a social group signify, in Marx's phrase, the molding of a partial man rather than of a universal and harmonious personality. In submitting himself to material goals, man becomes dependent upon the system of material _-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, The German Ideology, p. 267.
~^^2^^ K. Marx, Grundrisse der Kritik der Politischen Okonomie (Rohentwurf), 1857--1858, Berlin, 1953, S. 79.
163 relations. He becomes a thing among other things, labour power. Therefore, according to Marx, the task consists in overcoming any forms of group community which are an obstacle in the development of universality and subordinate the individual to forms of "external expediency''; man must turn away from religion, the family and the state to proper human, viz., social being.Therefore Marx and Engels speak of distinguishing the individual as a personality from the class individual. Communism is that form of collectivism in which "the transformation of labour into self-activity corresponds to the transformation of the earlier limited intercourse into the intercourse of individuals as such" [and not as members of the socium---the Author]^^1^^. Communism is individuals in unity. Its basic principle is the full and free development of each individual, the absence of social boundaries limiting his formation as a personality. Communism is regarded as an "association, in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all".^^2^^
Turning to Marx's writings on morality, we note that he (as well as Engels) emphasizes its class character and the possibility of its utilization for the selfish aims of dominance over men. In particular morality, as a rule, ideally expresses the conditions for the existence of the ruling class, which the ideologues of this class transform theoretically into something self-contained. These conditions are advanced by the dominant class against the oppressed class in the capacity of vital norms, as the recognition of its dominance on the one hand, and as a moral means to this dominance, on the other. Giving expression to group interests, morality is a form of external expediency, limiting the freedom in the formation of the universal personality. But, "the mortal danger for every being lies in losing itself. Hence lack of freedom is the real mortal danger for mankind.''^^3^^ Engels wrote that "in reality every class, even every profession, has its own morality, and even this it violates whenever it can do with impunity.''^^4^^
We must now consider the individual in contemporary bourgeois society with its division of labour, classes, etc. This society begins to indoctrinate him from the moment of birth. _-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, The German Ideology, p. 84.
~^^2^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, Selected Works, Vol. 1, Moscow, 1973, p. 127.
~^^3^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, Selected Works, Vol. Ill, p. 30.
~^^4^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, Selected Works, Vol. 1, Moscow, 1974, p. 164.
164 Morality and its standards represent one of the means used for this channeling and for behavioral regulation. The individual perceives these standards and demands as an external factor, acting upon his ``ego''. The problem arises as to what are the origins of this ``ego'' which society endeavours with varying results to transform into the moral individual, a ``useful'' member of society (the relationship of usefulness is in fact the material relationship)? Can it be that this ``ego'' is not a product of society, of the social environment? So why is it that this product turns out to be such that it must be infused with the social principles and moral standards while it sees them as external and often limiting its freedom and suppressing its individuality?To add to this, sometimes moral standards and principles contradict the individual's inner convictions of what is just and humane. For example, the situation often arises in which to act according to the dictates of morality means to act unconscionably and inhumanely. But this very evaluation (``unconscionably and inhumanely'') is an ethical judgement and pertains to ethical consciousness. It only remains to admit that the ethical consciousness of our individual is contradictory, that the demands of morality and the conscience often do not coincide, and that the notion of duty turns out to have disintegrated into contradictory notions.
This contradiction may be explained by reference to the contradictory nature of the socium. But such an explanation is limited: beyond its confines we may locate a certain ethical content which cannot be explained by actual social conditions. For example, it is impossible to derive from social conditions of the past or present the unconditional commandment "thou shall not kill' (below we shall attempt to demonstrate that an acceptance of this unconditionality can be derived, but by other means).
We may outline the path leading to a resolution of this problem if we turn to the Marxist conception of man. Man is a potentially universal and therefore a free being, but he realizes his potentiality only in the infinite historical process of his development. "The universally developed individuals whose social relations are their own collective relations and are therefore also subordinate to their own collective control, are the product of history and not of nature.''~^^1^^ The universal character of his activity determines future man as universal _-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx, Capital, Vol. I, p. 178.
165 and free. Historically, however, he is determined by the social conditions of this activity in the present, and is limited as ``private'' and unfree.The actual social system of which the individual is inescapably a member determines his activity (and consequently, nis consciousness and psyche as a whole) objectively as cause, as external expediency, objectified activity, completed and snuffed out in the actual structure of being (including the activity of preceding generations). In the temporal context this is determined by the past. On the other hand, this activity is simultaneously determined by the subjective will, by the goal, that is, by the future. Man "not only effects a change of form in the material on which he works, but he also realises a purpose of his own that gives the law to his modus operandi, and to wnich he must subordinate his will".^^1^^ Moreover, all material goals, consistently subtracted by historical motion, turn out to be converted forms of the solely true goal, which is man as a ``tribal'' (directly collective) creature.
This potential universality, existing in the form of the goal, leads to the formation of a value system in agreement with conceptions of the infinite perfectibility of man (and mankind as the medium of his universal intercourse and likewise of the formation of his "generic essence''). It does not depend upon the actual form of the socium, and what is more, is tne negation of this limited form, being in this sense absolute.
On the other hand, the determination of activity by the conditions of actual being (causa/ determination) requires of man the formation of a different system of values, connected with the structure of a given concrete socium. The individual is included within it as a member of a social group, class, as labour power, in a word, as a private individual. The norms and requirements put before the individual by the socium are connected with an unconditional value system, but only in the manner displaying its converted, partial, finite form, adapted to the limited conditions of the given socium. Therefore, they contradict this unconditional system as a universal and general one.
The first of these value systems says to man: "Be free and universal, for you are a personality, a citizen of the world.'' The second recommends: "Subordinate your will and interests to interests which lie without you (the church, socium, social group, etc.), for you are a member (of the church, socium, _-_-_
^^1^^ Ibid.
166 social group, nation, state, etc.).'' To be sure, the second, as a rule, does not say: "You are a partial human" and often also asserts: "You are a personality it you submit...'', and often tries to pass itself as the only true, just, universal and pan-human system of values. The individual nevertheless perceives it as external expediency, as a limitation upon his freedom, although as long as, under the sway of certain situations, there does not arise within him an acute inner conflict he may not note this and may even regard this expediency to be the only just path. There exist individuals who do not notice this under any circumstances and also those who notice, but do not act in the corresponding manner.Marx gave the name ``morality'' to this conditional, concretehistorical system of rules of behaviour and requirements laid before the individual on behalf of society in the conditions of its alienated social being. Now we may understand his negative stance towards morality which may have provoked puzzlement at first glance. Morality is for Marx above all one of the forms of external expediency, making the individual an unfree, partial man. We refer the reader to a few of the limited statements Marx and Engels made concerning this question. "The Communists do not preach morality at all,''^^1^^ they affirmed. Speaking of the emergence of communist and socialist attitudes they note: "That shattered the bases of all morality....''^^2^^ In The Holy Family and The German Ideology the attempts to argue from morality in the investigation of social relations are mocked. In Capital Marx, considering the economists' views notes that all and sundry considerations are irrelevant.
For Marx and Engels the intensification of moral preaching and the insistence upon the holiness of universal interests is an indicator of a deep split between the productive forces and the ideology of a society, between various social groups, when traditional notions cease to .correspond to the form of intercourse in practice. Such conceptions, "in which actual private interests, etc., etc., are expressed as universal interests, descend to the level of mere idealising phrases, conscious illusion, deliberate hypocrisy. But the more their falsity is exposed by life, and the less meaning they have for consciousness itself, the more firmly are they asserted, the more _-_-_
~^^1^^ K. Marx and F. Engels, The German Ideology, p. 267.
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 460.
167 hypocritical, moral and holy becomes the language of this normal society.''~^^1^^There exist historical and historico-philosophical considerations that the general and unconditional value system which stands in opposition to morality should be called ethical or ethics in the strict sense of the word, regarding morality as its own opposite and as a form adapted to the being of the partial man and historically limited socium. We are concerned here not with a term but with the fact that ethical consciousness is contradictory and its contradictory forms must be different. In the given instance this distinction is important if only because the interrelations between these forms of the modern man's ethical consciousness on the one hand, and science, on the other, differ widely, and this makes his own relation to science extremely complex and ambiguous. As we see, in the Marxist philosophical system this differentiation is carried out according to the principles opposed to those in the Hegelian system, and the results achieved are also opposite.
The internal cleavage of the moral consciousness had been depicted in the prose as well as the religious, philosophical and scientific literature of the world. We could, for example, characterize the conflict depicted in Tolstoy's play The Living Corpse as the collision between morality and law on the one hand, and ethics on the other. Boris Pasternak in Safe Conduct Pass employed what is in our opinion a very precise phrase: "unethical morality" (beznravstvennaya moral).
The commandment "thou shalt not kill" considered in ethical terms is an unconditional injunction because it implies the man whose value is unconditional and self-contained, the man as a personality, as an aim in itself. If we recall that according to Marx such a personality can be given shape only through the universal creativity of forms of intercourse and in the process of this intercourse itself, then the nature of this commandment connected with the universal development of man as aim in itself becomes clear. In killing another human one not only kills that which is human within oneself, but also takes a stance against mankind in general (against freedom, against the very principle of intercourse in which the personality as such is molded and developed as the highest and absolute value).
Therefore, murder can only be perceived as the gravest of crimes, graver even than suicide. In the future, to all _-_-_
^^1^^ Ibid., p. 317.
168 appearances any coercive restriction imposed upon the freedom of human intercourse will be assessed as a grave ethical crime.The very same "thou shall not kill" considered on the level of a moral injunction is hemmed in by a cluster of conditions, reservations and exclusions and lives quite comfortably with the bonfires of the inquisition wars and the death penalty.
Morality presupposes award or retribution not only in the ideal but often in the material form.
Ethics on the other hand, excludes awards or retributions in the material form. Its only award or censure lies in the self-awareness of the individual. It is justified not by the immediate goal implemented in actual being, but only historically as a form of movement into the infinite future. Therefore it does not ``reckon'' the consequences of the individual's deeds either for himself or for the actual social conditions. The individual often finds himself in a situation in which he is compelled to choose whether he ought to act in accordance with existing morality (which, as a rule, more or less agrees with common sense and allows a given action to be rationally justified in one way or another), to win approval and praise or ought he to commit an ``incomprehensible'' or ``unreasonable'' deed, even, perhaps, to the extreme of perishing and of drawing upon himself the curses and disdain of his contemporaries, but in so doing, to realize himself as the personality, that is to say, act truly ethically.
We must caution against drawing the conclusion from our brief discussion that ethics is ``good'' and morality is ``bad'' or vice versa.
In the first place we must take into account that our consideration of these aspects of ethical consciousness in isolation is in fact a method of theoretical analysis, rendering possible an exposition of the complex and contradictory structure of the ethical consciousness unfolded in space and time, and thereby marking out one of the possible paths of approaching ethical phenomena. So far as the real individual, our contemporary is concerned, a clear-cut awareness of the mutual opposition of these aspects arises only, as a rule, in acute conflict situations, and even then not always and not for all people. Ordinarily the conflict is not rationally apprehended. Rather it takes the form of the remorseful conscience, of the vague awareness that "something is not as it should be'', of conflicts in the emotional sphere and so forth. Practically speaking morality and ethics are indistinguishable in the mind of contemporary man, forcing him to agonize over 169 internal contradictions, to reflect, choose, etc. Movement within the framework of these contradictions is the only possible avenue for personality formation under the dominance of material relations and the social division of labour.
In the second place the actual life of the individual within any given, historically limited socium cannot be governed by pure ethics, since by virtue of their unconditionally universal nature ethical principles will always conflict with actual and historicallv limited conditions, and the individual, guided by these principles, will always be out of place. When such individuals appear, as for instance, Dostoyevsky's Prince Myshkin in The Idiot, who are variously called by society ``holy'', ``prophets'', Don Quixotes or ``idiots'', they turn out to be, to paraphrase Ludwig Feuerbach, more likely candidates for the other world than active participants in this world.
In the third place, if we approach the question historically we can demonstrate that in the tribal collective there was no cleavage of the ethical consciousness into ethics as such and morality. This is explained by the fact that the individual was entirely absorbed in the collective and did not isolate himself as a personality. The cleavage in the ethical consciousness at a later date is a testimony to its higher form of development. The syncretic, integral ethical consciousness of the primitive world was the ``tribal'' consciousness of a given collective; it determined the substance of man's actions and did not foresee the possibility of the separating out and development of the individual into a personality. In this syncretic state the individual's ethical consciousness does not suffer cleavages. The social system of education making him a member of the tribal collective directly creates his self-awareness so that for him to be human means to be a member of precisely this given collective (the kin, tribe or tribal community). Such an individual is fuller and more harmonious than contemporary man, who is marked by multiple cleavages in his inner world and is agonizing over endless problems. But according to Marx, the isolated individual at the early stages of development functions more fully because he has yet not worked out the fullness of his relations and has not juxtaposed these relations to himself as social forces and relationships independent of him. Morality operates as the first and therefore an abstract form of reflection of the ethical consciousness in its alienation from itself (this is clearly expressed, for example, in Kant's categorical imperative with its principle of formalism).
In the form of morality the ethical consciousness operates as a certain impersonal force, to which the individual must 170 subordinate his ``ego''. But at the same time, because of this formal abstractness the substantial resolution of this ethical task remains in the hands of the individual himself, forcing him to agonize over this resolution. This is the torments of creation, the birth pangs of the personality.
The formalism of morality turns out to be substantially interpreted by the actual sociality (that is, by social groups). At the same time in its abstract universality morality is a limited, converted, but nevertheless universal form of pan-human ethics overcome by historical development.
The extent and the means by which the morality of one or another social group carries the content of pan-human morality, to all appearances, depends upon the concrete historical role played by this group (class) in the given socium. It is possible that this is in some way connected with the ability to transcend this socium, that is, to transform society into a new form. These are very complex problems the analysis of which depends upon one's notion of historical progress (we leave aside this problem). In any case, proceeding from the conception of the revolutionary role of the proletariat in bourgeois society Engels wrote of the forms of morality and coinciding themes of ethics existing in this society: "Which, then, is the true one? Not one of them, in the sense of absolute finality; but certainly that morality contains the maximum elements promising permanence which, in the present, represents the overthrow 'of the present, represents the future, and that is proletarian morality.''~^^1^^
We argue in this circumspect and non-categorical way concerning the character of correlations between me morality of definite social group and pan-human ethics because even so far as the revolutionary class is concerned the dialectical contradiction is retained between its apprehension of itself as the final social group and the expression in this form of the infinity of human development. Therefore Marx and Engels regarded revolution as that change of people in the course of which the class carrying out the revolution is also fundamentally transformed. It is always a process of self-change.
With the abolition of the social division of labour and of the dominance of the world of material relations the ethical consciousness must overcome its cleavage. It will leave no room for morality as a form of external expediency subordinating the individual to itself. This consciousness will express a form _-_-_
~^^1^^ F. Engels, Anti-Duhring, Moscow, 1969, pp. 113--14.
171 of activity the direct aim of which will be not the production of things but the development of the human faculties as an end in itself.So far as the problem pertaining to the formation of the dual nature of the individual ethical consciousness is concerned, in the present article we may only briefly point to that sphere in which in our opinion is located the possibility of providing a substantial analysis of this problem, since we have arrived at the extremely complex question of human knowledge---and one which goes beyond the range of this article---directly connected with the question of anthropogenesis: "What is time? What is history?''
The object active intercourse of the individual by means of which he assimilates his human essence is determined by two different spheres of social being or, in other words, by two superimposed fields of force: that of actual being, unfolded in space and in its contemporary configuration represented by the social structure; and the field of historical being, unfolded in time and represented by culture. In the field of the socium the individual feels attached to a given social group as its part, and his activity is carried out jointly with other individuals as synchronous labour discrete in space. In the field of culture he feels himself to be the heir of the past and the creator of the future. He perceives the past as his own, as living within him, acting through his hands, looking through his eyes, and the future as his future, created by him, for which he is directly and personally responsible before himself, his contemporaries and his descendants. The individual carries out his activity in the field of culture as "general spiritual" labour, connected not only with his contemporaries but with the spiritual labour of past and future generations---that is to say, unfolded in time. To the extent that by the instrumental nature of his activity man is ``projected'' as a universal being, to that extent his unfolding in time turns out to be infinite and his universality is embodied as his incompleteness. Therefore man appears as a being living in the future, realizing himself in goal-positing and goal-implementing as an uncompleted process.
As a cultural-historical subject man today can assimilate his generic essence only in a disjointed form, corresponding to the cleavages marking his social being. He can do so (a) in the complete and limited form of actual being as such, of sociality, to which at the level of activity correspond joint labour, alienation and material relations, and at the level of ethics---its socially conditioned and converted form, morality; or (b) in the incomplete, general, historical-cultural potential form, 172 connected with spiritual labour, the development of personal relations, and at the level of ethics, with its unconditional pan-human form, which we indicated to be ethics in the proper sense of the word.
According to Marx, a form of sociality is the historically transient form of the dominance of material relations where man as a "generic being" feels himself disjoined and partial. But at the same time this form is the first, still abstract form of universality, and is thereby counterposed to the concrete individual, regarding him as an abstract entity, for example, as a subject of law, as labour power. It is a step in the direction of that form of universality in which the relations of man as a generic being will include all of mankind as a genus. For this reason the form of sociality must be preferred to the narrowly limited tribal relations of the earlier period in human history.
In this way man as a being living in time, as an historical subject is from the outset determined in two different ways. As a product of the past history he is conditioned by the activity of preceding generations, and is determined by the past causally. Such determinacy makes the man an actually limited being and is perceived by him as necessity. But as the creator of history he is conditioned by his future, his goal. This determination is the negation of the now existing as the limited, which is connected with transgressing the boundaries of the self and of actual reality---transcendence into the sphere of the infinite. This transcendence makes him a potentially universal being, and is perceived by him as freedom. (In connection with this man could be defined as a transcending being.)
Man cannot bring this freedom into existence in a single act, for the real transformation of the object-world (natural and social) compels him to tailor his goals to existing reality. This is perceived by him as a limitation imposed upon his freedom, his personality. From here also stems the above-mentioned reaction of the individual to the demands put to him in the capacity of moral rules and standards---his inner protest. The lower the cultural level of the individual the less conscious and controllable are the forms taken by his protest, including actions which violate juridical norms. These actions may appear strange and unmotivated to his neighbours, since the common sense of contemporary man, fortified with a dose of ``scientific'' logic, will look for an explanation of sorts in the individual's conditions of life, in the causal-object and psychological ``situation'' of his action, while this situation, as we have seen, may well not be confined to the sphere of causality.
173The cleavage of ethical consciousness into ethics and morality, as we have presented it in our discussion, is a rather crude and schematized distinction, merely an abstract reference point for the analysis of the highly complex interweaving of sentiments and ideas making up the content of the man's ethical world. These aspects may be regarded as coordinate axes of a sort, as general tendencies determining the nature of concrete disjunctures, engendering the necessity of further fragmentation and synthesis, since a final and complete disintegration along these axes would indicate the disintegration of the personality (not in the psychiatric sense, but rather as an ethical phenomenon). At the same time the clash of these tendencies can be externally embodied in conflicts between individuals, between the individual and the social group or social environment, etc. (in this instance an inner or total rupture between the individual and his social group or environment is possible).
__ALPHA_LVL3__ SCIENCE AND ETHICSIn connection with the matter at hand a number of conclusions can be derived and further Questions posed, touching upon the interrelation of science ana ethics, scientific education and ethical upbringing.
If each is considered in relation to its object sphere, science and ethics remain mutually indifferent. The sphere of science is the world of things and material relations. That of ethics is the world of man and human relations.
We recall, however, that according to Marx the world in its entirety, including the whole of nature, must be understood as the world of man, of human activity. Nature apprehends itself in man, and man initiates the remolding of nature. The world of material relations from this point of view is the historical phenomenon of the alienation of man from himself and from nature. Therefore, strictly speaking, science cognizes not the pure world of things, but rather the material forms of activity and the man's attitude to the world. In other words the object of research for any given science turns out in the final result to be the process of human labour in a definite sphere.
For its part ethics is broken up into ethics proper and morality. The latter, being adapted to the material relations of actual being, is close to science as the systematized theoretical form of expression of these very relations. The relationship 174 between scientific and ethical consciousness is complex and contradictory. The complexity of its analysis for ordinary common sense is determined by the fact that science functions as the only representative of the "materialized force of knowledge'', permitting man to master the world of external nature, and by the fact that morality, expressing the interests of a definite social group, masquerades these interests as pan-human. This complexity is aggravated by the difficulty of drawing a line of demarcation between ethics and morality, owing to which the ethical consciousness seems to ordinary common sense whole and monolithic. However, this demarcation line stands out in bold relief as soon as an acute conflict situation emerges.
Since morality is akin to prudent common sense, the temptation arises to "verify harmony with algebra": to scientifically assess the moral action. Given this, from the point of view of common sense, science and morality everything looks respectable. Let us consider, for example, the knotty problem frequently and astutely discussed by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. For the good of mankind is it admissible to sacrifice the life of even one man? From the viewpoint of science, common sense and morality this is not only possible but necessary. Here science and morality differ only in that the former will follow this dictate without unnecessary lamentation.
But then, suppose it is necessary to ``eliminate'' one hundred thousand people for the good and use of humanity? Or perhaps a million? Science will answer: of course it is a difficult situation but the reckoning is clear; if it is necessary to sacrifice millions of lives to save billions, we must act accordingly. The moralist will suffer, but when all is said and done, will acquit the scientist who has made such a decision. He will sympathize with the difficult moral pains accompanying this decision and feel the weight of the responsibility before humanity which he bears, etc.
Now suppose that for the good and the use of humanity it is necessary to conduct medical experiments on human beings? At this point morality is indignant! But, by the way, science can demonstrate to morality that it errs.
However, from the viewpoint of ethics (and from Dostoyevsky's position) the problem offers no resolution, because, as we have demonstrated above, man as an individual is a potentially universal and infinite being. In this sphere of the universal and infinite (and it is precisely here that ethics takes shape) the individual is incomparable and immeasurable. He is the 175 equivalent of any other individual, but also of all humanity and the entire universe, remaining (precisely as a result of this) unique and irreplaceable. Therefore the sacrifice can only be made by the individual as a freely made self-sacrifice; no one else may sacrifice him. Thus it is clear why the doctor who conducts dangerous experiments with the diseased evokes aversion while simultaneously the experiment conducted on himself summons forth praise and turns him into a hero.
The situation is still further complicated by the fact that in the world of the capitalist machine civilization science itself begins to be regarded as a value and as a universal evaluative criterion. The word ``scientific'' is becoming a synonym for ``good'' where ``unscientific'' takes on a ``bad'' shade of meaning. Hence the conclusion follows that good knowledge is scientific knowledge and therefore that knowledge of man must be restricted to that which is ``scientific''. Without a doubt science can and must study man. But it must be taken into account that it will portray him one-sidedly, namely from his material, objective aspect. In fact even human physiology turns out to be conditioned by the subjective, spiritual side of man (firewalking, the inducement of burns, stigmata, and iatrogenic symptoms) to such an extent that this mode of insight turns out to be quite insufficient. Certain aspects of psychic life do not fit (and should not) into the causal-material explanatory mode. From the viewpoint of rational common sense, of science and scientific logic they must be left inexplicable, bordering on the miraculous.
In a society which is dominated by material relations and in which science directly disposes of practical might, ethics, as a rule, is proselytized in the form of morality; in its pan-human form it turns out to be the object of ridicule for its practical helplessness, as a result of which immoral people are often the victors in life. But this victory is at the same time a defeat, the blotting out of that which is human inside, and the process of blotting out is often accomplished quietly and by degrees, unnoticed by the individual himself. Merging with his social role and becoming a pure functionary, he nevertheless continues to regard himself a human. This transformation is sometimes accompanied by the formation of a distinctive duplicity: operating in the external social environment within the confines of prescribed group morality the individual also preserves certain ethical principles strictly for "domestic consumption''. As self-affirmation and for the inner justification of his immoral actions he might think of himself as "living in agreement with a strict moral code, never having caused 176 harm to anyone''. But if this does not work and our individual is plagued with restlessness and an unpleasant aftertaste, then he must make an objective and logical judgement (on the scientific, so to speak, level). In such cases it is always possible to demonstrate, as surely as two times two makes four, that it was necessary to act in such a manner, for it was precisely this sequence of actions which brought the greater benefit, the greater use to society, etc. In this context the personality's spiritual loss is simply not considered, in fact it cannot even be fixed within the scheme of causal logic (therefore excluding it from the realm of common sense and science as well). It was precisely for this reason that such primitive arithmetic provoked the hatred of Dostoyevsky.
But matters are complicated by the fact that the world of material relations also belongs to human activity just as does the spiritual culture. Therefore morality, strictly speaking, is no more impersonal than is ethics external to society. Their divergence in conflict situations is simply one of the forms expressing the temporal historical nature of human existence, that is to say, the simultaneous determination of man's present being by both the past and future. Thus the question: is science moral or immoral---yields no simple answer. Considered on the historical level science functions as the means with which man masters the world of things and turns this world into a moment subordinated to human life activity as such. In other words it serves the "emancipation of man''. At such a level science has a profound ethical sense. Considered, however, on the level of existing social being, it inevitably operates as a factor subordinating man to material goals, turning him into labour power, an object of social manipulation and so forth---crowning the process marking the dehumanisation of human relations. In the same sweep it opposes ethics, turns out to be immoral.
The relationship of science to the formation of the individual also turns out to be ambiguous. As a form of the development of one of the "essential strengths" of man, it shapes within him a consciousness of truthfulness and of the sovereign might of his thought and relations to the world. Science fosters a dedication to and unswerving pursuit of the truth. In short, it develops certain ethical qualities in the individual. But at the same time this conviction in the sovereign might of thought turns out to be connected with a historically limited form of specifically scientific thought and a scientific stance towards the world as the world of things. The same devotion to science and unswerving pursuit of scientific truth is 177 thereby transformed into the extension of scientific logic and methods to the world of man, of ethical relations. Man begins to be measured with an inadequate (material) yardstick, which ultimately leads to the false, immoral and antihuman conception of the "human machine''.
At the same time science requires critical, that is to say reflective thought, which is a necessary condition of the possibility of transcendence (an outlet to the boundless and the formation of a new yardstick---that of creativity). Consequently it contributes to the shaping of the personality. However, according to its tendency, the indicated reflection is formally rational.^^1^^ It is precisely for this reason that it is incapable of adopting a universal form, to be turned to itself, to become the reflection of a reflection (that is to say, to move into the sphere of the concrete-universal, that of philosophy). The attempt theoretically to consider oneself in a purely material, objectivized form leads to the construction of a hierarchy of metasystems, to ``bad'' infinity, but not to universality.
For this reason scientific reflection assumes a critical stance towards any given partial result or assertion, but not towards itself as a whole. This indicates that it cannot be pan-human. Nor can it be adequate in this sense for the individual or for ethics.
If we accept the approach towards science outlined above, then the position of, say, C.P. Snow, professor at Cambridge University, must be recognized as mistaken. In an article entitled "The Moral Un-Neutrality of Science" he asserts: "There is no need for an extrinsic scientific criticism, because criticism is inherent in the process itself.'' Snow has much to say about the duty of the scientist, his moral responsibility and so on, but he overlooks the fact that his evaluation is fully applicable to the serviceman, diplomat or politician (although he endeavours to counterpose the "moral code of the scientist" to the "military code of morality'').
He would like to deduce the moral qualities which he ascribes to scientists from the intrinsic morality of science as such, in which he sees two moral impulses: the "search for truth" and ``knowledge''. "The way in which a scientist tries to find the truth imposes on him a constant moral discipline,'' writes Snow.^^2^^ However a few pages later he asserts: "I see no evidence that scientific work on weapons of maximum _-_-_
~^^1^^ "Thought generating solely finite definitions and moving in them is called reason" (G.W.F. Hegel, Samtliche Werke, Bd. V, Leipzig, 1930, S. 58).
~^^2^^ C. P. Snow, Public Affairs, London, 1971, p. 192.
178 destruction has been in any intellectual respect different from other scientific work. But there is a moral difference.''~^^1^^ Since scientific methods bear upon the intellectual rather than the moral sphere (and precisely for this reason the absence of a moral framework has not to this date hindered anyone in the development of weapons of maximum destruction), we may regard the preceding assertion by C.P. Snow to be refuted by his latter statement.There remains "... a spring of moral action in the scientific activity which is at least as strong as the search for truth. The name of this spring is knowledge''. In the fact that it is "at least as strong" we are soon persuaded, for knowledge "throwsupon scientists a direct and personal responsibility.... For scientists have a moral imperative to say what they know. (Is this a distinctive feature of the scientist?---the Author). It is going to make them unpopular in their own nation-states (does this pertain to divulging military secrets because of moral impulses?---the Author.).'' For the ``moral'' to arise it is necessary that respective knowledge be possessed by the moral individual. That no moral direction is inherent in knowledge as such is clear, since we may imagine numerous situations when "to say" means, from the viewpoint of group morality---to commit treason, that is, to act with the utmost amorality. Even C. P. Snow seems to sense the untenability of his argument, for he finishes the article with the words: "I cannot prove it, but I believe that, simply because scientists cannot escape their own knowledge, they also won't be able to avoid showing themselves disposed to good.''^^2^^
The problem of science and ethics becomes in our day especially topical, if it is considered in terms of the shaping of the individual. Here the problem emerges as that of the interrelationship of a scientific education and ethical upbringing, subject to the discretion of the educator. Not wishing to intrude into the sphere of competence of the educator, we snail restrict ourselves to a few brief remarks on behalf of philosophy.
The common type of contemporary school providing a general education evolved in its general features (including its tasks, methods of their realization and didactic principles) in the epoch of the European Enlightenment. The assimilation of scientific knowledge was regarded by the Enlighteners as the decisive factor in the development of the individual and of _-_-_
~^^1^^ C. P. Snow, Public Affairs, p. 195.
~^^2^^ /6«i,pp. 197--98.
179 mankind. This conception was justified for the task of practical mastery of the material world as the causally conditional world was pressing indeed, a task connected with freeing this sphere from the sway of religion, which had blocked off avenues to cognition and activity adequate to this very world. Therefore in school as well ethical education was relegated to an inferior position and became a random factor dependent on the family, the immediate social environment ana religion. During the Enlightenment this was also justified, since both religion and family and kinship traditions still enjoyed immense authority for the bulk of the population in maintaining a definite value system. Family and kinship ties and traditions are much weaker in contemporary society than they were three hundred years ago. The separation of the school from the church and an atheistic education have virtually excluded religion as a factor in upbringing. This is only natural since the value system which could be fostered by religion, the family-kinship and communal traditions bears no correspondence to the contemporary socio-historical situation.But in this instance, the type of the enlightenment school which has lived to see our day, marked by the primacy of scientific education over ethical upbriging is also unacceptable. In the course of the last three hundred years science has not only ousted religion from the sphere of knowledge of things, but, as we have seen, has also actively intruded in the sphere of human relations. The ``scientification'' of the school, for example, in the organization of the pedagogical process has proceeded as far as suggestions to formalize the entire process in algorithms and even to replace the teacher with machines as if the pupils were computers rather than human beings. Such an approach excludes the possibility of personal contact with the educator, which would otherwise make a significant impact on the shaping of the pupil's ethical consciousness. As far as curriculum is concerned, even those disciplines which judging by their social functions would seem to be intended to foster an aesthetic and ethical awareness (such as literature and history), are now dismembered and analyzed in a so-called `` technological'' manner and transformed into a list of dates, events and of the "character traits" of the heroes, spiced up with vulgar sociological maxims. The assimilation of the forms of panhuman culture is replaced by ``pumping'' with knowledge. As a result the school ``drops'' (if not completely, at least to a significant measure) from its range of influence an important sphere of the spiritual world of the student---that of the molding of truly human ethical relations.
180When the problem of shaping the ethical personality arises educators and psychologists often respond in the following manner: draw up a list of ethical (in their view) qualities of the personality, and the question boils down to developing methods with the help of which these qualities can be drummed into the child. In point of fact to cultivate the ethical personality means to foster an individual who is sensitive to the inner conflict between morality and ethics, who is capable of differentiating them, who is capable of making the appropriate decisions and of bearing full and undivided responsibility for them. To this date we know of no means of accomplishing this other than that of personal contact and a mastery of the world of pan-human culture. In this situation, apparently, in the process of imparting scientific knowledge, the attitude must be fostered in the pupil to science as to an instrument, a powerful tool produced by man for the mastery of material reality; but the ability to utilize this tool, though necessary, nevertheless does not make a human being a man.
We note that the discussion which we have engaged in on the pages of this article represents only one of many possible approaches and makes no claims to being either exhaustive or comprehensive. The problem which we nave touched upon in a general form (the relationship of cause and goal, of materiality and spirituality) has been the centre of discussion for thousands of years---from various angles and in a range of diverse historical modifications. For example, in early Christian theology the problem at hand took the form of the doctrine that man belonged to two societies, the "City of God" and the city of his birth (to cite the Augustinian distinction). In the milieu of the European Middle Ages, tinged with spirituality, it appeared in a multitude of forms, including that of the | contradiction between the scholastics and the mystics or the j church and the secular world. This specific feature of medieval ; culture was observed by the Russian scholar P. Bitsilli: "The > life of the church and that of the world were thought to I proceed on different levels and be subordinated to different types of law. The destinies of the church can be understood only from a ideological standpoint whereas the transformations of the world, viewed in themselves, irrespective of that role which it (the world) fulfills as a receptacle of the Church, are subordinated to causality.''~^^1^^
In modern times the problem of the dual nature of man continued to occupy the attention of philosophers, taking _-_-_
~^^1^^ P. Bitsilli, Aspects of Medieval Culture, Moscow, 1919, p. 133 (in Russian).
181 various forms. The historicism of West European culture, with its specific development of understanding and perception of time---and moreover its explosive development against the background of the stagnating cultures of the East, may be connected precisely with this form of cleavage in man (both as an individual and as a social subject), a cleavage emerging at some point in antiquity and representing one of the conceivable historical modifications of the subject-object relation.In Marx's theoretical conception in which the world is considered as the world of human object-activity, this cleavage emerges as a historically conditioned division of activity into the general spiritual and material production proper (in the form of the social division of labour); a division to be sublated in the course of historical development. Material production in turn is divided into mental and manual labour with further cleavages engendering the social structure of contemporary society, the phenomenon of alienation, etc.---with all the complex and contradictory collisions marking the contemporary man's being. We took precisely this conception as our starting point in trying to put forward our ideas and ascertain the place and role of science and morality as socio-historical phenomena.
This evaluation briefly and schematically outlines one of the possible approaches to the theme. Here we touch upon a knot of problems so complex and broad in scope that a single article cannot provide even a simple exposition not to speak of a theoretical analysis of them. A thorough analysis of these problems requires a colossal effort and cannot be completed in principle, as, incidentally, the analysis of any problem which has adopted a universal categorial form. We are travelling here in a sphere of such logic where each logical step, each rung on the ladder of theoretical knowledge is simultaneously a critical analysis and overcoming of the previous step, the previous rung. This unending process is a form of the existence of truth.
Let us point to a few of the contradictions to which the argument presented in this article leads and which must, in our opinion, testify to its vitality, responsiveness to change and receptiveness to transcendence. We speak of the cultural and historical subject, of that which we call the "field of culture" unfolded in time. But the historical subject is a paradoxical entity and, in a demonstrative-logical framework quite unimaginable for he must change, remaining just the same. If we attribute to him only change, then we have no basis to believe that temporally sequential states in fact represent phenomena 182 of one and the same subject. Times become "out of joint'', history disappears: there remain discrete states without time as temporal change. If we assume that our subject is not changing, remains the same, then there is no time, there is only eternity and once again no history. The first of these possibilities is embodied in the theory of discrete, hermetically sealed cultures (civilizations). The second is exemplified by mythological thought patterns. The Christian eschatological consciousness realizes both conceptions in a twofold manner. First, in the image of Christ, who, being both God and man, belongs at one and the same time both to eternity and to time. As a man he is causally determined by external necessity and perishes on the cross. As God he is free, that is to say, determined by the goals immanent to him, and emerges before man as an envoy of the future, of the very goal which, in Christian terms, mankind must implement through its history. The image of Christ is consequently the first (as far as we know) theoretical model of the historical subject (hence, of man as creator and reformer and as ethical creature). So we observe the formation in Christianity of a notion of universal history and of man as the representative of mankind as a whole. Secondly, the Christian consciousness actualizes this notion in the idea of the discrete---in relation to time---being of the world. Indeed universal history, according to Christianity, is only a limited moment of being and its boundaries are strictly and precisely defined: the commitment of the primal sin (and this sin bears directly upon our theme, since it consists in the cognition of good and evit\), sets in motion the historical clock, the Last Judgement stops it. Before and after history there is only eternity.
Certain scholars attempt to portray Marx's understanding of communism as eschatological, viz., as an absolute goal the realization of which signifies the end of history.^^1^^ To us such views seem quite unfounded. Both the direct statements of Marx and the entire thrust of his theoretical construction demonstrates that communism in Marx's understanding is man's transcending beyond the boundaries of limited sociality, placing man in dependence upon external expediency, making him unfree, partial. That is why communism is characterized by Marx either through negation (the absence of the social division of labour, of classes, the state, etc.) or through the _-_-_
~^^1^^ See Robert C. Tucker, "Marx and the End of History" (Paper presented to the international symposium at Triers, 1968, dedicated to the 150th Anniversary of the Birth of Karl Marx).
183 parameters of the infinite (freedom, the universal development of the essential forces of man, universal intercourse, etc). We observe that Marx's negative observations pertain to the socium, and positive-infinite---to man.Thus, that which we might call the present or actual sensuous being of the historical subject is determined in two opposite ways: from the past to the present (causal determination) and from the future to the present (goal determination). The former is expressed in the dependence of the subject upon the external world (necessity), the latter---in the dependence of the world upon the activity of the goal-positing subject (freedom). The degree of dominance neld by the second way over the first could most probably be taken as a criterion, thereby a definition of historical progress (of course, not the sole criterion).
This twofold determination has not been grasped by contemporary scientific thought, which regards as explanation only the discovery of cause and therefore repeatedly inquires: "Where, then, is the cause of the goal?" This question can be answered only in one manner: "Trie same place as you'll find the goal of the cause,'' that is to say, in nature, in the universe. In pointing to the cause for a given goal we are committing, perhaps unwittingly, an act of reduction; we reduce time to space (``geometrize'' time), man to matter (``the human machine" or "labour power''), freedom to necessity (``freedom is cognized necessity''), process to structure (system analysis applied to history), history to sociology and ethics to morality. At the historical level this indicates that we, in explaining the past, investigate the causes and motives underlying processes and actions, that is to say, man within the sphere of causal logic. But as soon as we try to extrapolate this mode of explanation into the future, we arrive at one or another form of fatalism. For the notions of ``freedom'' and ``subject'' there is no place in such a conception; hence there is no room for the concept of history. One is compelled to state that there exists a fundamental distinction between the future (the logic of aim) and the past (the logic of cause). The world of things does not know such a distinction, therefore extrapolation ``works'' perfectly there (in the form of scientific prediction), but it does not know real time either (time is ``geometrized''). Science presents a picture not of nature as such but rather of its 'material projection'', a view of nature through the prism of the logic of things and material relations.
Still, what goal does in fact ``project'' human history and man as a historical subject? In philosophy the answer was 184 found long ago: man as goal in itself, as universal being. In such an instance the entire history may be regarded as the formation of man, as continuing anthropogenesis. The point of origin must be considered the emergence of reflection; that is to say, the ability to make of oneself an object (and consequently a goal), to detach oneself from one's own life activity (ana hence to make this life activity the means to an end). The ability to reflect signifies the possibility of standing outside oneself, viz., transcending the boundaries of the self, which in fact is the definition of infinity, universality and of a being living in time (the equivalent---in the future), and perhaps even the definition of time itself.
This ``projecting'' of man lives in him, and is carried out in the concrete-historical, transient images of various cultures. Giving expression and accomplishing these images man is not absorbed by this concreteness, and cannot in this act of accomplishment express himself exhaustively, completely, for in each instance he divorces himself from his embodiment and transcends---remaining through all changes himself to an equal measure---i.e., unfulfilled, potential universality.
This tantalizing feature ot man compels him throughout the history to search out for the eternal in all cultural manifestations and try to detach it from the ``transient''---from historically conditioned forms. The images of the eternal cosmos, eternal gods, eternal substance and eternal matter are nothing but an attempt to explain the ``many'' through the ``one'', the temporal through the eternal. The persistence of the idea of trie transcendent and of truth as process demonstrates that this search is necessary, but at the same time cannot be brought to completion. The very existence of this enquiry reveals to us man as a being ``projected'' by his own future (not extrinsically but intrinsically, not of necessity, but freely). One of the forms of this projectivity, or as was commonly said, of "man's mission'', turns out to be, as we have tried to demonstrate, ethics.
Without an analysis of this determinacy the understanding of history as the becoming of man, as continuing anthropogenesis is impossible. This means one cannot understand the origins of man, that is, his past, without analyzing his future, in particular, such forms of determinacy by and of the future as ethics. Incidentally our argument permits an unambiguous resolution of the question so hotly debated in contemporary science: is man homo habilis or is he an animal?^^1^^ _-_-_
~^^1^^ See the discussion in the journal Priroda Nos. 1, 2, 1973 (in Russian).
185 The fact that homo habilis possesses the aptitude for instrumental action demonstrates that despite his pithecoid morphology he already detaches himself from his life activity, i. e., reflects and is capable of transcendence. But this indicates that he is already a man, for in him is already ``projected'' all of subsequent genuinely human development: all of history, culture, ethics, etc. Incidentally, the morphology of the homo sapiens species is also projected. All of his subsequent development is not of a biological type, nor is it determined by biological laws. Thus even anthropogenesis is regarded only as the establishment of the biological species homo sapiens, even here it is necessary to formulate a thesis which is paradoxical from the viewpoint of modern anthropology: the emergence of the biological species homo sapiens is not a biological process. In this context our image and understanding of anthropogenesis turns out to be substantially different from that accepted in modern science.The way in which we in this article have presented the formation of individual ethics meets with yet another series of contradictions and paradoxes. We posited the spatial-temporal existence of the individual as the development of his life simultaneously on two levels---the social (spatial unfolding) and the cultural-historical (temporal unfolding). A concrete analysis of cultural-historical determination of the individual implies that the given historical culture be taken as a qualitatively unique whole. But the representation of culture through definitions characterizing it as a whole, links the historical origins of this culture with its end, and it takes shape before us as a structure and not as a process, that is to say, once again in the "spatial unfolding'', as one both confined and limited (in general any definition is a limitation). Ethics, which bears pan-numan and absolute content, turns out to be beyond the scope of our investigation, and remains elusive. Time is in this context ousted to the sphere of transition from one culture to the next, i.e., to the immeasurable, the transcendent.
But then the effort can be made to approach the analysis of concrete-historical culture from the other side, namely to define it as a whole through its ``future-past'', viz., to ascertain from what and how it emerges and into what it is being transformed. With such an approach culture appears as the struggle between the past and the future and its own essence appears as a contradiction in substance. Culture in this instance bears within itself universality in the form of the possibility of transcending its own limits. Then the opportunity arises of 186 understanding it as a unique phenomenon and as the embodiment of universal human history, and hence, as panhuman ethical content in the forms of the ethical consciousness set forth by the given culture. But even this is not quite so simple, since the very understanding of the universal also changes and for an elucidation of the meaning of history it is necessary to understand what ``projects'' man per se. It remains to define man through his ``future-past'' since, as we have made clear, no universal structural definitions are applicable in this instance and since the essence of man lies in transcendence. Once again we have arrived at an understanding of history as a problem of anthropogenesis---an unending problem, requiring simultaneous theoretical movement both in the past and in the future, both in the forms of causal logic (in particular, scientific) and of goal logic which itself is still a problem.
The argument we have presented concerning the succession of ethics through the "field of culture" permits us, as we have sought to demonstrate, to clarify certain relations between ethics and science as a historical phenomenon. The question becomes much more complex when we touch upon the formation of the ethical consciousness of a separate individual. Here we encounter instances revealing the insufficiency and one-sidedness of this argument.
One instance is the full ethical transformation of the individual, an upheaval of sorts leading him to a high ethical position. In this context we know of instances when such a transformation takes place in circumstances virtually excluding the mastery by the given individual of the substance of culture.
Research in psychology and education provides us with examples of mature ethical consciousness in children aged 7-9 who, naturally, have not had the time to assimilate culture to the degree permitting us to consider this assimilation the source of the evolution of their ethical consciousness.
Sometimes the image of a person encountered by the individual in his life serves over a stretch of years as the ethical criterion for this individual's actions. The assessment of the action in this context takes on the form of a question: "What would X say about this?" or "How would X act in this situation?''
This example, to all appearances, marks the path to an understanding of the earlier ones: there took place an encounter with a personality, with a man in whom personal qualities were pronounced. If we recall that the personality (as a transcending entity) is boundless, it becomes clear that 187 contact with a personality can lead one beyond the boundaries of limited sociality and hence, on an ethical level, offer the individual the opportunity of appraising the restricted nature of existing morality. This in turn leads to the development of that inner conflict which we have attempted to portray as forming the individual's ethical consciousness. Moreover, as a result of this boundlessness, contact even with one isolated individual may exert more influence on the individual and in his eyes be more important than his social and quotidian environment.
This personality (this X) may turn out to be one's school teacher, school- or play-mate and so forth, perhaps even an incidental acquaintance. Apparently of great import in this context is the role played by extreme situations when a sole instance either experienced through or witnessed by the individual can bring him to an ethical turnabout.
We can thus state that the formation of the individual's ethics is not of necessity directly connected with his assimilation of forms of culture. Ethics (just as in the opposite case---- immorality) is infectious and the ``infection'' can take place through personal contact between individuals (their social intercourse is responsible for morality). The historical forms of culture and social relations in this instance determine the objective conditions and opportunities for personal contact and, apparently, the susceptibility of the individual to this ``infection''.
The Christian church was a social institution controlling education for hundreds of years because, in particular, it organized each individual's encounter and contact with an ethical ideal and image presented in the personality of Christ. We call attention to the fact that this ideal is simultaneously a ``model'' of the historical subject and an image of culture. As such it is not confined within the framework of the church, which bears all the limitations and flaws of a social institution. The Reformation tried to resolve this among other contradictions, although the attempt was unsuccessful.
In conclusion we observe that forms of culture and direct personal contact do not apparently exhaust all modes of the `projection'' of man by his ``future-past''. Indeed even the historical development itself of these forms is in turn ``projected'' in man, i.e., human history is projected within man. We still know very little of the means by which this is carried out (this, too, is a problem of anthropogenesis). Thus, the theme which we have touched upon remains open for further inquiry.
188 __ALPHA_LVL2__ O. DrobnitskyThe question discussed in this book is by no means a novel one. As early as the nineteenth century stormy debates could be heard on this subject and since the turn of this century when science and morality seemed to take up firm opposing positions in literature, the argument of the two ``hypostases'' of the spiritual world of man ignited with new force. It was carried on in the form of an argument between ``rationalism'' and ``romanticism'', between ``physics'' and ``lyrics'', between reason and sentiment, between social expediency and personal intimacy, between the historical necessity driving us into the future and the personal fate, the tragedy and happiness of the individual who does not submit to the dictates of the universal laws of historical development. Then somehow it turned out that the discussion took the form of an argument concerning scientific truth and moral good, knowledge and ethics.
How did this happen? For quite some time now people have been disturbed by the fact that neither scientific and technological progress nor the professions concerned with precise knowledge create preconditions for the comprehensive development of the personality, neither do they resolve all problems of a daily the more so of a spiritual order. For this we need something else. But this ``something'' seemed for long to be multifaceted and elusive of definition. Its significance and profile seemed just as ambiguous.
The extremely broad scope of this problem calls forth our doubts. Couldn't it be that two unrelated subjects have been intertwined here, subjects in each case requiring an independent approach? Morality is of course not ``lyrics'' as distinct from ``physics''; it is not ``intimate'' as opposed to the objective laws of human existence; it is not simply personal fate or one's 189 calling, by no means comparable with historical necessity. Romanticism and struggle, one's lot in life and one's success, will and heroic deed, guilt and tragedy---all this, although interconnected in human life (after all everything is interconnected) represent things which cannot be juxtaposed, things of a different order. Without a precise definition of the scope of the problem, ethics---the science of morality---would be inconceivable. Morality in and of itself is not a science: the objective cognition of reality is not a choice of a moral position, and the resolution of an intellectual task is not to be equated to a moral deed. Duty is not truth but something of a completely different order.
If we assume that everyone is fully aware of what truth and science are and what is beauty and that everyone, drawing from his life experience, knows what makes up happiness and defeat, desire and ambition, will and its enactment, one nevertheless still must provide a definition for morality. As matters stand, in the dispute concerning the relationship between morality and science the former seems to retain something of a fluctuating and indeterminate quality, receiving one or another definition in accordance with the viewpoint of the moment. Therefore within certain limits an attempt to solve the given problem may be made by way of specifying the terms and clarifying the nature and specifics of morality.
First, a word or two about the problem itself. The ``task'' must be formulated in such a way that only one answer may be derived. Before a problem may be resolved it must be correctly posed. To prevent the discussion from taking on a scholastic nature stemming from insufficient comprehension of the substance of the given problem (i. e., what must be clarified and what demonstrated) we shall attempt at first to determine the origins of the problem itself.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ HISTORICAL ROOTSThe sources of the problem may be located in the ancient philosophy of the East and the Greco-Roman world. But to avoid intimidating the reader with a protracted discussion of these roots, let us begin with the Enlightenment, more immediate to our concerns. The fact of the matter is that, on the one hand, the Enlightenment understanding of the problem persists even today and, on the other, for precisely 190 this reason most often of all in the West one may hear the accusation that it oversimplified the problem of the relationship between science and morality.
The ideologues of the French Enlightenment of the 18th century in fact did resolve the question at hand in an extremely simple manner. Morality, they reasoned, is needed by man to help him organize his life correctly. But the same need was ascribed to science itself, which was called upon to help man acquire all that is essential, including happiness. In this, the tasks of morality and science do coincide. To be sure science studies the world as it is, morality tells man what he must do. These of course are different things. But one's choice of actions must be posited upon the knowledge of reality, upon the understanding of facts and circumstances. This is already the task of science.
Incidentally, the Enlightenment philosophers by no means limited themselves to declarations that a simple statement of facts of itself determines what is necessary. Their contemporary opponents in the West (for example, the Neo-Positivists) try to reduce the problem to the relationship of ``facts'' and ``values'', to a description of reality and a decision concerning what is morally due. For the Enlightenment philosophers it was clear that scientific knowledge singles out the determining features (essence) of reality, which are not always apparent to simple observation or exhausted by information. If the imperative is founded upon the existent, the latter may yet turn out to be distinct from that which is perceived by direct observation. Such is human nature, the hidden essence of man, which may bear no resemblance to the actual life of the individual, his habits, ambitions, inclinations or to social organization, social order or the laws of the state. ``True'' human interests are not those which people in actuality want but those which they should want in accordance with their ``nature''. But if we concede that science clarifies human nature then it is science which must explain to people how they must behave. To be moral means to act in accordance with one's correctly understood interests.
But are not the demands of the inner nature of the individual in contradiction with external necessity? After all the environment (nature and society) does have its own laws with which one's actions must conform. In general, what are the origins of the contradictions existing between the subjective ambitions and needs of the individual and those laws, prescriptions, obstacles and injunctions imposed from without? After all, the laws of the external world, of the universe and of social life 191 coincide in principle with the demands of authentic human nature. All tnis, according to the convictions of the Enlightenment philosophers, was the consequence of unfortunate misunderstandings, of historical error and deviation from the only correct, ``natural'' path. The shortcomings of society and crime are attributable in the final count to ignorance and superstition, to a distorted understanding of one's own interests. If the individual understands his ``true'' interests he will act to his own benefit and to that of others, in a word, morally. Enlightenment must eliminate moral shortcomings, so it follows.
A deep belief in man's harmony with the surrounding world was the cornerstone of the Enlightenment unity of science and morality. The study of all that exists is man's self-awareness.^^1^^ Man's self-awareness is equated to understanding one's duty. In the final result, duty and interest coincide.
But are we satisfied with this Enlightenment conception?
At one time it was customary among philosophers to praise the great minds of the past for their unconditional belief in the unlimited possibilities and capabilities of man, including his innate propensity to virtue.
But the optimism of the philosophers has worn thin with time above all because of its uncritical approach to the then existing social conditions. The "reign of reason" dreamt up by them came to the surface in the form of the system of private enterprise. At the basis of universal harmony lay the transparent model of an idealized bourgeois society: the private entrepreneur, guided entirely by his "correctly understood" interest was presented by his philosophical interpreter as the ``natural'' benefactor of society; after all, he receives profit only under the condition that he provide work for some, and useful objects and services for others. For this historical personage, ennobled by the logic of philosophical abstraction, duty and interest coincide perfectly. Further, it was precisely he who declared himself a supporter of scientific knowledge.
But let us look now at the origins of the sceptical stance towards science in relation to its moral significance. We could bring to mind several thinkers who adopted a critical pose to the ideas of the Enlightenment. From them we choose the first _-_-_
^^1^^ In this sense the Enlightenment philosophers continued a tradition stretching back to antiquity. On the pediment of the Delphic oracle is inscribed the dictum: "Know thyself and you will know the Gods and the universe''. It is said that this idea came to the Greeks from the East.
192 and the most consistent of these thinkers, who by virtue of this position now is seen as the precursor of the contemporary antithesis between science and morality. Immanuel Kant---it was he who most clearly recognized the critical nature of such human problem as the relationship between scientific and technological progress and the moral purpose of the intelligent being.We observe, apropos of the historico-philosophical evaluations and our contemporary sympathies and antipathies towards the thinkers representing the intellectual life of the past, that there are some who very poignantly reflect and suffer through in their writings the tragic contradictions of their age. Often this turns out to be a profound scepticism and doubt concerning the human prospect, the postulation of unresolvable alternatives or a generally negative resolution of problems. Such a solution, of course, we must not accept as in the least satisfactory. This may however represent the actual historical contribution made by these thinkers, namely, that they didn't void the problem through a comforting synthesis of the opposites but rather exposed it with penetrating insight. The task now stands before us of resolving it in all its complexity and contradictoriness. Kant was just such a thinker. Subjecting to criticism those philosophical propositions unacceptable to Marxists, we must nevertheless in all justice acknowledge his piercing and restless conscience. In addition, Kant's scepticism represented a certain critique of the bourgeois way of life.
From Kant s viewpoint science can do little to aid man in the resolution of his moral problems, for it only studies that which empirically exists or makes up the hidden nature of the existent. Actual interests, needs, desires and ambitions---such "natural properties" of the human species do not seem to Kant to answer to the true human essence and therefore are not a pledge of human morality. Kant never makes a direct utterance concerning his own position on the virtues or shortcomings of man---not to mention which historically concrete man he has in view. It is only with the benefit of hindsight that we may now say that Kant indirectly subjected to criticism bourgeois man, whom he actually observed in the time contemporary to him. Kant's thought proceeds as if in a system of pure logic and definitional limitations: that which exists in man does not in itself represent a foundation for determining his moral duty. The positive sciences of man in his real manifestations (anthropology and psychology) have, in Kant's opinion, no bearing upon ethics, the science of morality.
193Kant is by no means an irrationalist and has no intention of denying the practical achievements of scientific and technological progress. He understands that science has a definite practical significance for man and for his practical decisions on how to behave in any given instance. If it is necessary to attain a given end, one must resort to the corresponding measures, means and methods. Kant expresses this interrelation between activity and knowledge in the formula of "hypothetical imperative": for the achievement of a desired result one must act in a definite manner. Science is called upon to suggest how one must act, but only under the condition that the end pursued by man is determined in advance. But this, as Kant assumes, by no means offers a resolution to a moral problem. The latter concerns the choice of the end as such, which is not a means to another goal, but is an end in itself---higher and unconditional. This is the question of man's mission.
The moral task is given formulation by Kant in his celebrated "categorical imperative": act in accordance with that rule which could become the law for all mankind, in order that you represent a choice for each and every person. But to the question of how precisely one must act, what choice must be considered proper Kant can provide no answer. This is the heart of his notorious formalism.
Certain of the contributors to this look, in defending the unity of science and morality, demonstrate this unity by the argument that without the knowledge of facts, of the conceivable effects of one's actions and of the means and methods of achieving a determined goal man is not capable of making the proper decision. His good intents and moral motivations remain unfulfilled or lead to regrettable results. Let us assume that this is so, although it sounds somewhat categorical: man does not always make his decisions on the basis of verified knowledge.
Besides, are "good intentions" and "moral motivations" really of no consequence for us? Is the attainment of "useful results" really sufficient? If these intentions and motivations must only involve a useful outcome, then what are the origins of the notion of ``useful'' as such? What exactly is of use for mankind? After all this latter is something quite distinct from the realm of known facts. But let us assume further, that the question of what is useful and what is harmful for mankind has been once and for all decided. Even in this situation a fatal alternative (familiar to the student of intellectual history) arises. Some thinkers believed that societal and human progress is achieved as a result of actions produced by "good 194 intentions''. This seemingly rationalistic conception according to which man knows what he wants, and depending upon the veracity of this knowledge, achieves the necessary results, led to a naive moralization in the interpretation of the historical process: history is the fulfilment or moral ideals, the man of virtue being its sole creator. Others, who observed contradiction between the intention and the realization, between the desired and the attained, have been inclined towards a different rendering of history (Kant and Hegel were among them). History is made by people pursuing egotistical interests (or at least unaware of what they do), and their summary actions, by virtue of Providential logic (or the Absolute Spirit), result in the progress of mankind as a whole.
Consequently even if we may today---possessing a scientific world outlook---discern cause ana effect in history and demonstrate the connection between activity and its consequences, this does not mean that people always behave upon the basis of such knowledge alone. We are not concerned with actual cause-and-effect connections (what and how is happening) but with how people ideally, subjectively choose their goals. Here we have not argued with Kant as yet. According to his understanding, the actual sphere of moral choice begins only when man is faced with the question of the nature of his higher mission. But if such is already known, the rest may be left to science. This is the sphere 01 means and methods.
It would be useful to clarify the nature of the problem posed but left unsolved by Kant, and facing us today. People simultaneously pursue a multitude of goals. They work for the attainment of concrete results which are stepping stones to the next, more distant goals, which are in turn means to still more remote ends. Life in society in a certain sense is formed from a multitude of interconnected goals, each of which could be determined, justified and explained by means of other goals. Can we, however, determine with the aid of this endless chain of goals the purpose and meaning of human life? To answer affirmatively signifies to proceed only from that which exists, from the nature of the existent in the given moment. And activity determined in such a manner will be goal-expedient but still not goal-positing.
The question as posed is not essentially concerned with how well-coordinated are the links of any given social system nor with the degree of expediency of this or that action within the framework of that system. It concerns rather the right of the system itself to exist. Even sociology, capable of instructing us in the spheres of management and organization, is not capable 195 of giving a complete answer to this question: in our opinion, it investigates self-reproducing social systems, but not the logic of the historical process as a whole, a process leading to the replacement of one formation by another. This lacuna prevents sociology from uncovering the meaning of human existence. The truly moral question is: for the sake of what is it worth and indeed necessary to live? This is a question of world outlook: is that which exists legitimized simply by the fact of its existence? How should man's social world be organized? Often this question is decided not in accordance with, but despite existing reality: man must live differently than he in fact lives.
The other side of the Kantian doctrine of morality is the distinction drawn between the practical results and the moral judgement of an action. If a person acts correctly he always achieves his goal. But if he acts correctly not from the point of view of simple expediency and efficiency, but in the moral sense, no one and nothing can guarantee him success. Necessity deriving from social circumstances, the "logic of facts" does not always encourage the individual to act in a truly moral manner. On the other hand, actions stemming from moral duty do not always answer practical interests and do not always accord with circumstances. Even if an individual is well aware of his moral obligation, this is by no means an assurance that he will act accordingly. External obstacles, compulsion, a fear of public opinion, personal habits and private interests can counteract the performance of moral actions. It is well known that Kant drew idealistic conclusions from this configuration of facts. But we are not immediately concerned with these conclusions (since in the present article we are not attempting to make an historical and philosophical assessment of the Kantian heritage), but only with the question as posed.
What are the foundations for moral duty? Why is it that to act in accordance with circumstances is not always correct? Why do people gain the right to judge circumstances and to nullify them if they do not correspond to man's mission? Why is it that moral action, in spite of the logic of simple expediency, does not receive the corresponding remuneration? History testifies that certain moral dictums that did not conform to social conditions and were virtually unfulfillable, have nevertheless survived the centuries and retained significance for contemporary man. How can this be explained?
At the turn of this century yet another question was posed bearing upon the relationship of morality and science: can one include moral conceptions along with science in the sphere of 196 objective knowledge? This question takes on a varying significance depending on its philosophical orientation.
Knowledge (including scientific) always ``depicts'' existing reality observed as fact and verified empirically. But that which is morally imperative may in fact not be enacted in reality: it does not follow from the fact that something is worthy and valuable that it exists or will exist.
The notion of what is morally imperative may not be equated with knowledge, since it does not inform us of that which exists. Rather it represents a simple articulation of will or emotion. It is not difficult to observe that this (neo-positivist) interpretation of the problem (we deliberately isolated it from the specialized logical subtleties) in substance represents a restatement of Kant.
There is another interpretation given to this problem, one developed by neo-protestant philosophers. In our discussion we shall also free this interpretation from the specialized religious terminology and purely theological problem study. Man, it is said, ordinarily acts in conformity with the logic of social expediency and in so doing achieves certain practical results. Society makes certain demands of the individual which he must fulfil, otherwise social life as such would be inconceivable. But this sphere of practical ``reason'' should not be confused with the spnere of ' authentic" moral behaviour. To the latter we can attribute only fidelity to the absolute moral dictums, to higher justice and the selflessness of moral motives. This second sphere is in a state of irreconcilable conflict with man's ``natural'' world and his social being. Moral good cannot emerge from the evil life of society, nor is it capable of being embodied in full in social reality. As may be readily observed, this interpretation speaks to the same issue.
All that we have said above suggests that in deciding the question at hand it is fruitless to begin with a statement of "universally known truths" and to argue ``logically''. As long as we are content with a statement of evident facts at the level of common sense and the elementary principles of science, conceptions far removed from a rigorous scientific order will continue to agitate and to retain their significance.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ SCIENCE AND MORALITY:In our time the problem of the relationship of science and morality has been invested with a degree of specificity, although its principle content still remains within the 197 boundaries of the Kantian juxtaposition of the hypothetical and categorical imperatives. Science discovered atomic energy (and much else) and this accomplishment of the human intellect and of technology may be applied either for the good or for the bad of man. This is where the alternative arises: science does not have any moral significance, say certain Western minds, it does not determine the use to which its achievements and data are put. Science, consequently, must be supplemented with some other mode of the human reasoning, including the category of morality, which must suggest how and to what end scientific achievements will be applied. Science has never before been so morally significant, ooject others, for today scientific discoveries exert the unprecedented influence on the fate of mankind. Therefore the scientist must be imparted with a consciousness of his accountability before mankind. It follows that science must be subsumed under the moral law just as is any other aspect of human activity.
What can be said of this antithesis? It doesn't require a specialist in ethics to note that the opponents in substance have no point of dispute. Some simply sharpen or dramatize the problem by virtue of their inclination towards a tragic or pessimistic bent of mind, while others, to the contrary, cover the same ground in optimistic tones. Incidentally, to view the morality of science in terms of the necessity of imposing limitations in one form or another is illogical. If science and the scientist are to be confronted with certain moral demands this indicates that science as such does not bring forth these demands, rather it stands in need of a formulation to be contributed by morality.
But let us attempt, nevertheless, to transgress the boundaries imposed by such a statement of the problem and decide whether or not science with its concomitant attributes---- rational and logical thinking and empirical verification---is capable not only of demonstrating the path to the achievement of predetermined goals but also of helping man in the choice of these goals? How can we pinpoint the fallacy in the Kantian dilemma and in the entire philosophical school of thought which remains within its boundaries? This fallacy lies above all in the fact that the ultimate, or higher goal of human ambitions is interpreted as something of an unconditional nature, as free of external determination and thereby rationally and empirically undefinable. What is then the origin of these "higher goals'', viz., the goals which are not formulated by existing reality, by any given system of social relations but which on the contrary underlie, justify or reject this reality?
198The reality of human existence is by no means onedimensional. In addition to existing reality there is that which is essential, law-governed, that which determines such reality. In man's life in society the essential characteristics of his being are by no means always in direct causal dependence upon external circumstances and facts. Sometimes, in fact, they are in a sharp contradiction. This is what actually forms the logic of historical change: one and the same social reality (for example, contemporary capitalist society) both reproduces itself in the form of a system of existing facts and is fraught with tendencies which sooner or later undermine the social order of the system. This is also a link---but one of a principally different order---the link of transition, development, motion into the future. Social contradictions, conflicts, class struggle, the clash of ideologies are phenomena yielding to explanation only from the point of view of their substance. Only in the context of historical development, which is both conditioned by the past and the present and creates something principally new, can we understand the emergence of goals, ideals, criticism of the substance of revolutionary programmes for a social change which counterpose reality as morally imperative.
Thus, science is capable of explaining the emergence of man's "higher goals" which extend beyond the boundaries of the system of relations existing in a given society. But can science provide a foundation for such goals?
In the explanation of the origin of human goals man is regarded as one of the links in a functioning and developing system, as an object of the activity of socio-nistorical laws of development and as an agent of "natural-historical necessity''. The problem of substantiation, or ``justification'' (as moralists would have it) of goals presupposes the acceptance of man as an active, free and goal-positing subject. But to explain how and why this or that individual became what he is (what were his social and life conditions, his upbringing, the level of his education, the reasons underlying his conduct and the origins of his guiding motivations) does not signify a justification ofhis actions nor does it elicit his responsibility, nor reveal his merit or guilt. Sometimes it is necessary for an individual to act in disregard of circumstances and in opposition to the very ``facts'' which predetermined him as such.
What are the roots of the differences in the two modes of argumentation: on the one hand, in a "scientific manner" and on the other, according to the logic of morality? A resolution of the question depends above all on our understanding (or on the actual content) of science. In the so-called "positivist 199 science" represented by a multitude of relatively isolated and specialized research areas, to which one cannot refer as to "science in general'', the study subject is regarded as something external to the consciousness of the investigator. The intellectual activity of the scientist is taken into consideration in terms of methodology, or a mode of dealing with the object, viz., as an aid which may be dropped as soon as the result sought is received. It is unimportant whether or not (and for what reason) man needs the subject studied by the given specialized discipline and the results of the investigation. The process of cognition, the search for scientific truth is all that is invested with importance. As a result of abstracting and deflecting the object under investigation from the human world the scientist's consciousness treats the object as something indifferent to the subject and in this sense as something objective. As to how the scientific data received will be applied, this falls outside the limits of the process of scientific research proper. Of course, the scientist may also be a public figure, a morally responsible person, a citizen and a thinker concerned over trie fate of the world. In such an instance he is not indifferent to the application of his discoveries. But, and we repeat, in and of itself the mode of regarding the world as a totality of objects does not determine the practical cognition of this world by the individual. Precisely for this reason scientific knowledge can be applied indiscriminately. The nature of its application does not depend upon science itself.
Man may also become an object of investigation by the positive sciences---for example, by social psychology. But the tter is free to explain only the immediate causes of normal or ``abnormal'' (in one way or another) behavioral acts of the average group of men as well as work out methods for exerting direct influence over the consciousness and feelings of human beings. However, it cannot show precisely how the individual ought to act, not simply in terms of adaptation to existing social conditions, but in terms of the conscious creation of these conditions, the transformation of the very preconditions for law-governed activities of people.
In other words (if we express this proposition in the language of the philosopher) for social psychology man functions as an externally and internally determined object, not as a free subject. For precisely this reason data yielded by the study of man can be applied variously---to the detriment or for the good of man. One might recall in this connection the practice of psychological brain-washing of the people, for example, through commercial advertising and political 200 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1975/SAM277/20080323/277.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2008.03.24) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ top __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ propaganda. Public figures in the West (and above all scientists) have repeatedly expressed the fear that the newest discoveries in the study of the mechanisms of the human psyche could become a tool for the spiritual enslavement of the individual.
But is a principally different mode of cognition possible? Yes, Marxist philosophers answer this question, such a mode is readily possible. It is the mode of considering the world as a whole, including man as an active being within it, as a unity of subject and object. In the context of such an approach to cognition man, who in all his activities is subordinated to objective laws, will stand out also as an active maker of history, its subject.
The integrated philosophical world outlook of dialectical materialism thus erases the distinction between the two modes of investigating man and nature in terms of the existent and the imperative. But the heart of the matter is that each concrete science as it has in fact evolved and is evolving is something distinct from philosophy both in modes of thinking and methods.^^1^^ The data gathered in any concrete science can determine the goal of human activity only to the extent that certain more general, universal and essential goals of man are known in advance. Here the necessity arises of `` supplementing'' the scientific conclusions with moral principles, with an understanding of "in the name of what man lives''. In this sense morality and science cannot be equated, for they describe different aspects of human life activity.
_-_-_^^1^^ This bears not only upon the natural and precise sciences, but upon certain societal disciplines. It is one thing to talk of the philosophical sciences---ethics, aesthetics, historical materialism, in which the general world-view orientation enters directly into the subject of study and investigation. But there are more limited and specialized disciplines, such as, for sociological theory of averages in which general philosophical unction primarily as methodological prerequisites. Characteristic ies is the investigation of social phenomena within the framework of ``closed'', self-reproducing systems and man as an ``agent'' or ``link'' in this system, viz., in the capacity of an object functioning according to the laws of that structure into which he is included.
The study of logic of the historical process as a whole, in which man functions in the capacity of an active subject as well as questions concerning the ``direction'' or ``meaning'' of historical change, or focusing on the formation of man over thousands of years, and man's subsequent self-awareness as a free, creative subject---these are tasks not for sociology as a specialized discipline but for the philosophy of history, historical materialism. The distinction in problematique can hardly be explained solely by levels of abstraction, for it is ooth more concrete and more general. The key to the matter is, to all appearances, in the very mode of formulating the problems.
201Marxist philosophy, characterized by rigorous scientific methods, is able to respond to questions concerning the meaning of human life. But philosophy---and this represents the other side of the question---as a result of the extreme generality of the questions it tackles, can make no claims to offer solutions to everyday problems of man. The study of general problems of existence at the level of history and humanity (which is philosophy's terrain) should not be mechanically transferred to concrete circumstances as a yardstick for each and every daily event. In daily life the individual does not argue like a philosopher, not only because it is impossible to elevate the consciousness of every person to the heights of abstraction, but also because the position of the individual in his daily routine cannot always be directly inferred from his world outlook. Attempts to establish such a rigorous dependency in all cases can lead only to pedantic and doctrinaire attitudes, trivializing the very notion or philosophy.
Morality is also a world view incorporating the determination of goals and the understanding of the meaning of human life. But in the sphere of maximal abstraction it, of course, is not the equal of philosophy. It is quotidian (both mass and individual) consciousness, not a theory, i. e., the subject of specialized professional reflection. Morality emerges well before philosophy (although not quite as early as is sometimes assumed).
It is hardly possible to say that morality emerges simultaneously with human society. Therefore the assertion would seem to be unjustified that, as we often read, primitive man was a creature bearing high moral qualities. We are not concerned with how primitive man conducted himself in the early collective and with the restrictions he set upon his behaviour, but rather with the mode of behavioral regulation with which a state of mores was achieved which is so attractive to some contemporary moralists. By no means all behavioral norms, but rather a limited type of them in distinction from all the rest, is encompassed by the notion of ``morality''.
If we instruct an individual to follow only one behavioral code so that the "only possible" becomes tor him almost a physical necessity and if nothing compels him to deviate from the immutable order or even to entertain thoughts about other forms of activity, we cannot still call this pattern of behaviour morality.
For primitive man the form of behaviour was, in the language of cybernetics, ``programmed''. But man---including primitive man---differs from a programmed device in that in a physical 202 and psychological sense, not possessing any instincts in the sphere of community life, from the very beginning he was capable of a range of actions when faced with conditions in which the situation itself posed alternatives, displayed internal conflict, contradiction or incompatibility of interests and demands. Without this there would have been no morality, which since ancient times has been regarded as the choice between good and evil. The word ``habit'' also provides little help in our attempt to explain the rather rigidly ordered behaviour of primitive man. Habit must first be given form and then constantly reinforced by external constraint. The simplest form of such collective influence was coercion and psychological pressure, which is in fact a threat to apply the same coercion to he who deviated from the general norm. This, of course, is not morality.
If we allow for the fact that the primitives were stricter than our contemporaries in the observance of collective prescriptions even then it does not necessarily follow that the mode of regulation of their behaviour was morality. The latter expresses the mode of spiritual connection between the individual and society. Certain means of spiritual influence were at the disposition of the primitive collective (to be sure, they were to all appearances already developed at the point when the primitive mob took on trie form of a tribal organization). It was essential for the maintenance of general discipline that at least some of the members of the tribe were convinced of how one can and must act in this or that situation---otherwise this discipline would have been impossible. But this conviction could not have a rational foundation: at that point the awareness was too dim of what constituted the necessary conditions for cohabitation, althouigh it was precisely these conditions which had to be constantly reproduced in the form of corresponding behavioral norms.
Certain students of the primitive world, in establishing the existence of rather complex regulations among tribal people, try to explain their origin by means of the rationally expedient thinking of our distant ancestors: man, so it is said, understood what was good or bad for the life of the individual and the clan, and from this deduced the necessary behavioral norms. In our opinion, the practical result attained through the spontaneous experience of many generations and their unconscious selection of a code of life is presented by these scholars as the conscious goal and product of rational calculation. This is in fact the ``riddle'' of primitive life: it worked out numerous injunctions and prescriptions which even the great minds of 203 antiquity, trying to argue ``scientifically'', could not explain in a rational manner. We could include among these norms the extremely subtle rules governing sexual behaviour, which gradually limited the number of relatives who established the matrimonial bonds.
In what manner were primitive conceptions of what was morally imperative and what was taboo established? Above all by means of evolving ideas about the sacred and the inviolable in the existing mode of life. "This is necessary because this is it, because it is universally accepted, and it is impossible to act otherwise''. Such was the simplest foundation for existing behavioral norms. This is not morality, however, but the logic of simple custom, unfortunately not always distinguished from morality in the true sense of the word.
The attempts at explanation (as of yet not rational) of the origin of the existing norms governing society begin with primitive mythology. Totems and ancestors, then later gods and legendary heroes explained to man why he must act just so and not otherwise. Still this is not morality in the true sense. The authority of dead or concocted ancestors, in order to have the force of injunction, needed emotional reinforcement. After all, the lawgiver from the world beyond possessed no direct power, hence was incapable of applying sanctions. These sanctions had to be thought up.
The mode of fixing universally obligatory behavioral norms in the consciousness of each individualbecame rituals---sacred ceremonies of an ``imaginary'' character by means of which the individual supposedly made mystical contact with the other world, and fulfilled the commands of his ancestors. His actual conduct in the community took on in his mind a higher meaning of sorts, a meaning which could not be translated into the language of real relationships and practical needs. But man at that time stood in need precisely of such forms---mystifying the authentic meaning of his practical activity---for accumulating his social experience since he did not and could not understand the true, socially expedient meaning of his actions. The necessary under these conditions could only be recognized in the form of the sacredly inviolable.
We may assume that in the era of the early tribal system each socially useful action acquired in the consciousness of man a ceremonial and symbolic nature. This is suggested, for example, by primitive magic, connected both with the hunt and the healing of disease. Man at that time quite simply didn't make a distinction between practical activity leading to a desired result and symbolic rites, simply depicting such a 204 quasi-expedient act. It was believed that no activity can have a useful result without the performance of maeic rituals. To deviate from the rigidly canonized sequence of ``operations'' meant not only to fail in one's objective but also to violate the sacral laws, to draw upon one s kin sundry calamities as punishment by the otherworldly forces.
All of this pertains to the ideological (magical, religious, fantastic) conceptualization by primitive man of his social reality and practical aims. But we can isolate here yet one other aspect---the method of regulating reality itself. The motivation of activity on the principle of expediency (a characteristic feature of man's consciousness of a later era) was difficult to be understood by the individual at that point, especially in relation to the awareness of the social consequences of his actions. It was simpler to act according to immutable code: carrying out this code, so it seemed, was in itself a selfsufficient activity. The result of such conduct was regarded not as the consequence of a correct or incorrect choice of means and methods, but a manifestation of the very order of things, as a matter of Providence, the normal order of events, luck or chance.
It may be hypothetically assumed that moral consciousness is genetically more closely connected with such forms of reasoning than with notions concerning the expediency of human actions. We have in mind, of course, not magic or symbolism, and even less so mystical and religious forms of consciousness, but simply a scheme of activity; the link between situation and action is regarded as something imperative, obligatory and irrelevant to the result achieved (the latter is viewed as something independent of man's purposeful actions). Why in general does such a mode of practical reasoning arise?
The fortuitous and unforeseen which is often contrary to the intentions and aims of one's actions has long occupied a secure place in human history. Hence by no means all aspects of life in society could be governed by the principle of expediency. Since some human actions have in the majority of cases led to the desired results and had useful consequences, while others---to a disastrous outcome, generalization and clarification of the logical connection between actions and the results achieved--- were beyond the reach of rational consciousness; this connection merely unfolds gradually through spontaneous experience on a wide scale. In individual experience the rule which is expedient when viewed at the macroscopic level, can operate as an inviolable demand (``act in such a fashion, and don t bother about the results''). In addition, socially useful results do not 205 always reveal their social significance to the individual. They remain beyond the range of assessment from the viewpoint of use-value. Even if we concede that the individual coula always glimpse the practical consequences of his actions, he would not be in a position to evaluate their historical significance. Nevertheless the individual had somehow to isolate that which was necessary for the life of the community from that which undermined its foundations.
Out of this arose the need to formulate general rules governing human actions without even the understanding of its expediential nature, and to assess human actions without yet understanding why certain actions are preferable to others. There emerged both unconditional imperatives, prescriptions and commands applicable in a multitude of instances, and the notions of good and evil, which by no means were initially explained by the conceptions of usefulness and expediency. As the measure and sphere of rational consciousness increased, social life grew more complex and the boundaries of its sphere which had as of yet not been comprehended, expanded. All this conditioned the necessity of that mode of consciousness which would set man's goals before the conditions and prerequisites for such goals would be understood. One of these forms of consciousness was morality.
Here we have arrived at the core of the problem under discussion: both science and morality determine the goals and the rules governing practical activity, but the mode of determination differs. Science can formulate man's goals only within the framework of comprehension of the actual conditions underlying man's existence, given the verifiable knowledge of the prerequisites for these very goals (``what does this goal serve'', "wny is this necessary'') and of the external factors of their realization (``is this goal achievable, and what means will do to carry it out''). In other words, science determines only the purposeful activity of man, predicts the results of this activity and demonstrates the necessity of these results. In the moral form of regulating human activity the given conditions and the prerequisites of goals may remain uncfarified. This constitutes both a ``weak'' point of morality as compared to science, and its ``strong'' point.
Morality sometimes demands the ``inexplicable'' of man, that which in terms of its consequences transgresses the boundaries of his rational reasoning. Sometimes morality demands the ``impossible'' of man, that is to say it forces him to recognize the necessity of those actions for which the historical conditions have not as yet sufficiently matured and consequently the 206 grounds for such actions are not manifest. Moral imperatives can turn out to be extremely ``impractical'' or may demand actions of an individual which, under certain conditions, cannot be made into a universal rule. But mankind simply would make no progress if it set for itself only those goals and demands which could be immediately realized: it would reproduce over and over again the same conditions of existence. Indeed, many moral demands which were unrealizable in the distant past but which are now practical goals, were passed over to us from the past as a spiritual inheritance to the future. The historical character of man consists in the handing down of unresolved questions from one generation to the next. Such is the spiritual continuity in the life of mankind.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ MORALITY IS ALSO KNOWLEDGEWe have emphasized the differences between science and morality. But is there any common ground between them? Does morality include an element of knowledge of man himself? It was already underscored that genetically morality is linked with custom, but in many ways it differs from that form of consciousness which underlies and maintains custom.^^1^^ We refer in this connection to two essential points having a direct relation to the question under discussion.
First, the logic supporting a moral demand does not necessarily originate in that which is given, universally accepted and recognized. In moral argumentation we encounter, for example, reasoning such as the following: "Let everyone act as he will, but it is incorrect and I shall act otherwise.'' _-_-_
~^^1^^ The reader should not interpret this to say that morality, historically breaking away from custom, subsequently crowds out and replaces simpler forms of regulation such as customs, traditions and rituals. The latter also retain their significance in contemporary society in formulating and directing our activities, habits, motivations, and conceptions of what is correct, fitting and necessary. But in our society these regulators, granted their importance in everyday life, carry out the more ``prosaic'' function of ordering out activities along a well-trodden and verified route of typical behavioral forms, simplifying for us the choice of action in each given instance. If we are to refer to a choice of world-views and ideals, to a substantiation of the very principle underlying behaviour or to a resolution of a conflict between various ways of life and thought---at this point we are dealing with a true moral problem. One should not be isolated from the other, for subsequently the resolution of the moral problem on a mass scale leads to the affirmation of new customs and traditions which ultimately ``consolidate'' the results of the moral search and choice.
207 ``Although the majority believe that one must act just so, in point of fact one must act quite differently.'' The man possessing moral consciousness is capable, therefore, of freeing himself 01 the power of the established order (custom) and the traditional opinion and thus of taking a critical stance towards the dominant foundations of social life. The moral consciousness of the oppressed classes could never become revolutionary if it based its demands only on that which is.The capability of maintaining a critical stance to reality and of juxtaposing to this reality something of an ideal and imperative order takes form in man in the period marking the shattering of the tribal and primitive communal ties and the emergence of class differentiation. At this point there arise for the first time nostalgic conceptions of the "golden age" and a belief that the existing order, customs and laws in some manner or another violate the ``true'' foundations of human life. Although this critique of the existent was initially directed to the past (a fairly idealized past at that), from this critique at a later date springs man's ability to predicate a better future, to prophesy forms of human community which after a number of centuries will become realities. This ability to hazily outline a more humanistic and just society arises long before the social sciences make their initial conclusions concerning, man's progress in history and the inevitable emergence of a society free of exploitation and oppression.
The ancient Utopias and the pre-scientific socialism of the modern world were nourished above all by moral notions of the depravity of the then existing social reality and of the necessity of bringing about a moral world order. Only the scientific communism of Marx replaced moral duty with the objective necessity of history. But having transformed a world-view into a science, Marxism by no means eliminated m,oral views---those forms of mass and individual thought in which the laws of history are reflected in a pattern of evaluations and ideals as well as spiritual strivings.
This is one of the concrete instances or aspects of the interrelationship of science and morality. We have in mind here not science in general but rather socio-historical science. Although its scientifically demonstrative propositions were anticipated by the moral form of assimilating social reality, to a large extent this science replaced morality, restricting the latter in the sphere of ordinary consciousness---of a dream of a better future and of the final triumph of justice. The interconnection and simultaneous distinction between science and 'morality, however, consists in the very fact that even "strict 208 science" cannot do without a moral justification of its conclusions.
An essential distinction between science and morality, between the true and the good, is also manifested in the mode of substantiating notions which in terms of their practical conclusions may quite fully coincide. Let us suppose that both the comprehension of the objective necessity of movement into the future and the acceptance of moral exigency of an ideal world order induce people to identical actions. In the first instance, however, the essence of man, substantiating the necessity of revolutionary practice, is an historical category, as an entity given definition by the past. In the second instance, the essence of man, requiring the establishment of "authentically human" conditions, is perceived as the only possible truth which was only gradually apprehended in the course of historical progress. But we must not conclude from the foregoing that the moral consciousness is ahistorical or metaphysical. If the course of history is a law-governed process, its general scheme can be presented in the perspective of the evolution of the principle of essence, which is inherent in human history as a whole. However, the moral viewpoint cannot become a philosophy of history, nor can it explain the laws and mechanisms underlying social change; it remains only a mode by which man may apprehend his ``mission''.
Moralizing as well as the substitution of moral postulates for scientific methods has been a common occurrence in the realm of socio-philosophical thought. When moral consciousness intrudes into the sphere of socio-historical theory and endeavours to explain the course of history it often degenerates to the level of ideological apologetic of an order far removed from morality. The intermingling of scientific and moral criteria can only act to the detriment of both.
Thus the question of the relationship between science and morality cannot be decided through a simple choice between the alternatives: either unity and identity or distinction and discreteness. The fact of mutual interconnectedness presupposes differentiation. Functioning in a certain sense as things of a different order, science and morality ``penetrate'' one another much as electromagnetic fields through a medium of any degree of density. Moral laws operate in the field of scientific activity and morality as an object of study is subject to all the laws of scientific analysis.
But let us return to the differences between morals and customs. The second such difference consists in that a customary norm is spread only in the community widely 209 practising this norm. In the case of relatively autarchic communities the customs practised by each of them, granted all their diversity, remain indifferent to each other: some communities follow certain customs, others follow different ones. The question of who is ``right'' never arises. Morality is a different matter. Here the notions of what is correct and morally exigent are extended to all people regardless of individual group, tribal or national affiliation. This aspect of the moral consciousness arises for the first time parallel with embryonic notions concerning the unity of the human species---when the narrow confines of tribal thought are sundered. According to the latter the individual is obligated only to his tribe and no further. Only the recognition of certain universal laws of life can be attributed to moral consciousness in the proper sense. Any given morality (including class) propagates its tenets as being true and equally obligatory for all mankind.
In The German Ideology Marx and Engels wrote: "The class making a revolution appears from the very start, if only because it is opposed to a class, not as a class but as the representative of the whole of society; it appears as the whole mass of society confronting the one ruling class.'' Marx in a marginal note observed that "universality corresponds... to the class contra the state".^^1^^ The foregoing also fully pertains to morality in an antagonistic society. The dominant class is in a position to recognize any given moral principles only to the extent they are compatible with the existing order and the privileged position of this class within it. These are the historically restricted boundaries delimitating such notions as justice, humanism and equality. But this class understanding of morality by the dominant class is by no means limited to the boundaries of their own existence. To the contrary, it is imposed upon all classes and estates. Even the oppressed classes are compelled in a certain sense to share this interpretation, to submit to the norms set by the dominant morality to the extent and as long as these classes retain their loyalty to the given order, reconcile themselves to it and live according to its laws. But when an oppressed class rises in revolution (or in some other way strikes out against the established order) its class morality begins to clash with the dominant morality. But even this morality is not confined to the boundaries of any given estate. To the contrary, it _-_-_
^^1^^ Marx and F. Engels, The German Ideology, p. 62.
210 functions at the given stage as the only correct and universal morality and therefore clashes with the dominant morality, excludes and negates the latter. This morality not only subjectively is universal, but also objectively reflects the requirements posed by history, augurs the coming social order and in this sense operates as a universal morality.Of course, class morality always reflects class and therefore particular rather than general interests. But the justification of this morality lies in the measure of coincidence between the particular interests and the needs of the progressive development of mankind as a whole. In other words a comparison of the various class positions vis-a-vis morality clarifies which one is truly humanist, just and humane; in a word, which one has the truly moral basis. It follows that morality is not merely the expressed will of a given subject (in this case a class). After all, this expression of will itself must have a moral substantiation. When two contrary moral viewpoints clash the question is decided of which is ``right'' not of which can by force and effort impose its interests upon the other. From the point of view of morality we can justify or condemn the interests themselves (``authentic'' or ``distorted'', ``high'' or ``low'').
Of course, practically the question "who will win and who will lose out" is decided depending upon the interrelation of real forces (material, economic and political). But here the moral problem is-also decided: which side is ``right''. Otherwise an ideological struggle in the realm of morality would be senseless. Of course, each class pushes and confesses "its own" morality, contrasting it to the morality of other classes. But in scientific analysis or assessment of the worth of each of the systems of morality known to us it seems that one must avoid applying a plurality of criteria which are in no way interconnected. For such a point of view in substance excludes both morality and science.
The point of view of ethics, which compares various types of morality in terms of their relative worth, should not be confused with a scientific understanding of the historical role of each of them. This is one more aspect differentiating science from morality. Is such a comparison justified within the boundaries of the moral consciousness itself?
If the socio-historical science simply confirmed the existence of differing class interests there would be no grounds for testing how each of the moral systems "measures up''. In such a case the "scientific analysis" of one or another form of morality would be limited to a clarification of "whom it profits''. But this is in fact key, that class interests represent a 211 manifestation of objective socio-historical laws of development, therefore every class interest (and the corresponding morality) is at the same time a step in the ladder of progressive development of history. We can measure up the historical significance of various moral systems and their place on this ``ladder''. The negation of the past was always a step higher and therefore a further development of the past experience.
The question of the universality of given moral propositions often contains paradoxes. Virtually none of the moral norms of the past was enacted in a ubiquitous manner. In fact, it was impossible given class differentiation, the isolation of estates from one another and the existence of national and cultural barriers. In these conditions the demands of morality equally applicable to all mankind, turned out to be at best barren ``wishes'' and more commonly represented expressions of hypocrisy. The official ideology of the exploiter classes often profited off the moral consciousness of the people in general or of individual thinkers. Impotence, frustration and passive expectation of the triumph of justice often took the form of abstract ideals. But we must not overlook the other side of the matter: the spiritual heritage of the past has passed on to us the ideas of universal equality, individual freedoms, humanism and fraternity, the basic universal moral norms worked out by the people in their struggle with social injustice and moral vice.
Many of the moral commandments addressed equally to all men turned out to be unfeasible in conditions marked by class antagonisms. Indeed, how can we talk of the universality of the commandment "thou shalt not kill" in the context of antagonistic society, international and civil war, the death penalty applied against dissidents, treachery and murder? It is one affair to eliminate an enemy of society and of the nation but quite another to deprive a fellow-citizen of his life for selfish reasons. But despite this reservation the commandment "thou shalt not kill" had an abstract and universal character and admitted no exceptions. This commandment turned out to be not only impracticable but also contradictory to all awareness of social expediency. From this point on morality was confronted with an impassable hurdle---how to make the ideal and reality coincide. This point also marked the initiation of ideological profiteering on the part of the dominant class, of the propagation of submission and non-resistance to evil, and of political contrivances expressed in doctrines stating the inferiority of entire nations and classes which must be sacrificed for the benefit of the "true representatives" of mankind. But strange as it is, this commandment, smeared by 212 innumerable crimes and acts of barbarism committed in its name, continues to occupy a place in people's moral consciousness, and holds this place without sacrificing its rigorously uncompromising nature. If in certain circumstances the killing of an individual would appear to be an absolute necessity this indicates that the circumstances themselves are not entirely moral, that there must in the final result be implemented a social state in which the elimination of human life is not necessary. Such was the ``extreme'' conclusion arrived at by the moral consciousness. The logic of history confirms the justice of this conclusion. The future belongs to communism---to a society without coercion or bloodshed.
On what foundation does the belief in the inviolability of human life rest if historical conditions to this date refute such a notion? In what manner does the impossible become the possible if it relies only upon the power of the moral dictate? Is it admissible to draw conclusions concerning the subsequent course of history on the basis of moral indignation against certain aspects of social life? How can one arrive at the conclusion that it is necessary to alter the objective conditions of the existing social order on the basis that a certain moral imperative is impracticable?
From the foregoing we may draw only the following inference: the ultimate conclusions reached by the sociohistorical science and the moral consciousness are identical. But the methods of reaching these conclusions are principally different. Indeed, at the time of germination of many of the moral notions which we have inherited, mankind could not know what awaited it in the future. It could only conjecture in the form of the ideal. The logic of this conjecture posited a state of irreconcilability with the existing conditions and a striving towards something differing from existing reality. Granted the ``indemonstrability'' of the logic of the moral consciousness it nevertheless turned out to be historically perspicacious and prophetic.
This might all seem rather mystical to the excessively pedantic ``rationalist''. But the scientific understanding of the logic of the historical development of the moral consciousness presupposes a clarification of those objective prerequisites engendering such paradoxes. The very conditions underlying human existence forced man's consciousness to transgress the boundaries set by the existing system of social relations and to take the endless path of historical creativity although this very facility of the moral consciousness was devoid of scientific underpinnings.
213Science at any point in history is limited by what is known and verified. But at each of these points there is still a huge area of spontaneous notions, intuitive guesswork and positing of ends, all of which at that date remained outside the realm of verified knowledge. Subsequently these notions will be verified, the "rational core" adopted and the rest discarded. This is all retrospection, speaking with the benefit of hindsight. As to forecasting the future, this must always be somewhat hypothetical. Some of the cardinal concepts of morality represent such a ``supposition'' the verity of which will be tested by the science of the future. We note thus that the connection between science and morality is also of a historical nature. Science representing a higher form of consciousness in terms of verifiabiuty, demonstrability and the logical substantiability of its conclusions, at a later date "ties up the loose ends" of moral consciousness which consistently transgresses the borders of reliable fact.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ MORALITY IS ``PRACTICAL'' IN ITS OWN WAYWe turn now to the typical method of arguing---from the propositions stated on a general theoretical level we shall pass without any intermediary links directly to the realm of the quotidian. In ordinary experience the ``rationalist'' and the romantic" often lock horns over the subject of our discussion. The one endeavours to act strictly "according to science''. His constant opponent, somewhat "removed from reality" is the advocate of moral ideals. The one considers that any goal must be purpose-oriented and verified in terms of its feasibility. The other asserts that his goals are ``higher'' even if they are not always practicable or even explicable. This is an obvious embodiment of the eternal clash oetween science and morality. To what side do we offer our sympathies?
We won't rush to conclusions. Each of these personages, _ frequently encountered in daily life, is at times a true representative of humanity; each is a persistent struggler against evil and each ends up occasionally in rather absurd positions. Think of the moral zealot who in defending a just cause takes no account of circumstances and perishes in unequal battle. Looking back we may say that his cause was from the start doomed to defeat, since the "conditions were not yet ripe''. Yet he still appeals to us, this heroic sufferer, despite the impracticality of his elevated motivations and his ``unnatural'' activities. Think of the dreamer, wrapped up in 214 fantasies of the invincibility of humanism in an age in which the outcome of the battle is in fact decided by practical activity based on a precise knowledge of the facts ana circumstances. Truly, it is but a step from the sublime to the ridiculous. The representative of the "rational thinking" is subject to the same vicissitudes. His sobriety and firm grounding in reality sometimes turn out to be unprincipled acquiescence or reflect the futility of a ploddingly calculated action. The moral dictate granted all its external lack of expedience in the final result turns out to be effective, while the rational assessment which takes only the obvious into account can be disgraced in practice.
Thus, the alternative: either calculation or high principle, either facts or duty. The long debate over abstract matters is crowned with a simple everyday dilemma. Which should be given preference? The individual is often uninformed of the situation and acts ``irrationally'', applying ordinary principles adopted spontaneously from his immediate acquaintances, or perhaps from his distant ancestors. But morality offers no guarantee of success and practical calculation most often emerges victorious from the conflict with circumstances and with "impractical moralists''. The consistent rationalist must always think within the framework of real possibilities, unexpected success is for him simple fortuitousness and is in general excluded from his ``scientific'' calculations.
Now let us look trom this angle at the actual passage of history. Movement in history is not effectuated at each point according to preordained prognoses or on the basis of a thoroughly worked out programme. Any truly scientific programme takes into account conceivable deviation and chance occurrence, the element of the unforeseen. In the midst of these vicissitudes in the struggle for a just cause, the moral command takes its place next to the principle of expediency. The moral command means to be true to an ideal not only proceeding from the practical prerequisites for its effectuation (the end doesn't always justify the means) but also orienting oneself upon "the model" and "the example" in conditions contradicting this ideal. True advocates of human justice have always displayed much ``impracticality'': they have suffered ``unjustified' loss and perished in unequal combat, remained honest when deceit, so it seemed, yielded a bountiful harvest and have sacrificed themselves not only with success in mind but also "out of principle''. The expediency of such actions (not calculated in advance) rested not only in 215 preserving the cause itself but also in safeguarding its claim to Tightness in the eyes of its later defenders.
Morality, consequently, if looked at in a broad historical perspective, forms the spiritual link between the ``testator'' and the ``heir'', the precursor and the successor---a tie implemented by projecting ``paradigms'' of true humanity into the distant future. What is key is that by becoming the bearer of such an historical link man is elevated over surrounding circumstances and offers a challenge to existing reality from the position of higher standards in human existence. The unending nature of human history contributes to the justification of ``mindless'' actions. To be sure, the results are not directly credited to the enactor in the form of tangible reward or of "an honoured place in the memories of one's descendants" (many of history makers have remained "unsung heroes'').The chain of expediency in this case always remains open-ended, neither he who follows a moral impulse nor the witnesses of his act are able to draw conclusions concerning the future impact of the completed act. Succeeding generations are also unable to speak definitively in their assessments of the acts of the past from a more modern point of view---for history remains in a state of transition. Of course, individual or even group conduct of this type cannot be considered commensurate with processes enacted on a historical scale. But without such attempts to bring closer the moral ideal, without ``unfounded'' activities transgressing the laws of expediency human history could surely not be enacted.
A few words in conclusion. It would have been sufficient to state that morality and science are different forms of social consciousness, each possessing a distinctive logic and specific mode of conceptualizing social reality and man's practical activity.
But science and morality also share common ground. It would seem that an analogy between the two can be drawn only in one sense. Morality like scientific thought is a specific mode of understanding one's existence in history. If this is not theoretical knowledge it is at least a specific conception of reality, expressing in its distinctive language the objective laws of that reality.
The doubt that morality provides a specific knowledge of reality arises precisely because moral demands often differ astonishingly from the real facts. Indeed, this is the true meaning of the imperative as something distinct from the existent: it requires the fulfilment of the moral command and the elimination of the facts which have sunk deep roots in 216 reality by virtue of a number of causes and contributing factors. The moral substantiation of the imperative does not mean the explanation of objective necessity. The justification or condemnation of reality does not imply a comprehension of the logic of the historical process. But it is precisely here, in the counterposing of the ideal to reality, of the morally imperative to the existent that we locate the ability of moral consciousness to penetrate through the curtain of surficial phenomena to the essential definition of man as the subject of history. Regardless of the distance between the formulation of a moral demand to the establishment of the conditions preliminary to its practical effectuation, from the posing of a human problem to its satisfactory conclusion, this very juxtaposing of the imperative and the existent points the direction to progress in history---a progress which serves as a self-affirmation of the individual. Sometimes in this context certain traits of the future also come into view.
To be sure, the demand for a "higher justice" is by no means equivalent to the creation of a tangible programme of social reconstruction and the course of history is not merely the story of the struggle between good and evil. But there is a definite connection here. It may be remote and at times obscure, however it is sufficiently evident that man constantly transgresses the boundaries of the given and strives in the direction of the as yet unknown future.
But the good is not to be equated with truth, it will be said. We shall not enter the fray, the more so that this question is often merely a terminological one. We only observe that there is a certain resemblance between the conceptions of moral good and the ideas of verifiable truth. Good, just as truth, is universal. This fact does not contradict the class nature of morality. Each class morality promotes its demands and assessments as the exclusive truth. It is usually opposed by another class morality also making claims to universality. In science, the truth cannot belong simultaneously to two mutually contradictory convictions (although this is not a cut-and-dried case either). In terms of morality there are situations in which both positions have a socio-historical substantiation. The point of the matter is that existing society cannot function without enforcing certain demands put forth by the dominant morality. The opposing morality also reflects the objective social necessity---the transition to a new social order. The contradiction between the two positions, it follows, reflects the actual contradiction of the era, the opposition between the present and the future whose mutually-exclusive 217 laws of existence together form a uniform law---the law of movement and development.
It is no accident, of course, that opposed systems of morality are most often of all defended by antagonistic classes (for example the proletariat and the bourgeoisie), each of which defends its own interest. But any given class interest in one way or another pertains to objective historical tendencies and laws of development of human society as a whole. In this context only we can speak of the progressive or reactionary nature (speaking in the jargon of politics) of this or that class, of the historical mission (applying the language of social science) of the given class, or of the universal, humane and just meaning of the moral demands of the given class (from the viewpoint of morality).
The complications begin when we move from the simple juxtapositioning of different class systems of morality to a more tangible comparison in content. Just as in the development of scientific knowledge we observe here a certain degree of continuity. Each class morality (if at one point it was a progressive phenomenon) has an element of universality which becomes the intellectual inheritance passed on to subsequent ages and classes, the latter taking up arms against the morality which has outlived its day. The class representing a progressive force struggles not with this element of universality, but rather with what restricts it. Thereby the class giving battle imparts a fuller resonance and a Qualitatively different tone to the commandments inherited from the past.
As an example of this continuity we might recall the fact of another ancient commandment---"thou shalt not steal''. The actual bourgeois understanding of this commandment states that private property is inviolable. This commandment is turned against the interests of the dispossessed, rebuffing their infringements upon the privileges of those who maintain possession of social wealth. The practical effectuation of this commandment however is accompanied by an internal contradiction: the historical evolution of private property included the expropriation of petty proprietors. The emergence of the proletariat posed the problem of defending the interests of labour. Fidelity to the above commandment has now come to mean the abolition of private, and above all capitalist property. In actuality, the initial proletarian movements often enveloped its economic and political demands in this moralistic form. Here we observe approximately the same process as occurred with the commandment "thou shalt not kill": if a moral prescription turns out to be impracticable, if it functions with a 218 halter---for some and against others, one must not renege upon the commandment itself but rather rebuild the society as such.
Thus if concrete social conditions impart a limited and partial shading to moral demands and predetermine an unequal distribution of rights among the members of society, sooner or later these limitations come to the surface and acquire the significance of a demand for. full and impartially enforced equality for all members of society. Such is the logic of the establishment and evolution of the moral consciousness, which of course cannot be equated with the vicissitudes of unmediated historical events. The notion of moral good, we may be assured, is to this date not a truism of the social and historical sciences. For this the moral representation of reality lacks in theoretical substantiation and in a comprehension of the mechanics of the historical process. But let us turn to Engels on this subject: "If we now say: that is unjust, that ought not to be so, then that has nothing immediately to do with economics. We are merely saying that this economic fact is in contradiction to our sense of morality.... If the moral consciousness of the mass declares an economic fact to be unjust, as it has done in the case of slavery or serf labour, that is a proof that the fact itself has been outlived....''~^^1^^
Accordingly, in at least this sphere of social process and reality the demands stemming from the notion of moral good coincide with scientific truth, if not in form, then at least in substance. Morality is also a ``notion'', man's understanding of his reality, including not only the fact of his immediate situation, but also tendencies, possibilities and perspectives, the alternatives and problems posed by the evolution of this situation, and the meaning and significance of history for the individual.
_-_-_^^1^^ K. Marx, The Poverty nf Philosophy, p. 12.
[219] __NUMERIC_LVL1__ III __ALPHA_LVL1__ [The third section of this book is concerned with the question of the moral responsibility of the scientist for the social consequences of the application of scientific discoveries and achievements, the significance of the moral qualities of figures in the world of science and of the atmosphere within this world itself for the fulfilment of its social and humanist function.] __ALPHA_LVL2__ [introduction.]The third section of this book is concerned with the question of the moral responsibility of the scientist for the social consequences of the application of scientific discoveries and achievements, the significance of the moral qualities of figures in the world of science and of the atmosphere within this world itself for the fulfilment of its social and humanist function. The authors proceed from a recognition in this context of the socially conditioned nature of scientific activity. Doctors of Philosophical Science A. V. Gulyga and V. I. Tolstykh demonstrate the untenability of the myth of the absolute ``freedom'' of scientific creativity.
In conclusion Doctor of Philosophical Sciences E. V. Ilyenkov considers the historical and philosophical aspects of the problem of science and humanism.
[220] ~ [221] __ALPHA_LVL2__ V. TolstykhIn arguments centering upon the problem of science and morality one can hardly bypass art in silence, for art has the capacity to satisfy man's need to know not only the laws, principles, norms and rules deduced and formulated by science, but also the entire abundance and variety of the practical manifestations of these laws, principles, norms and rules. Delving in that which Gorky considered the most interesting in human existence---the motivations underlying the moral behaviour of the individual, art is the source of moral lessons which---by the depth and power of their influence---could be the envy of the most talented moralist.
Let us take for example Bertolt Brecht's play Leben des Galilei (Galileo), in which the question of the moral responsibility of the scientist is posed with the cutting edge of polemic. Leben des Galilei can only conventionally be called a historical drama. In substance it is a philosophical drama.
Aristotle made the observation in his Poetics that the historian and the poet differ not merely in the fact that the one speaks in verse and the other in prose. You could in principle rewrite Herodotus in verse, yet it would still be history, only now in metric form. The difference lies in the fact that the historian narrates ex post factum while the poet tells of the "quality of events past'. As a result, according to Aristotle we find more that is philosophical and of use-value in poetry than in history, for the former is more universal, the latter---- particular.
We cannot agree with such evaluation of history as science. It is not difficult to understand, however, why Aristotle evaluated it just so. After all, in the time of Herodotus and Plutarch 222 history as a science concerned with conformities and laws had not evolved as of yet. As a rule it limited itself to the ``biography'' of facts, events, personalities. As far as art is concerned Aristotle was quite right to speak of the "quality of events past" as the primary concern and end of the artist. By the term ``general'' in art he implied the depiction of that which this or that individual must---in terms or probability or necessity---say or do. In this sense Leben des Galilei is not an historical drama.
Anyone familiar with the biography of Galileo will note a multitude of inconsistencies between Brecht's play and the actual events and facts surrounding the protagonist's life. The dramatist was extremely free in his rendering of the life of Galilei but the precise moral significance of his life was grasped and transmitted. Central to the play is precisely that which the individual (in this case, Galileo Galilei) must---in terms of probability or necessity---say or do. Completely shorn of that which Engels bitingly called "petty philosophising" and of grubbing in the domestic trivialities of the life of an historical personality, the play elevates the historical fact to the level, of philosophical generalization and, in the same act, of contemporary resonance.
As distinct from science which is concerned with the laws of historical events, of clashes and situations, art places its accent upon the discovery of their personal impact, comprehended from the viewpoint of the interests of modern man. For art Hamlet's phrase "to be or not to be" is not only a familiar question, but also the expression of its specific approach to human problems. In this context art is profoundly alien to both ``museum'' depiction and to the forced ``modernization'' or "contemporary rendering" of the events of long ago. Turning to the past it sees its civic goal in evoking in its contemporary reflections on oneself and on one's time while remaining faithful to the truth of history. In point of fact it would be naive to assume that even the viewer possessing the diligence of the first-rate student will hurry to a performance of Shakespeare's Chronicles or Hamlet only to "verify and broaden" his insight into history. Being a social animal the man in the audience is interested not only in how people lived in the Kingdom of Denmark but rather primarily in how the Prince of Denmark pertains to him and to his times. Quite the same may be said of Brecht's Galileo.
This play has no direct relationship to contemporary events. It does however incorporate the timely problem of the moral responsibility of the scientist, a problem which is perceived by 223 the viewer and reader of our time in the light of their own experience in society.
Art is capable of either awakening or smothering the civic conscience of the audience. It all depends upon the relations which arise between a work of art and the audience. Brecht's attitude to his audience is always one of polemic and conflict. He saturates the moral content of his plays with ideas and thoughts which are politically germane and are addressed to each and every of his viewers. Therefore he is not satisfied with simple agreement or disagreement with events upon the stage on the part of this viewer. What is important is to provoke conflict in the consciousness and soul of everyone seated in the theatre, to force each into an inner polemic with his own conscience.
Here as well, of course, much depends upon the nature of the virtues possessed by the theatre-goer himself.
In speaking of the French theatre and painting during the period of the bourgeois revolution (of 1789--1793) an outstanding Russian Marxist G. V. Plekhanov observed that inasmuch as the virtue of the French citizen of that time was primarily a political virtue, to that extent his art was predominantly political an. ``Don't take fright, dear reader,'' wrote G. V. Plekhanov, "this means that the citizen of that time, that is the citizen worthy of that appellation, was indifferent or almost indifferent to those works of art at the heart of which he could not find a political idea cherished by him.''~^^1^^
In Leben des Galilei there is such an idea ``cherished'' by the playwright and the contemporary viewer, an idea which is richer than the concrete content of the play.
Does progress in science depend upon the moral stature of its contributors? Is there a connection, and if so, what is it, between intellectual accomplishments and the moral positions and profile of the scientist? In an age in which scientific and technological achievements penetrate every pore of human existence and simultaneously bring about the highest good and the highest evil, when the triumphs of scientific thought as never before are emerging as a factor in the political struggle and when ethical relativism has sunk deep roots in the consciousness of certain scientists, these questions have become very pressing.
Progressive scientists have always emphasised the moral significance of science for the development of society. In the _-_-_
^^1^^ G. V. Plekhanov, Art and Literature, Moscow, 1948, p. 185 (in Russian).
224 foreword to the book, Science et morale, by Marcelin Berthelot, a French chemist and one of the founders of the synthesis of organic substances, K. A. Timiryazev wrote: "Science, marked by an unceasing thrust into the future has enriched mankind both materially and morally since when all is said and done progress in any given direction goes hand in hand with the growth of knowledge, not to mention the fact that moral progress often finds itself in direct dependence upon material progress.''~^^1^^ Timiryazev regards .science as a tool for putting ethics into effect m life, at that, not a passive contemplative morality which makes peace with existing evil, but an active morality which "endeavours to apply itself to the matter at hand and sets as its task the amelioration of injustice, evil, and suffering".^^2^^Berthelot also falls into an extreme position in his assessment of the moral force of science. He considers it the sole force capable of "providing a foundation for individual human dignity and of creating future societies''. The entire pathos of his book consists of a disarming faith in the fact that the universal triumph of science will assure man of "the maximum of happiness and morality".^^3^^ A half century later another outstanding scientist and the contemporary of the Hiroshima and Oswiecim (Auschwitz) tragedies, Albert Einstein expressed his doubts in the harmony of science and morality and expressed his preference in the latter. Man's fate from this point depends upon his moral foundations, not upon the level of his technological achievements---Einstein's conviction demonstrates the path of evolution traced by the point of view expressed by Berthelot. No matter how great the force of science it is incapable---even at its pinnacle---of assuring that moral underpinning for society which would guarantee the rational application of the achievements of the human mind. Einstein too was far from acknowledging the necessity of revolutionary social changes, but events led him squarely to this conclusion.
The following eloquent fact bears testimony to such a statement. In June 1970 a twenty-five-year-old Doctor at Sussex University, Peter Harper declared publicly at an International Conference of scientists on the question " Science, Menace and Promises'', that he had decided to halt his _-_-_
~^^1^^ M. Berthelot, Science et morale, Moscow, 1898, p. 11 (in Russian).
~^^2^^ Ibid., p. 15.
~^^3^^ Ibid., p. 48.
225 research on the brain, since the experimental results already obtained could easily be used by the "forces of evil" against man. In his opinion the appearance of a truly "humane science" is connected with a fundamental transformation of the economy, ideology and society as a whole. Only a human science will free the scientist from the power of the "forces of evil''. Science as an end in itself resembles a narcotic---it is harmful and leads to terrible effects.The example at hand, though abstract and vulnerable in a number of points is incontestable in that it acknowledges the very close dependence of the development and functioning of science upon the nature of the social order, economy and ideology of a given society. The achievement of the humanist mission of science is determined in the final result by factors extrinsic to its own sphere of activity.
The link between science and morality is not as simple and direct as is imagined bv, for example, the advocates of straightforward rationalist ethics. Even today we may encounter the conviction that knowledge of how we must act is a sufficient condition for true moral behaviour. In actuality, however, things are much more complex. The feasibility of carrying out a moral deed is not assured by knowledge of moral principles and norms alone. Therefore the level of knowledge of both the isolated individual and the age as a whole does not coincide with that of their moral consciousness. The contradiction between the ``rates'' of growth of knowledge and consciousness (this contradiction makes itself felt even today) is not resolved by a simple increase in the integral of scientific knowledge.
The instance at hand concerning Galileo also supports this conclusion. In terms of erudition Galileo and Giordano Bruno hardly differ, not to mention the fact that they defended one and the same idea. In the moment of decision, however, they acted differently. This difference engendered the moral drama enacted by one of them and of such interest to Brecht.
Brecht's interest in the life of Galileo was prompted by concrete social causes. In the rough draft of a preface to the play he wrote: "The bourgeoisie isolates science in the mind of the scientist, represents it as an autarkic island region, in order in practice to harness it to the chariot of its politics, its economy, its ideology. The goal of the researcher is ``pure'' research, the results however couldn't be less pure. The formula E=mC2 is thought to be eternal and discrete. But such a position permits others to establish the existence of this tie: the city of 226 Hiroshima is suddenly wiped from the face of the earth. Scientists claim that the machine is not responsible.''~^^1^^
This anti-fascist writer and Communist considers that the liberation of science from moral responsibility before society reflects the class interests of the bourgeoisie which is quite satisfied with the theory of the social impartiality of the natural sciences and the moral unaccountability of the scientist. In a world in which profit has become a fetish regulating all forms of social relations this theory finds fertile soil. With the emergence of positivist ideas the process of purging science of its ideological and moral aspect has taken place with unusual intensity and acquired in the imperialist era the most ``aggressive'' form. This purge is taking place under the seductive slogan of "freedom of research" and wages on the natural desire of the scientist to focus on his research, removing himself from worldly cares. Brecht observed in apposition: "Many people, aware of, or at least with an inkling of the shortcomings of capitalism, are prepared to make peace with these shortcomings for the sake of the individual freedom which it allegedly gives. They believe in this freedom primarily because it is almost never made use of.''^^2^^
The bourgeoisie is true to its own practicality: in providing the "freedom of research" it supplements this with another ``freedom'', that of marketing one's research. The slogan ``freedom'' is transformed into its opposite, into a trap, a snare into which many scientists do indeed fall. No matter how much the scientist might wish to remain within the confines of ``pure'' research, even there the process implies a total, a summing up. The latter turns out to be beyond the power of the scientist. To each his own: to the scientist---the research process, to the bourgeois---its results. How a discovery will be applied, for the good or to the detriment of mankind---this ethical, moral question is removed from the jurisdiction of science and becomes the prerogative of the powers that be. The scientist is instructed in the idea that his profession has no bearing upon his civic obligations.
The idea of an "ivory tower" in which one might hide from the trials and tribulations of life penetrates into the world of science and insistently demands its right to recognition alongside "art for art's sake''. Decadence as an expression of a _-_-_
~^^1^^ Bertolt Brecht, Schriften zum Theater, Band IV, Berlin und Weimar, 1964, S. 222--23.
~^^2^^ Ibid., S. 227.
227 disjuncture between people of creative skills and the surrounding world, consequently, must not be considered a monopoly of the world of art. It is a general feature of the bourgeois way of life and world-view in the era of imperialism.The penetration of immoralist tendencies and moods into the scientific environment is not however only a purely ideological problem. It is a logical consequence of the more general process of scientific development in the age of imperialism. As John D. Bernal quite justifiably remarked: "The application of science---in the present capitalist system---leads to an insoluble ethical dilemma. Therefore we must abandon science or ethics or both. The minor premise, the economic system, is never taken into account.''~^^1^^ Therefore it is naive to reduce the substance of the problem to the question of the morality of the scientist as certain progressive figures in the Western scientific world do. Academician N. N. Semyonov, the Nobel Prize winner, observed in one of his articles touching upon this question: "The famous mathematician Norbert Wiener proposed that scientists should organize so to speak a system of `self-control' and not publish a single line that might serve the cause of militarism. This noble but naive proposition could never be put into effect.... Suggestions of this sort do not take into account the fact that the entire complex of questions concerning the social nature of contemporary science and its accountability before mankind as well as its efforts to promote, the cause of man's well-being---in real social life go beyond the limits of competence of the scientists.''~^^2^^ By the way, within the ``competence'' of the latter something essential does remain.
Those who defend the indifference of science to the sphere of morality in point of fact exaggerate its autonomy. They refer for support to the allegation that science has but one goal---the search for truth. The scientist takes off where the human ends. The precise demarcation of the spheres of science and life is considered to be a sign of particular honesty, for the ethical meaning of the first allegedly is fully exhausted by fidelity to the principle of "objective truth''. To the extent that science, in actuality, does not directly pursue mo'ral goals and that the possession of truth does of itself not make the _-_-_
~^^1^^ John D. Bernal, "The Abdication of Science''. In: The Modern Quarterly, Vol. 8, No. 1, Winter 1952--1953, pp. 45--46.
^^2^^ ``Science and Society in the Atomic Age'', Voprosy Filosofii, 1960, No. 7, p. 30 (in Russian).
228 scientist moral such a viewpoint could seem just and convincing. (In point of fact recognition that the Earth orbits the Sun of itself has no moral content). But if cognition is the path of inquiry, much of this pertains to the character, will and personality of the scientist. The arrival at a truth is most often associated with a re-evaluation of established opinions, and a fresh look at widespread but outmoded conceptions. Therefore it directly or indirectly forces the investigator to confront serious moral questions---often demanding a moral feat of him.Observing the growing responsibility on the part of the scientist before mankind one might recall the proverbial adage that "villainy and genius are two things that never go together''. Therefore the true scientist cannot shy away from moral problems, from deciding the question of the ends to which his discoveries and inventions are put. He cannot be comforted by the thought that the integral or the spontaneous nuclear reaction are in and of themselves ``heartless'' and as such are devoid of ethical criteria. The fact that spiritual turmoil and the scientist's pangs of conscience as a rule remain concealed from the gaze or the outside world does not alter this situation.
Science by its very nature is inseparably bound with social interests---it never was a form of hermeticism. The history of scientific thought represents a history of the strivings, desires and passions of the man in search of truth. Being an inseparable part of universal strivings towards an ideal it forms an element of secular history. The stages in this struggle are instructive, the list of heroes long. Brecht chose Galileo Galilei.
During the lifetime of this remarkable Florentine physical conceptions which seem natural from the vantage point of contemporary science were then becoming an element in an ideological struggle. The views of Copernicus which were sharea and defended by Galileo and Giordano Bruno, struck to the very core of the religious Weltanschauung. The natural sciences became the arena of the bitterest ideological engagements. Any struggle of ideas, be it political or scientific, is simultaneously a conflict and struggle of moral positions.
It is said that the first stage of wisdom is the discerning of falsehoods and the second the perception of the truth. If this is true, Galileo completed both stages. For seventeen years he taught the Ptolemaic system, while harbouring doubts of its accuracy. These doubts stood in need of confirmation by fact. It was the telescope directed by Galileo at the starry heavens which introduced these long-awaited facts. Now it was possible 229 to proclaim openly to the entire world the correctness of the views of Copernicus and Giordano Bruno. As a scientist Galileo believed in the conclusions of reason. He however forgot that in the Scriptures sin and knowledge were from the beginning inseparable: it was precisely the thirst for knowledge which forced man to bite upon the apple from the tree of knowledge. From the point of view of the ecclesiast, an evident crime had taken place against the principles and norms which had been given and legitimatized for eternity.
In the scale of sins rigorously worked out by the Holy Church a sharp distinction was made between ``pardonable'' and ``unpardonable'' sins. To the first belonged sins of the ``flesh'', to the second, sins of the ``spirit''. In itself this division demonstrates that Church orthodoxy was not. distinguished by overwhelming consistency and, what is most important, was not really as formalist as it is customary to assume. The tolerant attitude to carnal sins justified the violation of ascetic norms on the part of the Church Fathers themselves (``Nq mortal is so high that his sins need not be prayed for'') and also---and this was fundamental---the fact that it permitted the Church to play with human weaknesses in order to curb a more terrible sin, namely ``blasphemy'', when the ties with the fount of everything, God, are severed.
Galileo, like Giordano Bruno, committed an `` unpardonable'' sin. To be sure, as distinct from that of Galileo, Bruno's ``guilt'' was aggravated by another deadly sin--- praesumptio---that is to say impudence, when a well-known person hopes to be forgiven for an unpardonable sin without an act of penitence (sine poenitentia) and in the same motion hopes to attain the right to sin in a still more unbridled manner. The moral irreproachability and invulnerability of the Nolan (as Bruno called himself in his works, after the town in which he was born, Nola), bitingly and relentlessly speaking out against the dissoluteness of the aristocracy and of the art of "vulgar passions" and advocating restraint in one's inclinations as well as moderation in the passions, were not even given passing mention by the Inquisition. Here the Holy Fathers could not retreat from consistency: ``morality'' or ``immorality'' was to be determined for the scientist in terms of his stance toward the postulates of the Church.
The split between science and religion was placed in bold relief by the very notion of the moral accountability of the scientist. The Church considered his responsibility to rest in the concealment of the truth, for the latter could lead in unpredictable directions as one court philosopher frankly 230 points out in Brecht's play. The playwright gives us to understand that we are not concerned with the Church as such. Beyond the facade of the canons of the Church are concealed the interests of definite social and political forces, the personification of which is the Church. Science, on the contrary, understood the responsibility of the scientist to lie in the resolute rejection of all outmoded conceptions. Two ethical codes, the Church and the scientific, differed literally in every matter of concern. For the scientist the most "stubborn fact" was data, the experiment. For the scholastic it was the citation, the sophistry and the authority of ``heavenly'' Aristotle (incidentally, the great Greek philosopher and naturalist should bear little blame for this, for the Church distorted his works beyond recognition, destroying, in the words of Lenin, all that was ``alive'' and preserving that which was ``moribund''). The sincere and naive attempts by Galileo to ``persuade'' by rational argumentation were shattered against the impenetrable shield of scholasticism, dogmatism, ignorance, and ``asininity'', to use Bruno's concise appraisal.
``For the scholastic,'' Bruno writes ironically, "everything measures up to standard.'' Witness the academy over the entrance of which is written: ``Don't violate the norm of moderation.'' In this habitation the inhabitants are painstakingly and tirelessly working out the most complex problems of existence. Precisely what problems? Some are deciphering the Scriptures. Others are engaged in the resurrection of outdated words, determining the rules of correct and incorrect orthography. Still others are carrying on an endless dispute on what comes first: the sea or its sources, the noun or the verb. They are to the last person replete with an awareness of the absolute necessity of such activity, of the certitude of time-honoured notions and viewpoints. Any encroachment upon their substantiality calls forth protests and indignation. Science might lead in unpredictable directions---Brecht caustically epitomized the substance of the methodology of the Holy Chuich.
Galileo, just like any other individual, was not free to choose his own opponents. The ``asses'' set against him were in fact the powers that be in society. Therefore Galileo's defeat in his conflict with the Holy Church was predictable. The methodology of the scholastics and dogmatists becomes impenetrable the moment it is taken seriously. Orthodoxy makes ``asininity'' unassailable. Galileo became convinced of this after receiving scholars from the Florentine court. This was a dialogue of the deaf. Two thought patterns, absolutely alien and mutually 231 exclusive, came into conflict. Galileo would have been fully justified in repeating Socrates' sad aphorism: "As for me, all I know is that I know nothing.'' But they lack even that knowledge. Indeed to the ignorant any new idea seems superfluous.
The age of Galileo, so rich in talent in all intellectual and creative walks of life (Galileo's year of birth marks that of the death of Michelangelo, the mature life of the scientist coincides with the flowering of Shakespeare's genius and with Kepler's discovery of the laws of planetary motion)---lacked an essential link, that of sensitivity to genius. Often self-satisfied mediocrity triumphed over brilliance and talent; banality and baseness over honesty and sincerity. Accommodation was elevated to a moral norm. Crude utilitarianism, on the one hand, and absolute intolerance of unorthodoxy on the other, transformed the life of the talented person into uninterrupted moral torment.
Galileo, a devout believer in the power of reason, was forced to the recognition that the triumph of the latter was to a large extent determined by factors extrinsic to reason and science. But he could free himself definitively of illusions and soberly evaluate his situation in the surrounding world only after his individual fate had been decided for him. But he left us, people of another historical era and another way of life, his moral experience of which it would be unwise not to take advantage.
Science, like everything living, develops through contradictions, through a conflict of opinions. But this struggle begins to acquire a distorted form as soon as elementary ethical norms have been violated. In its own time an article by the American sage Benjamin Franklin entitled "The Morals of Chess" caused quite a stir. In ironic form the game of chess is compared in this article with life itself. In a few points outlining the ``rules'' of the game Franklin formulates a kind of moral codex for human behaviour and mutual relations. This codification, as a brief look will demonstrate, bears directly upon science.
The following represent certain of these rules:,
``Therefore, first, if it is agreed to play according to the strict rules, then those rules are to be exactly observed by both parties, and should not be insisted on for one side, while deviated from by the other, for this is not equitable.
``Secondly, if it is agreed not to observe the rules exactly, but one party demands indulgences, he should then be as willing to allow them to the other.
232``Thirdly, no false move should ever he made to extricate yourself out of difficulty, or to gain an advantage. There can be no pleasure in playing with a person once detected in such unfair practice....
``Snatch not eagerly at every advantage offered by his unskillfulness or inattention; but point out to him kindly, that by such a move he places or leaves a piece in danger and unsupported; that by another he will put his king in a perilous situation, etc. By this generous civility (so opposite to the unfairness above forbidden) you may, indeed, happen to lose the game to your opponent; but you will win what is better, his esteem, his respect, and his affection, together with the silent approbation and good-will of impartial spectators.''~^^1^^
Unfortunately in maintaining various scientific points of view, the contestants by no means always observe rules of this type. The violation of ethical and scientific norms for conducting polemics, claims by some scholars to a monopoly of knowledge, the self-serving application of accepted terminology in place of an objective analysis of data---all these habits interfere with and delay progress in science.
However, let us return to our discussion of Galileo.
If it is possible to speak of being ready to die, Giordano Bruno had morally readied himself for the terrible end prepared for him by the Inquisition. In his Degli eroici furori the unyielding Bruno wrote: "It is unquestionable that a dignified and courageous death is preferable to an unworthy and vile triumph.''^^2^^ On the Campo dei Fieri in Rome he demonstrated his sincerity and the deliberateness of his words as he faced the bonfire. Incidentally Galileo's abnegation demonstrated with clarity that even a "vile triumph" is unattainable: people are not indifferent to the moral price at which the right to live is bought. The scene depicting Galileo in a state of dotage---as it is written in the play---testifies to the total deterioration of his personality.
It should be observed that here, as well, Brecht remains faithful to the truth of his character. His Galileo is not one who under the spell of "objective circumstances" will seek for a source of self-justification. The position of the playwright excludes even the slightest possibility of self-justification for the hero, for this would call into doubt morality as a whole. _-_-_
~^^1^^ Benjamin Franklin, "Morals of Chess''. In: The Works of Benjamin Franklin, Vol. II, Boston, 1840, pp. 190--91.
^^2^^ Giordano Bruno, Des fureurs heroiques (Degli eroici furori), Paris, 1954, p. 192.
233 Brecht's Galileo unambiguously admits the unforgivable nature of abnegation. "I have become convinced,'' Galileo says to Sarti, "that I was never threatened in a direct manner. For the course of several years I was just as strong as were the authorities.'' His will and nature constantly find themselves under the control of his reason, excluding an unpremeditated decision. If nevertheless he carried out deeds for which he was later repentant, they were by no means committed "in ignorance''. The level of consciousness of the scientist is too high to succumb to the temptation to attribute it to the "work of the devil'', or even to refer to "higher considerations''. "If I had agreed to remain silent,'' he says, "then I would have been acting of course not out of higher, but in fact the lowest of motivations, to live a comfortable life without a knowledge of persecution....''In Brecht's attitude toward Galileo it is important to distinguish two closely related yet nevertheless relatively independent features: though uncompromising in his negative evaluation of the act of abnegation the playwright as realist does not rush to condemn. He wants to understand Galileo.
Brecht demonstrates that where it is only "laws of genuflection" that matter morality becomes a purely personal affair. In point of fact if the deed is to be evaluated irrespective of motivation, if it is the word rather than the thought which matters, the striving to look at the world with one's own eyes is regarded a heresy---moral convictions and motivations only obstruct life and the attempt to tend peacefully to one's affairs. The moral agonies suffered by the scientist are usually concealed from the gaze of the outsider.
In Galileo's world these considerations are not taken into account. Indeed they are just as impractical as the indulgences generously lavished upon the devout by the Church to free them from the necessity of making their deeds commensurate with the voice of the conscience. He succeeds who has learned to live with "two ledgers'', with two sets of tabulations, one for ``them'', the other for ``me''. Galileo, it would seem, learned the workings of this inveigling tabulator. Brecht more than once underscores the resourcefulness and assertiveness of his protagonist. Lying, maintaining a discrete silence, evasiveness, the anility to compose slavish letters and to shower with assurances of his "utmost esteem" the nobodies in cassocks---the scientist didn't shy away from such tactical weapons, hoping with their aid to maintain his right to conduct research and---to live. Cunning on the part of the honest person, however, suffers from one essential flaw: it is easily 234 identified. Galileo's cunning was several notches below that of the powerful Church.
Defence of the truth requires a special type of courage of which Galileo was bereft.
Those who believe that truth will blaze its own trail are sorely mistaken. No, "the amount of truth which comes to light is exactly equal to that amount which we ourselves bring forth,'' says Brecht through the voice of his hero. Strength or frailty of character and the moral qualities .of the individual are just as important in sciertce as they are in politics. Einstein wrote in an article entitled "Marie Curie in Memoriam" that "It is the moral qualities of its leading personalities that are perhaps of even greater significance for a generation and for the course of history than purely intellectual accomplishments. Even these latter are, to a far greater degree than is commonly credited, dependent on the stature of character".^^1^^
This conclusion was arrived at through deep suffering on the part of the great physicist. Just before his death Einstein admitted that although he had throughout his life striven to maintain his ethical convictions in a society of cynics, he had done so with "mixed success''. In a letter to Max Brod, the author of a novel entitled Galilei in Gefangenschaft Einstein wrote that his conception of Galileo differed from that presented by Born. "He passionately sought out the truth, more than did anyone else. But ... without any good reason he set out for Rome to take issue there with the clergy and politicians.... I cannot imagine, for example, that I would have acted in a similar manner to defend the theory of relativity. I would have thought: the truth is much stronger than I am, and it would take the insanity of a Don Quixote to mount Rosinante and defend the truth with the sword.''^^2^^ However, the story of the stance taken to the atom bomb by the author of these lines belies the truth: having learned that the nazis had stepped up work on nuclear fission, Einstein insisted upon active counter-measures, then after an interval of several years tried to ward off Hiroshima through a letter to the American president. It is impossible to deny to this genius the logic of his deeds or the exceptional nature of his human worth, which played such an important part in the crucial moments.
_-_-_~^^1^^ Albert Einstein, Out of My Later Years, London, 1950, p. 227.
^^2^^ B. G. Kuznetsov, Galileo Galilei (Study of His Life and Scientific Work). In: Galileo Galilei, Selected Works. In two volumes. Vol. 2, Moscow, 1964, pp. 487--88 (in Russian).
235Galileo is truly "no stranger to all that is human''; his adherence to sensual pleasures only serves to demonstrate the fullness and versatility of his character. We should not look for the cause of his moral fall here. The proverbial image of the monastic scientist, indifferent to the ordinary joys and trepidations of life, an image from time to time resurrected by art, is nothing more than an illusion of art, the result of superficial conceptions of the labours and life-style of original scientific minds. In Brecht's Galileo there is nothing of the eccentric---scatter-brained, again and again putting his foot in his mouth, clumsy and ridiculous in habit. In the play Galileo is physically sturdy, passionate in all aspects of his nature, full of mischief and, in a word, enraptured with life. But his love of life suffers from shortcomings in his character, will and courage. These are forgivable, perhaps, in ordinary affairs, but not when matters concern the defence of one's convictions.
In the celebrated closing monologue by Galileo the playwright gives (in the form of self-analysis) a philosophical explanation of the moral consequences of abnegation. "If I had stood firm the natural scientists would have been able to work something like the doctors' Hypocratic oath, a solemn oath to use one's own knowledge only for the benefit of mankind. But ... now one can count at best on a species of inventive dwarfs who will be employed for striving any ends.... I have betrayed my mission. The man who is doing what I have done cannot be kept in the world of science.''~^^1^^
Self-flagellation is by no means in the nature of Galileo. His self-criticism is the fruit of deep meditation on the moral question basic to the man of science: "Can we retreat and renounce the needs of the majority of the population and still remain scientists?''~^^2^^ Galileo's answer is well-known, a resounding ``No''. But the fate of the scientific discovery depends not only upon the courage and fortitude of the scientist, it is in the hands of those whom science serves. Answering the little monk Galileo gave precise expression to this thought: "Who will assume that the sum of the angles of a tTiangle runs ccjunter to the requirements ... of peasants? But if they are not set in motion and learn to think the finest irrigation installations will be no help for them. Goddamn! I have seen enough of your relatives' heavenly patience but where is their heavenly _-_-_
~^^1^^ Bettoll Brecht, l.eben des Galilei, Berlin uncl Weimar, 1964, S. 188.
^^2^^ Ibid.. S. 186--187.
236 wrath?''~^^1^^ As we see, the playwright is far removed from trying to reduce the problem of moral responsibility in science to the moral qualities of its creators. Depicting the concrete circumstances surrounding Galileo's abnegation, he uncovers the social wellsprings of the behaviour of his protagonist.Brecht, like his audience, knows that Galileo retained his place in science, just as did Giordano Bruno and Copernicus. Nevertheless he forces his hero to pronounce an uncompromising verdict upon himself. The technique of `` distancing'' is employed here not for dramatic effect, but to underscore the central idea of the play---the social accountability of the individual for each deed committed. The first play Brecht was to write after Galileo was Mother Courage and Her Children (Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder) where the same theme, already on the material of the "man in the street'', is continued. Courage as distinct from Galileo does not recognize the historical consequences of her actions. At the end of the play, having forced the mother of sons who had perished in the war, to drag her van out to meet new carnage, Brecht poses the question of the responsibility of the so-called "man in the street" for the fate of the world. Both in the case of the ``famous'' scientist and in that of the unknown sutler, the writer and Communist defends the significance of the ethical values of the individual and of the moral self-awareness of society. As a realist he knows well that only the person who considers himself the master of his own fate feels responsibility for his actions. If any human decision is a complex blend of character and external circumstances, then one must concern oneself not only with changes in social conditions but also with fostering the human attributes capable of meeting these changes.
In an acknowledgement of the important role played by character we find nothing idealistic or voluntaristic. In the contemporary world when knowingly or unknowingly, willingly or unwillingly every individual is a political being, compelled by circumstances themselves to choose one or another side of the barricades, to take the decision, the uncompromising moral position of the author of Leben des Galilei seems much more preferable than the position of those who, guided by noble intentions try to minimize the moral significance of the great physicist's recantation. To wit, the author of the interesting book Heroes and Heretics, the progressive American _-_-_
^^1^^ Bertolt Brecht, Leben des Galilei, S. 119.
237 philosopher Barrows Dunham, in comparing the behaviour and late of Giordano Bruno and Galileo endeavours to justify the line of conduct followed by the latter with considerations of common sense. Dunham admits that Galileo's tactic was less ``heroic'' than Bruno's, but it "was rather more astute, aware of the political possibilities''. In what did this ``astuteness'' consist? Dunham explains: "Martyrdom is no doubt a noble act, and has more than once been necessary to human salvation. But it is possible for men to be made drunk with it, and thus to lose reason [emphasis added---V. T.]. Galileo's discovery---not less important than his discovery of the earth's rotation---was that one could now propagate science without ultimate personal disaster, and that a little suffering together with a little statesmanship would see one through.''~^^1^^The author of the foregoing lines does not conceal that "clever manoeuvring in the labyrinth of politics and ideology" is a "wiser tactic" than is the "heroic posture" of Bruno. And though Dunham doesn't deny the significance of the deed of the ``immolated'' (``... with Bruno's death coercive power at last abandoned the faggot and the stake'') he tries to explain it by the maximalism ofBruno's position and by an almost conscious striving to hasten the arrival of the terrible and fatal end.^^2^^ Dunham, relying exclusively upon common sense considerations, clearly does not take into account the fact that without precise moral criteria this very common sense can lead to the most unexpected results. This is where the complication lies, in that authentic morality is often compelled, in Blaise Pascal's expression, to disdain the "morality of the intellect'', the so-called "common sense" arguments.
As far as the tactic of "clever manoeuvring in the labyrinth of politics and ideology" is concerned, it can bear results only given the presence of certain very important conditions: definite independence of research from political goals set by the ruling class and a sufficiently high level of social awareness among scientists. The situation in which science and the scientists find themselves in contemporary bourgeois society is characterized precisely by the absence of such conditions. During the time of Galileo natural science remained a source of diversion and scientists conducted their experiments counting on,so to speak, their own ``wages''. In any case in the very process of scientific experimentation, research and the _-_-_
^^1^^ Barrows Dunham, Heroes and Heretics, New York, 1964, p. 319.
^^2^^ Ibid., p. 318.
238 search for the truth, the scholar was given a relatively free hand from outside interference and from economic pressure. Today the circumstances have radically changed: in order to conduct serious research major allocations are a must, which signifies the participation of powerful corporations and monopolies. The scientist as a rule from the very initiation of his research is bound "hand and foot" by moral obligations with social forces which may be absolutely alien to him. The application of the automated and advanced technology necessary for the experiment leads to the loss of an ethical order, for as Max Born observed, this process reduces the significance of the individual contribution in the carrying out of work and destroys the feeling of personal dignity. The objective position of science and scientists in bourgeois society is such that the tactics of "clever manoeuvring" more often than not are condemned from the start to Failure. It goes without saying that true scientists form, as always, an insignificant minority. However the extraordinarily nigh level of technological development has placed them in key positions within society. But despite the clear advantages of their way of thinking, they nevertheless are quite blind to its fundamental limitations. The political and ethical argumentations posed by scientists are for this-reason often both primitive and dangerous.There can be no argument that surmounting this dramatic situation does not depend upon the individual moral position or nature of the behaviour of the scientist. Egress, as Lenin demonstrated in his analysis of the social causes of the "crisis of natural science" must be sought in a fundamental restructuring of society through socialist revolution. But a role of some significance does fall upon the scientist as well. It is this side of the question that occupies the attention of the author of Leben des Galilei.
Brecht is by no means inclined to oversimplify the circumstances in which Galileo finds himself. His hero remains at the "height of his faculties" even when it is quite impossible to agree with him. Brecht does not exaggerate the role of personal courage, but his sympathies in this instance are unquestionably not on the side of Galileo. It is not incorrect to observe that truth will blaze its own trail in the end and triumph over the forces of ignorance and obscurantism. But this does not free the man of science from the duty of struggling for this victory through the force of personal example, and when circumstances compel him to the point, through a readiness to sacrifice his own personal interests.
The moral import of Galileo's abnegation has multiple 239 ramifications. It isn't simply that before the eyes of people who are indiscriminate in means and who don't trouble themselves over an excess of conscience there looms a contagious example to which it is convenient to allude on certain occasions. Just as in art a step by step inquiry into the "hero`s'' deeds is not the most widespread source of his impact upon life. The sobriety and severity with which Galileo judges his own deed excludes the possibility of any kind of analogy with the likes of Edward Teller, who is often called the "father of the hydrogen bomb''. Of course it would be outrageous to make a direct analogy here but the ethical principles flaunted by the behaviour of Teller at the hearings on Robert Oppenheimer, at which he without the slightest sign of inner spiritual drama consciously demonstrated where moral indifference could lead the scientist---have not only class but historical roots.
The legend of the great heretic has come down through the centuries allegedly exclaiming after his renunciation forced by the Inquisition: "E pur si muove!" In actuality Brecht is closer to the truth, for the historical documents support the artistic rather than the legendary version. But man's optimism is also understandable. The legend contains a faith in the victory of reason, in the endurance of scientific thought and in progress. Insisting on the necessity of an uncompromising verdict against the act of ``treason'' committed by the scientist, and supporting the second ``maximalist'' edition of the play (1946--1947), Brecht at the same time observed that in appreciation of Galileo's faith in a science not divorced from the people, "the people demonstrated its tribute in that for centuries across me face of Europe no one believed in his recantation".^^1^^
The play Leben des Galilei carries a very valuable and needed message to its audience concerning the accountability of the individual before his time and before the future. This message is that one must not betray one's convictions, enter into a compromise with one's conscience when matters concern the fate of truth. The favourite formula of the philistine "what can I do alone?" is opposed in the play by another: "What a victory was achieved by the fact that one person said"---No!" The play is also about individual value of the personality measured by the degree of its self-sacrifice in the struggle for progressive ideas, in our century---in the struggle for communism.
_-_-_^^1^^ Bertolt Brecht, Schriften zum Theater, S. 254.
[240] __ALPHA_LVL2__ A. GulygaBrecht's play Leben des Galilei(Galileo) is an important event both in art and science. The West German journal of theoretical physics Physikalische Blatter at one time submitted the play to a detailed analysis, an unprecedented fact in the history of the press covering the natural sciences. The writer Ernst Schumacher published a book entitled Drama und Geschichte (Drama and History), in which Brecht's techniques and the history of the play are studied against the background of the development of contemporary physics---an unusual event in theatrical criticism.
Brecht saw in Galileo's situation a number of conflicts typical for the development of science under capitalism. Hence the writer's endeavour to draw the substance of the play out of the boundaries of the seventeenth century and bring it closer to the modern times. Brecht underscored the fact that his play should not be interpreted purely as invective against the Catholic Church. "In this play,'' he writes, "the Church, even when it opposes scientific freedom, functions simply as the supreme power.... The play demonstrates the temporary victory won by this power, not by the clergy. It would be risky in our day to stamp on Galileo's struggle for freedom of scientific inquiry the impress of the struggle against religion. This would have the most undesirable consequence of distracting attention from forces of reaction in the world today, which are by no means restricted to the church.''~^^1^^ By this Brecht had in mind fascism.
_-_-_~^^1^^ Bertolt Brecht, Theatre, Volume 5/1, p. 350.
241Thus, at the core of Leben des Galilei lies the conflict between the progressive scholar and the reactionary power. The scientist strives for the truth, the power---for its further consolidation. Since the path to truth passes through doubt, science encourages scepticism and works to destroy illusions in its acquisition of knowledge. The bulwark of reactionary power is the force of habit, the faith in the reasonableness of the established order. Therefore a conflict between science and the forces of reaction is inevitable.
This conflict is initiated within the framework of science itself. For ages its representatives have been divided into two categories: creative scientists, the destroyers of old systems, and ``erudite'' scientists who, having assimilated scholastic wisdom, remain in fact blockheads who vigilantly stand on guard of society's mainstays and authorities. In the play there is an inimitable scene involving a dispute in the course of which Galileo suggests that his opponents look in the telescope to convince themselves in the existence of Jupiter's satellites, but they resolutely refuse to do so, since the astronomer's observation contradicts- the Aristotelian doctrine---the scientific Bible. If the facts don't coincide with dogma, so much the worse for the facts. "Such a thing cannot be because it can never happen, for Aristotle teaches us that, etc.'' Such a structure of proof exists to this day in certain sciences.
The conflict is made more complex by the fact that base material interests poke out from under the vociferous phrases concerning elevated matters. Galileo is seen not merely as a free thinker, but as a renegade who could have availed himself of all of the privileges of the ruling caste, but instead infringes upon its well-being. ``You're biting the hand that feeds you,'' the old cardinal rages in a state of frenzy.
The substance of the matter, however, is to be found elsewhere. The fact is that power cannot rest on ignorance alone. Knowledge is strengtn and the powers that be try to secure exclusive domain over this strength. "We need you more than you need us,'' says Cardinal Barberini (the future Pope Urban VIII) who will force Galileo to renounce his positions, but will preserve his star charts which are so essential for navigation. The reactionary ruling elite is forced to manoeuvre between the Scylla of free-thinking and the Charybdis of conservatism. It is no secret that those who fall behind are left to the wolves. The retrogrades would have been only too glad to forbid sciences as such if not for the danger of military damage consequent upon such an action. This is why 242 even the most reactionary, obscurantist power trembles before science and seeks to nurture its development. This is the conflict that disturbs Brecht.
The writer is concerned above all with the fact that in the bourgeois countries the destructive capacities of modern science frequently fall into the hands of ruling adventurists. He began work on Leben des Galilei soon after the nazis came to power and finished it by the time when German physicists had succeeded in splitting the uranium atom. Brecht revised the play after Hiroshima and carried out a second revision after the creation of the hydrogen bomb. The concluding monologue of Galileo is addressed to the contemporary natural scientists: "The only aim of science is to alleviate the hard human existence and if the scientists, threatened by self-seeking rulers, will confine themselves to accumulating knowledge for the sake of knowledge science may be crippled and your new machines will only bring new hardships. Eventually you will probably succeed in discovering all that can be discovered, but your progress in science will mean your departure from mankind. And the gulf separating you from mankind may be so great that one day your exclamation of triumph concerning a new discovery will be met with a general cry of horror.''
The historical Galileo could not have said anything of the kind: in the seventeenth century such a problem did not and could not have arisen. It has come to the surface only in our time.^^1^^
Norbert Wiener in his autobiography describes the doubts which beset him in the last years of his life when he began to ponder the conceivable social effects of his research, which could become the theoretical foundation for the creation of automated factories: "All these emotional experiences were nothing to those through which I went at tne time of the bombing of Hiroshima. At first I was of course startled, but not surprised.... Frankly, however, I had been clinging to the hope that at the last minute something in the atomic bomb would fail to work, for I had already reflected considerably on the significance in the bomb and on the meaning to society of _-_-_
~^^1^^ One may find a premonition of this problem in Rousseau's paradoxes. He asserted that scientific progress had had no beneficial effect upon mankind, it has simply corrupted morals. Rousseau did not call for a ban upon science, he only wanted to direct it to the path to truth. This, he believed, necessitated driving ignoramuses and profiteers from science, as well as pointing it to the higher goal---that of serving the people.
243 being compelled to live from that time on under the shadow of the threat of limitless destruction.''~^^1^^Albert Einstein wrote in 1945: "Physicists find themselves in a position not unlike that of Alfred Nobel. Alfred Nobel invented the most powerful explosive ever known up to his time, a means of destruction par excellence. In order to atone for this, in order to relieve his human conscience he instituted his award for the promotion of peace and for achievements of peace. Today, the physicists who participated in forging the most formidable and dangerous weapon of all times are harassed by an equal feeling of responsibility, not to say guilt.''~^^2^^
Otto Hahn who had split the uranium atom in 1939 was on the verge of suicide after Hiroshima.
``Physics, fear metaphysics,'' so it was said in the .time of Galileo. Now physics itself has become the source of fear. Science has suddenly shown its other face to mankind and emerged not only as a productive but also as a powerful destructive force. "The disdain,'' wrote Brecht in the rough draft of a foreword to his play, "which the people always felt towards the closeted scientist was transformed into unconcealed horror from the time that this scientist became a grave menace for mankind. And when he confined himself entirely to his science and steered clear from the people, the scholar to his horror discovered his connection with the people, for the threat hung over him as well; his own life was endangered and he knows better than anyone else the seriousness of this threat. He voices protests not only against pressure being exerted upon his science---pressure which slows down, sterilizes and misleads it---but also against the threat posited by science to humanity and the scientist himself.''^^3^^
It is only today that the problem of the moral justification of scientific activity has acquired the character or responsibility for the fate of the human species. Doubt has been cast upon a conviction which to the scientist of an earlier time seemed to be an unquestionable fact, namely, that the expansion of knowledge bears an a priori justification. The question was posited for the first time as to the human criterion the researcher should be guided by.
``Science knows only one yardstick---a contribution to _-_-_
~^^1^^ Norbert Wiener, / Am a Mathematician, p. 299.
~^^2^^ Albert Einstein, Aus meinen spdten Jahren, Stuttgart, 1952, S. 207.
~^^3^^ Bertolt Brecht, Schriften zum Theater, Bd. IV, S. 225--26.
244 science,'' says the young student Andrea to Galileo in Brecht's play. Galileo, the wiser from experience, corrects him: "The only aim of science is to alleviate the hard human existence.'' Galileo had come to this conclusion through suffering. At first he himself had held Andrea's views, i.e., he had not reflected upon the consequences. But then he understood: the joy of discovery, the pleasure of creative activity, the pursuit of "knowledge for knowledge's sake" are dangerous impulses which can turn the scientist into a tool of reactionary forces. Galileo begins to doubt the irreproachable position of the scientist possessed only with the thirst for knowledge during his conversation with the little monk-physicist, (der kleine monch) who proposes that his teacher think about the people. Galileo has no ready response, instead he tosses at his student a bundle of manuscripts in which "the causes of the tides which move the oceans are considered''. The monk falls silent, engrossed in his reading. But what does Galileo say in this context? "The apple from the tree of knowledge. He is already biting into it. He is condemned for eternity but still he must finish eating, the unfortunate glutton! Sometimes I think that I would agree to be locked into an underground dungeon deep under the surface of the earth where light didn't penetrate if only I could learn in exchange what in fact light is. The most terrifying thing is that all that I know, I must communicate to others. As a lover, or drunkard or betrayer. This is of course a vice, and threatens calamity.'' Why such self-flagellation? Galileo refers to his own "unconquerable need to carry on research as the sadist or pervert caught on the scene of the crime refers to his hormones'', as Brecht comments upon this scene. As the play draws to a close Galileo demands of the natural scientist something resembling the Hippocratic Oath, "Use your knowledge only for the benefit of mankind''.The two differing approaches to the problems of scientific research, as exemplified in the controversy between Andrea and Galileo, are taken from contemporary life. Witness the argument put forth by a contemporary Andrea, Edward Teller, the father of the hydrogen bomb: "The scientist is not responsible for the laws of nature. It is his job to find out how these laws operate. It is the scientist's job to find ways in which these laws can serve the human will. However, it is not the scientist's job to determine whether a hydrogen bomb should be constructed, whether it should be used, or how it should be used.''~^^1^^ In contrast here is "A Hippocratic Oath for Scientists" _-_-_
~^^1^^ James R. Shepley and Clay Blair, Jr., The Hydrogen Bomb, N. Y., 1954, p.
245 published in a specialized journal: "Realizing that my scientific knowledge provides me with increased power over the forces of nature I pledge myself to use this knowledge and power solely to what, according to my ability and judgement, I consider to be for the benefit of mankind and to abstain from any scientific activity known to me to be intended for harmful purposes.''~^^1^^ There are several variants of similar oaths for the contemporary scientist. These variants appeared in the press as a direct response to Brecht's appeal to actively counteract the dehumanization of science.One must not silently wait in the wings, says" Brecht, believing in a better future and hoping that reason in and of itself will triumph over ignorance. ``Don't you believe that the truth, if this is the truth, will come to the surface without our help?" Galileo is asked, and he cries out in answer: "No! A thousand times no! The amount of truth that will come to light will be no more or no less than that which we ourselves bring forth. Reason can only triumph through the efforts of the man of reason.''
But what of the scientist under a reign of fascist terror when he is daily and even hourly forced to renounce his convictions and direct his gifts in dangerous channels? Brecht rewrote the finale to his play three times. The significance of these revisions rests in the intensification of his condemnation of Galileo, who, in the words of the author, led science into battle, and then betrayed it in the heat of this battle by renouncing his ideals. He handed over his knowledge to the powers that be for them to dispose of, to use or abuse in their own interests.
But in passing a verdict against Galileo, Brecht also understood that matters must not stop at this. "In Galileo,'' he wrote, "we are not at all concerned with the fact that one must firmly hold one's ground as long as one is convinced of the righteousness of his position---and thereby win the reputation of a stalwart individual.''^^2^^
The absolutely unyielding body even in the world of physical relations is an abstraction, achieved through idealization, that is to say, a projection of that which cannot be implemented in reality. It is all the less feasible in the world of'human relations. If an individual is not given the opportunity of a timely death, his spirit can in the end be broken by "qualified specialists" Campanella who withstood long hours of torture and _-_-_
~^^1^^ Atom's Scientists Journal, Vol. 5, No. 3, London, 1956, p. 165.
~^^2^^ Bertolt Brecht, Schriftm z.um Theater, Bd. IV, S. 272.
246 exhausted his torturers, had simply run into people poorly trained in their craft. The craft of torture evinces its own ``progress'', the long-range perspectives of which were vividly outlined in George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. This " antiutopian novel" depicts the triumph of "English socialism'', a modification of nazi national-socialism. The Ministry of Love, carrying out the functions of the Gestapo, practises a novel approach to its victims. The hero of the book is subjected to a variety of tortures but does not yield. This continues until his tormentors succeed in discovering his weakness: a pathological fear of rats. His resistance crumbles at this point. For Galileo matters were simpler, he was just shown the instruments of torture---this in itself sufficed.Galileo is broken. But what ensues of this? This question is of the utmost importance for Brecht. How ought a scientist to act if he is compelled to compromise with his conscience, or is drawn into a criminal conspiracy by force, cunning or personal carelessness? Orwell's hero leaving the Ministry of Love in freedom, has become enraptured with his Fiihrer---Big Brother. He is destroyed as a personality, turned into a passive' being leading a supine animalistic life.
Brecht's Galileo is broken, but not crushed. After his abnegation he lives under the eye of the Inquisition and, like a secret vice, devotes himself to science and secretly sends out the results of his research for publication. "Brecht,'' we read in the commentary to the most recent Soviet edition of the play, "had in mind that complex and often crafty policy to which the underground resistance (in particular in the Third Reich) was forced to resort in order to bring its truth to the people: it is necessary to conceal, mask one's activities and through demonstrations of loyalty and obedience, to deceive those in power.'' But what is this in fact? Is this not praise rather than condemnation of Galileo? In life there are few questions that can be answered directly, and Brecht does not simplify the situation. "It is highly unlikely,'' he writes, "that one can either wholeheartedly condemn or praise Galileo.''~^^1^^
In the first production of the play (Zurich, 1943) the accent was on praise of Galileo, the underground fighter who had not bowed his head. In 1957 the Berliner Ensemble shifted the accent to condemnation for his betrayal. In the production of the Moscow Theatre of Drama and Comedy (The Taganka Theatre) the thought of the playwright is dissected into _-_-_
^^1^^ Bertolt Brecht, Leben des Galilei, S. 201.
247 component elements, it is as if the spectacle has two endings. At first the viewer sees humbled Galileo who has fallen into a state resembling childhood, an evil idiot who abuses those about him and drives away his former student, come to pay a visit before his departure overseas. The light fades on the stage: a choir of imbecile monks celebrates, and a boy's choir, personifying the bright future, mourns the events of the day. AH is finished. But suddenly the stage is bright again, and everything seems different: Galileo's imbecility is but a camouflage: the scientist after his abnegation not only retained coherence in his thoughts but even continued to work at an intense pace. More than this, Galileo appears before the viewer as a thinker who has elevated his understanding of the place of science and role of the scientist in the life of society to a much higher position and who is from this position faulting the notions neld by his student (as well as his own former conceptions) of science as a kind of self-contained and self-justifying moment in the life of mankind. The import of the concluding monologue by Galileo can be expressed in the words of Julius Fucik, the prominent fighter against fascism: "People, be vigilant!" Both the pioneers who race onto the scene with spinning globes in their hands, and the music of Shostakovich---everything underscores the fact that all the same it does rotate---our planet Earth---regardless of the fictive constructs given to the world by those who would see it otherwise.Two endings to the play---two variants of fate: satiated supine vegetation, or resistance to the end. The moral problem of the scientist is formulated here with unusual acuity. Each is free to make a choice, in any situation there are two solutions. But is the play only concerned with this? If so this indicates that it culminates in Andrea's cue after Galileo's abnegation: "Miserable country, bereft of heroes!" But indeed following upon this cue come the vehement words of Galileo: "Miserable country, standing in need of heroes!" Most important for Brecht is the social aspect of the problem.
Kathe Rulicke-Weiler relates in her memoirs that when Brecht was once requested to summarize the content of Leben des Galilei he recited the nursery rhyme:
Humpty-Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty-Dumpty had a great fall,
All the King's horses ana all the King's men
Cannot put Humpty-Dumpty together again.
Then Brecht quoted from Karl Valentin, whom he had always admired:
248Two little boys climbed up a ladder, The one was dumb, the other clever. But when the ladder tumbled down Both little boys fell to the ground.
The unredeemable nature and universality of the threatening catastrophe which will engulf all---both the ``wise'' at the top and the ``stupid'' under them, if the social status of contemporary science is not altered---this is the centralidea of the play. In this light the words of Brecht cited above take on a more profound hue: "In Galileo we are not at all concerned with the fact that one must firmly hold one's ground as long as one is convinced of the righteousness of his position---and thereby win the reputation of a stalwart individual.''
Of course one can and must make appeals to the courage as well as to the reason and moral sentiment of the individual---scientist, politician, etc., but mankind will be in peace only when a system of social relations excluding the possibility of a catastrophic unfolding of events has been created. The individual ought to conduct himself morally, but woe upon the country in which moral behaviour demands heroism! The moral problem is devoid of solution in isolation from the social problem.
Let us return however to those thoughts which captivated the scientific minds of the world after 1945. We already know that Norbert Wiener tried to establish the nature of his moral debt. Should he take advantage of his right to maintain personal secrets and conceal both his work and his ideas? "After toying with the notion for some time, I came to the conclusion that this was impossible, for the ideas which I possessed belonged to the times rather than to myself. If I had been able to suppress every word of what I had done, they were bound to reappear in the work of other people, very possibly in a form in which the philosophic significance and the social dangers would be stressed less.''~^^1^^ The idea of concealing a discovery is just as Utopian as that of keeping the discovery the property of a narrow elite of scientists. In his book on American science Robert Jungk depicts in idyllic tones the atmosphere reigning at the Princeton Center for Advanced Studies. Hundreds of scientists from a number of countries congregate here without any pre-established plan, control or limitations, to study ``pure'' science. Without thinking of _-_-_
^^1^^ Norbert Wiener, I Am a Mathematician, p. 308.
249 practical applications they respond only to their own consciences and dispose of the research results achieved as they see fit. It would be nice to believe in the existence of such a scientific "Promised Land''. However press communiques put us on our guard. Not long ago, for example, the whole world was stunned by a sensational exposure: leading scientists in neutral Sweden have for more than ten years been conducting research tailored and funded by the Pentagon.The problems which after World War II held the attention of Wiener, Einstein and Brecht today have caught the eye of the progressive world public. Recently scientific circles in the West have been engaged in a debate over the problem of academic freedom. If the scientist in isolation is not capable of halting the momentum of knowledge along a dangerous path, perhaps society is capable of doing so? Should science be restricted to predetermined areas in its development? How could this be effected? There are scientists who reject out of principle any attempt to interfere in the sphere of research activity. Academic freedom, they say, is absolute and untouchable. Science won its freedom through suffering; it did not fight for this freedom in order to be shackled with chains as soon as it had achieved this goal. Times have changed, their opponents reply, science has arrived at a dangerous frontier, its subsequent unguided development will be fraught with danger.
Each new scientific discovery is for the good of mankind, Kurt Vonnegut, the American writer, comments ironically in his Utopia 14. With precise humour he draws a picture of American life after the culmination of the scientific and technological revolution: the ruling class oppresses the people through the use of cunningly designed machines. "...Anything a scientist worked on was sure to wind up as a weapon, one way or another.'' This aphorism is borrowed from another of Vonnegut's novels, Cat's Cradle. In this story we are confronted with a certain genius of a physicist, a Nobel Laureate, the "father of the American bomb'', but alas, devoid of any sense of morality, humanity, etc. "People weren't his speciality,'' says his son. The novel ends with the snuffing out of civilization from the after-effects of a great discovery, "Ice Nine'', which freezes all living things. It all began with the American marines, who "after almost two-hundred years of wallowing in the mud, were sick of it''. The physicist agreed to lend a hand. The author's idea is not difficult to follow: the unlimited development of science and technology under antagonistic social relations is harmful for society---what is needed is control.
250The same thought has been expressed in academic prose. "It cannot ... be seriously argued,'' writes the American chemist R. J. Rutman, in the journal Scientific World, "that the regulation of the academic community on the basis of agreed upon and generally accepted customs is at all unreasonable, and that therefore there is no way of declaring the subject matter of research as beyond the bounds of such regulations.... Furthermore, the right to do research when and how the scholar chooses is by no means absolute to begin with, for it is subject to numerous direct and indirect restrictions imposed by society, most of which act to control the application and development of new knowledge rather than its discovery.... On this basis there can be no such thing as the individual academic freedom to undertake activities which undermine and contradict the very goals and purposes for which academic freedom exists.''~^^1^^
This scientist's logic of argumentation coincides with the train of thought of the author of Leben des Galilei. Brecht, as we know, rejects the principle of "knowledge for the sake of the Inquisition" (and consequently rejects the Inquisition's control over science). To an equal degree he rejects the principle of "knowledge for knowledge's sake" (for in this case the uncontrolled progress of science gives the Inquisition the opportunity of obtaining all that it needs for carrying out its anti-humanist goals). The principle affirmed in the play proclaims "knowledge for the sake of mankind".^^2^^ Mankind is interested in establishing intelligent control over science. How will this control be organized? Brecht gives no answer, he merely leads us to the formulation of such a question. R. J. Rutman is totally engaged in precisely this side of the matter.
Rutman's article is interesting above all because he transplants the question of the dangerous effects of scientific development from the fragile soil of morality to the more solid ground of law. He is concerned not with the ethics of the scholar but with the legal position of science. Law, however, is _-_-_
~^^1^^ R. J. Rutman, "On the Question of Academic Freedom and University Research Policy'', Scientific World, No. 2, 1967, p. 25.
~^^2^^ In addition to the question "knowledge for the benefit of what?" there is yet another, no less intriguing, namely "by what path is knowledge achieved?" Does an elevated end justify anti-humanist means? Can one, for example, for the sake of the bulk of humanity conduct experiments on isolated individuals who are outlawed or condemned to death? For the fascists this evoked no problem. Himmler, the ringleader of nazi science, placed the concentration camps at the disposal of SS medics. Later they were convicted at Nurenberg, and the most zealous were hanged.
251 supported by compelling sanctions. Who after all is the guarantor of this law? Can we entrust contemporary imperialist state with control over science when we are concerned, in Galileo's words, precisely with how to protect scientific knowledge from "abuse or misuse" on the part of the powers that be. As matters stand the very structure of bourgeois state power gives birth to conditions nullifying attempts at intelligent control over the forces of destruction. In 1945 when atom bombs exploded over two Japanese cities, this was carried out not because of scientific or even military considerations, but rather for political, or more precisely, opportunist reasons. Control over science on the part of the ruling imperialist elite, identifying their selfish interests with national interests, is worse than any imaginable anarchy.Rutman places his hopes on the scientific community as the proper instance of control over scientific research. But if this community is an internal state organization it is hardly likely that it will be able to carry out any measures running at cross purposes with the government point of view. Extremely indicative in this respect is the example of the RAND Corporation of Santa Monica, California. This "independent and non-profit" scientific organization originally was formed as a research centre for Douglas Aircraft. Today it is an unofficial "brain trust" of the Pentagon. From time to time, it is true, the ethics of scientific research comes under discussion. One can even hear radical speeches concerning the duty of the scientist to immediately destroy his invention as soon as the danger arises that it may be put to ill-use against mankind. But these discussions occupy the leisure hours. During working hours the focus is different. Day after day, in conditions of absolute secrecy (security measures at RAND are tighter than at the Pentagon itself), rehearsals for thermonuclear war are carried out in situations "approximating reality'', the effactivity of espionage is verified, as are the connections linking various weapons systems, possible losses are calculated, etc. RAND has garnered together specialists from all areas of science (from astrophysics to micro-sociology) who at the beck of the War Department provide the necessary data, recommendations and prognoses.
But the contemporary scientific world is familiar with other types of organizations as well. A good example is the Pugwash movement which arose in response to scientific concern over the effects of radioactive fallout on the Bikini atoll in March 1954. (It was at that time that Brecht uttered his celebrated remark: "Now we have no need for war in order to destroy the 252 world thanks to the development of nuclear physics military preparations are quite adequate to the task!'') At the cradle of this movement stood Albert Einstein and Bertrand Russell.
Pugwash conferences invite the most outstanding scientists who exert an influence on political events in their respective countries, rather than scientific institutions and organizations. Parity in representation for the different countries and ideologies is strictly observed. The material under discussion is not published. The latter fact assures complete sincerity in the exchange of opinions and wards off the utilization of the conference as a tribune for propagandistic ends. As the necessity arises Pugwashers make declarations and addresses to the world public opinion, but the primary goal of their meetings remains maintaining unofficial contacts among specialists capable of giving intelligent advice to their governments or, minimally, of keeping them informed of the scientific and technological aspects of contemporary international politics.
The late Academician M. D. Millionshchikov summarized in the following manner the twentieth Pugwash meeting: "While the first conferences basically devoted their energies to warding off the nuclear threat, Pugwash meetings in recent years, though not ignoring this threat, have also discussed such questions as the banning of the chemical and biological (bacteriological) weaponry, preventing the militarization of the sea bottom.... Participants in the Pugwash movement always lend an ear to the pulse of international events, and untiringly endeavour to be in the front ranks of the struggle for eliminating the most dangerous obstacles in the path of the peaceful progress of mankind. The widening scope of the problems discussed by the conferences is indicative of the maturation of the movement and of the fact that this maturation is accompanied by a higher effectiveness of these discussions. Pugwash scientists made a contribution to the preparations for a Treaty banning the nuclear weapons tests in three spheres, to the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons and to the treaty forbidding the deployment of weapons on the ocean bottom.'' These treaties are evidence of the feasibility of intelligent control over experiments posing dangers to mankind. The adoption of all these decisions was to no small degree facilitated by the vigorous activity of So>viet scientists who are members of the Pugwash movement.
In 1946 The World Federation of Scientific Workers was created. Today it has more than 300,000 members. It is noteworthy that the tenth anniversary of the World Federation 253 was celebrated in the building housing the Berliner Ensemble, where in honour of the anniversary Leben des Galileo was performed. The most important goals of this organization, inscribed in its charter, are as follows:~
to work for the most effective utilization of science to assure the peace and well-being of mankind, focusing attention on the application of science for solving the most pressing problems of our time;~
to work for international cooperation in science and technology through active participation in United Nations institutions on education, science and culture;~
to support the international exchange of scientific information and personnel, etc.
Scientists from the Soviet Union are active participants in the operations of the World Federation of Scientific Workers and are initiating discussion on the most urgent problems. It is worth recalling, for example, the Vienna Conference of 1968, dedicated to the problem of scientific cooperation in Europe. The representative of the USSR, G. G. Kotovsky, gave a speech entitled "Concerning the Question of Certain Tasks Standing before European Cooperation''. The final goal of international cooperation, this report states, is to stimulate scientific and technological progress for the benefit of mankind. However the utmost development of material production in and of itself is clearly insufficient for the creation of the harmonious society of the future. In this context the highest task of European scientific cooperation consists in the development of methods and forms for "the humanist amelioration of contemporary machine civilization''. The Soviet scholar proposed joint work in two areas. First, fending off a catastrophic destruction of the homeostasis of the biosphere, which has evolved to its present state over aeons of time. Second, the preservation of the cultural and historical heritage of mankind. ``It'is amazing to observe the lag of the consciousness of the scientific community,'' the speaker concluded, "from the actual role in contemporary society which it has taken on in recent decides. The awareness by the intelligentsia, and above all by scientists, of their place in contemporary socio-political development, and the uniting of this community on an international level in the epoch of the great social and scientific and technological revolution, will become a factor of the utmost importance in stepping up the pace of human progress.''~^^1^^
_-_-_~^^1^^ Mir nauki, 1968, No. 4/5, p. 15.
254At the present time we may observe very widespread discussion of the good which will rain down upon mankind as a result of scientific and technological progress. Futurologists predict that by 1985 we will have achieved the recovery of mineral resources from the ocean, control over heredity and the transformation of agriculture into a sector of industry, to name but a few examples. The future promises the complete emancipation of man from the production process, automatic thought reading, space flights to Jupiter, a symbiosis between man and electronic machinery. These promises are all accompanied however by the reservation, "if the human species does not wipe itself out through a thermonuclear catastrophe".^^1^^
Progressive scholars are with growing trepidation turning their attention to social and ethical problems connected with the development of science. This is not limited to physics alone. The American psychologist David Krech provided a sufficiently gloomy assessment of the long-range prospects stemming trom the intrusion of science into the region of the human brain. If this happens, he considers, humanity will be confronted with problems more frightening than those which arose after the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, when atomic physicists demonstrated their achievements to the world.
The late Soviet physiologist, Academician P. Anokhin, shares the fears of his American colleague. In Anokhin's opinion, international control, viz., through the United Nations, must be put into effect not only over the application of this or that achievement of science, but also over the research process itself, which can lead to dangerous results.
The appeal to establish control over selected spheres of research in the natural sciences is dictated by a higher concern for the fate of society and man. This is not a "Back to the Ape!" slogan. It expresses not a distrust in rational forms of cognition, but rather a sober evaluation of the irrational situation posed by class society in which there can be no "pure science''. Science is a social phenomenon and it is impossible to consider it "in itself''.
Lenin in Materialism and Empirio-Criticism wrote of the crisis in physics. To the superficial observer this seemed to be a paradox: science was making giant strides forward, and the _-_-_
~^^1^^ Joseph Rotblat, "Wissenschafder als Friedensstiftler'', Unsere Welt 1985, Munchen, Wien, Basel, 1967, S. 346.
255 philosopher was talking about a crisis. But Lenin explained that matters concerned a methodological crisis, the inability of the natural scientist to apprehend and interpret his own discoveries. Marvellous precision was given to the question of the existence of a shadowy side of science: "the reactionary attempts are engendered by the very progress of science.''~^^1^^The results of a lifetime of reflection on the fate of science and mankind were summarized by Einstein in an article eloquently entitled "Warum Sozialismus?" (``Why Socialism?''). The great physicist described his encounter with a certain respectable-looking "intelligent man" concerning the threat of a new war, which, in Einstein's opinion, would seriously endanger the existence of mankind. "...I remarked that only a supra-national organization would offer protection from that danger. Thereupon my visitor very calmly and coolly said tome: 'Why are you so deeply opposed to the disappearance of the human race?'" Einstein was amazed at this turn of the conversation. "...As little as a century ago no one would have so .lightly made a statement of this kind. It is the statement of a man who has striven in vain to attain an equilibrium within himself and has more or less lost hope of succeeding.'' Einstein found the explanation for such a disintegration of the personality in the "economic anarchy of capitalist society...'', and the resolution of the problem in "the establishment of a socialist economy".^^2^^
As we can see, in the interval since the publication of Lenin's Materialism and Empirio-Criticism the scientific crisis in the capitalist countries has spilled over into the social sphere, has been transformed into the scientist's impotence in the face of the accomplishments of science, which have freed themselves from his control. Situation has become more complicated but the solution to it remains the same. This solution was pointed to by Lenin---the mastering of the scientific dialecticalmaterialist world outlook and, most important, its practical implementation. The author of Leben des Galilei shared in full this point of view.
__*_*_*__In 1968 the journal Teatr published N. Pogodin's play "Albert Einstein'',^^3^^ dedicated to the same problems as those in _-_-_
~^^1^^ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Vol. 14, p. 308.
~^^2^^ Albert Einstein, Out of My Later Years, pp. 124--25, 128, 130.
^^3^^ Pogodin died without finishing the work, it was brought to completion by A. Volgar.
256 Leben des Galilei. The Soviet playwright took an approach differing from Brecht's. "...Refutation of the idea that Einstein was responsible for the development of atomic weaponry was the central idea,'' writes Professor B. Kuznetsov in an article accompanying the publication of the play. "...Einstein's feeling of responsibility was not personal.''~^^1^^ Pogodin's Einstein was, as it turns out, only unwillingly drawn into the atom bomb project, he didn't draft, but only reluctantly added his signature to the letter to Roosevelt, marking the beginning of atomic production. In his words: "Atomic energy ... what does this mean? Where does it come from, this atomic energy? What is its source? For fire the source can be located in the sun. But for the atom? It is of a different origin ... hidden from man by nature itself, a sealed book, inaccessible.... We have not only infringed upon this secret ... we want to use it to commit murder.... Think upon this phrase, 'the fission of an atom of uranium to create weapons'.... Dear Lord, explain to me what are we doing ... it seems that I have lost my ability to think straight.'' Without thinking through all the ramifications of his action, Einstein yielded to persuasion and placed his signature on the fatal document. In the play then a tragic collision is avoided, the substance of which lies in the fact that the protagonist consciously chooses a fatal path, for there is none other open to him. In point of fact Einstein did consciously embark upon the development of the atom bomb and after the war he just as consciously and with a great deal of vigour struggled to ban the bomb and for the adoption of other measures of international security. "Einstein died,'' asserts his close friend Albert Schweitzer, "...from the awareness of his responsibility for the atom bomb danger suspended over the head of mankind.''^^2^^ Brecht, who intended in the last years of his life to write a play on the life of Einstein perceived the tragedy which beset the great physicist in just mis manner.By correlating the designs of Pogodin and Brecht we arrive at the initial point of our article---the Question of personal responsibility. The fact that the moral problem turns out to be merely a part of a larger, social problem ``subtracts'' the first only in a philosophical sense, namely, it elevates it to a higher level and by no means removes it as such. Responsibility for _-_-_
^^1^^ B. Kuznetsov, "The Intuition of the Artist and Historical Truth'', Teatr, No,9, 1968, p. 190.
^^2^^ Gerald Getting, = Zu Cast in Lambarene, Begegemmgen mil Albert Schweitzer, Berlin, 1964,8. 123.
257 collusion in a crime remains for each individual personally and to write it off as a vice of the capitalist system is quite beyond our reach. This fact is brought to mind by the War Criminals Trials where not only fascism as a whole but also its actual carriers were accused, including those with academic degrees and awards. Science is a social phenomenon, society determines its fate. The scientist is however a man, and as such, he is the master of his own fate. [258] __ALPHA_LVL2__ E. IlyenkovThe reader has become acquainted with various points of view relating to a problem which in one manner or another is of concern to every thoughtful person in our time. The reader has become participant in this discussion. One does not have to be a philosopher to note the essential differences in approaching a resolution of the problem at hand. We will also make an attempt, without pretensions of providing a final answer, to express our own opinion.
Of primary importance is a formulation of the essential aspect of the problem grappled with by each of the authors in this book despite the obvious differences separating them. This is important because it may sometimes seem that various approaches to the question simply signify discussions concerning various sides or aspects, but not (often opposing) means of resolving one and the same question. This one and the same question must be constantly born in mind in as concise and sharp a formulation as possible. Only then can it be decided, following the arguments presented by the authors, which path points towards a solution, and which to a dead end. Otherwise we will be left with the impression that each approach contains partial glimpses of the truth and, equally, that each contains biases as well as mistakes. But the truth was never born of a simple summation of ``various'' aspects or through the unification of differing points of view.
What is in fact this question which so disturbs everyone? Can it be formulated in such a way that each disputant will recognize in it the object of his own reflections? Indeed, to state the question properly is to be well on the way to a solution. Therefore an authentic theoretical argument always begins with the theoretical formulation of the problem.
259It is best when agreement on this point is reached from the very beginning---at the very least this agreement must be arrived at. Otherwise the formulation of the topic under dispute will remain insufficiently precisely articulated. The attempt must be made to bring the problem to the level of a contradiction, for every authentic problem, we are taught by the dialectic, must appear before tne mind in the form of an intense and unresolved contradiction, in the form of an antinomy.
If for the time being we leave aside the purely theoretical ways of expressing the problem and approach it in a form comprehensible without requiring debilitating definitions and explanations, such an approach will permit us to evaluate each of the theoretical'formulations provided.
What is the substance of this real and vital problem troubling each of us, which each of us has recognized to one degree or another and articulated in a more or less clear fashion?
Each of us has been aware almost literally from the time of our childhood of the dissonance between the conclusions of the mind and the dictates of the heart, of the frequent conflict between the voice of the conscience and calculations of our reason. Each of us knows that sometimes ``circumstances'' provide an act which stands in contradiction to our conscience, to our sense of kindness and of decency; we are familiar with the opposite, when the desire to do a "good deed" is overwhelmed by the force of ``circumstances''. Sometimes we prefer to submit to these circumstances, at other times we act ``unwisely'' but ``nobly'', entertaining no illusions of success....
It is clear that we perceive such a contradiction as dissonance and divarication bringing neither peace of mind nor the tranquil carrying out of one's business. This conflict of motives, between "the mind's reflections coldly noted, the bitter insights of the heart" is not, of course, an insidious invention on the part of advocates of philosophical dualism. It is (whether to better or worse) the stuff of reality, the centre of our lives and thoughts.
Our planet, alas, is poorly prepared to grant happiness. Circumstances as they stand at present on earth are such that one can find no automatic guide to action which will coincide to the last detail with our inbred desire to bring about the well-being and happiness of all on earth. The very `` circumstances'' surrounding our actions are contradictory. Often we must do somebody harm in order to do a good deed for another, and vice versa.
260Given this situation is it possible to locate a universal principle, a general formula guaranteeing faultless decision-making?
It is conceivable, of course, to decide once and for all to pursue unwaveringly the "voice of the conscience'', the "dictates of the heart" and the "striving for good''. One may decide to follow the principles of absolute and uncompromizing honesty, ingenuousness and directness, regardless of considerations of other people and other facts and despite the cautions set forth by reason in its account of the pertinent circumstances. One can, on the other hand, rely solely upon reason, upon a sober calculation and estimation of all circumstances, upon the mathematically rigorous mind, placing unwavering trust in this mind---both when its conclusions accord with direct moral intuition and when they run in contrary directions.
Which of these principles is preferable, which is the more correct?
Will one risk the choice between these two, particularly after having read this book from cover to cover? It may be concluded with certainty from the preceding chapters, that each of the suggested solutions contains a certain logic and that each, in its rigorous purity, is abstract to an identicaldegree. In other words, from a more sophisticated point of view, the risk is unreasonable.
In point of fact the first solution attracts by virtue of its nobility of morals, often celebrated in the great art of the world. Don Quixote, Prince Myshkin in Dostoevskv's lillol, Siegfried (Der Ring des Nibelungeri).... But the position is a martyr's lot. Moreover the martyr here is not only the protagonist, but also the principles themselves. Nobility of sentiment devoid of rationality and refracted through the prism of ``circumstances'' sometimes emerges as a caricature and sometimes a tragedy. Abstract, that is to say, alien to reason and calculation---noble sentiment inevitably leads to self-denial and even suicide. One can find moral comfort here, but the truly noble simpleton, as a rule, serves---unbeknownst to himself and unwittingly---as a convenient tool of evil and torment in the web of insidious circumstances.
No less insidious in terms of consequences is the opposite solution. The habit of giving preference to the rigorously mathematical calculation or estimate of all circumstances (when the circumstances are repugnant to the conscience) leads, in the final result, to moral collapse. All is well and good when the calculations are flawless. But since it is in the end 261 impossible to take fully into accout all of an endless stream of dialectically interwoven circumstances, sooner or later, the calculating human being is bound to make a miscalculation, in so doing committing a moral transgression, passed by in the process as something inessential.
The dialectical ``self-negation'' (that is to say ``suicide'' of the given principle and its bearer) in a subjective sense, to be sure, endures even worse. For a miscalculation together with a criminal act against the elementary norms of decency leads to a result perceived, among other things, as moral retribution ... as the collapse, the total crushing of the personality.
Indeed it is one matter---the magnificent internal demise of Don Quixote, and quite another---the suicide, dictated by horror and self-repugnance, of Smerdyakov (one of the protagonists in Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov). The mind, flouting the elementary demands of morality, ends up as a stupid fraud, a fraudulent ignoramus, recognizing this intolerable---both for the ``mind'' and for the ``conscience''---state, to which it has brought itself by virtues of its principles.... Trust was placed in an abstract principle, but the trust was betrayed.
Don Quixote---is an easier case. Those ``circumstances'' which he didn't take into account---and had no desire to include in his calculations---proved to be the stronger. A sad state of affairs, but what can you do? Don Quixote will live on, however, in the grateful memories of all those who sooner or later will in fact remake ``circumstances''.
Such an outcome is easier, although it is nevertheless not the most pleasant. The outcome for Socrates, the outcome for Giordano Bruno.
There, on the other side we have Smerdyakov, Rudolf Hess, Julius Streicher.
Thus, if there is to be a defeat the first type is preferable, although one-sided and helpless before the crush of circumstances, then at least justified by its nobility of principle.
But both lead to defeat, to demise, to dialectical selfnegation. A more optimistic exit must be sought.
__*_*_*__From the Marxist point of view a full solution to the problem may be found solely by "making the circumstances humane'', organizing the entire network of circumstances so that the problem itself disappears, so that no one ever has to choose between the demands of the ``conscience'' and the dictates of 262 ``reason"---so that circumstances themselves dictate (and the ``mind'' perceive) activity and deeds, in conformity with the interests of all other people.
The totality of social relations, social ``circumstances'' organized on the basis of this principle, is called communism. Communism in this sense is the only possible, only conceivable, theoretically valid and complete solution to the problem given formulation in this book. But the relations between science and morality are only one, only a partial expression of the fundamental problem of our age---the communist transformation of all social relations between humans. Only on the basis of a solution to this problem will we find, in the end, a solution to the conflict between impartial science, purged of all `` sentiments'', and of humanism. There is no other solution. Without the overarching solution our conflict will become more and more acute, the two polar principles will diverge even more widely and fall into sharper cleavage.
The capitalist system has only such a prospect: the exacerbation of the problem---antinomy between the demands of humaneness, on the one hand, and cold-blooded calculation, alien to authentic scientific humanism, on the other hand. The culture of the bourgeois capitalist system divides inexorably along these two lines, both identically catastrophic for the fact of civilization. These two poles are counterposed in longestablished and crystallized images.
One is "abstract humanism''. Noble, but powerless before the "force of circumstances" and condemned to the fate of a lamb before the slaughter, the intellectuals in the West are inclined to support this pole. At times this position degenerates into flowery phrases and senseless chatter. At other times it instigates one to an aesthetically-tainted anarchism, to revolt. Sometimes it forces one to lend an ear to the solution offered by the long-range prospects of communism.
The other pole is ``scientism'' (also quite widespread in the West), that is the decisive rejection of all humanistic principles, termed as "unscientific sentiments'', as "poetry and fiction''. Scientism is the humanist emasculation of the scientific spirit, turned into a new God, a new Moloch, to whom, if he so desires, must be sacrificed tens, thousands, millions, and even hundreds of millions of people.
This new absolute spirit---the "scientific spirit" at all costs---has long had its priests. One of them stated with satisfaction, upon hearing the news of the destruction of Hiroshima: "What a magnificent experiment in physics!''
Given the preservation of such a world of "circumstances" 263 organized on the basis of private property and the principle of competition there is no solution.
The only solution, according to Marx and Lenin, is the struggle 01 all working people (both manual and intellectual labour) for the establishment of those conditions on earth guaranteeing the disappearance of the "cursed problem" itself, of the tragic polarization of spiritual culture into two hostile camps---the dehumanized "scientific spirit" and the humanism of Don Quixote, devoid of a scientific foundation. Specifically we refer to the fight to eliminate the sphere of private property and to establish communism.
__*_*_*__The authors of the given book derive their standpoints from this Marxist premise. Not one of them poses the problem in an adolescent fashion: "What is better, scientism or abstract humanism?" or, "What is worse, 'the unreasoning conscience' or the 'unscrupulous mind'?" We all understand that both of them are unacceptable, that is to say ``worse''.
All of the authors take the stance that high moral standards in human relations (that is to say, humanitarianism) can triumph on the earth only with the aid and support of science, and conversely, that science can develop along the path of universal-historical discoveries only if it is oriented to the well-being of all, if it consistently marks its course with the compass of humanitarianism. All of the authors of the present work propose a reasoned morality or, in other words, the moral development of the mind.
All of the authors understand well that the primary task of the socialist system, as noted in the CPSU Programme, consists in the education of people---both scientists and laymen---in the spirit of the harmonious-development of both the scientific intellect and the highest moral principles, in the spirit of unity. The combination in each and every human of these two equally important elements of spiritual culture, is a task yet to be completed. How can this task be accomplished more rapidly and conscientiously? How can the vestiges of the antinomy of ``mind'' and ``conscience'' left to us as the legacy of the bourgeois-capitalist order be eliminated more swiftly and completely?
The authors have also tried to come to grips with this problem. In terms of the goal of the argument they are not in disagreement. The differences to be observed concern the 264 means to the end. They may be described as various shadings of an approach to the resolution of a given problem: how can the "reasoning conscience" or "conscientious reason" be more faithfully fostered in each and every human? The alternatives: the humanistically-oriented scientific judgement or a rationally acting humanism, a humanized scientific spirit or a scientifically infused humanitarianism. These alternatives are, in the end result, one and the same. The authors are in agreement on this point, we find no source of dispute.
But perhaps, given this agreement, there is nothing to hold the reader's interest, no serious disagreement?
Perhaps both groups of writers (and it's not difficult to note that each of them is pulled to one of the two poles, each pole demonstrating the same argument) have drawn the links of their arguments from different premises. Some wish to resolve the task by means of the "humanization of scientific thought'', wish to furnish the cold theoretical intellect with a "value orientation''. Others, on the contrary, wish to equip humanitarian strivings with the strength of scientific insight and the might of the theoretical intellect, to provide humanitarianism with a "scientific rigging''. Both groups accomplish a good deed in the process. He who lacks a scientific background should be provided with the essentials, he who lacks a moral framework, should be encouraged above all in moral relations (not ignoring, of course, a scientific education). In the one instance science must be imparted in a morally ``cultivated'' soil, in the other---moral principles must be inculcated in a scientifically literate mind. Both poles of the theoretical setting are thus justified, correct and good, but in different respects.
Is not the dispute itself resolved, may it not be said that "what the philosophers are arguing about" in the given instance is a false contradiction?
It would seem so. It would seem that the antinomy has disappeared and turned out to be "a contradiction in different relations''. In other words, each side is correct in relation to one object (to that category of people which it had in mind) and incorrect in relation to another. If this be so, the reader may put aside the book in peace and call a halt to the inquiry. The contradiction has proven to be a formal, verbal one. Let those who derive pleasure from this type of problem continue the dispute.
Nevertheless, let us look somewhat more closely at the issue. In the fine print of the given formal contradiction can we not find something more essential?
265Thus, the first solution: add a dose of science to humanitarianism.
The second: humanize the sciences, direct them toward humanitarian, noble goals and ``values''.
Let us try to clarify the premises implicit in each of these propositions, accepted without reflection as given. Will we not find concealed an authentically, rather than merely verbal dialectical contradiction in these premises?
The first solution, stressing the scientific ``outfitting'' of the human psyche (of both scientists and laymen) proceeds from the tacit presupposition that the majority of people are already sufficiently developed in a moral sense that it remains only to provide them with the apparatus of scientific notions or literacy" to implement the previously stated goal.
The second, on the contrary, proposes that in relation to science people (or at least people engaged in the scientific disciplines) have already reached the summit and that if something is found lacking, this something is a clear and indisputable "scale of values'', a certain moral (or, strictly speaking, ethical) regulator. Arming the scientist with a scale of value orientation" we will put everything in order, and science will begin to bring exclusively well-being and happiness to humankind; catastrophe and harm will be forever excluded....
Is the reader satisfied with such a solution?
We fear each solution has only an extremely limited range of application. Such is the case, for example, with the morally irreproachable, ethically attractive, but unfortunately semiliterate person; and such is the case with the ``academician'' who has pulled himself up to the moral level of a Hottentot. Are there really such cases? Alas, yes. But, as luck would have it, they are rare birds, just as are all ``pure'' extremes. The two strategies (and the theories underlying them) mentioned above are perhaps applicable in these cases. Infrequency is not the only point here; these personages themselves are terminal cases. The ambulance of theory arrived on the scene much too late in this case.
The highly refined scientific mind inculcated in a human being with the moral level of the primitive psyche, can hardly be transformed into a human and humane mind (particularly through the inculcation of "value categories'*. On the other hand, for the morally proper, good, honest and selfless person lacking a higher education, it is probably too late to encourage a scientific and theoretical intellect of the first order.
266A theoretical understanding of the relationship existing between "the scientific spirit" and ``morality'' cannot be concerned, therefore, with these exclusive situations, nor must it orient itself upon them. A theoretical understanding can be gained only through the analysis of mass phenomena and must be sufficient to resolve instances and problems occurring on a large scale. If this be so, then each of the solutions presented in a schematic fashion above to the problem as a whole, may be judged imperfect.
Of course, one must try to foster in each and every human both of these qualities---to develop his theoretical intellect without forgetting about his' moral upbringing, about the encouragement of his humanitarian inclinations. But such a correct practical ``solution'' does not speak to our point: are these elements of an authentic spiritual culture connected internally, in essence? Perhaps there are various---to be sure, of identical importance---but nevertheless mutually independent and autonomously cultivated means with which an individual can carry on relationships with the world about and with other people.
If this be so, then science is an objective picture of the world absolutely shorn of any and all ``sentiments''. This picture is both socio-historical and naturalistic, and must be thoroughly cleansed of the slightest admixture of the "subjectively human''. It portrays trie world about us as such and teaches us of our own biological structure---demonstrating how the world and life as such contrived independently of our consciousness, will, sympathies and antipathies, desires and strivings. Concerning the question of how to dispose of the world, of the use we maKe of our scientific and theoretical knowledge of the environment, this, if we pursue the reasoning of such an interpretation of the scientific spirit, is a question of another order. To rephrase it, is a question of the moral ``values'' we wish to foster in the human being. But ``values'' interpret not that which is, but that which should be. We are more accurately, in the realm of ideals and dreams, be they elevated or mean, noble or selfish. At any rate, we are dealing with criteria providing a subjective evaluation of purely objective circumstances, things, situations and events which have been described by science.
In its classically clear and consistent form such a relationship between "pure reason" and the "voice of the conscience'', as between two equally important but principally heterogeneous modes of perceiving the world of phenomena, is presented in the philosophy of Immanuel Kant.
267Science impartially describes that which is; theoretical reason in its ``pure'' state has neither the right nor the resources to judge whether something is ``good'' or ``bad'' from the point of view of the "well-being of the human species'', of its ``self-perfection''. Precisely for this reason Kant considered that "pure reason" must be supplemented by an absolutely independent and autonomous moral regulator, the " categorical imperative" which can be neither scientifically proven nor refuted. This categorical imperative must be accepted on faith. Without blind faith in this moral regulator ``pure'' ( scientifictheoretical) reason can serve both good and evil with equal ease; of and by itself it is capable of any action and neutral in the struggle between good and evil. In actuality this signifies: a halter or moral restrictions must be fitted to scientific reflection. Such a halter will help to guide science and direct its inquiries.
It is not difficult to observe that for Kant the theoretical solution to the question posed by the relationship between ``pure'' and ``practical'' reason, that is to say, between science and the "voice of the conscience"---the "moral regulator"---is given sufficient definition. Kant does not simply argue that the ``intellect'' (verstand) and the ``conscience'' (the scientific and moral aspects of the human psyche) are of equal importance, mutually-complementary, and, in isolation, inadequate modes of orientation to the world on the part of the individual. If Kant had confined himself to this, he would have been uttering trivial bits of worldly wisdom, against which no one would have bothered to object. Each individual (providing of course that he is not an inveterate scoundrel or an impenetrable thickhead) constantly tries to correlate his thoughts and deeds, both with the conclusions of the intellect and the demands of morality. The problem cannot be pinpointed here.
It arises rather when the intellect and morals (science and morality) conflict with an unresolvable antinomy, when they require of the individual diametrically opposite decisions. In such instances Kant grants the right for an unconditional verdict, for a final decision concerning that which is correct or incorrect frorh a superior point of view---precisely to moral principle. For Kant theoretically this position is founded on the judgement that the intellect (theoretical reason) is fundamentally incapable of taking fully into account the interminable succession of conditions bearing upon the resolution of a task, that the "voice of the conscience" by some miraculous means is in fact capable of grasping in an integral fashion, immediately and without analytical digging into the details, the full picture 268 of this unending sequence. Therefore if reason collides with the voice of the conscience this indicates that the former has left something essential out of account which in the end result, having emerged from the shadows of the unknown, will overturn its calculations.
Therefore the categorical imperative moral principle is placed over science by Kant as an absolutely independent of its considerations, and fully autonomous cnterion of a higher truth. In turn the development of science is dependent upon its dictates. This further signifies that science (the intellect) is proclaimed a means of implementing moral ends, a mode for the concretization (embodiment) of moral principles.
This may be concretely presented in the following manner: if "pure reason" (science) has arrived at a state of antinomy, that is to say, if two theories, two schools, or two conceptions emerge, each as logical as its opponent, and each as well founded in terms of the given contemporary state of knowledge as the other, the decision on which is correct and which incorrect will be left not to science (for it is incapable of finding an exit from this unpleasant situation) but rather to ethics. The latter would demonstrate which of the two mutually exclusive theories is to be supported and developed further and which to be prohibited as ill-intentioned.
The arbiter, furthermore, renders a peremptory judgement and in such disputes between scholars becomes what might be called a priest of morality judging science from without.
Could it be, however, that the problem is solved in precisely the opposite manner? Perhaps science should not be declared the handmaid of ethics (the form of realizing moral strivings); on the contrary, morals should become the means for inculcating scientifically demonstrated principles of behaviour, that is to say, science should be granted the right to guide morality. In such a case morality becomes a form of the psyche derivative of "pure reason''. Here morality, both by essence and by origin, is identified with science, only expressed in the language of imperative (rather than declarative) statements. Let us say that science has established that "human nature" bears specific features. Ethics translates this fact in the following manner: "You are human, therefore you must do this and that''. Ethics in such a case would be distinguished from scientific reflection in an exclusively linguistic manner, by the exclusively imperative form of the sentence giving expression to those very same truths established by science. Ethics here will become a form of realization of a scientific approach.
269This alternative is also a theoretical one, not a "from that, follows this''. It is easy to observe that it stands in direct opposition to the Kantian solution. In the latter ethics directs the development of science, in the former science directs the development of ethics and of morality. At first glance such a solution seems more reasonable than that preferred by Kant. Scientists are more inclined to accept the second alternative. Perhaps we may also rest our case on it?
The advantages of such a solution are indisputable. They represent the advantages held by the scientific spirit over blind faith in the force of moral ``values'', in the strength of "the good'', in the triumph of "mankind's well-being'', as well as other noble but, as a result of their abstractness, ambiguous reference points. Indeed both "the good" and the "well-being of humanity" can be interpreted variously. Here after all begins the very same dialectic that we find in the sphere of "pure reason"....
Nevertheless it seems to us that this solution is not so infallible, despite the fact that it is closer to the truth than are Kant's proposals. One's suspicions are aroused from the fact that this solution represents the mirror opposite of Kant's. They bear the same similarities and differences that we find between a photographic negative and positive. In one scientific thought evolves in the direction suggested by ethics, in the other, morality is constructed and refurbished to correspond with the instructions given "according to science''.
The latter would be a wonderful solution, but only under the condition that the notion (science) were an absolute one in terms of infallibility, to repeat, free of error. To put it briefly the scientific notion would have to possess all those qualities of divine perfection ascribed to it by Plato and Hegel respectively. The Hegelian "Absolute Idea" in substance, is nothing but the "deified scientific notion" to which is given all the attributes of God.
Science is a wonderful thing; we hope the reader does nor entertain the suspicion that we hold it in disrespect. The "deification of science" (deification of the notion),' as any deification, is another matter. It (of course not science itself, but its authorized representatives) begins to imagine itself the creator not only of morals, but also of law, of political systems, of wide-scale historical events, of cities, temples, statues, in general of all human history. The "deified notion" begins to look upon history as upon its own work, its own creation; an "empirical world" brought about by its omnipotence and creative power. If we follow this train of thought, historical 270 man in his deeds and affairs realizes, often quite unwittingly, the designs of the "Absolute Idea'', that is to say, of the deified (under such a name) logic of scientific-theoretical reflection.
If the absolute notion proclaimes through its priests that man has completed his service to the absolute and that it has decided to create a perfected instrument to embody its will, let us say a "thinking machine'', an artificial intellect with capabilities exceeding those of the human brain, then humans will be obliged to submit unconditionally to the command of the absolute and lead themselves to the sacrifice, recognizing their imperfection, fallibility and biologically imposed limitations. Such is the logic of the position we have outlined carried to its conclusion.
It must be added that the Hegelian variant of a deified notion or logical idea was nevertheless more humane than the newest deity on the altar (the worship of the cybernetic-mathematical notion). With Hegel God-Logos specifically granted men the right to act as instruments of self-cognition and self-awareness, ``objectification'' and ``de-objectification''. Heinrich Heine came to the conclusion, on the basis of conversations with Hegel himself that his philosophy points to a humanitarian proposition: man is in fact the only God, at least on earth. Man as a thinking being is the God of this world. The human guided by logic is the creator of history and its fully-empowered ``steward''. He must be handed the reins of government over human affairs. It is precisely he, the dialectically thinking theoretician who from this point on must be the high priest of God---that is, of the self-impelled Absolute Idea. Hegel's God is the God of the theoretician who believes in the strength of the Idea, that is, of the logical scheme imposed upon the development of science. Still it is a God, with all the ensuing undesirable consequences for mankind.
The more man relinquishes to God, the less he leaves for himself. The more God appropriates, the more is ``alienated'' from the living human being. Further, the ``alienated'' (i.e., the deified) reason signifies on the other hand the ``alienated'' (including the spheres of reason, science---the Idea) man. With the deification of science we have (just as in Hegelian* philosophy) a mystified inversion of their actual relations. To be precise: man created and continues to create science, but then it turns out that it is not science that serves the well-being and happiness of mankind, but quite the opposite. Mankind is being enlisted in the service of science and is becoming the obedient executor and even slave of its despotic design. This is 271 well and good when the design is authentically scientific (veritas in the highest sense of the word). But if this be not the case?
Science, once deified, becomes not only despotic and intolerant, but also quite incapable of self-criticism. It goes without saying that we refer not to science itself, for in and of itself it is devoid of consciousness and will, but rather to its plenipotentiary, individual and sometimes quite authoritative scientists. Indeed they speak out not of personal conviction, but in the name of science. People respect science, for this reason the blanket phrase "in the name of science" sometimes conceals the true nature of certain ideas parading under this title but in reality having nothing in common with either humanism or with the authentic scientific spirit.
Things are even worse when a morally inferior person begins to lay down the law in the name of science. When Truman ordered the bomb to be dropped on Hiroshima, this was apparently an inadequate measure for one scientist. He suggested that Hiroshima be destroyed even more `` scientifically'', namely, by dropping in advance over the city multicoloured illuminating rockets. The residents of the city would look up at this curious spectacle, and at precisely this time the atom Domb would explode. The result would be mass blindness---for the survivors. Thus the "experiment in physics" would be, in his opinion, the more complete and would more succinctly demonstrate to the world the "strength of American science''. And those who designed and built Hitler's mobile gas-chambers were also, after all, scientists....
Of course to dream of preventing similar applications of science by the "moral enlightenment of su£h ``scientists'', by introducing them to a "value orientation centred on the good ' and by the propagation of a "scale of moral values"---such a dream is worthy only of the very naive humanist.
The idolization of science is a solution no better than that offered by Kant. The power of science must be respected, but in no instance deified.
Neither morality nor science can be the "higher value" in the scale of that which is valuable in human civilization. MWality and science have always been and remain today simply means, tools, instruments, designed by Man for his own use, to augment his mastery over nature, to support measures facilitating human happiness. If science and morality instead begin to support the oppression, crippling, disfiguring and even extermination of living human beings, that is to say, if they are transformed not only into an antipode, but also a deadly enemy of humanism, for the Marxist this testifies above all to 272 the inhuman, anti-humanist nature of that system of relations between people which so perverts the relations between science, morality and the human being. By "the human being" we have in mind the masses of people---a body composed of working people, both in the manual and intellectual spheres of labour---and not an abstract "humankind in general''.
Marxism represents a higher form of humanism, precisely because it rejects idolization (or as is also said, ``alienation'') of any given institutionalized form of human activity including that of science (in other words, activity of a scietific-theoretical type, professionally isolated from the majority of human beings: logical reflections, transformed into a profession, into the full-time occupation of a more or less narrow group of individuals----mathematicians and logicians by profession, etc.). This by no means belittles the importance of science or the deep respect accorded to a science founded on the dialectical materialist world outlook, for the latter is the most scientific world view.
This respect excluded the scientistic view on people as "raw material" tor scientific research. Scientism is therefore the contemporary form of anti-humanism. From the point of view of Marxism-Leninism science is in essence (rather than in the distorted and alienated images in which it is often presented in bourgeois society) a form for the realization of humanist goals. Marxist himanism proceeds from the historically matured (and scientifically clarified) requirements for the comprehensive development of the majority (or maximally---all humans without exception) of humans.
This is in fact the substance of communism. From such a point of view science is not a form for the realization of abstract numanist strivings (as with Kant) nor are ethics the form for the realization of the "logical idea" or ``notion'' (as with Hegel). Both science and ethics (an authentic, humanistically oriented morality or code of morals) represent two forms of consciousness, expressing and realizing one and the same---the concretely and historically understood being of man and of the world of man's life and works. Therefore an authentic science and authentically high level of morality cannot but coincide in their very essence. They cannot stand in juxtaposition.
But what if they coincide only "in essence'', but in reality, in the empirical world, often run into conflict with each other?
Here it is by no means admissible to ignore the "moral sentiment" and place one's support wholly behind science regardless of circumstances, as advocates of scientism 273 recommend. Indeed science (not as a whole, that is, not the entirety of scientific knowledge of man and nature, but isolated science, isolated theory) and, more precisely, scientists speaking in its name, are capable of erring. If an individual science suddenly advances a conception (with recommendations stemming from this conception) which runs counter to the principles of humanism, then we are fully justified in assuming that in the given instance the ultimate truth may be found in morality, that the given science has gone astray. Here it is useful to submit the infallible Goddess to a critical analysis from the point of view of its own criteria.
Marxist humanism (or, in other words, the Marxist world-view and logic), locating its reference points in scientific knowledge as a whole has the advantage of being an integral representative of scientific truth in the nighest sense. It holds this advantage over any given individual science or theory no matter how marvellously elaborated this science or theory is in a formal sense. Such is the image of truth, accessible for science only in that instance and that sense of the word signifying not a given individual theory but rather the entire scientifictheoretical culture of mankind, the latter understood from a development perspective. In this sense, in this interpretation science and humanism coincide in all their conclusions and formulae. Between an individual science (theory) and humanism a conflict may well arise. To decide this contradiction in favour of the given theory and its "infallible formulae" would be at least incautious. One must initially determine the cause of the conflict.
This is precisely how Frederick Engels depicted the relationship between "scientific accuracy" and "the moral selfconsciousness of the mass''. He remarked that science could not rely upon arguments derived from morality nor base its propositions on arguments derived from "moral sentiment''.
``Marx, therefore, never based his communist demands upon this.... But what formally may be economically incorrect, may all the same be correct from the point of view of world history. If the moral consciousness of the mass declares an economic fact to be unjust, as it has done in the case of slavery or serf labour, that is a proof that the fact itself has been outlived, that other economic facts have made their appearance, owingto which the former has become unbearable and untenable. Therefore, a very true economic content may be concealed behind the formal economic incorrectness.''~^^1^^
_-_-_^^1^^ Karl Marx, The Poverty of Philosophy, p. 9.
274The "moral sentiment of the mass" turns out to be correct in its stance against "strict science" which has not yet succeeded in getting to the heart of the matter precisely because the masses are truly caught in the vise of the contradiction between two categories of stubborn facts. In other words, the "moral sentiment"---humanistically-oriented consciousness---- expresses in the given instance the presence of a real problem which must be resolved both theoretically and practically, the existence of an actual social contradiction, an outlet from which must be sought in a scientific manner.
Therefore it was precisely Karl Marx---a man with a developed morality and sensitivity to arguments stemming from the moral consciousness of the masses---who saw an authentic scientific problem where philistine scientists saw cause only for the elaboration of a formally non-contradictory scheme of concepts. Spotting an aut.he.ntic scientific problem means travelling half the distance to its solution. Therefore Marx's Capital, though constructed with a strictly scientific scaffolding, is nevertheless invested with a humanistic core, that is to say, a humanistic formulation of the problem and thrust.
The basic moral inspiration underlying Capital is fully and precisely expressed by the thesis of authentic humanism: Man, the living numan being, not money, nor machines, nor products or any form of ``wealth'', is the highest value and the ``creator-subject'' of all ``alienated'' forms. If we were to divest Capital of this ``moral'' principle, declaring it unscientific, the scientific logic underlying this work of genius would collapse as a whole. Indeed can one give a purely ``logical'' basis to the thesis that human labour creates value, while the work of the donkey, although it performs exactly the same labour, creates no new value?
__*_*_*__The scientific communism of Marx, Engels and Lenin provides an internal unification for humanism and the scientific spirit which goes to the heart of the matter. This signifies that scientific communism, first of all, finds its reference point in the human being as the highest value; man understood not in an abstract manner but as the actual majority of working people. It finds its orientation in the general and fundamental interests of the working pedple. Scientific communism, secondly, represents, from beginning to end, a practical and concrete programme for the realization of humanism understood in precisely this sense.
275Therefore humanism does not form a special ``sub-system'' within Marxism, nor does it represent a separate "scale of values" existing autonomously in relation to the remaining scientific system of concepts.
From this stems as well the Leninist definition of communist ethics and communist morality and its guiding principle: that which serves the building of communist society is moral. We classify as moral that deed, that way of thinking which offers support to this noble cause. Any other understanding of morality and ethics represents without fail a bourgeois lie cleverly masked to one extent or another.
In this connection we note the theoretical untenability of the attempt to create within Marxism a special (autonomous) sub-system dealing with "moral values . The proposal to supplement scientific communism with a special "scale of moral imperatives'', with "humanistic premises" originates as a rule in the West from people who personally sympathize with communism but poorly understand the Marxist-Leninist solution of the real problem incorporated here.
This problem is particularly acute today because the struggle for authentic humanism, for communism, is precisely a struggle. It is not an easy struggle, not only an ideological struggle, but at times it is even bloody. The latter is carried on against an enemy prepared to carry out the most extreme and inhumane measures, in this struggle the old conflict between the "values of humanism" and the necessity of violating them in the name of this humanism is renewed daily if not hourly. The typical dialectical situation arises in which the authentic humanist (as distinct from the "fair-weather humanist'') is sometimes forced to apply violence against another human. Sometimes circumstances evolve in such a manner that the authentic humanist is compelled to resort to deceit and cunning (for example, during interrogations in fascist torture chambers). Once again this deceit and cunning is applied in the name of humanism, for to tell the truth in such surroundings would be to commit a far more heinous and immoral adt than to lie. Here there is no theoretical problem, but merely one of personal stamina, and moral fortitude in the pursuit of high moral principles.
The real and very difficult problem, calling for a clear theoretical solution lies elsewhere. Is it admissible to interpret the formula: "that which serves the victory of communism is moral" to mean that in the name of this great cause "all is permitted'', that there are and can be no restrictions of a moral 276 nature imposed here? Or might it be argued that even here not all is ``permitted''?
Is there in general a limit beyond which a deviation, forced by extreme circumstances, from the abstract general norms of humaneness in the name of and for the sake of the triumph of a concretely and historically understood humanism is transformed into---in full agreement with the laws of the dialectic---a crime against the very goal for the sake of which the act was undertaken? To speak more to the point, can this fatal limit be determined, for it always exists somewhere or the other? In actuality this border forms the great divide between the authentic communism of Marx, Engels and Lenin and those ``left'' doctrines which interpret Marxist moral formula as indicating that "all is permitted''. It is one matter to understand that violence and murder are inevitable actions summoned by the extreme circumstances accompanying the deadly battle of the classes, actions to which the revolutionary must resort, recognizing fully their inhumanity. It is quite another matter, to look upon'these activities as the optimal, the safest and even the only methods of establishing ``happiness'' on earth. Both Marx and Lenin morally approved violence only in the most extreme circumstances, and then, only on the minimal scale, that which is absolutely necessary.
Lenin wrote that Communists are opposed to violence against men in general and they resort to coercion only when it is imposed upon them by authentic admirers of violence. The only justification for violence is as a means of opposing violence, as violence against the violent, but not as a means of influencing the will of the majority of the working people.
Therefore Communists are never the initiators of actions such as war or the "export of revolution" at the point of the bayonet. Lenin always categorically and consistently opposed ``left'' ideas of this type. In his understanding the scientific spirit of communism is always inseparably connected with the principle of humaneness in the direct sense of the word.
This also forms the principal difference between Lenin and those doctrinaires who allow themselves the pleasure of cynically counting up the number of human lives ``worth'' paying for the victory of world communism.... As a rule such calculations in today's world are the occupation of people characterized by primitivity both in terms of theory and in their moral profile. '
In order to resolve the problem of uniting high moral standards with a maximum of the scientific spirit, the problem must first of all be viewed in all of the acuity and dialectical 277 complexity which it has acquired in the difficult and tumultuous time we live in. A simple algebraic solution will not do. The problem of the relationship between morality and the scientific spirit has been resolved only in the most general fashion by Marxist philosophy. In concrete situations, on the other hand, it will occur again and again in the foreseeable future; each time it will have a new and unexpected twist. Therefore there can be no simple or ready-made solution for each individual occurrence of the conflict between the ``mind'' and the ``conscience''.
There can be no simple prescription or mathematical formula capable of meeting every occasion. If you run into a conflict of this nature, do not assume that in each instance ``science'' is correct and ``conscience''---rubbish, or at best a fairy tale for children. The opposite is no closer to the truth, namely that "moral sentiment" is always correct, that science, if it runs into conflict with the former---is the heartless and brutal ``devil'' of Ivan Karamazov, engendering types like Smerdyakov. Only through a concrete examination of the causes of the conflict itself may we find a dialectical resolution, that is to say, the wisest and the most humane solution. Only thus may we find, to phrase it in current jargon, the "optimal variant" of correspondence between the demands of the intellect and of the conscience.
To be sure finding a concrete, dialectical unity between the principles of mind and conscience in each instance is not an easy matter. Unfortunately there is no magic wand, there is no simple algorithm, either of a ``scientific'' or a ``moral'' nature.
__ALPHA_LVL0__ The End. [END] [278] ~ [279]REQUEST TO READERS
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