Sadokhin A.P. Concepts of modern natural science - file n1.doc. Alexander Sadokhin concepts of modern natural science Sadokhin concepts of modern natural science read online
Concepts modern natural science. Sadokhin A.P.
2nd ed., revised. and additional - M.: 2006. - 447 p.
The textbook was prepared in accordance with the requirements of the State educational standard for higher professional education in the discipline “Concepts of modern natural science,” which is included in the curricula of all humanitarian specialties at universities. The work presents a wide panorama of concepts covering various processes and phenomena in living and inanimate nature, and describes modern scientific methods of understanding the world. The main attention is paid to the consideration of the concepts of modern natural science, which have important ideological and methodological significance.
For undergraduates, graduate students and teachers humanities faculties and universities, as well as everyone interested in philosophical issues of natural science.
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Table of contents
From the author 3
Chapter 1. Science as part of culture 5
1.1. Science among other areas of culture 5
1.2. Natural science and humanitarian cultures 7
1.3. Criteria of scientific knowledge 11
1.4. Structure of scientific knowledge 15
1.5. Scientific picture of the world 17
Chapter 2. Structure and methods of scientific knowledge 20
2.1. Levels and forms of scientific knowledge 20
2.2. Methods of scientific knowledge 23
2.3. Special empirical methods of scientific knowledge 25
2.4. Special theoretical methods of scientific knowledge 27
2.5. Special universal methods of scientific knowledge 29
2.6. General scientific approaches 32
2.7. Systematic approach 33
2.8. Global evolutionism 38
Chapter 3. Basics of natural science 49
3.1. Subject and structure of natural science 49
3.2. History of natural science 53
3.3. The Beginning of Science 54
3.4. Global scientific revolution of the late XIX - early XX centuries. 69
3.5. Main features of modern natural science as a science 71
Chapter 4. Physical picture of the world 75
4.1. The concept of the physical picture of the world 75
4.2. Mechanical picture of the world 78
4.3. Electromagnetic picture of the world 81
4.4. Quantum field picture of the world 85
4.5. The relationship between dynamic and statistical laws 88
4.6. Principles of modern physics 91
Chapter 5. Modern concepts of physics 96
5.1. Structural levels of matter organization 96
5.2. Movement and physical interaction 106
5.3. Concepts of space and time in modern natural science 116
Chapter 6. Modern cosmological concepts 126
6.1. Cosmology and cosmogony 126
6.2. Cosmological models of the Universe 128
6.3. Origin of the Universe - Big Bang Concept 134
6.4. Structural self-organization of the Universe 138
6.5. Further complication of matter in the Universe 144
6.6. The problem of the existence and search for extraterrestrial civilizations 151
Chapter 7. Earth as a subject of natural science 157
7.1. Shape and size of the Earth 157
7.2. Earth among other planets solar system 159
7.3. Earth Education 163
7.4. Geospheres of the Earth 170
7.5. Geodynamic processes 179
Chapter 8. Modern concepts of chemistry 184
8.1. Specifics of chemistry as a science 184
8.2. First level of chemical knowledge. The doctrine of the composition of matter 186
8.3. Second level of chemical knowledge. Structural Chemistry 193
8.4. Third level of chemical knowledge. Doctrine of chemical process 197
8.5. The fourth level of chemical knowledge. Evolutionary Chemistry 205
Chapter 9. Structural levels of life 212
9.1. Structure of biological knowledge 212
9.2. Structural levels of life organization 218
Chapter 10. Origin and essence of life 243
10.1. Essence of Life 243
10.2. Basic concepts of the origin of life 249
10.3. Current state of the problem of the origin of life 257
10.4. The emergence of life on Earth 260
10.5. Formation and development of the Earth's biosphere 267
10.6. Emergence of the plant and animal kingdoms 271
Chapter 11. The theory of evolution of the organic world 278
11.1. Formation of the idea of development in biology 278
11.2. Ch. Darwin's theory of evolution 284
11.3. Further development evolutionary theory. Anti-Darwinism 289
11.4. Basics of Genetics 295
11.5. Synthetic Theory of Evolution 301
Chapter 12. Man as a subject of natural science 308
12.1. Concepts of Human Origins 308
12.2. Similarities and differences between humans and animals 321
12.3. The essence of man. Biological and social in man 332
12.4. Ethology about human behavior 336
Chapter 13. The phenomenon of man in modern science 340
13.1. The essence and origins of human consciousness 340
13.2. Human emotions 350
13.3. Human health, performance and creativity 353
13.4. Bioethics 365
Chapter 14. Man and the biosphere 372
14.1. The concept and essence of the biosphere 372
14.2. Biosphere and space 376
14.3. Man and space 378
14.4. Man and nature 383
14.5. The concept of the noosphere V.I. Vernadskogo 393
14.6. Environmental protection 397
14.7. Rational environmental management 401
14.8. The anthropic principle in modern science 407
Conclusion 413
Bibliography 414
Questions for the exam (test) for the course
“Concepts of modern natural science” 415
Glossary 416
Presented in a concise and accessible form full course disciplines, the most important ones are highlighted modern concepts sciences about inanimate and living nature. It is an expanded and revised version of the textbook recommended by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation for studying the course “Concepts of modern natural science.” For undergraduate and graduate students, graduate students and teachers of the humanities, for teachers of secondary schools, lyceums and colleges, as well as for a wide range of readers interested in various aspects of natural science.
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The given introductory fragment of the book Concepts of modern natural science (A. P. Sadokhin) provided by our book partner - the company liters.
Chapter 1. Science in the context of culture
1.1. Science as part of culture
Throughout their history, people have developed many ways of understanding and mastering the world around them. Among them, science occupies one of the most important places. main goal which is the description, explanation and prediction of the processes of reality that constitute the subject of its study. In the modern understanding, science is considered as:
The highest form of human knowledge;
Social Institute, consisting of various organizations and institutions engaged in obtaining new knowledge about the world;
System of developing knowledge;
A way of knowing the world;
A system of principles, categories, laws, techniques and methods for obtaining adequate knowledge;
Element of spiritual culture;
System of spiritual activity and production.
All given meanings of the term “science” are legitimate. But this ambiguity also means that science is a complex system designed to provide generalized, holistic knowledge about the world. Moreover, this knowledge cannot be disclosed by any one separate science or set of sciences.
To understand the specifics of science, it should be considered as part of a culture created by man, and compared with other spheres of culture.
A specific feature of human life is the fact that it occurs simultaneously in two interrelated aspects - natural and cultural. Initially, man is a living being, a product of nature, however, in order to exist in it comfortably and safely, he creates an artificial world of culture, a “second nature”, inside nature. Thus, a person exists in nature, interacts with it as a living organism, but at the same time “doubles” external world, developing knowledge about it, creating images, models, assessments, household items, etc. It is precisely this kind of thing-cognitive human activity that constitutes the cultural aspect of human existence.
Culture is embodied in the objective results of activities, ways and methods of human existence, in various norms of behavior and various knowledge about the world around us. The entire set of practical manifestations of culture is divided into two main groups: material and spiritual values. Material values form material culture, and the world of spiritual values, which includes science, art, religion, forms the world of spiritual culture.
Spiritual culture covers the spiritual life of society, its social experience and results, which appear in the form of ideas, scientific theories, artistic images, moral and legal norms, political and religious views and other elements of the human spiritual world.
Integral integral part Culture is science, which determines many important aspects of society and human life. It, like other spheres of culture, has its own tasks that distinguish them from each other. Thus, the economy is the foundation that ensures all the activities of society; it arises on the basis of a person’s ability to work. Morality regulates relations between people in society, which is very important for a person who cannot live outside society and must limit his own freedom in the name of the survival of the entire team. Religion arises from a person’s need for consolation in situations that cannot be resolved rationally (for example, the death of loved ones, illness, unhappy love, etc.).
The task of science is to obtain objective knowledge about the world, to understand the laws according to which the world around us functions and develops. Possessing such knowledge, it is much easier for a person to transform this world, make it more convenient and safe for himself. Thus, science is the sphere of culture most closely associated with the task of directly transforming the world and increasing its convenience for humans.
In accordance with the transformative role of science, its high authority was formed, which was expressed in the emergence scientism - a worldview based on faith in science as the only force called upon to solve all human problems. Scientism declared science to be the pinnacle of human knowledge, while it absolutized the methods and results of natural sciences, denying the scientific nature of social and humanitarian knowledge as having no cognitive significance. From such ideas gradually emerged the idea of two cultures unrelated to each other - the natural sciences and the humanities.
In contrast to scientism in the second half of the twentieth century. an ideology was formed antiscientism, considering science a dangerous force leading to the destruction of humanity. Its supporters are convinced of the limited capabilities of science to solve fundamental human problems and deny science positive impact on culture. They believe that science improves the well-being of the population, but at the same time increases the danger of the destruction of humanity. Only by the end of the 20th century, having comprehended both the positive and negative aspects of science, humanity developed a more balanced position in relation to the role of science in modern society.
While recognizing the important role of science in the life of society, one should not agree with its “claims” to a dominant position. Science in itself cannot be considered the highest value of human civilization; it is only a means in solving some problems of human existence. The same applies to other areas of culture. Only by mutually complementing each other can all spheres of culture fulfill their main function - to provide and facilitate human life. If in this relationship some part of the culture is given greater importance compared to others, this leads to the impoverishment of the culture as a whole and disruption of its normal functioning.
Based on this assessment, science today is considered as a part of culture, representing a body of objective knowledge about existence, the process of obtaining this knowledge and applying it in practice.
1.2. Natural science and humanities cultures
Culture, being the result of human activity, cannot exist in isolation from the natural world, which is its material basis. It is inextricably linked with nature and exists within it, but, having a natural basis, retains its social content. This kind of duality of culture led to the formation of two types of culture: natural science and humanitarian (or two ways of relating to the world and its knowledge). On initial stage In human history, both types existed as a single whole, since human knowledge was equally directed at nature and at itself. However, gradually each type developed its own principles and approaches and defined goals; The natural science culture sought to study nature and conquer it, while the humanitarian culture aimed to study man and his world.
For the first time, the idea of the difference between natural science and humanities knowledge was put forward in late XIX V. the German philosopher W. Dilthey and the philosophers of the Baden school of neo-Kantianism W. Windelband and G. Rickert. The terms “science of nature” and “science of spirit” they proposed quickly became generally accepted, and the idea itself was firmly established in philosophy. Finally, in 1960–1970. English historian and writer Charles Snow formulated the idea of an alternative to two cultures: natural science and humanitarian. He stated that the spiritual world of the intelligentsia is increasingly split into two camps, in one of which there are artists, in the other - scientists. In his opinion, two cultures are in constant conflict with each other, and mutual understanding between representatives of these cultures is impossible due to their absolute alienness.
A thorough study of the issue of the relationship between natural science and humanities cultures really makes it possible to find significant differences between them. There are two extreme points of view. Proponents of the first claim that it is natural science with its precise methods of research that should become the model that the humanities should imitate. Radical representatives of this point of view are positivists who consider mathematical physics the “ideal” of science, and the main method of constructing any scientific knowledge is the deductive method of mathematics. Proponents of the opposite position argue that such a view does not take into account all the complexity and specificity of humanitarian knowledge and is therefore utopian and unproductive.
Focusing on the creative essence of culture, it can be argued that the fundamental feature of natural science culture is its ability to “discover” the world, nature, which represent a self-sufficient system functioning according to its own laws and cause-and-effect relationships. Natural scientific culture focuses on the study and research of natural processes and laws; its specificity lies in a high degree of objectivity and reliability of knowledge about nature. She strives to read the endless “book of nature” as accurately as possible, to master its powers, to cognize it as an objective reality that exists independently of man.
At the same time, the history of human culture shows that any spiritual activity of people occurs not only in the form of natural science, but also in the form of philosophy, religion, art, social and human sciences. All these types of activities constitute the content of humanitarian culture. The main subject of humanitarian culture, therefore, is the inner world of a person, his personal qualities, human relationships, etc., and its specificity is determined by the social position of a person and the spiritual values prevailing in society.
The differences between natural science and humanities knowledge are caused not only by different goals, subjects and objects of these areas of cognitive activity, but also by two main ways of the thinking process, which are of a physiological nature. It is known that the human brain is functionally asymmetrical: its right hemisphere is associated with figurative intuitive type thinking, left - with the logical type. Accordingly, the predominance of one or another type of thinking determines a person’s inclination towards an artistic or rational way of perceiving the world.
Rational knowledge serves as the basis of natural science culture, since it is focused on the division, comparison, measurement and distribution into categories of knowledge and information about the world around us. It is best suited for the accumulation, formalization and transmission of an ever-increasing amount of knowledge. In the totality of various facts, events and manifestations of the surrounding world, it reveals something common, stable, necessary and natural, giving them a systematic character through logical comprehension. Natural scientific knowledge is characterized by the desire for truth, the development special language for the most accurate and unambiguous expression of the acquired knowledge.
Intuitive thinking, on the contrary, serves as the basis for humanitarian knowledge, since it is distinguished by its individual character and cannot be subject to strict classification or formalization. It is based on a person’s internal experiences and does not have strict objective criteria of truth. However, intuitive thinking has enormous cognitive power, since it is associative and metaphorical in nature. Using the method of analogy, it is able to go beyond logical structures and give birth to new phenomena of material and spiritual culture.
Thus, the natural science and humanitarian cultures are not isolated by chance. But this division does not exclude their initial interdependence, which is not in the nature of incompatible opposites, but rather appears as complementarity. The relevance of the problem of interaction between two cultures lies in the fact that they turned out to be too “distanced” from each other: one explores nature “in itself,” the other explores man “in itself.” Each culture considers the interaction of man and nature either in a cognitive or “subjugative” way, while turning to human existence requires deepening the unity not only of the natural science and humanitarian cultures, but also the unity of human culture as a whole. The solution to this problem rests on the paradox that the laws of nature are the same for all people everywhere, but the worldviews, norms and ideals of people are different and sometimes incompatible.
The fact that there are differences between the natural science and humanitarian cultures does not negate the need for unity between them, which can only be achieved through their direct interaction. Today, both in the natural sciences and in the humanities, integration processes are intensifying due to common research methods; in this process, the technical equipment of humanities research is enriched. This establishes connections between the humanities and the natural sciences, which are also interested in this. For example, the results of logical and linguistic research are used in the development of information tools for natural science. Joint developments of natural scientists and humanists in the field of ethical and legal problems of science are becoming increasingly important.
IN last years under the influence of the achievements of technological progress and such a general scientific method of research as systems approach, the previous confrontation between naturalists and humanists has weakened significantly. Humanists understood the importance and necessity of using in their knowledge not only technical and information means of natural science and exact sciences, but also effective scientific research methods that originally arose within the framework of natural science. The experimental method of research from the natural sciences penetrates into the humanities (sociology, psychology); in turn, natural scientists are increasingly turning to the experience of humanitarian knowledge. Thus, we can talk about the humanitarization of natural science and the scientization of humanities, which are actively occurring today and are gradually erasing the boundaries between the two cultures.
1.3. Criteria of scientific knowledge
Throughout its history, humanity has accumulated a huge amount of knowledge about the world that is different in nature. In it, along with scientific knowledge, there is religious, mythological, everyday, etc. The existence of various types of knowledge raises the question of the criteria that make it possible to distinguish scientific knowledge from non-scientific knowledge. In modern science, it is customary to distinguish four main criteria of scientific knowledge.
The first of them is consistency knowledge, according to which science has a certain structure, and is not an incoherent set of separate parts. A system, in contrast to a sum, is characterized by internal unity, the impossibility of removing or adding any elements to its structure without good reason. Scientific knowledge always acts as certain systems; in these systems there are initial principles, fundamental concepts (axioms), as well as knowledge derived from these principles and concepts according to the laws of logic. Based on the accepted initial principles and concepts, new knowledge is substantiated, new facts, results of experiments, observations, and measurements are interpreted. A chaotic set of true statements, not systematized in relation to each other, cannot in itself be considered scientific knowledge.
The second criterion of science is the presence of a mechanism for obtaining new knowledge. This provides not only a proven methodology for practical and theoretical research, but also the presence of people specializing in this activity, relevant organizations, as well as necessary materials, technologies and means of recording information. Science appears when objective conditions for this are created in society, when there is a sufficiently high level of development of civilization.
The third criterion of scientific character is theoretical knowledge, the defining goal of scientific knowledge. All scientific knowledge is organized in theories and concepts that are consistent with each other and with the dominant ideas about the objective world. After all, the ultimate goal of science is to obtain truth for the sake of truth itself, and not for the sake of a practical result. If science is aimed only at solving practical problems, it ceases to be science in the full sense of the word. Science is based on fundamental research, pure interest in the world around us, and then on this basis applied research is carried out, if the level of technological development allows it. Thus, the scientific knowledge that existed in the East was used only in religious magical rituals and ceremonies or in direct practical activities. Therefore, we cannot talk about the presence of science there for many centuries as an independent sphere of culture.
The fourth criterion of scientific character is rationality knowledge, i.e. obtaining knowledge only on the basis of rational procedures. Unlike other types of knowledge, scientific knowledge is not limited to stating facts, but seeks to explain them and make them understandable to the human mind. The rational style of thinking is based on the recognition of the existence of universal causal relationships accessible to reason, as well as formal proof as the main means of substantiating knowledge. Today this position seems trivial, but knowledge of the world primarily through reason appeared only in Ancient Greece. Eastern civilization never adopted this specific European path, giving priority to intuition and extrasensory perception.
For science, starting from the New Age, an additional, fifth criterion of scientificity has been introduced. This is availability experimental method of research, mathematization of science, which connected science with practice and created a modern civilization focused on the conscious transformation of the surrounding world in the interests of man.
Using the above criteria, you can always distinguish scientific knowledge from non-scientific (pseudoscience). This is especially important these days, since Lately Pseudoscience, which has always existed alongside science, is attracting an increasing number of supporters.
The structure of pseudoscientific knowledge is usually not systematic, but fragmented. Pseudoscience is characterized by an uncritical analysis of source data (myths, legends, stories of third parties), disregard for contradictory facts, and often direct manipulation of facts.
Despite this, pseudoscience is successful. There are appropriate reasons for this. One of them is the fundamental incompleteness of the scientific worldview, which leaves room for guesswork and fabrications. But if earlier these voids were mainly filled by religion, today their place has been taken by pseudoscience, whose arguments, if incorrect, are understandable to everyone. Pseudoscientific explanations are more accessible to the average person than dry scientific reasoning, which is often impossible to understand without special education. Therefore, the roots of pseudoscience lie in human nature itself.
The first are relic pseudosciences, among which are well-known astrology and alchemy. Once upon a time they were a source of knowledge about the world, a breeding ground for the emergence of true science. They became pseudosciences after the advent of chemistry and astronomy.
In modern times appeared occult pseudosciences - spiritualism, mesmerism, parapsychology. What they have in common is the recognition of the existence of an otherworldly (astral) world that does not obey physical laws. It is believed that this is a world higher than us, in which any miracles are possible. You can communicate with this world through mediums, psychics, telepaths, and in this case various paranormal phenomena arise, which become the subject of study of pseudoscience.
In the 20th century there appeared modernist pseudosciences, in which the mystical basis of the old pseudosciences was transformed under the influence science fiction. Among such sciences, the leading place belongs to ufology, which studies UFOs.
How to separate genuine science from counterfeits? For this purpose, scientific methodologists, in addition to the scientific criteria we have already mentioned, have formulated several important principles.
The first one is verification principle(practical confirmability): if some concept or judgment is reducible to direct experience (i.e., empirically verifiable), then it makes sense. In other words, scientific knowledge can be tested for consistency with experience, but non-scientific knowledge cannot be tested for such verification.
A distinction is made between direct verification, when statements are directly verified, and indirect, when logical relationships are established between indirectly verified statements. Since the concepts of a developed scientific theory, as a rule, are difficult to reduce to experimental data, indirect verification is used for them, which states: if it is impossible to experimentally confirm some concept or proposition of the theory, one can limit ourselves to experimental confirmation of the conclusions from them. For example, the concept of “quark” was introduced in physics back in the 1930s, but such a particle of matter could not be detected in experiments. At the same time, the quark theory predicted a number of phenomena that allowed experimental verification, during which the expected results were obtained. This indirectly confirmed the existence of quarks.
Immediately after its appearance, the verification principle was sharply criticized by its opponents. The essence of the objections was that science cannot develop only on the basis of experience, since it involves obtaining results that are irreducible to experience and cannot be directly deduced from it. In science, there are formulations of laws that cannot be verified using verification criteria. In addition, the very principle of verifiability is “unverifiable,” i.e., it should be classified as meaningless and subject to exclusion from the system of scientific statements.
In response to this criticism, scientists proposed another criterion for distinguishing scientific and non-scientific knowledge - principle of falsification formulated by the greatest philosopher and methodologist of science of the 20th century. K. Popper. In accordance with this principle, only fundamentally refutable (falsifiable) knowledge can be considered scientific. It has long been known that no amount of experimental evidence is sufficient to prove a theory. Thus, we can observe any number of examples that confirm the law of universal gravitation every minute. But one example is enough (for example, a stone that did not fall to the ground, but flew away from the ground) to recognize this law as false. Therefore, a scientist should direct all his efforts not to search for yet another experimental proof of the hypothesis or theory he has formulated, but to try to refute his statement; the critical desire to refute a scientific theory is the most effective way to confirm its scientific nature and truth. A critical refutation of the conclusions and statements of science does not allow it to stagnate and is the most important source of its growth, although it makes any scientific knowledge hypothetical, depriving it of completeness and absoluteness.
The falsification criterion has also been criticized. It was argued that the principle of falsifiability is insufficient, since it is not applicable to those provisions of science that cannot be compared with experience. In addition, actual scientific practice contradicts the immediate abandonment of a theory if a single empirical fact contradicting it is discovered.
In fact, true science is not afraid to make mistakes, to recognize its previous conclusions as false. If some concept, despite all its scientific nature, claims that it cannot be refuted, denies the very possibility of a different interpretation of any facts, this indicates that we are faced not with science, but with pseudoscience.
1.4. Structure of scientific knowledge
The term “science” usually refers to a special field of human activity, the main goal of which is the development and theoretical systematization of objective knowledge about all aspects and areas of reality. With this understanding of the essence of science, it is a system, the diverse elements of which are interconnected by common ideological and methodological foundations. The elements of the science system are various natural, social, humanitarian and technical scientific disciplines (individual sciences). Modern science includes more than 15,000 different disciplines, and the number of professional scientists in the world has exceeded 5 million people. Therefore, science today has a complex structure, which can be considered in several aspects.
In modern science, the main basis for the classification of scientific disciplines is the subject of research. Depending on the sphere of existence, which acts as the subject of scientific research, it is customary to distinguish between natural (a complex of sciences about nature), social (sciences about the types and forms of social life) and humanitarian (studying man as a thinking being) sciences. This classification is based on the division of the world around us into three spheres: nature, society and man. Each of these areas is studied by a corresponding group of sciences, and each group in turn represents a complex complex of many independent sciences interacting with each other.
Thus, natural science, the subject of study of which is nature as a whole, includes physics, chemistry, biology, earth sciences, astronomy, cosmology, etc. Social science consists of economic sciences, law, sociology, political science. The complex of humanities consists of psychology, logic, cultural studies, linguistics, art history, etc. A special place is occupied by mathematics, which, contrary to widespread misconception, is not part of natural science. It is an interdisciplinary science that is used by both the natural sciences, social sciences and humanities. Mathematics is often called the universal language of science; The special place of mathematics is determined by the subject of its research. This is a science about the quantitative relations of reality (all other sciences have as their subject some qualitative side of reality), it is more general, abstract in nature than all other sciences, it “doesn’t care” what to count (see Table 1.1).
Based on their orientation towards the practical application of results, all sciences are united into two large groups: fundamental and applied. Basic Sciences – a system of knowledge about the deepest properties of objective reality that does not have a clear practical orientation. Such sciences create theories that explain the fundamentals of human existence; the fundamental knowledge of these theories determines the features of a person’s idea of the world and himself, that is, they are the basis for a scientific picture of the world. As a rule, fundamental research is carried out not due to external (social) needs, but due to internal (immanent) incentives; Fundamental sciences are characterized by axiological (value) neutrality. Discoveries and achievements of fundamental sciences are decisive in the formation of the natural scientific picture of the world, in changing the paradigm of scientific thinking. In the fundamental sciences, basic models of cognition are developed, concepts, principles and laws that form the basis of applied sciences are identified. The fundamental sciences include mathematics, natural sciences (astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, anthropology), social sciences (history, economics, sociology, philosophy), humanities (philology, psychology, cultural studies).
Applied Science, on the contrary, they are considered as a knowledge system with a clearly defined practical orientation. Based on the results of fundamental research, they focus on solving specific problems related to people's interests. Applied sciences are ambivalent, i.e., depending on the field of application, they can have both positive and negative impact per person, they are value-oriented. Applied sciences include technical disciplines, agronomy, medicine, pedagogy, etc.
There is a dichotomy (contradiction) between fundamental and applied sciences that has historical roots. In the process of conducting fundamental research, applied problems can be formulated and solved, and conducting applied research often requires extensive use of fundamental developments, especially in interdisciplinary fields. However, this dichotomy is not fundamental, as can be seen from the analysis of the relationship between the natural and technical sciences. It is the development of technical sciences that clearly demonstrates the conventionality of the boundaries between fundamental and applied research.
1.5. Scientific picture of the world
In the process of cognition of the surrounding world, the results of cognition are reflected and consolidated in the human mind in the form of knowledge, abilities, skills, types of behavior and communication. The totality of the results of human cognitive activity forms a certain model, a picture of the world. In the history of mankind, quite a lot have been created and existed a large number of a wide variety of pictures of the world, each of which was distinguished by its vision of the world and its explanation. However, the broadest and most complete picture of the world is provided by the scientific picture of the world, which includes the most important achievements of science that create a certain understanding of the world and man’s place in it. The scientific picture of the world does not include private knowledge about the various properties of specific phenomena, about the details of the cognitive process itself; it is a holistic system of ideas about the general properties, spheres, levels and patterns of reality. At its core, the scientific picture of the world is a special form of systematization of knowledge, a qualitative generalization and ideological synthesis of various scientific theories.
Being an integral system of ideas about the general properties and patterns of the objective world, the scientific picture of the world exists as a complex structure, including components a general scientific picture of the world and a picture of the world of a particular science (physical, biological, geological, etc.). The picture of the world of a particular science, in turn, includes corresponding numerous concepts - certain ways of understanding and interpreting any objects, phenomena and processes of the objective world.
The basis of the modern scientific picture of the world is fundamental knowledge obtained primarily in the field of physics. However, in the last decades of the twentieth century. The opinion is increasingly being established that biology occupies a leading position in the modern scientific picture of the world. This is expressed in the strengthening of the influence that biological knowledge has on the content of the scientific picture of the world. The ideas of biology gradually acquire a universal character and become the fundamental principles of other sciences. In particular, this is the idea of development, the penetration of which into cosmology, physics, chemistry, anthropology, sociology, etc. has led to a significant change in man’s views on the world.
The concept of a scientific picture of the world is one of the fundamental ones in natural science. Throughout its history, it has gone through several stages of development and, accordingly, the formation of scientific pictures of the world as any particular science or branch of science dominated, based on a new theoretical, methodological and axiological system of views, accepted as the basis for solving scientific problems. Similar system scientific views and attitudes shared by the overwhelming majority of scientists is called a scientific paradigm.
When applied to science, the term “paradigm” in a general sense means a set of ideas, theories, methods, concepts and samples for solving various scientific problems. At the paradigm level, the basic norms for distinguishing between scientific and non-scientific knowledge are formed. As a result of a paradigm shift, scientific standards change. Theories formulated in different paradigms cannot be compared because they are based on different standards of science and rationality.
In scientific studies, it is customary to consider paradigms in two aspects: epistemic (cognitive-theoretical) and social. In epistemic terms, a paradigm is a set of fundamental knowledge, values, beliefs and techniques that serve as a model of scientific activity. IN socially a paradigm determines the integrity and boundaries of the scientific community that shares its basic provisions.
During the period of dominance of any paradigm in science, a relatively calm development of science occurs, but over time it is replaced by the formation of a new paradigm, which is established through a scientific revolution, i.e., a transition to new system scientific values and worldview. The philosophical concept of a paradigm is productive in describing the basic theoretical and methodological foundations of the scientific study of the world and is often used in the practice of modern science.
Table 1.1. Duration of some physical processes (sec)
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T.G.Grushevitskaya, A.P.Sadokhin
CONCEPTS
MODERN
NATURAL SCIENCE
Tutorial
For students
Full-time and part-time
University departments
Moscow
Reviewers:
Department of Philosophy and Sociology of St. Petersburg Maritime State Technical University (Head. Department Dr. Philosopher sciences, prof. A.V. Soldatov);
Full member of the International Academy of Informatization and the Academy of Social Education, Doctor of Philosophy. sciences, prof. A.V. Fedotov; Doctor of Philosophy Sciences, Associate Professor V.I. Smirnov (St. Petersburg State Academic Institute of Painting, Sculpture, Architecture named after I.E. Repin).
Vocational education Russian Federation as
Textbook for university students.
Grushevitskaya T. G., Sadokhin A. P.
G90 Concepts of modern natural science: Textbook. manual-M.: Higher. school, 1998.-383 p.
ISBN 5-06-003474 -7
The course is studied in all universities of the country as compulsory. The manual is written in accordance with the requirements of the “State Educational Standard” and provides basic knowledge, forming a future specialist with a broad scientific outlook.
The work highlights the specifics of science as a form of knowledge, the history of science, and outlines the basic modern concepts of physics, chemistry, biology, astronomy, etc.
For students of technical and humanities universities, for teachers and students of technical schools and colleges.
ISBN 5-06-003474-7 © "Higher School", 1998
Preface
TOPIC 1. SCIENCE AND ITS ROLE IN THE LIFE OF SOCIETY
TOPIC 2. SCIENTIFIC THEORY. STRUCTURE AND BASES OF THE THEORY
TOPIC 3. METHODS OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE. DEVELOPMENT OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE
TOPIC 4. THE EMERGENCE OF SCIENCE. APPEARANCE OF THE FIRST RESEARCH PROGRAMS
TOPIC 5. FORMATION OF THE FOUNDATIONS OF NATURAL SCIENCE IN THE MIDDLE AGES AND RENAISSANCE
TOPIC 6. SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION XVI - XVII CENTURIES. AND THE FORMATION OF CLASSICAL SCIENCE
TOPIC 7. SPECIFICITY AND NATURE OF MODERN SCIENCE
TOPIC 8. PHYSICAL PICTURE OF THE WORLD
TOPIC 9. STRUCTURAL LEVELS OF MATTER ORGANIZATION
TOPIC A 10. PHYSICAL INTERACTION
TOPIC 11. CONCEPTS OF SPACE AND TIME IN MODERN NATURAL SCIENCE
TOPIC 12. DETERMINISM AND CAUSALITY IN MODERN PHYSICS. DYNAMIC AND STATISTICAL LAWS
TOPIC 13. PRINCIPLES OF MODERN PHYSICS
TOPIC 14. COSMOLOGICAL MODELS OF THE UNIVERSE
TOPIC 15. EVOLUTION OF THE UNIVERSE
TOPIC 16. PROBLEMS OF SELF-ORGANIZATION OF MATTER
TOPIC 17. FORMATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE CHEMICAL PICTURE OF THE WORLD
TOPIC 18. MODERN CONCEPTS OF CHEMISTRY
TOPIC 19. ORIGIN AND ESSENCE OF LIFE
TOPIC 20. EVOLUTION OF THE ORGANIC WORLD
TOPIC 21. MODERN THEORIES OF EVOLUTION
TOPIC 22. MAN AS A SUBJECT OF NATURAL SCIENCE
TOPIC 23. MAN, BIOSPHERE AND SPACE
TOPIC 24. ON THE WAY TO THE NOOSPHERE
Questions for the exam and test
PREFACE
Reform higher education, carried out in our country, aims to make it more versatile and fundamental. For this purpose, new lecture courses are being introduced into the curricula of higher educational institutions, designed to ensure, among other things, the independent formation of ideological orientation and personality attitudes, and to help the student master the modern natural science picture of the world and his chosen profession.
Today, society does not need specialists who are capable of solving only narrowly utilitarian problems within the limits of the knowledge acquired during training. Modern requirements for a specialist require his readiness to improve his qualifications, the desire to keep abreast of the latest achievements in his field, and be able to creatively adapt them to his work.
Therefore, the main task of modern education is to develop the creative abilities of students, so that after graduation the graduate can become a creative person capable of various forms of activity. The course “Concepts of modern natural science” is focused on the implementation of these goals.
The relevance of introducing the course “Concepts of modern natural science” into the educational process is also due to the fact that in recent years various kinds of irrational types of knowledge, such as astrology, magic, mystical, etc., have become increasingly widespread in our country. Gradually and quite consistently, they are displacing from the public consciousness the natural scientific picture of the world, based on rational methods of explaining it. Representatives of modern parascience persistently spread any teachings, including mysticism, superstition, etc. Many of them are sincerely convinced that the status of the scientific worldview in modern society is no higher than any myth, and they promote unlimited ideological pluralism. Therefore, today, more than ever, it is important to establish natural science knowledge in the public consciousness.
The achievements of natural sciences are an integral part of human culture. Knowledge of basic modern theories and concepts of natural science are formed by the scientific method of thinking, an adequate attitude of a person to the world around him. Any person needs to know that the world is rationally knowable, that it is governed by objective laws that cannot be canceled or circumvented with the help of God or psychics. “Concepts of modern natural science” is a course designed to acquaint the reader, at the level of general ideas, with the most important data from various sciences about the world and man’s place in it.
Finally, knowledge of the concepts of modern natural science should help students penetrate inside the microworld and into extraterrestrial space, understand and imagine what material and intellectual costs it costs to produce modern televisions and computers, how important the problem of preserving nature is, what the essence of man is, etc.
However, developing a textbook for a completely new academic course is always an extremely complex and responsible matter. However, it becomes significantly more complicated if the title and subject of this course are defined very roughly and abstractly.
Firstly, the basis of the manual was made up of lecture courses, which were given by the authors for several years at the humanities faculties of Kaluga State University. pedagogical university them. K.E. Tsiolkovsky and in the Kaluga branch of the Moscow Humanitarian-Economic Institute. As a result, the manual was created specifically for students of various humanitarian specialties. Here, the authors saw their main task in making the form of presentation of the material accessible to future specialists for whom natural science is not a professional discipline.
Secondly, since the range of humanities specialties in the higher education system is quite wide, the authors sought to ensure that their work would be of interest to readers with a wide variety of needs and levels of training, and would also be useful for use in educational process precisely as educational and Toolkit. This purpose of the manual is determined by the requirements of the “State Educational Standard” for the course “Concepts of Modern Natural Sciences”, according to which the achievements of the natural sciences are an integral part of human culture. Knowledge of the fundamentals of natural sciences and methods of scientific knowledge shapes the character of students’ thinking and contributes to the development of an adequate attitude towards the world around them.
Thirdly, due to the fact that “Concepts of modern natural science” is a course designed to show the place and significance of natural science in modern culture, to introduce students at the level of general ideas to the most important concepts of the origin of nature and man, to help them master the modern natural science picture of the world , the authors sought to uncover relevant problems based on a synthesis of natural science, philosophy and cultural studies. This methodological approach is determined by the authors’ conviction that only in this way can one show the unity and diversity of the world and contribute to the formation of a holistic worldview among students. Therefore, where necessary, the authors used scientific, historical and philosophical approaches to describe relevant topics and issues, and tried to show not only the results of solving natural science problems, but also the paths in the development of knowledge that led to them.
These methodological approaches determined the content and structure of the textbook. The logic of the course presentation develops from questions of the history of science and the foundations of scientific studies (1-7 topics) through a description of the physical, chemical and biological pictures of the world (8-21 topics) to the disclosure of the essence of man and modern problems his life activity (22 - 24 topics). At the same time, the authors provided for the possibility of presenting this course in various versions, depending on the capabilities and characteristics of the educational institution, forms of training, structure of the curriculum and qualifications of each teacher.
It should be added to the above that it is impossible to simultaneously be a specialist in all scientific areas described in this course. Therefore, consultations, advice and recommendations from specialists in various scientific fields provided significant assistance in the work on the manual. In this regard, the authors express their deep gratitude to Doctor of Philology, Prof. Biryukov V.F.; Ph.D., Associate Professor Dronov A.I.; Ph.D., Associate Professor Zubarev A.E.; Ph.D., Associate Professor Savitkin N.I. for their help and support provided in the preparation of the manuscript.
In conclusion, I would like to note that since sufficient experience in teaching the discipline itself has not yet been accumulated, the course program has not been firmly established, its content is being actively discussed, the authors are aware of the imperfection of their work. Therefore, they express their gratitude in advance to all interested readers for their well-meaning and reasonable comments and suggestions for improving their work.
TOPIC 1 SCIENCE AND ITS ROLE IN THE LIFE OF SOCIETY
THE PROBLEM OF DEFINITION OF SCIENCE
Throughout their history, people have developed several ways of understanding and mastering the world around them. One of these the most important ways, of course, is science. We are familiar with this word; we use it very often in Everyday life, but we absolutely do not think about its actual meaning. Today it is quite obvious to us that science is an integral part of the spiritual culture of society. With its emergence, unique spiritual products accumulate in the treasury of knowledge passed on from generation to generation, which play an increasingly important role in awareness, understanding and transformation of reality. At a certain stage of human history, science, like other previously emerged elements of culture, develops into a relatively independent form of social consciousness. This is due to the fact that a number of problems facing society can only be solved with the help of science.
Understanding the role and place of science in people's lives is a complex process that is not completed today. It was and is being developed long and hard, in the struggle of approaches, ideas, in the course of overcoming difficulties, contradictions, doubts and the emergence of new and new questions. Only in the 20s of our century a new scientific discipline arose, called “scientific studies” and designed to reveal the essence and characteristics of science, the mechanism of its development and application, as well as the general patterns of development and functioning of science as a system of knowledge and a special social institution.
The first thing that the founders of scientific studies paid attention to was the etymology of the Latin word"scientia", which means "knowledge". From a certain time, this word began to mean science and in this meaning entered some European languages. But the problem is that not all knowledge is science. Knowledge is acquired by a person in a wide variety of spheres of his life: in everyday life, in politics, in economics, in art, in engineering, but in them acquiring knowledge is not the main goal.
Thus, art, through artistic images, reflects reality, creates aesthetic values, and expresses the artist’s attitude to the real world. The economy, in order to ensure the activities of society, must be based on true knowledge of reality, but it must be assessed according to the criteria of efficiency and practical results. Religion creates a world of transcendental knowledge in which a person communicates with God. Philosophy shapes a person’s knowledge about existence, about a person’s place in the world and about his own inner world.
Along with these forms of social consciousness, science is part of a single culture. But it is in comparison and interaction with them that the specificity of science is revealed. Religion, philosophy, art, and science - they all reflect reality in their own way and at the same time create their own world, their own artificial reality. Science creates a world of knowledge, consisting only of experimentally proven data about this world, and conclusions obtained on the basis of the laws of logic. In this world, the person himself, the subjective element of this world, his value orientations are assigned a very insignificant role (for this there is art, morality, religion). Therefore, only by complementing each other, all these components of culture can fulfill their main function - to provide and facilitate human life, being a connecting link between man and nature. If in this relationship one part is given greater importance compared to others, then this leads to the impoverishment of the culture as a whole and a distortion of its main purpose.
RELATIONSHIP OF SCIENCE, PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION
History knows examples of the predominance of some spheres of culture to the detriment of others. First of all, this concerns the relationship between science, philosophy and religion in the Middle Ages and in modern times. Thus, medieval science was under the rule of religion, which slowed down the development of science for at least a millennium and consigned many achievements of ancient science to oblivion. Having escaped from the power of religion in the Renaissance, science begins to develop rapidly, but philosophy retains its place as the main element in the worldview of educated people (for the illiterate majority, religion still plays the leading role). And only in the 19th century. In connection with the successes of natural science, science began to claim a dominant position in the culture and worldview of man and society. At the same time, a conflict broke out between science and philosophy, which continued almost to this day. Its essence comes down to the struggle for the right to possess the ultimate truth. Science, not realizing its limitations, wanted to provide answers to all questions and lead humanity to a better future. Usually this future was imagined as a world of material prosperity and satiety, built on the basis of the achievements of science and technology. Against the background of the low standard of living inherent in most people at the beginning of the 20th century, the flawed nature of such ideas about the “brave new world” remained incomprehensible not only to the majority of the population, attracted by the promise of those benefits that they never had, but also to politicians purposefully leading their people into the world of high technology, and even some of the thinkers (philosophers, writers, artists), with all the fervor of converts, propagating these ideas. Only a few philosophers and cultural scientists were able to understand at the beginning of the 20th century that this path leads to disaster. This became clear in the middle of this century, after the creation of nuclear weapons and the impending environmental disaster.
However, remnants of the ideology of scientism - belief in science as the only saving force - persist to this day. Having emerged in the depths of the Enlightenment and being developed in the philosophy of positivism, in the second half of our century it was transformed into a tendency towards limitless praise of the achievements of the natural sciences as opposed to the social and humanities disciplines.
It was this conviction that led to the current ecological state of the planet, the danger of thermonuclear war, but most importantly, to a sharp decline in ethical and aesthetic indicators of culture, the ever-increasing influence of technocratic psychology, which stimulated consumerism in modern society.
This role of scientism is due to the fact that it, as a worldview, is based on rational calculation, and where there is a certain pragmatic goal, a person professing this ideology will strive for this goal, regardless of any ethical obstacles.
An individual feels lost and powerless in such a scientistic world. Science taught him to doubt spiritual values, surrounded him with material comfort, and taught him to see in everything, first of all, a rationally achieved goal. Naturally, such a person inevitably becomes a cold, calculating pragmatist, viewing other people only as a means to achieve his goals. He is deprived of the goal for which a person is worth living, the integrity of his worldview is destroyed. Indeed, since the industrial revolution, new scientific thinking began to destroy the religious picture of the world that had been functioning for thousands of years, in which man was offered universal and unshakable knowledge about how to live and what the principles underlying the world order were. At the same time, the paradox of scientific thinking lies in the fact that, destroying the naive holistic view of the world that is given by religion or religious philosophy, questioning every postulate previously taken on faith, science does not give in return the same holistic, convincing worldview - all specific truths sciences cover only a fairly narrow range of phenomena. Science has taught man to doubt everything and immediately created a worldview deficit around itself, which it is fundamentally unable to fill, because this is a matter of philosophy or religion.
There is no doubt that science represents a huge achievement of human culture. It makes a person’s life from generation to generation easier, more comfortable, more independent, and attracts with the prospect of an abundance of material and spiritual benefits. But deified science is a completely different phenomenon, generating completely opposite results. Objectively, science is only one of the spheres of human culture, which has its own specifics and its own tasks, and one should not try to change this situation. Science in itself cannot be considered the highest value of human civilization; it is only a means in solving various problems of human existence. In a normal harmonious society there should simultaneously be a place for science, and for art, and for philosophy, and for religion, and for all other parts of human culture.
Thus, based on the above ideas about the essence and role of science in culture and society, we can give it a more precise definition. The science - it is part of culture, which is a body of objective knowledge about existence. In terms of content, this concept also includes the process of obtaining this knowledge and various shapes and the mechanisms of their application in the practical life of people.
STRUCTURE OF SCIENCE AND ITS FUNCTIONS
The philosophical concept of objective existence includes nature, society and man. According to these three elements of objective being, science clearly distinguishes three spheres of knowledge about these constituent parts of being. This content aspect of science.
Depending on the sphere of existence, and therefore on the type of reality being studied, three areas of scientific knowledge are distinguished: natural science - knowledge about nature, social science - knowledge about various types and forms of social life, as well as knowledge about man as a thinking being. Naturally, these three spheres are not and should not be considered as three parts of a single whole, which are only side by side, adjacent to each other. The boundary between these spheres is relative.
The entire body of scientific knowledge about nature is formed by natural science. Its structure is a direct reflection of the logic of nature. The total volume and structure of natural science knowledge is large and varied.
This includes knowledge about matter and its structure, about the movement and interaction of substances, about chemical elements and compounds, about living matter and life, about Earth and Space. Fundamental natural science directions also originate from these objects of natural science.
Bodies, their movement, transformations and forms of manifestation at various levels are the object of physical scientific knowledge. Due to their fundamental nature, they form the basis of natural science and determine all other knowledge.
Chemical elements, their properties, transformations and compounds are reflected in chemical knowledge. They have many points of contact with physical knowledge, on the basis of which a number of related disciplines arise - physical chemistry, chemical physics, etc.
Biological knowledge covers a group of knowledge about living things; their subject of study is the cell and everything derived from it. Biological knowledge is based on knowledge about matter and chemical elements. Because of this, sciences such as biophysics, biochemistry, etc. arise at the intersection of sciences.
The Earth as a planet is the subject of geological knowledge. They consider the structure and development of our planet. At the intersection with other groups of knowledge, geochemistry, paleontology, geophysics, etc. arise.
One of the most ancient, but at the same time the most modern areas in science is cosmological knowledge, the subject of which is the Universe as a whole. Cosmology studies the states and changes of space objects.
The second fundamental direction of scientific knowledge is social science. Its subject is social phenomena and systems, structures, states, processes. Social sciences provide knowledge about individual varieties and the entirety of social connections and relationships.
By its nature, scientific knowledge about society is numerous, but it can be grouped into three areas: sociological, the subject of which is society as a whole; economic - reflect labor activity people, property relations, social production, exchange, distribution and relations in society based on them; state-legal knowledge - has as its subject state-legal structures and relations in social systems, they are considered by all sciences about the state and political sciences.
The third fundamental area of scientific knowledge is scientific knowledge about man and his thinking. Man is the object of study of a large number of different sciences, which consider him in various aspects. Of the entire set of sciences, the humanities are focused on the interests of man, who acts for them as the measure of all things. But man himself and his mental abilities are studied by psychology - the science of human consciousness; logic - the science of the forms of correct thinking.
Mathematics is the science of quantitative relations of reality. It is an interdisciplinary science. Its results are used in both natural and social sciences.
Along with the indicated main scientific directions, knowledge of science about itself should be included in a separate group of knowledge. The emergence of this branch of knowledge dates back to the 20s of our century and means that science in its development has risen to the level of understanding its role and significance in people's lives. Science today is considered an independent, rapidly developing scientific discipline.
One of the most important conditions A truly scientific approach to the study of any object is its analysis in various aspects, among which, in addition to the above-mentioned content, one of the main places belongs to structural. In relation to scientific knowledge, this aspect means the division of scientific knowledge into groups depending on their subject, nature, degree of explanation of reality and practical significance.
In this case, we distinguish: factual knowledge - a set of systematized facts of objective reality; theoretical or fundamental knowledge - theories that explain processes occurring in objective reality; technical and applied knowledge, or technology, is knowledge about the practical application of factual or fundamental knowledge, as a result of which a certain technical effect is achieved; practical-applied, or praxeological, knowledge - knowledge about the economic effect that can be obtained if the above-mentioned groups of knowledge are applied.
IN logical aspect scientific knowledge is a mental activity, the highest form of logical knowledge, a product of human creativity. Its starting point is sensory knowledge, passing from sensation to perception and representation. After this, there is a transition to rational knowledge, developing from concept to judgment and inference. This corresponds to the level of empirical and theoretical knowledge.
And finally social aspect scientific knowledge represents it as a social phenomenon, a collective process of research and application of the results of this research. In this aspect, we are interested in scientific institutions, teams, educational institutions, organizations of scientists, etc.
Having determined the structure of scientific knowledge, we thereby have the opportunity to define science. It is understood as a dynamic system of objectively true knowledge about the essential connections of reality, obtained and developed as a result of special social activities and transformed through their application into the direct practical force of society.
Closely related to the structure of scientific knowledge is the problem of the functions of science. There are several that stand out:
1. descriptive - identification of essential properties and relationships of reality;
2. systematizing - classifying what is described into classes and sections;
3. explanatory - a systematic presentation of the essence of the object being studied, the reasons for its emergence and development;
4. production-practical - the possibility of applying the acquired knowledge in production, for the regulation of social life, in social management;
5. prognostic - prediction of new discoveries within the framework of existing theories, as well as recommendations for the future;
6. worldview - introducing acquired knowledge into the existing picture of the world, rationalizing a person’s relationship to reality.
Speaking so far about science and scientific knowledge, we considered them as an already really existing object of study, which we analyzed from a formal point of view.
However, humanity in its history has accumulated knowledge of a very different nature, and scientific knowledge is only one of the types of this knowledge. Therefore, the question arises about the criteria for the scientific nature of knowledge, which accordingly allows us to classify it as scientific or some other.
CRITERIA FOR SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE
One of the main criteria of scientific character is the systematic nature of knowledge. A system, unlike a simple sum of parts, is characterized by internal unity and the impossibility of removing any elements. Scientific knowledge always acts as certain systems: in these systems there are initial principles, fundamental concepts and knowledge derived from these principles and concepts. In addition, the system includes interpreted experimental facts, experiments, mathematical apparatus, practical conclusions and recommendations that are important for this science.
But the principle of consistency alone is not enough to call some knowledge science. After all, outside science there is systematized knowledge - for example, religious knowledge, which also outwardly looks like harmonious, logically based systems.
Science is not just a system or body of knowledge, but also an activity to obtain new knowledge, which requires the existence of people specializing in this, relevant organizations coordinating research, as well as the availability of the necessary materials, technologies, and means of recording information. This means that science appears only when special objective conditions are created for this in society: a more or less clear social demand for objective knowledge, the social possibility of identifying a special group of people whose main task is to respond to this request; the division of labor that began within this group; accumulation of knowledge, skills, cognitive techniques that serve as the basis on which science is formed; the emergence of means of recording information, without which it is impossible to transfer accumulated information to next generations, as well as its prompt change.
An important criterion for scientificity is the presence of a goal of scientific knowledge, which is defined as the comprehension of truth for the sake of truth itself, or theoreticality. If science is aimed only at solving practical problems, it ceases to be science in the full sense of the word. Thus, the scientific knowledge that existed in the East was used only as an auxiliary in religious magical ceremonies and rituals. Therefore, we cannot talk about the presence of science there as an independent cultural phenomenon.
A distinctive feature of scientific knowledge is its rational nature. Today this position seems trivial, but faith in the possibilities of reason did not appear immediately and not everywhere. Eastern civilization never accepted this position, giving priority to intuition and extrasensory perception. This criterion is closely related to the property of intersubjectivity of scientific knowledge, which is understood as universal validity, universally binding knowledge, its invariance, the ability to obtain the same result by different researchers.
The defining features of science are also the presence of an experimental research method and the mathematization of science. These signs appeared in modern times, giving science a modern look, as well as connecting it with practice.
Plan seminar class(2 hours)
1. Science as a cultural phenomenon. The purpose and objectives of science.
2. Scientism as a worldview and its role in the formation of modern civilization.
3. Scientific knowledge and its various aspects.
4. Scientific criteria.
Topics of reports and abstracts
1. V.I. Vernadsky on the relationship between science, philosophy and religion.
2. Science as a social institution.
3. Science and philosophy.
4. Science and religion.
LITERATURE
1. BernalJ. Science in the history of society. M., 1956.
2. Vernadsky V.I. Works on the general history of science. M., 1988.
3. Vernadsky V.I. Philosophical thoughts of a naturalist. M., 1988.
4. Good G.M. Science about science. Kyiv, 1989.
5. Zinchenko V.P. Is science an integral part of culture?//Questions of Philosophy. 1990.No. 1.
6. Ilyin V.V., Kalinkin A.T. The nature of science. M., 1985.
7. Yordanov I. Science as a logical and social system. Kyiv, 1979.
8. Scientific progress: cognitive and sociocultural aspect. M., 1993.
9. Fundamentals of scientific studies. M., 1985.
10. Rachkov P. A. Scientific studies. M., 1974.
11. Philosophy and methodology of science. M., 1996.
12. Filatov V.P. Images of science in Russian culture//Questions of Philosophy. 1990. No. 5.
A.P. Sadokhin
Concepts of modern natural science
Tutorial
Introduction
Modern science unites more than a thousand different scientific disciplines, each of which contains special theories, concepts, methods of knowledge and experimental techniques. Achievements of science lay the foundations of a person’s worldview. In this process, one of the main places belongs to natural scientific knowledge, which is formed by a whole group of natural sciences, creating a holistic and adequate idea of the objective world.
In the same time modern level development of society places increased demands on the level of professional training of specialists, in which a significant place belongs to natural science knowledge. Today, society needs specialists who are focused not only on solving utilitarian problems within the limits of the knowledge acquired during training. Modern requirements for a specialist are based on his ability to constantly improve his qualifications, the desire to keep abreast of the latest advances in the profession, and the ability to creatively adapt them to his work. The education system is faced with the task of training highly qualified specialists with fundamental, comprehensive knowledge about various processes and phenomena of the surrounding world. For this purpose, the curricula of higher educational institutions include such disciplines and lecture courses that should form a student’s broad ideological orientations and attitudes, help him more fully master the scientific picture of the world and his chosen profession. The course “Concepts of modern natural science” is designed to realize these goals.
This discipline does not imply a deep and detailed study of all natural laws and processes, phenomena and facts, methods and experiments. The purpose of the course is to familiarize yourself with the basic principles and current state development of natural sciences, helping to form an idea of the complete picture of the surrounding world, the place of man in it, and to understand the problems of social development.
The key word of the course is the concept of “concept” (from Lat. conception – understanding, explanation), which means a relatively systematic explanation or understanding of some phenomena or events. In relation to this training course, it assumes a popular, meaningful description of natural scientific knowledge that forms the overall picture of the world in the human mind. Various natural scientific ideas about the structure of the world represent the basic knowledge necessary to understand the world in accordance with the level of knowledge of each era. In addition, without natural science knowledge it is difficult to understand not only the development of technology and technology, but also the development of society and culture.
The course “Concepts of modern natural science” covers the main problems, ideas and theories of natural sciences, scientific principles of knowledge, methodology, models and results of modern natural science, which together make up the scientific picture of the world. In this regard, the objectives of the course include the formation of knowledge about interdisciplinary, general scientific approaches and methods, the development of systematic thinking in the course of analyzing the problems of modern natural science, expanding the cognitive horizons of students by going beyond the boundaries of their narrow professional interests.
As a result of studying the discipline, students should gain knowledge that allows them to take into account in the future professional activity fundamental laws of nature and basic research methods, as well as information about the most important historical stages and paths of development of natural science.
The textbook was prepared in accordance with the State educational standard for higher professional education, which is included in the curricula for students of all humanities specialties. It is based on textbooks previously published by the author and courses of lectures given by the author at various universities.
The experience of teaching this discipline to students of various humanitarian specialties shows that one should not present the material of the natural sciences, delving into “technical details” if this is not justified by the general plan and methodological approach to the presentation of the subject. The author saw his main task as making the form of presentation of the material accessible to future specialists for whom natural science is not a professional discipline.
The range of humanitarian specialties in the higher education system is quite wide and diverse, so the author sought to give his work a universal character so that it would be useful for students of various humanitarian specialties - economists, psychologists, philosophers, historians, sociologists, managers, lawyers, etc. This orientation of the educational benefits involves a conscious refusal to master physical and chemical formulas, memorizing numerous rules and laws and concentrating on the most important concepts of modern natural science, which are the foundation of the scientific picture of the world. The textbook is both a scientific and popular publication, providing a quick and accessible introduction to the problems of natural sciences for a wide range of readers.
The author expresses gratitude to the reviewers and fellow teachers for their valuable comments and recommendations made during the creation of the textbook, as well as to all interested readers for possible comments and suggestions.
Chapter 1. Science in the context of culture
1.1. Science as part of culture
Throughout their history, people have developed many ways of understanding and mastering the world around them. Among them, one of the most important places is occupied by science, the main goal of which is to describe, explain and predict the processes of reality that constitute the subject of its study. In the modern understanding, science is considered as:
The highest form of human knowledge;
A social institution consisting of various organizations and institutions engaged in obtaining new knowledge about the world;
System of developing knowledge;
A way of knowing the world;
A system of principles, categories, laws, techniques and methods for obtaining adequate knowledge;
Element of spiritual culture;
System of spiritual activity and production.
All given meanings of the term “science” are legitimate. But this ambiguity also means that science is a complex system designed to provide generalized, holistic knowledge about the world. Moreover, this knowledge cannot be disclosed by any one separate science or set of sciences.
To understand the specifics of science, it should be considered as part of a culture created by man, and compared with other spheres of culture.
A specific feature of human life is the fact that it occurs simultaneously in two interrelated aspects - natural and cultural. Initially, man is a living being, a product of nature, however, in order to exist in it comfortably and safely, he creates an artificial world of culture, a “second nature”, inside nature. Thus, a person exists in nature, interacts with it as a living organism, but at the same time “doubles” the external world, developing knowledge about it, creating images, models, assessments, household items, etc. It is this kind of thing-cognitive activity of a person and constitutes the cultural aspect of human existence.
Culture is embodied in the objective results of activities, ways and methods of human existence, in various norms of behavior and various knowledge about the world around us. The entire set of practical manifestations of culture is divided into two main groups: material and spiritual values. Material values form material culture, and the world of spiritual values, which includes science, art, religion, forms the world of spiritual culture.
Spiritual culture covers the spiritual life of society, its social experience and results, which appear in the form of ideas, scientific theories, artistic images, moral and legal norms, political and religious views and other elements of the human spiritual world.
Science is an integral part of culture, determining many important aspects of society and human life. It, like other spheres of culture, has its own tasks that distinguish them from each other. Thus, the economy is the foundation that ensures all the activities of society; it arises on the basis of a person’s ability to work. Morality regulates relations between people in society, which is very important for a person who cannot live outside society and must limit his own freedom in the name of the survival of the entire team. Religion arises from a person’s need for consolation in situations that cannot be resolved rationally (for example, the death of loved ones, illness, unhappy love, etc.).
n1.doc
A.P. SADOKHINCONCEPTS
MODERN
NATURAL SCIENCE
Second edition, revised and expanded
Russian Federation as textbook
For university students,
students of humanitarian specialties
"Professional textbook" as textbook
for university students studying
in economics and management
and humanitarian and social specialties
UDC 50(075.8)
Reviewers:
Doctor of Philosophy sciences, prof., academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences A.V. Soldiers;
Cand. biol. Sciences, Associate Professor L.B. Fisherman;
Cand. chem. Sciences, Associate Professor N.N. Ivanova
Editor-in-chief of the publishing house
Candidate of Legal Sciences,
Doctor of Economic Sciences N.D. Eriashvili
Sadokhin, Alexander Petrovich.
C14 Concepts of modern natural science: a textbook for university students studying in the humanities and specialties in economics and management / A.P. Sadokhin. - 2nd ed., revised. and additional - M.: UNITY-DANA, 2006. - 447 p.
ISBN 5-238-00974-7
Agency C.I.P. RSL
The textbook was prepared in accordance with the requirements of the State educational standard for higher professional education in the discipline “Concepts of modern natural science,” which is included in the curricula of all humanitarian specialties at universities. The work presents a wide panorama of concepts covering various processes and phenomena in living and inanimate nature, and describes modern scientific methods of understanding the world. The main attention is paid to the consideration of the concepts of modern natural science, which have important ideological and methodological significance.
For undergraduates, graduate students and teachers of humanities faculties and universities, as well as everyone interested in philosophical issues of natural science.
ISBN 5-238-00974-7
© A.P. Sadokhin, 2006
© UNITY-DANA PUBLISHING HOUSE, 2003, 2006 Reproduction of the entire book or any part thereof by any means or in any form, including on the Internet, is prohibited without the written permission of the publisher
The proposed textbook has been prepared in accordance with the State educational standard for higher professional education and is intended for students of humanitarian specialties at universities.
It is common knowledge that modern system education must solve the problem of training highly qualified specialists with versatile and fundamental knowledge about a wide variety of processes and phenomena of the surrounding world. Nowadays, society does not need specialists focused only on solving narrowly utilitarian problems. A highly qualified professional in demand in the labor market must have a broad outlook, the skills to independently acquire new knowledge and critically comprehend it. In addition, he must have an understanding of the basic scientific concepts that explain the spatio-temporal relations of the objective world, the processes of self-organization in complex systems, such as living and inanimate nature, the relationship of man with the natural environment and man’s place in the Universe.
For this purpose, the discipline “Concepts of modern natural science” is included in the curricula of all higher educational institutions, designed to form broad ideological orientations and attitudes in students, to help them master the scientific picture of the world.
The purpose of the course “Concepts of modern natural science” is to familiarize students of humanities majors at universities with an integral component of human culture - natural science. At the same time, the main attention is paid to the consideration of those concepts of modern natural science that have the most important ideological and methodological significance for the understanding and analysis of social phenomena.
The content of the training course “Concepts of modern natural science” is an interdisciplinary complex based on historical-philosophical, cultural and evolutionary-synergetic approaches to modern natural science. The modern trend towards a harmonious synthesis of humanitarian and natural science knowledge is determined by the needs of society for a holistic worldview and emphasizes the relevance of this discipline.
The need to study this course is also due to the fact that over the past two decades, various forms of
The sources of irrational knowledge are mysticism, astrology, occultism, magic, spiritualism, etc. Gradually and consistently they are trying to displace from the public consciousness the scientific picture of the world, based on rational ways of explaining it. In the current conditions, the following are of particular importance: the approval of a scientific-rational attitude to reality, a holistic understanding of living and inanimate nature, an understanding of the content and possibilities modern methods scientific knowledge, as well as the ability to apply them in professional activities.
The experience of teaching this discipline in humanities universities shows that, when presenting the material of the natural sciences, excessive detail should be avoided if possible, unless this is justified by the general design and methodological approach to the presentation of this subject. It is advisable to focus on those most important concepts of modern natural science that form the foundation of the modern scientific picture of the world and are most important in the ideological aspect. Thus, the author saw his main task as making the form of presentation of the material as accessible as possible for those future specialists for whom natural science is not the main professional discipline. However, since the range of humanities specialties is quite wide and diverse, the author sought to give his work a universal character, so that it would thus be equally useful for students of all humanities specialties - future economists, psychologists, historians, sociologists, managers, etc.
Offering his work to a wide audience, the author expresses gratitude to the reviewers and fellow teachers for their valuable comments and recommendations, which provided invaluable assistance in the creation of this textbook. In addition, the author expresses in advance his sincere gratitude to all interested readers for their well-wishing wishes and comments.
Chapter 1
Science as part of culture
1.1. Science among other areas of culture
Throughout the history of their existence, people have developed many ways of understanding and mastering the world around them. Among them, science occupies one of the most important places. To understand its specifics, it is necessary to consider science as part of a culture created by man, and also compare it with other spheres of culture.
A specific feature of human life is the fact that it occurs simultaneously in two interrelated aspects: natural and cultural. Initially, man is a living being, a product of nature, but in order to exist in it comfortably and safely, man creates an artificial world of culture within nature, a “second nature.” Thus, a person exists in nature, interacts with it as a living organism, but at the same time he, as it were, doubles the external world, developing knowledge about it, creating images, models, assessments, household items, etc. It is precisely this material-cognitive human activity that constitutes the cultural aspect of human existence.
Culture is embodied in the objective results of activities, ways and methods of human existence, in various norms of behavior and various knowledge about the world around us. The entire set of practical manifestations of culture is divided into two main groups: material and spiritual values. Material values form material culture, and the world of spiritual values, which includes science, art, religion, forms the world of spiritual culture.
Spiritual culture covers the spiritual life of society, its social experience and results, which appear before us in the form of ideas, concepts, scientific theories, artistic images, moral and legal norms, political and religious views and many other elements of the human spiritual world.
Culture is the most important essential characteristic of man, distinguishing him from the rest of the organic world of our planet. With its help, a person does not adapt to
The environment, such as plants and animals, and changes it, transforms the world, making it convenient for itself. This reveals the most important function of culture - protective, aimed at directly or indirectly making people's lives easier. All spheres of culture are one way or another involved in solving this most important task, reflecting certain personal characteristics of a person, as well as his needs and interests.
In this context, science is an integral part of culture, determining many important aspects of society and human life. Science has its own tasks that distinguish it from other spheres of culture. Thus, the economy is the foundation that ensures all the activities of society; it arises on the basis of a person’s ability to work. Morality regulates relationships between people in society, which is very important for a person who cannot live outside society and must limit his own freedom for the sake of the survival of the entire team, creating moral norms. Religion is born out of a person’s need for consolation in situations that cannot be resolved rationally (for example, the death of loved ones, illness, unhappy love, etc.).
The task of science is to obtain objective knowledge about the world around us, to understand the laws by which it functions and develops. With this knowledge, it is much easier for a person to transform the world. Thus, science is the sphere of culture most closely related to the task of directly transforming the world, increasing its comfort and convenience for humans. It was the rapid growth of science that began in modern times that created modern technical civilization - the world in which we live today.
It is not surprising that many positive aspects sciences formed its high authority, led to the emergence scientism- a worldview based on faith in science as the only saving force designed to solve all human problems. Ideology antiscientism, which considers science to be a harmful and dangerous force leading to the destruction of humanity, could not compete with it until recently, although it referred to the negative consequences of scientific and technological progress, including the creation of weapons of mass destruction and the environmental crisis.
Only towards the end of the 20th century, having comprehended both the positive and negative aspects of science, humanity developed a more balanced position. Recognizing the important role of science in our lives, we should nevertheless not agree with its claims to a dominant place in the life of society. Science in itself cannot be considered the highest value of human civilization; it is only a means in solving some problems of human existence.
Nya. The same applies to other areas of culture. Only by mutually complementing each other can all spheres of culture fulfill their main function - to provide for the needs and make human life easier, being a connecting link between man and nature. If in this relationship any one part is given more importance than others, then this leads to the impoverishment of the culture as a whole and a disruption of its normal functioning.
Thus, the science- this is part of culture, which is a set of objective knowledge about existence, the process of obtaining this knowledge and applying it in practice.
1.2. Natural science and humanities cultures
Culture, being the result of human activity, cannot exist in isolation from the natural world, which is its material basis. It is inextricably linked with nature and exists within it, but, having a natural basis, culture at the same time retains its social content. This kind of duality led to the formation of two types of culture: natural science and humanitarian. It would be more correct to call them two ways of relating to the world, as well as to its knowledge.
At the initial stage of human history, natural science and humanitarian cultures existed as a single whole, since human knowledge was equally aimed at studying nature and at knowing oneself. However, gradually they developed their own principles and approaches, and defined goals: the natural science culture sought to study nature and conquer it, and the humanitarian culture set as its goal the study of man and his world.
The separation of natural science and humanitarian cultures began in antiquity, when astronomy, mathematics, geography, on the one hand, and theater, painting, music, architecture and sculpture appeared on the other. During the Renaissance, art became the most important part of social life, and therefore humanitarian culture developed especially intensively. Modern times, on the contrary, are characterized by exceptionally rapid development of natural science. This was facilitated by the emerging capitalist mode of production and new relations of production. The successes of the natural sciences at that time were so impressive that the idea of their omnipotence arose in society. Necessity
Increasingly deeper knowledge of the surrounding world and the outstanding successes of natural science in this process led to the differentiation of the natural sciences themselves, i.e. to the emergence of physics, chemistry, geology, biology and cosmology.
For the first time, the idea of the difference between natural science and humanities knowledge was put forward at the end of the 19th century. the German philosopher W. Dilthey and the philosophers of the Baden school of neo-Kantianism W. Windelband and G. Rickert. The terms “sciences of nature” and “sciences of spirit” they proposed quickly became generally accepted, and the idea itself was firmly established in philosophy. Finally, in the 60s and 70s. XX century English historian and writer Charles Snow formulated the idea of an alternative between two cultures: natural sciences and humanities. He stated that the spiritual world of the intelligentsia is increasingly split into two camps, in one of them - the artistic intelligentsia, in the other - scientists. In his opinion, we can conclude that there are two cultures that are in constant conflict with each other, and mutual understanding between representatives of these cultures is impossible due to their absolute alienness.
A thorough and in-depth study of the issue of the relationship between natural science and humanitarian cultures allows us to conclude that there really are significant differences between them. There are two extreme points of view here. Proponents of the first of them claim that it is natural science, with its precise methods of research, that is the model that the humanities should imitate. The most radical representatives of this point of view are positivists who consider mathematical physics to be the ideal of science, and the main method of constructing any scientific knowledge to be the deductive method of mathematics. Defenders of the opposite position rightly argue that such a view does not take into account all the complexity and specificity of humanitarian knowledge and is therefore utopian and unproductive.
Focusing on the active, creative essence of culture, it can be argued that the fundamental feature of natural science culture is that it “discovers” the natural world, nature, which is a self-sufficient system functioning in accordance with its own laws. That is why natural scientific culture focuses its attention on the study and research of natural processes and the laws that govern them. She strives to read the endless “book of nature” as accurately as possible, master its powers, and cognize it as an objective reality that exists independently of man.
At the same time, the history of human culture also shows that any spiritual activity of people occurs not only in the form of natural science, but also in the form of philosophy, religion, art, social and human sciences. All these types of activities constitute the content of humanitarian culture. The main subject of humanitarian culture, therefore, is the inner world of a person, his personal qualities, human relationships, etc. In other words, its most important feature is that the main problem for a person is his own existence, the meaning, norms and purpose of this existence.
All of the above gives grounds to assert that there are significant differences between natural science and humanities knowledge. These differences are due not only to different goals, subjects and objects of these areas of cognitive activity, but also to two main ways of the thinking process, which are of a physiological nature. Today it is reliably known that the human brain is functionally asymmetrical: its right hemisphere is associated with the imaginative intuitive type of thinking, and the left hemisphere is associated with logical thinking. The predominance of one or another type of thinking determines a person’s inclination towards a rational or artistic type of perception of the world.
Rational knowledge serves as the basis of natural science culture, since it is focused on the division, comparison, measurement and distribution into categories of knowledge and information about the world around us. It is best suited for formalizing, accumulating and transmitting an ever-increasing amount of knowledge. In the totality of various facts, events and manifestations of the surrounding world, it reveals the general, stable, necessary and natural, and gives them a systematic character through logical comprehension. Due to the listed features, natural scientific knowledge is characterized by the desire for truth, the development of a special language for the most accurate and unambiguous expression of the acquired knowledge.
Intuitive thinking, on the contrary, serves as the basis for humanitarian knowledge, since it has an individual character and therefore cannot be subject to strict classification or formalization. It is based on a person’s internal experiences and does not have strict objective criteria of truth. However, it has enormous cognitive power, since it is associative and metaphorical in nature. Using the method of analogy, it is able to go beyond logical structures and give birth to new phenomena of material and spiritual culture.
Thus, the natural science and humanitarian cultures are not isolated by chance; their differences are great. At the same time, this
The separation does not exclude their original interdependence, which is not in the nature of incompatible opposites, but rather appears as complementarity. The severity and relevance of the problem of interaction between two cultures lies in the fact that they turned out to be too distant from each other. One of them explores nature “in itself,” and the other explores man and society “in itself.” At the same time, each culture considers the interaction of man and nature either only in a cognitive or only in a “conquering” way, while turning to human existence requires deepening the unity not only of the natural science and humanitarian cultures, but also the unity of all human culture in in general. However, the solution to this problem rests on the paradox that the laws of nature are the same for all people everywhere, but their worldviews, norms and ideals of attitude towards oneself, other people and the world around them are different and hostilely incompatible.
Statement of the fact of the existence of certain differences between the natural science and humanitarian cultures does not negate the possibility of unity between them, which can only be achieved through their direct interaction. Today it is obvious that both in the natural sciences and in the humanities, integration processes are intensifying due to direct connections between the natural and human sciences and through common research methods. In this process, the technical equipment of humanities research is enriched. This establishes connections between the humanities and the natural sciences, which are also interested in this. For example, the results of logical and linguistic research are used in the development of information tools for natural science. Joint developments of natural scientists and humanists in the field of ethical and legal problems of science are also becoming increasingly important.
In recent years, under the influence of the achievements of scientific and technological progress and such a new general scientific method of research as the systems approach, the previous confrontation between natural scientists and humanists has weakened significantly. Humanists understood the importance and necessity of using in their knowledge not only technical and information means of natural science and exact sciences, but also effective scientific research methods that originally arose within the framework of natural science. For example, the experimental method of research from the natural sciences penetrates into the humanities (sociology, psychology). In turn, natural scientists are increasingly turning to the experience of humanitarian knowledge. Thus, we can talk about the humanitarization of natural science and the scientization of humanitarian knowledge, which is actively occurring today and blurring the boundaries between two cultures.
1.3. Criteria of scientific knowledge
Throughout its history, humanity has accumulated a huge amount of knowledge about the world that is different in nature. Along with scientific knowledge, there is religious, mythological, everyday knowledge, etc. The existence of different types of knowledge raises the question of criteria to distinguish scientific knowledge from non-scientific knowledge.
We identify four criteria of scientific knowledge: 1) systematic knowledge; 2) the presence of a proven mechanism for obtaining new knowledge; 3) theoretical knowledge; 4) rationality of knowledge.
Systematic knowledge
The first of the scientific criteria is consistency knowledge. A system, in contrast to the sum of certain elements, is characterized by internal unity, the impossibility of removing or adding any elements to its structure without good reason. Scientific knowledge always acts as certain systems: in these systems there are initial principles, fundamental concepts (axioms), as well as knowledge derived from these principles and concepts according to the laws of logic. In addition, the system includes interpreted experimental facts, experiments, mathematical apparatus, practical conclusions and recommendations that are important for this science. A chaotic collection of true statements cannot be considered science in itself.
Availability of a proven mechanism for obtaining new knowledge
The second criterion of science is presence of waste furnism to gain new knowledge. In other words, science is not just a system of knowledge, but also an activity to obtain it, which provides not only a proven methodology for practical and theoretical research, but also the presence of people specializing in this activity, relevant organizations coordinating research, as well as the necessary materials, technologies and means of recording information. This means that science appears only when objective conditions for this are created in society, i.e. There is a fairly high level of development of civilization.
Theoreticality of knowledge
The third criterion of scientific character is theoretical knowledge, defining the goals of scientific knowledge. Theoreticality of knowledge
Involves obtaining truth for the sake of truth itself, and not for the sake of a practical result. If science is aimed only at solving practical problems, it ceases to be science in the full sense of the word. Science is based on fundamental research, pure interest in the world around us, and then, on this basis, applied research is carried out, if the existing level of technological development allows it. Thus, in the Ancient East, scientific knowledge was used only in religious magical rituals and ceremonies or in direct practical activities, therefore in this case we cannot talk about the presence of science as an independent sphere of culture.
Rationality of knowledge. Availability of experimental research method
The fourth criterion of scientific character is rationality of knowledge. The rational style of thinking is based on the recognition of the existence of universal causal relationships accessible to reason, as well as formal proof as the main means of substantiating knowledge. Today this position seems trivial, but knowledge of the world primarily through reason appeared only in Ancient Greece. Eastern civilization never accepted this specifically European path, giving priority to intuition and extrasensory perception.
For science, starting from the New Age, an additional, fifth criterion of scientific character is introduced - this presence of experimentalresearch method, as well as the mathematization of science. This criterion connected modern science with practice and created a modern civilization focused on the conscious transformation of the surrounding world in the interests of man.
How to distinguish real science from pseudoscience
Using the introduced criteria, you can always distinguish scientific knowledge from non-scientific knowledge. This is especially important these days, since in recent times pseudoscience, which has always existed alongside science, has become increasingly popular and is attracting an increasing number of supporters and adherents.
Toward scientific knowledge. Mass consciousness, which does not see the difference between science and pseudoscience, is often sympathetic to pseudoscientists who, unlike real scientists, strive to be in the public eye. Therefore, you should clearly understand what pseudoscience is and know how it differs from genuine science.
The most important difference between science and pseudoscience is containingknowledge: statements of pseudosciences usually do not agree with established facts and do not withstand objective experimental verification. So, scientists have already tried many times to check the accuracy astrological forecasts, comparing people’s occupations and their personality type with horoscopes compiled for them, which took into account the sign of the Zodiac, the location of the planets at the time of birth, etc., but no significant correspondence was found.
The structure of pseudoscientific knowledge is usually not systematic in nature, but differs fragmentation. As a result, it is usually impossible to logically fit them into any detailed picture of the world.
Pseudoscience is also typical uncritical analysis of source data, which allows us to accept myths, legends, third-hand stories as such, neglecting contradictory facts, ignoring those data that contradict the concept being proven. Often it comes to direct forgery, manipulation of facts.
Despite this, pseudoscience enjoys great success. And there are reasons for this. One of them is the fundamental incompleteness of the scientific worldview, which leaves room for guesswork and fabrications. But if previously these voids were mainly filled by religion, today they are occupied by pseudoscience, whose arguments may be incorrect, but are understandable to everyone. Psychologically to an ordinary person Pseudoscientific explanations, which leave room for the miracles that people need, are clearer and more pleasant than dry scientific reasoning, which, moreover, is often impossible to understand without special education. Therefore, the roots of pseudoscience lie in human nature itself.
Pseudoscience is not homogeneous in its content; several categories of pseudoscience can be distinguished.
The first category is relic pseudosciences, among which the well-known astrology and alchemy. Once upon a time they were a source of knowledge about the world, a breeding ground for the emergence of true science. They became pseudosciences after the advent of chemistry and astronomy.
In modern times, occult pseudosciences appeared - spiritualism, mesmerism, parapsychology. What they have in common is the recognition of the existence of an otherworldly (astral) world that does not obey physical laws. It is believed that this is a world higher than us, in which any miracles are possible. Holy
You can communicate with this world through mediums, psychics, telepaths, and various paranormal phenomena arise, which become the subject of study of pseudoscience.
In the 20th century modernist pseudosciences appeared, in which the mystical basis of the old pseudosciences was transformed under the influence of science fiction. Among such sciences, the leading place belongs to ufology, which studies UFOs.
How to distinguish genuine science from counterfeits? For this purpose, scientific methodologists, in addition to the scientific criteria we have already mentioned, formulated several important principles.
The first one is verification principle asserting that if any concept or judgment is reducible to direct experience, i.e. empirically verifiable, then it makes sense. A distinction is made between direct verification, when statements are directly verified, and indirect verification, when logical relationships are established between indirectly verifiable statements. Since the concepts of a developed scientific theory, as a rule, are difficult to reduce to experimental data, indirect verification is used for them, which states that if it is impossible to experimentally confirm some concept or proposition of the theory, then one can limit ourselves to experimental confirmation of their conclusions. So, although the concept of “quark” was introduced in physics back in the 30s. XX century, however, such a particle could not be detected in experiments. At the same time, the quark theory predicted a number of phenomena that allowed experimental verification. During this process, the expected results were obtained. Thus, the existence of quarks was indirectly confirmed.
However, the principle of verification only to a first approximation separates scientific knowledge from non-scientific knowledge. Works more accurately principle of falsification formulated by the greatest philosopher and methodologist of science of the 20th century. K. Popper. In accordance with this principle, only fundamentally refutable (falsifiable) knowledge can be considered scientific. It has long been known that no amount of experimental evidence is sufficient to prove a theory. Thus, we can observe any number of examples that confirm the law of universal gravitation every minute. But just one example is enough (for example, a stone that did not fall to the ground, but flew away from the ground) to recognize this law as false. Therefore, a scientist should direct all his efforts not to search for another experimental proof of the hypothesis or theory he has formulated, but to try to refute his statement. Therefore, the critical desire to refute a scientific theory is the most effective way to confirm its scientific nature and truth. Critical refutation of the conclusions and statements of science is not
It allows it to stagnate and is the most important source of its development, although it makes any scientific knowledge hypothetical, depriving it of completeness and absoluteness.
Only true science is not afraid to make mistakes and admit his ownprevious conclusions are false. This is the strength of science, its difference from pseudoscience, which is devoid of this most important property. Therefore, if any concept, despite all its scientific nature, claims that it cannot be refuted, denies the very possibility of a different interpretation of any facts, then this indicates that we are faced not with science, but with pseudoscience.
1.4. Structure of scientific knowledge
The term “science” usually refers to a special field of human activity, the main goal of which is the development and theoretical systematization of objective knowledge about all aspects and areas of reality. With this understanding of the essence of science, it is a system, the diverse elements of which are interconnected by common ideological and methodological foundations. The elements of the “science” system are various natural, social, humanitarian and technical scientific disciplines (individual sciences). Modern science covers more than 15 thousand disciplines, the number of professional scientists in the world has exceeded 5 million people. Therefore, science today has a very complex structure and organization, which can be viewed in several aspects.
The structure of scientific knowledge from the point of view of orientation towards practical application
Based on their orientation towards practical application, sciences are combined into two large groups: fundamental and applied.
Basic Sciences- this is a system of knowledge about the most profound properties of objective reality, which does not have a pronounced practical orientation.
These sciences create theories that explain the fundamentals of human existence; the fundamental knowledge of these theories determines the features of a person’s idea of the world and himself, i.e. are the basis for the scientific picture of the world. As a rule, fundamental research is carried out not due to external (social) needs, but due to internal (immanent) incentives. Therefore, for the func-
Damental sciences are characterized by axiological (value) neutrality. Discoveries and achievements of fundamental sciences are decisive in the formation of the natural scientific picture of the world and changes in the paradigm of scientific thinking. In the fundamental sciences, basic models of cognition are developed, concepts, principles and laws that form the basis of applied sciences are identified. Fundamental sciences include mathematics, natural sciences (astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, anthropology, etc.), social sciences (history, economics, sociology, philosophy, etc.), humanities (philology, psychology, cultural studies, etc. .).
Applied Science are considered as a knowledge system with a pronounced practical orientation.
Based on the results of fundamental research, they focus on solving specific problems related to people's interests. Applied sciences are ambivalent, i.e. Depending on the area of application, they can have both positive and negative effects on a person, thus they are value-oriented. Applied sciences include technical disciplines, agronomy, medicine, pedagogy, etc.
The structure of scientific knowledge from the point of view of subject unity
Also, science should be considered from a substantive aspect, from the point of view of substantive unity. Since the world around us can be divided into three spheres - nature, society and man, sciences are also divided into three groups: 1) natural science (the science of nature), 2) social science (the science of the types and forms of social life) and 3) humanitarian knowledge that studies man as a thinking being. Each of them, in turn, represents a complex complex of many independent sciences interacting with each other.
Thus, natural science, the subject of which is nature as a whole, includes physics, chemistry, biology, earth sciences, astronomy, cosmology, etc., social science - economic sciences, law, sociology, political sciences. Among the humanities, it is necessary to highlight psychology, logic, cultural studies, linguistics, art history, etc. A special place in our scheme is occupied by mathematics, which, contrary to widespread misconception, is not part of natural science. It is an interdisciplinary science that is used as a natural
Mi, so social and human sciences. Very often, mathematics is called the universal language of science, the cement that holds its building together. The special place of mathematics is determined by the subject of its study. Mathematics is the science of quantitative relations of reality (all other sciences have as their subject some qualitative aspect of reality), it has a more general, abstract character than all other sciences, it does not care what to count.
1.5. Scientific picture of the world
In the process of cognition of the surrounding world, the results of cognition are reflected and consolidated in the human mind in the form of knowledge, abilities, skills, types of behavior and communication. The totality of the results of human cognitive activity forms a certain model, or picture of the world. In the history of mankind, a fairly large number of very diverse pictures of the world were created and existed, each of which was distinguished by its vision of the world and its specific explanation. However, the broadest and most complete picture of the world is provided by the scientific picture of the world, which includes the most important achievements of science that create a certain understanding of the world and man’s place in it. It does not include private knowledge about the various properties of specific phenomena, or about the details of the cognitive process itself. The scientific picture of the world is not the totality of all human knowledge about the objective world; it represents an integral system of ideas about the general properties, spheres, levels and patterns of reality.
At its core scientific picture of the world- this is a special form of systematization of knowledge, qualitative generalization and ideological synthesis of various scientific theories.
Being an integral system of ideas about the general properties and patterns of the objective world, the scientific picture of the world exists as a complex structure, including as components the general scientific picture of the world and the picture of the world of individual sciences (physical, biological, geological, etc.). Pictures of the world of individual sciences, in turn, include corresponding numerous concepts - certain ways of understanding and interpreting any objects, phenomena and processes of the objective world that exist in each individual science.
The basis of the modern scientific picture of the world is fundamental knowledge obtained, first of all, in the field of physics. However, in the last decades of the last century, the opinion was increasingly established that biology occupies a leading position in the modern scientific picture of the world. This is expressed in the increasing influence that biological knowledge has on the content of the scientific picture of the world. The ideas of biology gradually acquire a universal character and become the fundamental principles of other sciences. In particular, in modern science such a universal idea is the idea of development, the penetration of which into cosmology, physics, chemistry, anthropology, sociology, etc. led to a significant change in people's views on the world.
The concept of a scientific picture of the world is one of the fundamental ones in natural science. Throughout its history, it has gone through several stages of development and, accordingly, the formation of scientific pictures of the world as any particular science or branch of science dominates, based on a new theoretical, methodological and axiological system of views accepted as the basis for solving scientific problems. Such a system of scientific views and attitudes, shared by the overwhelming majority of scientists, is called scientific paradigm.
When applied to science, the term “paradigm” in its most general sense means a set of ideas, theories, methods, concepts and models for solving various scientific problems. We can say that the paradigm answers several important questions: “What to study?”, “How to study?”, “By what methods?”. In scientific studies, it is customary to consider paradigms in two aspects: epistemological (cognitive-theoretical) and social. In epistemological terms, a paradigm is a set of fundamental knowledge, values, beliefs and techniques that serve as a model of scientific activity. In social terms, a paradigm determines the integrity and boundaries of the scientific community that shares its (paradigm) basic provisions.
At the paradigm level, the basic norms for distinguishing scientific knowledge from non-scientific knowledge are formed. During the period of dominance of any paradigm in science, there is a relatively calm development of science, but over time it is replaced by the formation of a new paradigm, which is established through a scientific revolution, i.e. transition to a new system of scientific values and worldview. A paradigm shift leads to a change in scientific standards. The philosophical concept of a paradigm is productive in describing the basic theoretical and methodological foundations of the scientific study of the world and is often used in the practice of modern science and the development of new concepts in natural science.
Literature for self-study
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