The meaning of life and the problem of freedom. Man and nature in social philosophy Philosophy of life connection of man with nature

3. Man as part of nature

From the first steps of their conscious history, people have been thinking about what are the natural sources of man himself and the community of people, what is his connection with nature (more broadly - with the cosmos), what should be his attitude towards nature? All these questions did not receive a clear answer. With the accumulation of knowledge about himself, about the nature around him, about his place in this natural system, a person changed his views on the nature of his relationship with nature. Turning to history makes it possible to trace the course of changes in these views in the widest possible range: from the proclamation of ideas about the inextricable connection and unity of man with nature to the erection of man on a pedestal inaccessible to any other living beings, from which he allegedly can unlimitedly dispose of nature on his own. will and understanding. However, such ideas were relatively quickly debunked by the very natural course of history.

The real relations of man with nature testify to the fact that no matter how much a person strives to rise above nature, to neglect the natural conditions of his life, objectively he submits to these conditions and depends on them. Perhaps, in some cases, the current situation limits his plans, makes him abandon his plans, but, regardless of any momentary difficulties, a person must come to a conscious understanding of the irremovability of this fact.

The nature of the existing natural-human relations is traditionally the subject of attention of philosophy, which clarifies the most general principles of the structure of nature and the organization of man himself, using the possibilities of ontological description and epistemological explanation.

With the accumulation of practical experience, the formation of the rudiments of knowledge, an idea of ​​the relationship between man and nature developed to varying degrees approaching the real one.

The philosophy of the ancient Greeks is making significant progress in understanding the phenomenon of the human world and nature as a whole. Unlike the cosmos (the universe as a whole), ancient philosophers call the world inhabited by man ecumene. At the same time, the unity of the human world was limited to geographical representations; it is still far from historical awareness. Later, in the Hellenistic period, this shortcoming was overcome, and already for the Stoics, the idea of ​​the world is seen as a single historical whole. It is fair to say that it was Hellenism that formulated the idea of ​​ecumenical history.

Roman philosophy and history, beginning with the ancient Greek historian Polybius (207-126 BC), limit a person in his abilities, giving increasing importance to fate, which dominates a person’s life and predetermines it. In general, already Greco-Roman philosophy was characterized by a tendency towards humanism, which was based on the idea of ​​man as a basically rational animal. The understanding of man as a part of nature put forward the requirements for the unhindered satisfaction of his "earthly" needs, which later became the main point of more developed forms of humanistic ideology.

Like many other areas of spiritual and socio-political life, the problem of the relationship between man and nature was strongly influenced by Christianity, which critically revised, firstly, the optimistic view of human nature, and, secondly, the idea of ​​a substantial metaphysical philosophy of eternal entities, underlying historical development.

There is no way even to dwell briefly on the most characteristic relevant examples from the field of medieval philosophy, the philosophy of the Renaissance. We only note that practically not a single thinker who left a noticeable mark on philosophy avoided the question of the relationship between nature and man. Enthusiastic deification of nature is replaced by poetic admiration for man. Then, according to the Italian thinker Vico (1668-1744), poetry, as the human mind develops, is again replaced by prose, since the most refined poetry - the poetry of the barbarians or heroic eras, the poetry of Homer and Dante - ceases to satisfy the practical interests of people.

A special place in the problem of man in his relationship with nature belongs to the figures of the Enlightenment. It suffices to mention the names of such thinkers as Locke, Voltaire, Rousseau, Holbach, Helvetius, Herder, Goethe, Novikov, Radishchev and others in order to appreciate their contribution to the development of this issue, which is enduring in its significance.

In some cases, we are presented with concepts in which the emphasis is more and more placed on the disclosure of the inner nature of the person himself. Thus, in the concept of the French philosopher-enlightener Charles Montesquieu (1689-1755), a person is considered as a part of nature, and the ambiguity of his life is explained by the conditions of the external environment. Any social development, in his opinion, is nothing more than a reaction of a single and unchanging essence - human nature - to various external stimuli. In the history of science, Montesquieu appears as one of the founders of the geographical school in sociology. He did not limit himself to studying the influence of the environment only on the individual, but argued that the geographical environment and, above all, the climate have a decisive influence on the entire way of life of people, including such manifestations as forms of state power and legislation. Such maximalization leads to erroneous ideas about the nature of the relationship between man and civilization, the basis of which is a one-sided exaggeration, as was the case in this case, of geographical factors.

The development of the problem of the relationship between man and nature has reached a new level in German classical philosophy.

One of the ideologists of the German Enlightenment, J. G. Herder (1744–1803), the author of Ideas on the Philosophy of the History of Humanity, who was significantly influenced by Montesquieu, Diderot, and Lessing, and who devoted his life to promoting ideals Enlightenment. The world for him appears as a single continuously developing whole, naturally overcoming the necessary steps. The history of society is closely connected with the history of nature. The positions expressed by him sharply contradict the ideas of J.Zh. Rousseau (1712-1778), according to which the history of mankind is a chain of errors and is in irreconcilable contradiction with nature.

As is known, I. Kant (1724-1804) positively received the publication of the mentioned book by Herder, but the critical arrows directed by the author in his direction could not escape him. Because of this, Kant criticized in response those provisions of Herder that exaggerated the relationship of man with nature, opposing them to social relations and, in particular, to the state structure. Kant believes that only an ever-growing activity and culture, the indicators of which are a state constitution ordered in accordance with legal concepts, can underlie the relationship between man and nature. Real life cannot be replaced by a ghostly picture of happiness, the ideal of which is the blissful islands of Tahiti, where people lived for centuries without establishing contacts with the civilized world. Kant repeatedly refers to this example. Drawing such a panorama, Kant naturally asks himself the question: is there a need for people there at all, can they not be replaced by happy sheep and rams?

Johann Fichte (1762–1814), the most prominent representative of German classical idealism, emphasized in his work The Destiny of Man that “nature is a single whole, all parts of which are interconnected.” Man, in his opinion, is a special manifestation of all the forces of nature in their combination. Such a person goes through life, left to himself and nature, contemplates and recognizes himself in this highest and most perfect creation of it, which keeps him in the inexorable power of strict necessity. This indisputable fact fills Fichte with disgust and horror. At the same time, he cherishes the hope for a time when “nature should gradually enter into such a position that it would be possible to predict with certainty its natural course and that its force would stand in a certain relation to human power, which is destined to dominate the force of nature” Fichte believes that human creations themselves, regardless of the will of their creators, by the mere fact of their existence must, in turn, influence nature and play in it the role of a new active principle.

In the end, however, Fichte comes to a paradoxical and pessimistic conclusion. “But not nature,” he declares, “but freedom itself creates most of the most terrible disorders in human life: the worst enemy of man is man.”

Can we agree with such a tragically delineated ending? Is there any prospect of finding a way out of this seemingly vicious circle?

Today, we are still far from being able to make categorical judgments about ways to create optimal relationships between man and nature. Scientific philosophy, having outlined the methodological directions in resolving this issue, proceeds from the need for a comprehensive knowledge of all factors of natural existence and social development. Her own methods in this regard are limited to her subject matter.

A concrete analysis of natural processes, of the formation of man, must be carried out by all natural and social sciences. Their results are determined by the corresponding capabilities and depend both on the methodological equipment, the experimental and theoretical level of research, the availability of specialists, material support, and on the social order that stimulates the pace of scientific research.

The objective difficulties of scientific knowledge should also be taken into account: not always the result expected in the practical sphere can be quickly obtained in science. That is why we have to limit ourselves to intermediate incomplete data offered by specialists who study the relationship between man and nature. That is why, in all previous times and in our days, the philosophical analysis of these questions has played such an important role.

The beginning of the natural-science rethinking of nature was laid by the French philosopher R. Descartes. His conclusions made a person think again about his role, about his place and purpose in the world, which, according to Descartes, has a strictly predetermined structure. Until now, a bewitching effect on people who are trying to correlate nature as a whole and man as part of it, has engulfed another French thinker - B. Pascal (1623-1662) horror of vast spaces, completely indifferent, in his opinion, to man and his fate . The perception of the cosmos, characteristic of antiquity and the Middle Ages, has changed; man ceased to feel himself an organic part of his hierarchical organization. He found himself, as it were, one on one with nature, which made him look for his inner sources in nature itself. He visibly felt that the rhythm of his life was increasingly at odds with the rhythm of the life of nature.

Philosophers of the 18th century and their predecessors did not know, and if they knew, then they did not fully realize that ideas about the connection between man and nature are due to the historical development of human nature itself. Of course, individual philosophers have expressed correct propositions regarding this principle, which have been confirmed in the course of the development of science and social practice. For example, such a thinker as the English philosopher Francis Bacon (1561-1626) argued that the deepening of knowledge about nature will increase our power over it. But, on the other hand, if we follow the terminology of the subjective idealist J. Berkeley, then we will have to admit that God's providence, and not human thought, makes nature what it is and that in the course of our knowledge we do not create anything new, but only we reproduce the thoughts of God in ourselves.

In these and similar conceptions, the weaknesses and flaws of a philosophy are revealed, whose representatives, based on the constancy and immutability of human nature, have closed the opportunity for themselves to understand its own history, for true understanding presupposes the recognition of the variability, and not the constancy of human nature. Philosophy is still characterized by two extreme concepts of the relationship between man and nature: on the one hand, the idea of ​​the randomness of man in the world and, on the other, the teleological interpretation of man as the goal of the development of nature.

An attempt to overcome both the tendency towards the absolute opposition of man and nature, and the line towards their identification, manifested in the biologization interpretation of the essence of man and the anthropomorphization of nature, was made in Marxist philosophy.

A natural being - a person was formed according to the laws of nature, the diversity of which predetermines the sensual life of a person. Nature exists not only outside of man, but also in man himself: through him, she feels, cognizes herself.

The historically developing unity of man and nature is ultimately expressed in material production. And in this sphere one should look first of all for the answer to the difficulties that society experiences in its relationship with nature. Here it is desirable to avoid two extremes: on the one hand, to place all responsibility on a person who is limited in his ability to regulate relations with nature in an optimal way; and, on the other hand, to make unreasonable claims and reproaches against nature for the impossibility of obtaining from it everything necessary for mankind.

Indeed, attempts to place man at the center of the universe and thereby elevate the anthropological factor to the primacy of research are not new.

But at the same time, it is important to consider the problem of the relationship between man and nature as natural, that is, historical. It is necessary to fully take into account the complex nature of this problem, which, in order to solve it, requires the involvement of many sciences - natural and social. Only a comprehensive, interdisciplinary scientific approach to it will ensure the effectiveness of research in this area. Mankind faces many vital issues: from the need to avoid environmental consequences arising from the imperfection of technology, the destruction of resources, to the current state of the biosphere, the solution of global problems.

Philosophy of nature

The concept of nature. Nature as an object of philosophical knowledge

The problem of comprehension of nature has been before man for a long time. The range of people's interest in nature is extremely wide and varied: from purely consumer to moral and aesthetic. How did people's views change on the essence of nature, on the ways and forms of interaction between man and the natural environment?

Ancient philosophy: the search for the substantial foundations of nature. Naturphilosophy: cosmocentrism, aestheticism, the inclusion of man in the cosmic structure. In general, within the framework of ancient philosophy, the ideal of human life was conceived only in harmony with nature.

Medieval philosophy: nature was created from nothing by God, completely dependent on it and acts only as a distant reflection of divine perfection. Man stands out from nature as the most perfect part.

Renaissance: pantheism. Increasing interest in nature. But here, in contrast to antiquity, there is a desire to know the secrets of nature in order to guide it. Man is the main element of nature.

In modern times, this attitude is strengthened and turns into the consideration of nature as a sphere of active practical activity.

It should be noted that in the history of philosophy there were and developed three main positions in this aspect: ontological, the task of which was to prove the existence of nature as an objective reality; epistemological with the desire to substantiate the unlimited possibilities in the knowledge of nature by man; axiological - understanding and explanation of nature as a value, without which a person is not able to exist and develop as a rational and humane being.

Each of these positions allows us to interpret nature in the broad and narrow sense of the word. In a broad sense, nature is the whole variety of forms of being, an objective reality, matter, the distinguishing feature of which is the existence outside of consciousness and independently of it. Various aspects and fragments of this reality are the object of natural science knowledge.

And in what capacity does nature interest philosophy? Why does philosophy turn its attention to nature at all? The answer to these questions must take into account the specifics of philosophy as a science. Her main problem is a person, therefore she considers nature exclusively from the standpoint of a person, his interests and needs. And in this narrow sense, nature, as an object of philosophical knowledge, is a set of natural conditions for the existence of man and society. They are divided into natural sources of livelihood and natural wealth. Obviously, from the point of view of natural science, such a definition of nature is not entirely correct, since the natural conditions for human existence are not all of nature, but only part of it: the earth's crust, the lower part of the atmosphere, soil, hydrosphere, flora and fauna, that is, all what is commonly referred to as the geographic environment. But it is here that a person interacts with the outside world, and it is this aspect of nature that is the object of philosophical consideration.

Along with the natural geographical habitat of man, the artificial environment is growing (everything that is created by man, the "inorganic body of civilization"). Moreover, in our time, the artificial human habitat in terms of productivity exceeds the capabilities of the natural environment.

Nature as an object of scientific knowledge

Nature as an object of scientific knowledge is all matter as a multilevel system.

The description of individual levels of nature was carried out in classical science within the framework of individual scientific disciplines. But for a long time the question of how to move from one level to another remained open and how can such a transition be described? A new approach to solving this issue has emerged since the middle of the 20th century, when a real opportunity arose to combine ideas about the main levels of organization of matter into a single, holistic picture of the world based on basic principles that have a general scientific status. The desire to build a scientific picture of the world based on the principle of universal evolutionism.

Modern natural science, based on the principle of universal evolutionism, creates an image of nature as a systemic integrity that is in a state of self-development. Based on the ideas of systemic and evolutionism (based on evolutionary theory in biology and systems theory), modern natural science substantiates a single scientific picture of the world, which combines three main areas: inanimate nature, the organic world and social life. The concept of nature as a system capable of self-development is based on the theory of a non-stationary Universe, synergetics and the theory of biological evolution, supplemented by the concepts of the biosphere and noosphere.

Historically, the first concretization of the theory of the non-stationary Universe was the concept of its expansion, which made it possible to present the Universe as the result of cosmic evolution that began 15–20 billion years ago (the Big Bang the expansion of the initially hot and dense Universe, which cooled as it expanded, and the matter condensed into galaxies as it cooled; the latter broke into stars, gathered together, forming large clusters; in the process of birth and death of the first generations of stars, heavy elements were synthesized; after the transformation of stars into red giants, they threw out matter that condensed in dusty structures new stars and a variety of cosmic bodies). Description in terms of the evolution of the inorganic world a holistic picture of the world, revealing the general evolutionary characteristics of various levels of matter organization. In the middle of the twentieth century. developed the concept of an expanding universe. The key element of the concept was the concept of the so-called inflationary phase - the phase of accelerated expansion: after the colossal expansion after the Big Bang, a phase with broken symmetry was finally established, which led to a change in the vacuum state and the birth of a huge number of particles. As a result, the idea of ​​the Universe as consisting of many local mini-universes, in which the properties of elementary particles, the magnitude of the vacuum energy, and the dimension of space-time can be different. An opportunity has opened up to link evolutionary processes in the mega- and microworlds.

The studies of the last decades of the last century are aimed at creating a consistent model of the self-organization of the Universe, in which the processes occurring at different levels of matter organization are described on the basis of a unified approach.

Synergetics (founder - G. Haken) is a modern theory of self-organization of system formations. She considers the world as an interaction of systems that include various subsystems (atoms, molecules, cells, organs, organisms, people, human communities, etc.), a common feature of which is the ability to self-organize. Within the framework of synergetics, it is shown that the vast majority of natural objects are open systems that exchange energy, matter and information with the surrounding world, and unstable, non-equilibrium states acquire a decisive role in the changing world; non-linearity of changes. Self-structuring, self-regulation, self-reproduction are considered in synergetics as fundamental properties of the world.

Already in the first quarter of the twentieth century. the theory of biological evolution was supplemented by the doctrine of the evolution of the biosphere and noosphere. The foundations of this doctrine were developed by V.I. Vernadsky and laid by him in the foundation of biogeochemistry. According to Vernadsky, the biosphere is not just one of the parts of the world, a specific geological body, the structure and functions of which are determined by the special properties of the Earth and space. The biosphere was the result of a long evolution of living matter in close connection with the development of the inorganic world. The pinnacle of this evolution was the birth of man. His cognitive and practical activity, based on the mind, slowly but steadily leads to the formation of the noosphere as an addition, continuation, a new state of the biosphere, in which the reasonable capabilities of a person become comparable with the geological processes in the world, and life as an evolutionary process appears as an integral part of cosmic evolution. .

The relationship between man and nature

Usually, three forms of a person's relationship to the outside world are distinguished. One of them is a practical relationship, where nature acts as the natural conditions of existence, the means of human activity, the material for production. Pragmatic-utilitarian interest prevails here, and nature is seen as a source of consumption. With a cognitive attitude, the main goal is the knowledge of natural processes, and nature itself appears as an object of scientific research. In this regard, cognitive interests are realized, but they are dictated, as a rule, by the practical needs of people and are determined by them. The concrete natural sciences are the means of realizing the cognitive attitude to nature. Finally, the value attitude is based on the assessment of nature from the standpoint of goodness and beauty. At the same time, nature can be considered both as a sphere of perfection, an ideal of harmony and a role model, and as a sphere of the base, unreasonable, imperfect in comparison with culture.

The interaction of various spheres of nature is carried out in the form of an exchange of matter and energy. The following forms of such exchange can be distinguished:

) geological exchange includes changes in relief and landscape, circulation of water and atmospheric flows, transport of minerals;

) biological exchange ensures the synthesis and destruction of mineral substances;

) social exchange that arises with the birth of a person and society and is associated with the cultural-creative activity of people. It is at this stage that the problem of interaction between man and nature arises, the most important aspect of which is the nature of nature management.

There are two main types of nature management. The consumer-migration type of nature management is typical for the early stages of the development of society, when production is absent or exists in primitive rudimentary forms. Satisfaction of vital needs is carried out through the consumption and primitive processing of a certain natural resource until it is completely exhausted. Then migration occurs and the consumption of a new resource in a new location begins. This is a typically extensive way of managing, when a person is content with what nature gives, and his dependence on nature is maximum. philosophy nature knowledge

The stable production type of nature management is characterized not by the simple consumption of a natural product, but by its cultivation, purposeful transformation and artificial renewal in the production process.

With the development of the means of production, the nature of human impact on nature also changes. At the first, archaic, stage, the predominant form of life activity is the adaptation of a person to the external environment. This period covers the time span from the emergence of man to the Neolithic. This period is characterized by such activities as hunting, fishing, gathering, that is, the appropriation and consumption of a finished natural product. The greatest achievements of this period are the mastery of fire, the selection of some of the most valuable plant and animal species for humans. Nature here is spiritualized and humanized, and the person himself does not single out and does not separate himself from nature.

The pre-industrial or agrarian period lasted from the Neolithic to the end of the Middle Ages. It started with Neolithic (agricultural) revolution , which gave rise to and separated from each other animal husbandry and agriculture - the first forms of proper economic activity with a pronounced production character. Crafts, trade begin to develop, cities appear. This period is characterized by: an extensive character and a relatively slow development of the main types and forms of activity, the use of the muscular strength of animals and humans, water and wind as energy sources. The methods of activity and its results did not have a significant impact on nature, did not contradict the principles of its existence and did not violate the unity and integrity of the natural environment.

The industrial (industrial) period began at the end of the 16th century. and continued until the middle of the twentieth century. The leading sphere of social production is industry, machine production. The impact of man on nature here acquires a technical nature and dimensions that are destructive to the environment. This stage is characterized by:

the intensification of economic activity, the inclusion in the economic turnover of an increasing amount of natural resources;

urbanization of society;

development of steam energy, electricity and nuclear fusion;

the emergence of new means of communication and transport;

man's exit into space;

development of informatics and computer technology. The interaction of man and nature at this stage acquires the character of confrontation and domination, which has become the main reason for the emergence and aggravation of the environmental problem.

Modern, technological (post-industrial) stage: Deployment of the modern scientific and technological revolution, transformation of scientific and technical activities into the leading sphere of social production which gives rise to a number of problems of a global nature. The main thing is the problem of managing the biosphere, the solution of which is possible only on the basis of scientific management of all social processes. A characteristic feature is the increase in the degree of complexity of the problems that arise in the interaction of nature and man. Despite measures to protect and improve nature (mainly in developed countries), the general state of the environment continues to deteriorate. The question of further ways of development of nature and its interaction with society remains open.

Modern ecological crisis and its understanding in philosophy

Ecological crisis: To date, man-made techno-mass has become significantly superior to biomass. The release of various chemical compounds into the waters of the land and ocean, into the atmosphere and soil, which are formed as a result of human production activities, is ten times higher than the natural intake of substances during the weathering of rocks and volcanic eruptions. The problem of exhaustibility of natural resources. Smelting of metals, production of synthetic materials, use of mineral products and pesticides. Increased entry into the environment of iron, as well as lead and cadmium - elements with high toxic properties. Forests, etc.

Pessimism and optimism

The theory of the noosphere inspired the concept of co-evolution, which is currently gaining more and more popularity in theoretical models of nature and in the practice of interaction with it. The concept of co-evolution was first presented in 1968 by N.V. Timofeev-Resovsky. The idea of ​​co-evolution means the convergence of two interrelated evolving systems, when changes in one of which inspire changes in the other and at the same time do not lead to undesirable, let alone unacceptable consequences for the first system. The concept of co-evolution is based on the principles according to which mankind, changing the biosphere in order to adapt it to its needs, must change itself, taking into account the objective requirements of nature. Coevolution assumes a low rate of change in the parameters of the biosphere under the influence of anthropogenic factors, which makes human adaptation to changing external conditions real. In turn, a change in the external conditions of human existence due to anthropogenic influences should also be of an adaptive nature of a purposeful change in the parameters of the biosphere. This concept rejects the dominance of man over nature, requires consistency in relations between them and the need for dialogue with it, emphasizes the responsibility of man for everything that happens in the world around him. The development of ideas of co-evolution requires a clear formulation of a system of ecological imperatives that can reduce the danger of the threat of destruction of entire landscapes of nature, its various living organisms, man himself and his life on Earth. In this regard, they speak of the development of the ethosphere as a new stage of the noosphere (the principle of reverence for life). The ethosphere is an area of ​​being based on the principles of a moral relationship to nature, to all life on the planet.

Introduction………………………………………………………………..…3

1. Nature as a manifestation of being…………………………………..6

2. The problem of the relationship between man and nature in philosophy………...10

3. Historical forms of man's relationship to nature.…………22

Conclusion…………………………………………………………….28

List of sources used………………..………………31

INTRODUCTION

Nature in philosophy is understood as everything that exists, the whole world, subject to study by the methods of natural science. Society is a special part of nature that stands out as a form and product of human activity. The relationship of society with nature is understood as the relationship between the system of human community and the habitat of human civilization. In the broad sense of the word, nature is understood as everything that exists, in the narrow sense it is considered as that which gave rise to and surrounds a person, serves as an object of knowledge for him. Nature is an object of natural science, the scope of which is determined by the technological capabilities of mankind for the knowledge of the laws of the world and its change in accordance with human needs. Human society is part of nature. And it doesn't need much proof. After all, natural chemical, biological and other processes take place in the body of each person. The human body acts as a natural basis for its social activities in the field of production, politics, science, culture, etc.

The role of nature in the life of society has always been significant, because it acts as a natural basis for its existence and development. People satisfy many of their needs at the expense of nature, primarily the external natural environment. There is a so-called exchange of substances between man and nature - a necessary condition for the existence of man and society. The development of any society, of all mankind, is included in the process of development of nature, in constant interaction with it, and, ultimately, in the existence of the Universe.

In philosophical terms, nature, first of all, correlates with society, since it is a natural condition for the existence of people. Society appears as a separate part of nature, a condition and a product of human activity. The relationship between nature and society is an eternal and always relevant problem of philosophy and all humanitarian knowledge. The most acute problem of our time is the ratio of humanity and the living and non-living spheres of our planet. Society and nature are in organic connection and unity. This is manifested, firstly, in the fact that society arose as a product of nature, as a result of its long evolution. Secondly, society cannot exist separately and independently of nature. Man lives by nature, she is part of him. With her, a person, in order not to die, must remain in the process of constant communication. Thirdly, the unity of nature and society lies in their materiality. Materiality finds its expression in the general connection of processes and objects. Nature and society exist objectively, outside the consciousness of man and independently of him. Fourthly, the unity between society and nature is confirmed by the fact that in society, as in nature, there are uniform, general laws of development. one

With the advent of human society, nature began to experience anthropological influence (the influence of human activity). In the 20th century, the impact of man on nature has increased dramatically. Already at the end of the 19th century, the first signs of deterioration in the quality of the biosphere appeared due to the development of technogenic civilization. This was the beginning of the era of the conquest of nature. Nature began to be considered by man not as an independent reality, but as a source of raw materials in production activities. As a result of the scientific and technological revolution that took place in the 20th century, anthropogenic influence approached a catastrophic threshold. The main problem of anthropological influence is the discrepancy between the needs of mankind and its influence on nature and the possibilities of nature itself. 2

The organic connection between man and nature makes it necessary to fully take into account natural factors in the development of society. That is why nature has always been the object of attention of philosophers and philosophical reflection. Eternal philosophical questions are to clarify the interaction of man and his natural environment, the relationship of man and society to the cosmos - the universe.

These questions worried the philosophers of antiquity and modern times, they also worry modern philosophers. Philosophy poses and in its own way solves such questions as the interaction of natural (material) and spiritual principles in the development of man and society, the relationship between nature and human culture. Important philosophical questions are how the nature of the interaction between society and nature changes at different stages of the historical development of man and what is the nature of their interaction in the modern era.

The main objectives of this essay: a) to reveal the problem of the relationship between man and nature in philosophy; b) consider the historical forms of man's relationship to nature.

1. Nature as a manifestation of being.

Today, the word "nature" is used in many ways, it can be given different meanings. In the explanatory dictionary of Vl. Dahl explains nature as a living being, everything material, the Universe, the whole universe, everything visible, subject to five senses; but more common: our world, the earth, everything created on it. Mostly stable uses of this concept were determined. So, one of them is connected with the attitude towards nature as a habitat, the other implies the transformation of nature into an object of scientific knowledge and practical human activity. The word "nature" is used in a broad and narrow sense. The broadly understood nature is being, the Universe, all the variety of moving matter, its diverse states and properties. In this case, nature also includes society. However, another point of view has also developed, according to which nature is everything that, as it were, opposes society, without which society, that is, people, together with the product created by their hands, cannot exist.

Nature as a material object is a developing entity with a complex structure. The basis of nature is made up of elementary particles and fields that form outer space, the Universe. Atoms are formed from elementary particles, from which chemical elements are composed. The Russian chemist D. I. Mendeleev (1834 - 1907) discovered the patterns of the occurrence of chemical elements, he is responsible for the discovery of the periodic law of chemical elements. It reflects the spasmodic nature of changes in chemistry depending on changes in mass or atomic weight. Mendeleev's law points to the unity of opposite properties in each element, determines its place in the universal unity.

Outer space is inhabited by clumps of matter gigantic in mass and energy - stars and planets that form the Galaxy. In turn, a set of galaxies moving in the vast expanses of the Universe form a Metagalaxy. Nature within the boundaries of the Metagalaxy is distinguished by its peculiar structure. An essential feature of the structure of nature is its state - mobile and changeable, changing at every moment of time and never returning to the previous image of balance. The outstanding Russian scientist V. I. Vernadsky defined such a structure of nature by the concept of organization. The evolution of the planets leads to the emergence of the organic world and the appearance of living matter.

Such a view of nature became possible as a result of a long study of it by man. One of the first mentions of nature was preserved and brought to us by the monuments of ancient culture, among which mythology occupies an important place. So, in the mythopoetic worldview, the central role was assigned to cosmogonic myths and ideas, since they described the space-time parameters of the Universe, one might say, the cosmic conditions of human existence. There is no need to be categorical in assessing the creators of these ideas for their naivety and primitiveness, which are striking to modern man. They were the fruit of their time and embodied the still very weak capabilities of our ancestors in the knowledge of the universe and human existence.

According to mythological views, as a rule, there was an unambiguous connection between nature (macrocosm) and man (microcosm). Such a connection implied that man was created from the elements of the universe and, conversely, the universe comes from the body of the first man. Therefore, being the likeness of the Universe, man is only one of the elements of the cosmological scheme. Moreover, cosmological principles were transferred by analogy to the social sphere (mesocosm). The anthropocentric view of the cosmos sees in it the receptacle of human life.

These principles formed the basis of various mythological variants of the creation of nature, in particular, the Earth. In accordance with them, relations between man and nature were carried out through the gods, who were free to fulfill or not fulfill various, including the most secret and intimate, requests of man. For example, the most valuable information about the mythological relationship between man and nature is contained in the Psalter by Mikael Agricola, the head of the Finnish Reformation. From this work it is known that the Finns worshiped Tepio, the deity of the forest, who sent prey to hunters; Ahti - the god of the waters, who gave the fish; Lekio - the god of herbs, tree roots, etc. Both natural conditions and the rules of social life depended on the will of the gods. Ilmarinen determined the weather at sea, a successful voyage; Turisas helped win the battle; Kratoy took care of a person's property; Tontu "provided" for housekeeping; Einemoinen created the songs. The list of such examples could be continued. Each nation created its own gods, endowing them with properties that best reflect the specifics of their living conditions, the presence of urgent needs.

Thus, in ancient mythology, although the relationship between man and nature was discussed, this relationship acquired a one-sided, dependent character: a person felt and recognized his inseparable unity with nature, but could not go beyond the realization that his life was entirely at his disposal. gods. Hence the respectful attitude towards nature, reaching, as a rule, blind worship of the gods personifying it, enshrined in rituals and ceremonies that have existed for many centuries. Even today we find their influence without much difficulty, their traces in modern culture reflect the relationship between nature and society, realized at the very initial stage of history.

Mythology, obviously, will have its influence on the development of culture for a long time to come; art to this day draws inspiration and images from it for a kind of reconstruction of the past.

Subsequently, the view of nature acquired a natural-philosophical character. Naturphilosophy is a speculative interpretation of nature (considered in its entirety), based on the concepts developed by natural science. Since antiquity, the period of the greatest influence of natural philosophy, its role has changed historically. Having lost its progressive positions, which were determined by the objective logic of the development of science, natural philosophy gradually turned into a factor that restrains the knowledge of contradictory objects of nature and social relations.

The work of ancient philosophers contains many brilliant guesses about the structure of the universe. By nature, they meant a reality that does not depend either on the will of people or on their social aspirations. For them, nature acted as a fusis, which, in fact, meant this word in Greek. Nature is the world process of generation. The very word nature is translated as to bring into being, to nurture, to give birth, to create, to grow... Aristotle saw in fusis the primary matter underlying each of the bodies that have in themselves the beginning of movement and change. The ancients were busy searching for the fundamentals. So, for example, Thales believed that the stars are composed of the same substance as the Earth. Anaximander argued that the worlds are created and destroyed. Anaxagoras was one of the first adherents of the heliocentric system. For the ancient Greeks, water, fire, air personified not only the beginnings of life, but had a divine status.

At first, the formation of views on nature is determined by the perception of it as an integral being. The most revealing in this regard are the views of Heraclitus, for him nature is true being, hidden from view. The knowledge of nature presupposed the removal of the veil of mystery. "Nature loves to hide." Hence the tendency to anthropomorphize natural forces. A trend that has continued to this day. Hence the expressions: "mother - nature", "soul of nature", "fatal forces of nature" ... With particular expressiveness, the unity and inseparability of man with nature was imprinted in world culture and, above all, in poetry. So, already in the 19th century, the Russian poet-philosopher F.I. Tyutchev (1803–1873) wrote:

Not what you think, nature:

Not a cast, not a soulless face -

It has a soul, it has freedom,

It has love, it has a language...

The Christian worldview, based on the teachings of Ptolemy, considered the Earth to be the center of the universe. In the XV-XVIII centuries. ideas about nature are formed within the framework of pantheism - God dissolves in nature. The collapse of the Ptolemaic system is associated with the name of the Polish astronomer N. Copernicus (1473-1543), in accordance with whose views the Earth was given the place of one of the ordinary planets revolving around the Sun. Thus, for the first time, humanity was shown its true place in the universe.

The invention of the telescope allowed the Italian scientist G. Galileo (1564-1642) to establish that the planets are celestial bodies, in many respects similar to the Earth.

A concept that characterizes a person in his highest, final state and ultimate goal. Philosophers of antiquity (Lao Tzu, Confucius, Socrates, Democritus, Plato, Aristotle) ​​distinguish the main essential qualities in human nature - intelligence and morality, and the ultimate goal - virtue and happiness.

In medieval philosophy, these qualities and goals are interpreted as given. God creates man in his own image and likeness, but the divine nature of man can be realized if man follows the example of life, death and posthumous resurrection of Christ. The ultimate goal of earthly life is to gain eternal life in heaven.

Great Definition

Incomplete definition ↓

HUMAN NATURE

a concept that expresses the natural generation of a person, his kinship, closeness with everything that exists, and above all, with “life in general”, as well as the whole variety of human manifestations that distinguish a person from all other forms of being and living. P. h. was often identified with the human essence, which was reduced to rationality, consciousness, morality, language, symbolism, objective activity, the will to power, unconsciously libidinal foundations, play, creativity, freedom, attitude towards death, religiosity ... The mutual exclusivity of these signs does not allow one to find the unambiguous "essence" of a person without losing the living diversity, to establish integrity, unity, without turning a person into an object external to himself, into a kind of dissected exhibit, a one-dimensional being. The "essence" of man cannot be torn out of his "existence." Existence, one's own life, vital activity, living-experience - the substance of a person, his natural foundation. Vital activity goes into "life in general", into vital, bodily "zoo"-structures, that is, it turns out to be a product and continuation of the universe, nature; but it also embraces the whole variety of actually human manifestations, accomplishments, incarnations, the whole sphere where a person “just lives”, where he “leads his life” (X. Plesner); and, finally, it again enters "being-in-general", highlighting it, rushes towards the universe. Vital activity, existence, existence (and at the same time "existence", that is, a gap, a breakthrough into being, a revelation) is precisely what is called P. h.

P. h. includes the following aspects: the origin of man; man's place in the series of life; proper human existence.

The origin of man is explained either in a religious way (man was created by God on a special day from the dust of the earth in his own image and likeness), or in a scientific-evolutionary way (man naturally arises in the process of evolution of living organisms, in particular anthropoids, in a simplified way: "man descended from a monkey" ). In order to understand the legitimacy of natural anthropogenesis, it is necessary to compare man and animals, understanding the place of man in the series of life. Man has something in common with both plants and animals. Only in morphological terms, there are 1560 features by which people can be compared with higher anthropoids. This reveals, as noted by A. Servera Espinoza, that we have 396 features in common with the chimpanzee, 305 with the gorilla, 272 with the orangutan. However, at least 312 properties characterize exclusively a person. The famous hominid triad - "upright walking - hand - brain" distinguishes man among the highest anthropomorphs. It was this triad that was the key to the reconstruction of the origin of man from the animal world.

The commonality of physiological manifestations (food, blood groups, life expectancy, embryonic period are approximately the same), as well as the similarity of mental organization (sensory-emotional sphere, memory, imitation, curiosity...) does not make us the same as animals. "A person is always something more or something less than an animal, but never an animal" (Server Espinoza A. Who is a person? Philosophical anthropology // This is a person. Anthology. M .: Vyssh. shk., 1995, p. 82) .

Indeed, biologically, people are "less than an animal." Man is a being "insufficient", "biologically unequipped", characterized by "non-specialization of organs", the absence of "instinctive filters" that protect against dangers, from the pressure of the external environment. The animal always lives in one or another environment - "cutting from nature" - as at home, equipped with the original "knowledge-instinct": this is the enemy, this is food, this is danger, this does not matter for your life, and operates accordingly. A person, on the other hand, does not have an original specific "measure of behavior", does not have his own environment, he is homeless everywhere. A. Portham called man "a normalized baby monkey." It is the biological lack of equipment that "pushes" a person out of the sphere of life, into the World. Man is the "disease of life" (F. Nietzsche), the "deserter of life", its "ascetic", the only being capable of saying "no" to life (M. Scheler).

Comparison with animals shows that “on the zoological scale, man stands next to animals, more precisely, to the higher primates, but this “side by side” does not mean homogeneity or sameness, but rather a close connection between entities that are different in essence. The place occupied by man is not next, but a special place" (Server Espinoza A. This is a man, pp. 86 - 87).

Man is "more than an animal", for he is determined by the "principle of the spirit", opposite to life, spirit and life intersected in man. The spirit "ideas life", and life "gives life to the spirit" (M. Scheler). As a result, a special place appears - the world of culture - a valuable, object-symbolic reality, which is created by man and, in turn, creates him. Culture becomes the measure of the human in man. Culture, on the one hand, limits a person, closes him in on himself, makes him a "symbolic being" (E Cassirer). A person can no longer relate directly to the world, he is mediated by culture (primarily by language, patterns of thought and action, a system of norms-values). A person objects the world, comprehends, defines and creates everything in accordance with himself, his needs. A person turns into a subject - a carrier of activity, "bends the world under him" (O. M. Freidenberg). Nature, the world turn into an object that exists independently of man, but becomes a means of satisfying his needs. The "world" turns out to be proportionate to man. As a cultural-historical, ethnic, socially determined place, it puts limits on a person, makes it difficult to enter a different cultural environment, into nature, into "being-in general".

On the other hand, thanks to the "cultural factor" in man (A. Gehlen), the individual is able to rise to the level of achievements of the human race, to appropriate his generic essence (Hegel, Feuerbach, Marx, etc.). Moreover, man is fundamentally a world-open being. He takes an "eccentric position" (X. Plesner), that is, he transfers his center outside himself and thereby constantly pushes his limits, deploys his World to the Universe, the Absolute, through his individual self-existence "highlights" "being-in general" ( M. Heidegger), goes into the incomprehensible (S. L. Frank), into the sphere of the transcendent. It turns out that man is the only being capable of standing "above himself" and "above the world" (M. Scheler), that is, take the position of God, become "the key to the universe" (P. Teilhard de Chardin).

P. h. as a proper human being is revealed from human existence, from life activity. An elementary phenomenon of human life is a prelogical (or metalogical), pre-theoretical premonition of life, a manifestation of one's existence, which is difficult to express verbally, but can be conditionally fixed by the formula "I exist" ("I am", "I live", "I am alive") .

The phenomenon of "I exist" is an "irreflexive starting point" of a person's life, in which "I" and "existence" are not yet divided, everything is pulled together into a unity of self-existence, into a folded potentiality of possible unfoldings of an individual's life.

Traditionally, in this natural basis, three elements of human identity are distinguished: physicality, soulfulness, spirituality.

The body - first of all "flesh" - is a dense, obvious basis of our existence. As "flesh", "substantiality" people are one with the world, with its flesh and substance. The human body is a dedicated, formed flesh, which not only goes out into the outside world, but also turns out to be the bearer of its own inner world and its own Self. "- "whole", i.e. rootedness of human integrity, self-identity.

The human body is not anonymous, but "one's own body", singled out among "other bodies". The body turns out to be not just a vital, but a vital-semantic basis of self-existence and comprehension of the world - "the body that understands." The body is not only an external expression of a person's self-existence, but also an "inner landscape" in which "I exist." In this case, self-existence in the form of "spiritual life", "inner mental world" or "soul" of a person comes to the fore. This is a special inner reality, inaccessible to external observation, a hidden inner world, fundamentally inexpressible to the end in an external way. Although goals, motives, plans, projects, aspirations are rooted here, without which there are no actions, behavior, actions. The spiritual world is fundamentally unique, unrepeatable and incommunicable to another, and therefore "lonely", non-public. This world, as it were, does not exist, it does not have any special place in the body, it is a "country that does not exist." It can be a land of imagination, dreams, fantasies, illusions. But this reality "does not exist" for others, for the individual it is the true center of being, the true "being-in-all".

The spiritual world is not fenced off from the outside world. B-impressions, experiences, perceptions indicate a connection with the outside world, that the soul listens to the outside world; consciousness is fundamentally intentional, that is, it is directed toward something else; it is always "consciousness about" something else. The soul is multifaceted. The psychic sphere includes the unconscious, and consciousness, and sensory-emotional, and rational; and images and will, reflected and reflection, consciousness of the other and self-consciousness. Various manifestations of the spiritual world can come into conflict, confront, giving rise to mental illness, anxiety, but also forcing a person to change, look for himself and make himself.

The soul is relatively autonomous, but not separated from the body. If the body is the “shell” of the soul, then it also turns out to be its “appearance”, embodies the soul, expresses it and takes shape itself. A person's own inimitable and unique face appears, he becomes a personality. The personality is called the center of the spirit in the individual (M. Scheler and others), "the embodied face" (P. Florensky and others). This is already a manifestation of spiritual self-existence, the spiritual hypostasis of human nature.

If the body is outwardly representable, and the soul is the inner world, then "spirit" implies the connection of one's own and the other, "meeting", "revelation", news of the other (ultimately - about the transcendental, universal, about the universe, the absolute, "being in general" ). Being perceived by the individual, the "message" finds a response, becomes "compliance" and, finally, "conscience" - a proper human, individual state. On the basis of spirituality, there is an idea of ​​the unity of all things, as well as the unity of the human world. Co-existence with another and with other people takes shape in a "joint world" (X. Plesner).

The concept of "P. h." also includes gender. "Man" in many languages ​​is the same as "man". This fact is often cited as an argument to justify such a form of sexism (the oppression of one sex by the other) as phallocracy, that is, "the power of the masculine principle." Phallocracy involves the dominance of the male value system and the construction of culture and society on the basis of these values.

Men's values ​​traditionally include: reasonableness in the form of rationality; dualistic thinking; the prevalence of the active, volitional beginning; striving for a hierarchy of power; "narcissism" (a state "in which, by loving and protecting himself, he hopes to preserve himself").

Women's values ​​are: the prevalence of the sensual-emotional sphere of the soul, the unconscious-impulsive; feeling of integrity with the world and with other people; sacred sense of one's physicality. Women's values ​​act as "shadow" qualities of a man.

The woman was identified primarily with the body, with the carnal beginning, and the man - with the spirit, with spirituality. The apologetics of phallocracy reaches its most vivid expression in O. Weininger, who stated: “A woman has no soul, she is not a microcosm, she is not created in the likeness of God. She is an extramoral being. She is a thing of a man and a thing of a child. A woman is not a person. If a woman asserts herself personally, shows high intellect and spirituality, then all these qualities are explained by the fact that she is only apparently a woman, and the “male principle” prevails in her.

At the present time, when the subject-object separation has exhausted itself, has led mankind to a dead end, the feeling of belonging, empathy, addressing to another, unity with nature, i.e., "feminine" values, is much more valued. Another extreme appears - the desire to reduce a person to the originality of "prawoman" or an attempt to "erase sex", considering it as a cultural-historical phenomenon, and not a natural-biological one (postmodernism). The symbols become "neuter" (R. Bart), homosexual (M. Jeannot), hermaphrodite, bisexual. It is unlikely that overcoming sexism should be identified with asexuality. The human race is a unity of diversity, it cannot exist and reproduce without the combination of "male" and "female".

"Body - soul - spirit" in their unity constitute an abstract P. h., common to all people at all times. In fact, human nature is transformed and modified in the cultural, historical and social existence of people, depends on living conditions, on orientation, value-semantic attitudes, on ways of co-existence with other people and on the self-identification of individuals.

Great Definition

Incomplete definition ↓

Human society is part of nature. In the body of any person, natural chemical, biological and other processes take place.

Natural processes usually occurring in a society have a social form, and natural, primarily biological, patterns act as biosocial ones, which express the mutual influences of biological and social principles in the development of society.

The role of nature in the life of society has always been great, because it acts as a natural basis for its existence and development. Man satisfies almost all his needs at the expense of nature, primarily the external natural environment.

The development of every society, of all mankind, is included in the process of the development of nature, in constant interaction with it, and, ultimately, in the existence of the Universe.

Nature has been the object of attention of philosophers and philosophical reflection throughout the history of philosophy.

• the interaction of natural (material) and spiritual principles in the development of man and society;
• relation between nature and human culture;
• how the nature of the interaction between society and nature changes at different stages of the historical development of man;
• what is the nature of the interaction between society and nature in the modern era.

An organic connection with nature is a fundamental regularity in the development of society. It can be seen not only in the area of ​​satisfying people's needs, but also in the functioning of social production, and ultimately in the development of all material and spiritual culture. And it is clear that society cannot exist and develop without interaction with nature.

The presence of not only natural, but also social properties in a person, primarily the ability to think and carry out conscious labor and other activities, qualitatively distinguishes him from other natural beings and makes him and society as a whole be perceived as a specific part of nature.

Nature is a natural environment and a prerequisite for the existence and development of society. The natural environment includes the terrestrial landscape: mountains; plains; fields; forests; rivers; lakes; seas; oceans, etc.

The earthly landscape constitutes the so-called geographical environment of human life. However, the natural environment is not limited to this, it also includes:

• bowels of the earth;
• atmosphere;
• space.

Of course, nature, not excluding the geographical environment, has one or another influence on the economic, political and spiritual development of society. But a stronger influence on them is exerted by the practical activity of a person, which is guided by his needs, interests, goals and ideals.

Over the past century, the degree of society's impact on nature has greatly increased due to the rapid development of science and technology. people in the broadest sense becomes the environment for the active influence of the mind - the noosphere. As a result, the biosphere as a sphere of living nature, which includes human society, under its influence turns into a noosphere, the limits of which expand many times and are determined each time by the limits of penetration into the nature of the human mind.

Nature as a subject of philosophical analysis

Nature and life are studied by many sciences.

Numerous data indicate that the relationship between man and nature today is characterized by extreme trouble. Modern man lives in a deep ecological crisis.

Understanding the nature of this crisis and ways out of it gained particular intensity in the 20th century.

One of the prominent domestic scientists who paid attention to the problem of the relationship between man and nature was V.I. Vernadsky, who proposed the concept of modifying the connection between man and nature. According to this concept, the biosphere must be transformed into the noosphere, i.e. into the sphere of humane, reasonable activity. From now on, in his opinion, people can pin their hopes for their well-being only on such an organization of life support, which is based on the humane use of the achievements of science and technology. An important role in this should be played by the inclusion of space in the sphere of human rational activity.

In the future, the problem of the relationship between society and nature was reflected in the works of foreign (J. Doret, A. Pochchei, G. Odum, E. Odum, V. Hesle, etc.) and domestic scientists (E. V. Girusov, N.N. Moiseev, A.N. Kochergin, A.D. Ureul and others).

A way out of the ecological crisis is seen by many scientists through the careful use of natural resources, as well as through the introduction of scientific achievements into the practice of organizing social life.