Chapter VII. THEORY OF LIVING SYSTEMS AND MODERN BIOLOGICAL

1. Dialectics and biological knowledge The proposition about the universality of the laws and categories of dialectics and the specific forms of their manifestation in various areas of the objective world is one of the most important principles of Marxist-Leninist philosophy. According to F. Engels,

3. Social and biological in individual human development Consistent concretization of the unity of biological and social requires the study of their dialectics in relation to the process of individual human development as a whole in the unity of its age phases.

3. Biological and social in man and their unity Ideas about the unity of biological and social in the development of man were not formed immediately. Without delving into distant antiquity, let us recall that during the Enlightenment, many thinkers, differentiating the natural and

Chapter 17 Distorted social space. Social modeling Human self-consciousness has made a person a stranger in this world, giving rise to a feeling of loneliness and fear. Erich Fromm The following words belong to our wonderful thinker Arkady Davidovich: –

The need to study the mutual influence of nature and society is determined by the search for a methodological guideline in the study of this problem. The integrity of modern societies is cemented by organic, natural connections, which makes it possible to avoid social cataclysms, terrorist attacks, and numerous wars that interfere with their progressive development and harmonious interaction. Considering the historical stages of interaction between nature and society, it should be noted that the intensity of human impact on nature is increasing, and the interdependence and interpenetration of man and nature is acquiring a global scale. At the present stage, there is a need to follow the ideals of a humanistic society in order to harmonize the relationship between society and nature. The current tasks of humanity are the adaptation of industrial processes to natural ones and the transition from mechanical technology to one that models biological systems. Natural factors form the basis of human social existence, influencing the development of the production sector.

laws of social development.

anthroposociogenesis

organic concept of society

social organism

society

1. Volgin O.S. The idea of ​​progress in Russian religious philosophy of the Silver Age: abstract. dis. ... Doctor of Philosophy Sci. – M., 2004. – 36 p.

2. Kuzmina G.P. Ideas of organicism in Russian social philosophy: dis. ... Doctor of Philosophy Sci. – Cheboksary, 2007. – 297 p.

3. Marx K., Engels F. Selected works: in 3 volumes. T.1. – M., 1985. – 542 p.

4. Momdzhyan K.Kh. Social philosophy. Activity approach to the analysis of man, society, history. Part 1. – M.: Moscow University Publishing House, 2013. – 400 p.

5. Philosophy: textbook. – 2nd ed., rev. / N.S. Savkin, V.A. Abramov, A.I. Belkin et al.; head author. team and resp. ed. N.S. Savkin; editorial board: V.M. Boriskin and others - Saransk: Mordov Publishing House. University, 2002. – 356 p.

In social philosophy, the idea of ​​the essential unity of nature and society, both in historical and functional terms, currently prevails. In functional terms, the idea of ​​nature is developed as a “living” system of the circulation of substances, in which human society is included; in historical terms, society is understood as the highest social form of development of matter itself, and human history as the generation and continuation of the history of nature. “History can be viewed from two sides: it can be divided into the history of nature and the history of people,” wrote Marx. - However, both these sides are inextricably linked; as long as people exist, the history of nature and the history of people mutually determine each other.”

In accordance with scientific data, nature is considered, first of all, as a prerequisite for the emergence of man and society. Science has proven that it is no coincidence that humans share biological characteristics with animals. These include the genetic program of inheritance, the physiological and anatomical-morphological mechanism for satisfying the natural needs of the body and its adaptation to the external environment on the basis of neuropsychological activity, etc. However, humans also have specific biological characteristics that are absent in animals. Among them, F. Engels singled out: upright posture, the special structure of the hand, the mechanism of ligaments, the low rate of growth and biological maturation of the human body, the mobility of instincts, and the “exploratory” reflex. Modern Russian philosopher K.Kh. In addition to the listed distinctive features, Momdzhyan gives the following: “in situations that are called borderline, when it is impossible to maintain both the fact and the quality of life, a person is able to prefer quality to fact, i.e. voluntarily give up a life that does not correspond to his ideas about an existence worthy of a person.” It is known that these characteristics were fixed in humans not only under the influence of natural selection, but, above all, thanks to instrumental-communicative activity, i.e. in the process of anthroposociogenesis.

The question of the causes and process of the emergence of Homo sapiens as a biological species, of the accident or pattern of its appearance, worried the best minds of mankind. IN AND. Vernadsky emphasized that life is a non-random phenomenon in world evolution. Teilhard de Chardin believed that evolution in nature reveals the law of recurrence, according to which the world develops through complication, in the process of which consciousness appears.

In his work “Social Philosophy. Activity approach to the analysis of man, society, history” K.Kh. Momdzhyan says that reasoning about the laws of development of the world as a whole is possible only if “it is proven that all its subsystems are consistent with laws - including social reality, which is created by people who have substantially free will.” We will consider the objectivity of the laws of social development using the example of the law of population, which is associated both with the method of production in society and with natural factors.

Perhaps one of the first to try to establish the “laws” of population was the English economist, Bishop Malthus. He argued that in the absence of birth control, the population doubles every twenty-five years, i.e. increases in geometric progression, while the means of subsistence cannot, apparently, increase faster than in arithmetic progression, and therefore, with uncontrolled population growth, the consequence of this imbalance will be poverty in its various forms.

This concept of Malthus contains at least two erroneous theses. The first is that he tried to attribute poverty and unemployment to too high fertility, and not to the economic system. The second is that this high fertility is due to the action of an abstract, natural law of reproduction.

In addition to the above objections, we point out one more. Statistics show that, firstly, Malthus’ calculations themselves are incorrect. From 5500 BC until 1650, the population doubled approximately every thousand years. Over the next two hundred years it also doubled; it then doubled in the forty-five years between 1930 and 1975. It was expected to increase from about four to seven billion people. By the end of 2011, the world's population reached seven billion. At the same time, human needs for environmental resources are also increasing exponentially.

The history of mankind further proves that population growth is not an absolutely independent biological process, independent of social conditions. The number of people making up a society, on the contrary, depends on the degree of development of production, on economic relations, living conditions, level of well-being, development of healthcare, etc. Population growth is subject to certain patterns of social development and is regulated by the demographic policy of the state.

So, population reproduction cannot be considered in isolation from the laws of the method of production; however, one should not fall into vulgarization, i.e. reduce the laws of population reproduction only to economic laws. “In the struggle against the materialist understanding of history, non-Marxist concepts, including the organic one, did not recognize the action of one factor determining the course of historical development.” Moreover, O.S. Volgin notes that one of the main features of Russian religious philosophy is that “being itself as a whole is perceived as organic, not material.” In other words, the demographic process cannot be identified with the economic one. F. Engels points out that the determining factor, ultimately, is the production and reproduction of immediate life, which consists of the production of the means of life and the production of the person himself (childbirth). Fertility and mortality, which constitute the content of population reproduction, are influenced by biological laws, of course, mediated by the development of productive forces, the influence of social progress, which is expressed in industrial development, the growth of culture, medical advances, and the development of man himself. Engels asserted the dialectical unity of society and nature.

The laws of society, although secondary in origin, are much more complex than natural ones both in structure and in the manner of manifestation. Therefore, social development cannot be explained by the known laws of natural development, although such attempts have been made repeatedly. Society, being a part of nature, develops and “functions in accordance with both the universal laws of the development of the world and social laws.”

Natural conditions, which include a variety of objects, phenomena and processes of living and inanimate nature, serve as the natural (geographical) basis of material production and development of society. The laws of nature, manifested in the process of exchange of matter and energy between society and nature, are the basis of human activity as a biosocial being.

Human influence on nature is not limited to expedient changes in its phenomena and processes. The extent to which society is able to take into account for its purposes two aspects of environmental management - the social need for the economically productive development of nature and the need for its conservation as an immediate condition of existence - determines whether the process of environmental management will lead to the degradation of nature or whether it will be a rationally organized and harmonious process of satisfying everything. complex.

Until now, we have considered nature in the broad sense of the word: as a set of material processes and phenomena, including society as part of a single whole. Such a broad interpretation of the concept of “nature” leads to the identification of the concepts of “nature” and “matter”. So matter is a philosophical category for designating objective reality, the essence of nature. Doctor of Philosophy, Professor Yu. K. Pletnikov offers three different concepts: natural science - “natural environment”, social - “sphere of human activity” and natural-social - “geographical environment”. Unlike the “sociosphere,” which in principle has no natural boundaries, the “geographical environment” opposes society as that part of nature where society lives and develops. In short, the “geographical environment” is “humanized nature” involved in the process of social production. It is through social production that the geographical environment influences the development of society.

There are three historical stages of interaction between society and nature: the first is pre-industrial, when the social impact on nature is still extremely insignificant and is predominantly adaptive in nature. The second is industrial, when social production frees man from direct dependence on nature; here nature is seen as something motionless and impermanent. The interaction between society and nature is understood only as external: society is the subject, nature is the object. And finally, the third stage is characterized by the fact that the inappropriate change in nature that accompanies conscious human activity acquires a global scale, and the intensity of this process indicates that human activity is turning into a factor of planetary significance.

So, historically interacting with nature, man makes changes to it, which then themselves affect the development of society, as is observed today when scientists talk about the “ecological crisis.” We are sad witnesses to the depletion of flora and fauna, natural resources, we are observing an increase in the heat and noise levels of the planet, an increase in chemical and radioactive mutagens associated with environmental pollution. All this indicates the severity of the modern environmental situation and forces us to discuss this issue at the most representative levels. From a humanistic perspective, the pursuit of well-being should not be focused only on increasing the standard of living, on achieving more and more abundant and more advanced material benefits. This is the ideal of a consumer society, which has nothing to do with the humanistic perspective.

A humanistic society, in addition to a high standard of living and rapid growth of intangible goods, focuses on collective satisfaction with the environment, both social and geographical. All this forces advanced humanity to look for optimal ways out of the current environmental situation. This is not the first time that humanity has faced an environmental crisis. They have been observed more than once on our planet, and some of them have had a positive effect on the development of the organic world. Thus, the global environmental crisis caused by the Ice Age played an important role in the development of primitive man. The ability for social collective work and the social organization that arose on the basis of this subsequently led to the fact that, after certain periods, environmental crises of an anthropogenic nature began to arise, i.e. created by human activity. In this regard, some thinkers even then spoke out against the predatory attitude towards nature, warning that nature “takes revenge” on man for such an attitude, but the general public and political figures in various countries only recently comprehended these warnings.

The scientific and technological revolution has made the problem of interaction and mutual influence of nature and society global. Thanks to it, the concept of the boundlessness of the environment is replaced by the concept of the limitations of its individual elements. People in all countries are beginning to understand that technology needs to be built with an eye on nature, taking into account the fact of its impact on human health. All this suggests that in our time new ecological thinking is being formed, and in its formation a huge role belongs to philosophy with its experience in analyzing the relationship between nature and society. K.H. Momdzhyan notes that at the present stage of interaction between nature and society, problems of unity and systemic integrity of the world are of interest primarily to scientists, for whom a substantial view of the world is an important methodological guideline.

Today people work in space, under water, and their vital necessity is to understand and adapt to natural processes on a global scale, which requires not only practical, but also new theoretical solutions. In particular, the expansion of the content of the geographical environment leads in theory to the emergence of new terms that characterize new aspects of the interaction between society and nature. Natural scientists prefer to talk about the “biotechnosphere” and “noosphere”. The new stage of interaction between nature and society is intended to adapt industrial processes to natural ones and create on this basis a new cycle of substances and energy in the “society - nature” system.

In other words, in the modern world, economic, biological, social and other processes are intertwined so closely that there is a need to consider modern production as a complex ecological-economic system. Therefore, the task is to understand nature and society as something whole, indivisible, to comprehensively manage the spontaneous processes of nature, to orient them to one’s benefit, naturally fitting into its life. This means that the tools of human activity, its technical means and scientific methods must undergo corresponding changes. We are talking, in particular, about waste-free technology, closed production cycles, recycling of raw materials, land reclamation, wastewater treatment plants, and the transition from mechanical technology to one that simulates biological systems.

So, we have examined some current problems of the dialectical interaction between society and nature. This allows us to draw brief conclusions: natural geographical factors form the direct basis for the existence of society and influence its development, being included in production cycles.

Based on the above, let us analyze society using the natural characteristics of its “primary elements”. Man is a natural being, but at the same time his naturalness is, as it were, taken out of the brackets of social life. The development of science has shown that biological characteristics of a person are both a prerequisite and a condition of human social existence. In discussions about the biosocial nature of man, the dominance of the social nature of man is often emphasized. As a result, the idea of ​​the primacy of the social and the secondary nature of the biological in human nature arose. Man is whole, and all his facets are equally necessary. He lives in a world of material things created by his hands. The basis of everything is the natural substrate, to which labor, reason, and human will are applied. Thus, the original substance is preserved as natural, changing only its appearance and shape. Naturalness is always stationary and unchanging. Naturalness leaves its mark on all spheres and elements of society. Hence, society is basically a natural formation.

Mikhailova R.V., Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Department of General Educational Disciplines of the Chuvash State Agricultural Academy, Cheboksary;

Petrova G.D., Doctor of Philology, Professor of the Department of Communication Technologies and Management of the Chuvash State Pedagogical University named after. I. Ya. Yakovleva", Cheboksary.

Bibliographic link

The problem of man, his essence and origin, his present and future is one of the eternal ones. Man is the most complex in the world, a unique creature that embodies the unity of nature and history. The process of its development is subject to social laws and laws of nature, which have their own internal logic and at the same time the indirect influence of society. Man embodies the results of both biological evolution and the development of society, therefore he is not just a part of nature, but its highest product of a special kind. The fundamentally important position put forward by Marx that man is an active natural being makes it possible to understand that, unlike animals, he is not only a product of the environment, but also its creator.

The study of the synthesis of the social and natural in man is an independent problem of science, which has a philosophical aspect. The essence of man, who represents the totality of all social relations, is social; on the other hand, his nature as a biological being has gone through a complex path of evolutionary development. The study of the interaction of biological and social is the starting point of any scientific study of man, which is of fundamental importance for medicine, representing the most important prerequisite for the development of medical theory, as well as medical practice.

The problem of man is too complex to be satisfied with its study within the limits of anatomy. A successful solution to this problem is possible only through comprehensive research with the interaction of social and biological sciences. Since the beginning of the emergence of religion, this has been one of the acute problems of the ideological struggle, which has retained its relevance at the present stage of the scientific and technological revolution. Understanding the role of the social in the process of both the formation of man and society, and his ontogenetic development is an important prerequisite for ensuring conditions for the optimal development of a person not only during his individual life, but also in the life of entire generations.

The foundations of the scientific understanding of the relationship between the biological and the social in man were developed by Marxism. Marxist-Leninist philosophy established that social life represents the highest form of movement of matter, that is, biological laws are subject to social laws. That is why modern man as a biological being is not subject to the laws of natural selection. The relationship between the biological and the social is thus subject to the general dialectical principles of the connection between the lower and higher levels of the organization of matter.

The interaction of the biological and the social can be considered in relation to society as a self-organizing system in its relationship with living nature, to different structural levels of the human body and personality, to different stages of its ontogenetic and phylogenetic development. In this context, three aspects of the socio-biological problem can be distinguished: socio-phylogenetic, socio-ontogenetic and socio-ecological. Historically, the starting point among them is the socio-phylogenetic aspect, within which the relationship between biological and social patterns is revealed during the period of anthroposociogenesis and in the conditions of the formed society. The origin of man from higher anthropoid ancestors, which was revealed by Darwin, and the formation of society from the herd of animals (Engels) is in reality a two-pronged process that created man.

In the origin of man, the decisive condition was labor. Marx argued that labor is “... an eternal natural condition of human life.” The direction of changes that led to the formation of specifically human biology is associated with the inclusion of man in the system of society as an integral part of the productive forces. It is precisely his belonging to a new level of organization - the social - that leads to social transformations of his biology, to significant morphological transformations and the formation of new modes of behavior. Engels wrote: “When, after a thousand years of struggle, the hand was finally differentiated from the leg and a straight gait was established, then man was separated from the monkey, and the basis was laid for the development of articulate speech and for the powerful development of the brain, thanks to which the gulf between man and the monkey has since become impassable for now. Specialization of the hand means the appearance of a tool, and a tool means specifically human activity, transforming the reverse impact of man on nature - production.”

The question of the beginning of human history, determining the boundaries and reasons for the rapid divergence of two types of anthropoids at a distance of two different forms of movement of matter can be solved based on Engels’ position on the formative role of labor. Labor, in his opinion, “... is the first basic condition of all human life, and to such an extent that we, in a certain sense, must say: labor created man himself.” Breast is that qualitatively new feature that is inherent in man and is a universal condition for the formation its development. Man, unlike animals, cannot adapt the body to nature, but through his labor he adapts nature. This circumstance leaves an imprint on biological evolution, which has ceased in humans. Man is connected with nature not directly, like all other living beings, but indirectly through labor activity.

The initial process of hominization dates back to a period more than a million years distant from us, when anthropoid ancestors acquired the ability to work. Labor was a force that gave birth to completely new social laws and the sociality of man, being of fundamental importance for changing the nature of the relationship between man and nature. A person’s attitude to the environment thanks to work is significantly transformed; the production of tools allowed a person to influence an inadequate environment in the direction of adapting it to his needs.

From the first stages of anthropogenesis, labor activity was of a collective nature, i.e., the production and use of tools led to increased mutual assistance and cohesion. According to Marx, labor, being in its original meaning a means of ensuring life, becomes a person’s way of life, an essential form of his life activity, his relationship to the environment and an important basis for relations between people. V.I. Lenin noted that work becomes a need for a healthy person.

The increasing scale of work activity required improvement of the cognition process, which stimulated the development of the human brain; the collective nature of work formed such a means of social communication as speech. The transformation of the primitive herd of people into human society was accompanied by the formation and emergence of Homo sapiens.

It is possible to establish the difference that exists between a person and his closest ancestors only on the basis of a complex criterion. Numerous discoveries of recent decades in the field of anthropology, archeology, paleontology, paleopsychology, etc. have led to the conclusion that several more signs may be associated with the labor criterion than previously thought. The labor criterion must be supplemented by a morphological one, and also requires taking into account the changes occurring in the behavior of emerging people, and, finally, changes in ecological relations with the environment as a result of a more rapid development of the productive forces than the transformation of the environment. In turn, the morphological differences that make it possible to draw a line between animals and humans also represent a unique complex, called in anthropology the “hominoid (or hominid) triad.” This systemic morphological criterion includes such essential features as upright posture (bipedal or orthograde), a unique upper limb adapted for precise manipulation, and developed associative activity of the central nervous system. During anthropogenesis, upright posture improves first; later, the hand develops in the direction of fine manipulation and a highly developed, relatively large brain.

The dialectical nature of the formation of social patterns that displace biological ones is revealed by the theory of two leaps, two qualitative boundaries in anthropogenesis, widespread in modern science. The first milestone, approximately 2 million years away (there is evidence that primitive man arose 3 million years ago), is associated with the beginning of the manufacture of the first tools. It marks the transition from animal predecessors to the stage of emerging humans and signifies the emergence of social patterns. The second milestone was overcome about 100 thousand years ago, when the Neanderthal man was replaced by a person of a modern physical type - Homo sapiens. From this moment on, the dominance of social laws is established, biological laws practically disappear. The formative effect of the mechanism of natural selection on a person ceases, fundamental transformations of the physical type of a person do not occur, although assumptions are made about the possibility of some changes within the framework of “historical phylogenesis”. Human existence is determined by material production, and not by its adaptability to nature. Such relationships with the environment mean that significant transformations in the structure of a person do not occur, but it is understood that in the ontogenetic development of a person, social determinants still play a decisive role, determining both its general contours and its main details. The subordination of the biological to the social in individual development also represents the initial essential determinant of the material system.

Human ontogenesis is determined by the intersecting action of three types of programs (systems of determining factors) that have certain characteristics in humans: genetic, individual and socio-ecological. Human genetic programs include species characteristics of Homo sapiens, including characteristics of the genus, order, etc., racial, sexual and individual type.

In addition to genetic programs, ontogenesis is also determined by the socio-ecological program, or the conditions of the social and natural environment. At the same time, the environment influences ontogenesis in two ways: firstly, it ensures the implementation of genetic programs of ontogenesis; secondly, various sets of environmental factors create such structural and functional (morphophysiological) changes that, over long periods or even throughout the entire life of an individual, in a certain way determine his subsequent development. As a result, we can also talk about individual ontogenetically developing programs, understanding by them a systemic set of external factors that are not just a condition for the implementation of genetic programs, but individual determinants of ontogenesis, acting, of course, through internal individual programs.

The interaction of all three types of ontogenetic programs in humans has unique features. An essential part of the human living environment is society with its own internal laws of development, which influences nature in a certain way. Therefore, social laws are of central, leading importance in relation to the environment of human life. Social living conditions significantly influence the life activity, structure, and ontogenesis of a person, which determines the performance, health and functional capabilities of a person. This once again emphasizes that man is not only a biological, but also a social and social being.