Home – Home – Jornals – Philosophy of Sciences 2022 number 3

The article analyzes the category of tendency and its relation with the category of development. The reasons for the increase of scientists’ attention to the problems of identifying and describing tendencies are explained. The most popular types of tendencies in modern science are considered. When searching for an adequate definition of the category of tendency, the experience of modern natural and social sciences is summarized. The conclusion about the fundamental methodological importance of the category of tendency in scientific knowledge is substantiated.

The article presents a brief history of the formation of the reflexive project in the sociology of scientific knowledge and the rise of the concept of “new literary forms”. It also considers why reflexivity becomes one of the key concepts of discourse analysis in the work of J. Potter. The methodological aspects of discourse analysis and the mistakes that researchers make when analyzing are described. It is shown that discourse analysis implies the analyst’s “struggle” with his or her own interpretations, which makes discourse analysis a reflective practice.

The article considers the main provisions of the theory of the structure of scientific revolutions and its influence on the further development of philosophy. It is shown that Kuhn’s work caused a great surge of interest in the study of scientific practice among social philosophers, culturologists and historians, which led to the development of social epistemology. The philosophical result of the development of the theory of scientific revolutions was an attempt to defend the position of realism and truth in order to maintain the approach of scientific rationality.

In the article provides an overview the history of the emergence of analytical philosophy. It is shown that among the numerous works devoted to this topic, M. Potter's book "The Rise of Analytical Philosophy 1879-1930: from Frege to Russell" (2019) occupies a special place, both in terms of assessing the contribution of the "founding fathers" and in the manner of presentation. In particular, J. fell out of the traditional four. Moore, whose place was taken by F. Ramsay. Further, the traditional description of the philosopher's achievements, followed by criticism, gave way to a list of key moments in his work, which take the form of an "internal history", the history of searches, finds, mistakes, omissions, inconsistencies and doubts of philosophers. The new story presented by Potter gives a radically different picture of the rise of a new philosophical tradition compared to the traditional one.

We propose to interpret the notion of probability in quantum mechanics as Timothy Williamson’s evidential probability and call such probability quantum evidential probability. Williamson’s evidential probability, in our view, naturally fits into Jocelyn Benoist’s Wittgensteinian contextual realism rejecting the premises of the Modern philosophy and allowing dissolving of quantum paradoxes.

The article attempts to demonstrate the relationship between the methodological and epistemological hypotheses of the theory of relativity and numerous relativistic pictures of the world that subsequently appeared. For this purpose, the ontological consequences following from the three main Einsteinian assumptions are ordered. Numerous scenarios of the development of the Universe based on the relativist ontological scheme show some immanent difficulties associated with the methodological primacy of their source. For instance, the relativistic theory does not proceed from the deduction of the content of physical experiments, but rests on the results of rather speculative experiments. Therefore, it cannot set certain clear horizons of existence, but provokes a vast metaphysical multi-variance. Thus, relativism appeared as a result of sophisticated constructive speculation and represents a paradoxical contradiction between its methodological usefulness and the ontological difficulties it causes.

The article considers the typology of uncertainty as a state that a subject of predictive coding theory may experience. According to this theory, interaction with the external environment is mediated by neural filters that “remove” predictable signals and allow the cognitive system to focus on the difference between the expected and the actual. We propose a logical structure of predicative mechanisms and reveal two specific types of uncertainties arising at different stages of the work of these mechanisms (uncertainty of the possible and uncertainty of the expected), as well as several intraspecific types. We show that the theory has a heuristic potential for a wide range of research on human cognitive processes, especially in the context of modern socio-philosophical concepts of “turbulence” and unpredictability.

An article considers strong artificial intelligence as an opportunity to create an artificial personality. It is argued that radical connectionism is false and unacceptable for these purposes. The brain has a hybrid computational nature - in addition to self-learning cirquits, it contains algorithmic procedures. An evolutionary argument is put forward against the effectiveness of neural network modeling. The question is raised about the need to verify the quantum brain hypothesis in order to clarify the physical limitations of modeling. The question is raised about the acceptability of phenomenological knowledge. It is argued that Aristotle's trinitarian personality architecture reflects the fundamental structure of personality at a phenomenal level. The interpretation of emotions as an analogue form of representation is proposed. It is concluded that if an artificial personality as an adequate model can be built, then it can be created as a hybrid multi-agent system. Individual modules and entire levels may be analog, others digital; some systems can self-learn, others can function according to algorithmic rules and specific mathematical functions.

The article deals with the analysis of modern problems of consciousness in the context of the works of famous philosophers and neuroscientists. The issue of the connection between neuroscience and philosophy and the purpose of the latter in the explanation of consciousness is considered. It is argued that there is a cross-fertilization of these disciplines: philosophy can help to bridge the gap between the scientific explanation of reality and subjective experience, while research in the field of neuroscience can shed light on the fundamental problems of philosophy. The conclusion is made that the tendency of most scientists and philosophers to absolutism does not allow them to analyze the problem of consciousness and its moral boundaries from different perspectives.

The article discusses sociological surveys conducted by Russian and foreign researchers in 2009, 2015 and 2020. The surveys focused on the study of self-identification of members of the philosophical community and were conducted in the active Internet segment. As an online survey technique, the tools proposed by foreign colleagues who conducted the survey in 2009, D. Bourget and D. Chalmers, were used. They published the results of their survey in 2014. Based on it, Russian researchers conducted their survey in 2015. In 2020, foreign colleagues repeated their survey employing a larger sample. The author analyzes the results of these surveys both in terms of identifying the preferences, priorities and orientations of Western and Russian respondents, and in terms of the methods and tools of the surveys. It is revealed that when formulating questions, Western colleagues relied on the analytical tradition without any regard for continental philosophy. It is also shown that Western authors were actually engaged in the sociology of philosophy, without going deep into the content of philosophical problems proper. Russian researchers completely repeated the Western survey methodology, without introducing their own specificity. As a result, the question is raised of the validity and meaningfulness of such surveys, which practically take away from the actual philosophical problems and professional self-determination of members of the philosophical community.