“Common cause” as a principle of national science in Russia

Abstract

The article raises the problem of the possibility of updating the foundations of scientific knowledge. The authors proceed from the generally accepted thesis about the “crisis of European sciences”. Analyzing some cultural and historical features of the formation of classical science, the authors note its connection with the specifics of Western religiosity, from which science eventually freed itself. Further, referring to the formulation of the problem by E. Husserl, the authors substantiate the position according to which Russian philosophy, criticizing the Western type of rationality, put forward principles of the organization of science that differ from European ones. The originality of the Russian interpretation of science and scholarship is expressed in the synetic unity of the principles of Truth, Goodness and Beauty. The authors pay special attention to the philosophical views of N. F. Fedorov, which, on the one hand, paradoxically combine the scientific and religious ideas of the thinker, and, on the other, most fully reveal the format of the unity of cognitive, moral and aesthetic ideas. The authors consistently reconstruct N. F.’s teaching. Fedorova, showing that the “philosophy of the common cause”, in addition to radical criticism of the methodological principles and targets of the bourgeois system of knowledge, contain conceptual innovations that expand cognitive and heuristic possibilities. The generally recognized principles of rational egocentrism, formal criticism and pragmatic utilitarianism can be reformatted into conciliar unity and transformative pragmatism, respectively. The conclusion of the article is devoted to the actual implementation of the Fedorov principles in the process of the formation of scientific knowledge and its practical application in Russia. The authors emphasize that during the Soviet period of Russian history, the principles of science put forward by N. F. Fedorov began to be embodied in real life. Soviet cosmonautics became the brightest personification of science as a common cause.