This report presents the features of the organisation and the main ideas of the international scientific conference “‘No Right of Sedition’. Kant and the Problem of Revolution in the 18th—21st Century Philosophy.” The conference was held at the Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University (IKBFU) in Kaliningrad on November 9—10, 2017 and was dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the Russian Revolution. The event was organised by the Academia Kantiana — a research unit on comparative studies on Russian and Western philosophy (...) at the IKBFU’s Institute for the Humanities. The reports presented at the conference focused on the analysis of the phenomenon of revolution from Kant to the present day as well as the conceptions of revolution that appeared around the time of the Russian Revolution in 1917. The report summarises all the presentations and discussions that took place at the confe­rence in accordance with the thematic clusters. The conference confirmed that Kant’s ideas on the state and the revolution are still relevant today. (shrink)

The escape from the ‘Malthusian trap’ is shown to tend to generate in a rather systematic way quite serious political upheavals. Some demographic structural mechanisms that generate such upheavals have been analyzed, which has made it possible to develop a mathematical model of the respective processes. The forecast of political instability in Sub-Saharan African countries in 2015– 2050 produced on the basis of this model is presented.

In recent decades, perspectivism has developed into an epistemological research program claiming its independence. This autonomy stems from Perspectivism’s potential ability to resolve the contradictions between realist and constructivist programs. Perspectivism is based on the idea that the object depends on perspective, which constitutes any subjective attempt to cognize it. Perspectivists reconstruct and explain the factors involved in the formation of perspective, identifying the conditionality of epistemic acts, using concepts such as “position”, “point of view”, “view”, “angle”, “horizon”, “focus”, “picture”, (...) “context”, “aspect”, etc. Although these concepts are part of the perspectivist’s toolkit, their meanings and interrelation have so far been taken for granted and have not yet been critically and comprehensively analyzed. The purpose of this article is to take steps toward clarifying the conceptual basis for defending perspectivism as an epistemological program. Once consistently uncovered and correlated in a conceptual model, Perspectivist concepts can be used as a tool for a detailed analysis of theories, positions, and beliefs. The article begins with a preliminary description of the concept of perspectivism and its brief history as an epistemological program. In particular, the first modern attempts to outline perspectivist epistemology are described in the works of F. Kaulbach (1990), W. Stegmaier (2008), and M. Massimi (2017, 2020). The problem of identifying the special a priori status of perspectivist notions as a strategy for justifying the autonomy of Perspectivism is then posed. A method for demonstrating such a status, based on Kant’s transcendentalism and P. Strawson’s descriptive metaphysics, is then suggested. (shrink)

In recent decades, perspectivism has developed into an independent epistemological research program. Perspectivism is based on the idea of perspective as an attempt to elucidate an object from a multitude of factors. Perspectivists are concerned with reconstructing and explaining these factors, identifying the conditioning of epistemic acts, using concepts such as “position”/“point of view,” “gaze,” “angle of view,” “horizon,” “focus,” “picture,” “relativity,” and “context”. Although these concepts are part of the perspectivist's toolkit, their content and interrelationship have not yet been (...) critically and comprehensively analyzed. The purpose of this article is to clarify the conceptual basis of perspectivism as an epistemological program, which began in the works of F. Kaulbach (1990) and W. Stegmaier (2008). For this purpose, a systematic conceptual analysis will be carried out, a detailed presentation of the logical content of perspectivist notions and their reduction into a single coherent model, which can become the conceptual basis of perspectivism. Perspectivist concepts constitute a “population” or matrix of the concept “epistemic situation”. Being consistently expounded and correlated in a conceptual model, they can be used as a tool for a detailed analysis of epistemic situations and their results (theories, positions, views, etc.). The final part of the article will formulate a number of significant implications of the new programmatic understanding of perspectivism: the status of perspectivist concepts, the distinction of perspectivism from similar epistemological programs, and the challenges for its further development. (shrink)

Среди физиков и космологов нет единства мнений по проблемам первых стадий истории Универсума. Предполагается, что наша Вселенная поя-вилась примерно 13,82 млрд лет назад из неизвестного состояния. Пред-ставление, распространившееся в 1970-х гг., что она появилась из сингу-лярности (то есть состояния неопределенно малой величины и неопреде-ленно большой плотности материи) в результате необычайной силы Большого взрыва, хотя и разделяется до сих пор многими, устарело. В ре-зультате появления теории инфляции многие сложности теории Боль-шого взрыва удалось устранить, однако вопрос о самом Большом взрыве (часто называемом (...) горячим взрывом) оказался сильно запутан термино-логически и теоретически. Поэтому в современных исследованиях часто можно встретить только упоминания о Большом взрыве, но не ясное описание этого события. В современной литературе описания стадии горячего Большого взрыва после стадии разогрева обычно не дается. Но следует иметь в виду, что, добавив в понятие «Большой взрыв» детерминатив «горячий», нередко подразумевают, что был еще один Большой взрыв – доинфляци-онный, который то ли предшествовал начальной квантовой флуктуации, то ли явился началом инфляции. Однако его описание и характеристики являются еще более неясными, чем горячего Большого взрыва. В резуль-тате такой терминологической и теоретической путаницы все чаще упоминания о Большом взрыве среди физиков выглядят просто как дань традиции, которую они не осмеливаются нарушить, а потому такие упоминания носят скорее ритуальный, чем наполненный конкретным со-держанием характер. В целом представляется, что самая начальная ис-тория Вселенной вполне может обойтись без использования понятия «Большой взрыв», применяя схему: флуктуация (что бы ее ни вызвало) – инфляция – постинфляционный разогрев. В статье дается анализ совре-менных космологических взглядов на самое начало нашей Вселенной и ука-зывается на наиболее важные противоречия в них. (shrink)

This article presents possible answers, and their respective probabilities, to the question, ‘What are the consequences of the present global crisis in the proximate future of the World System?’ It also attempts to describe the basic characteristics of the forthcoming ‘Epoch of New Coalitions’ and to forecast certain future conditions. Among the problems analyzed in this paper are the following: What does the weakening of the economic role of the USA as the World System centre mean? Will there be a (...) leader in the future World System? Will the deficit of global governance and world fragmentation continue to worsen? How can national sovereignty be transformed? (shrink)

Есть исследователи, проблематика работ и теории которых остаются актуальными длительное время и после их смерти. К числу таких, несом- ненно, относится и Николай Дмитриевич Кондратьев – замечательный российский экономист, один из тех, чье имя довольно широко известно и за рубежом. И актуальность его идей тем более важно отметить в ознаме-нование 125-летнего юбилея Н. Д. Кондратьева, который мы отпраздновали в прошлом 2017 году. Именно этой теме – связи творчества Кондратьева и проблем современной экономики и экономической науки – и посвящены многие статьи (...) данного выпуска ежегодника. Биографии и отдельным аспектам творчества ученого отведены статьи первого раздела. Тем не менее нельзя не сказать хотя бы немного об этой личности и во Введении. (shrink)

Semantic relativism is the view that the truth-value of some types of statements can vary depending on factors besides possible worlds and times, without any change in their propositional content. It has grown increasingly popular as a semantic theory of several types of statements, including statements that attribute knowledge of a proposition to a subject (knowledge attributions). The ways of knowing claim is the view that perception logically implies knowledge. In my “Semantic Relativism and Ways of Knowing” (2019) I argued (...) that a relativist semantics for knowledge attributions is incompatible with the ways of knowing claim. I suggested that this incompatibility depends on some basic features of the logic of relativist semantics, and therefore can be shown to generalise beyond the discussion of knowledge attributions to semantic relativism more broadly. Here I make this generalisation. I demonstrate that for any proposition p expressed by a statement that does not have a relativist semantics, and for any proposition q expressed by a statement that does have a relativist semantics, p fails to logically imply q. I explain why this happens, discuss some of its philosophical consequences, and consider a way to modify relativist semantics to avoid it. I conclude that semantic relativism raises interesting philosophical questions that have gone largely unnoticed in discussions of this view until now. (shrink)

«Михаил Иванович Туган-Барановский» – расширенный биографический очерк Н. Д. Кондратьева, изданный в 1923 г. отдельной книгой в Петроградском издательстве «Колос» (125 с.).

Возникший глубокий кризис украинской государственности и идущая там, по сути, гражданская война вынуждают обратиться к причинам постоянных неудач формирования украинского государства. Многие на первый взгляд труднообъяснимые и откро-венно негативные особенности внешней и внутренней политики современной Украины в значительной степени связаны с геополитическими и историческими особенностями формирования государства, менталитета и традициями социально-политической психологии. Очевидно также, что многие отрицательно воздействующие на стабильность государства геополитические и геокультурные факторы прошлого не утратили своего значения до сих пор. Анализу этих факторов и их роли в разные (...) периоды украинской истории и посвящена данная статья. В статье также сделана попытка систематического сравнения истории Украины с историей ее ближайших соседей (России, Белоруссии, Польши), что позволяет лучше понять причины различий исторических судеб в сходных условиях и определить степень влияния соседей на политические модели Украины и ее отдельных областей. (shrink)

The following method is popular in some areas of philosophy and linguistics when trying to describe the semantics of a given sentence Φ. Present ordinary speakers with scenarios that involve an utterance of Φ, ask them whether these utterances are felicitous or infelicitous and then construct a semantics that assigns the truth-value True to felicitous utterances of Φ and the truth-value False to infelicitous utterances of Φ. The author makes five observations about this intuition-based approach to semantics; their upshot is (...) that it should be revised in favour of a more nuanced method. The author suggests that this method should be based on corpus linguistics and makes some tentative remarks about what it might look like and which questions we need to address in order to develop it. (shrink)

This essay examines the quantitative aspects of Greco-Roman science, represented by a group of established disci¬plines, which since the fourth century BC were called mathēmata or mathē¬ma¬tikai epistē¬mai. In the group of mathēmata that in Antiquity normally comprised mathematics, mathematical astronomy, harmonics, mechanics and optics, we have also included geography. Using a dataset based on The Encyclopaedia of Ancient Natural Scientists, our essay considers a community of mathēmatikoi (as they called themselves), or ancient scientists (as they are defined for the (...) purposes of the present paper) from a sociological point of view, focusing on the size of the scientific population known to us and its disciplinary, temporal and geographical distribution. A diachronic comparison of neighboring and partly overlapping communities, ancient scientists and philosophers, allows the pattern of their interrelationship to be traced. An examination of centers of science throughout ancient history reveals that there were five major centers – Athens, Alexandria, Rhodes, Rome and Byzantium/Constantinople – that appear and replace one another in succession as leaders. These conclusions serve to reopen the issue of the place of mathēmata and mathēmatikoi in ancient society. (shrink)

В настоящей статье на базе теории принципов производства и производственных революций мы показываем взаимосвязь между К-волнами и крупнейшими технологическими переворотами в истории, а также делаем прогнозы об особенностях шестой К-волны в свете идущей с 1950-х годов кибернетической революции. Мы предполагаем, что шестая кондратьевская волна в 2030–2040-х годах сольется с завершающей фазой кибернетической революции (которую мы назвали фазой самоуправляемых систем). Этот период будет характеризоваться прорывом в медицинских технологиях, которые смогут объединить вокруг себя много других технологий и в целом составят комплекс МБНРИК-технологий (...) (медико-био-нано-робото-инфо-когнитивных технологий). В статье даются некоторые прогнозы о разви-тии данных технологий. (shrink)

The figure of the cordial host of the Academy, who invited the most gifted mathematicians and cultivated pure research, whose keen intellect was able if not to solve the particular problem then at least to show the method for its solution: this figure is quite familiar to students of Greek science. But was the Academy as such a center of scientific research, and did Plato really set for mathematicians and astronomers the problems they should study and methods they should use? (...) Our sources tell about Plato's friendship or at least acquaintance with many brilliant mathematicians of his day (Theodorus, Archytas, Theaetetus), but they were never his pupils, rather vice versa -- he learned much from them and actively used this knowledge in developing his philosophy. There is no reliable evidence that Eudoxus, Menaechmus, Dinostratus, Theudius, and others, whom many scholars unite into the group of so-called "Academic mathematicians," ever were his pupils or close associates. Our analysis of the relevant passages (Eratosthenes' Platonicus, Sosigenes ap. Simplicius, Proclus' "Catalogue of geometers", and Philodemus' "History of the Academy", etc.) shows that the very tendency of portraying Plato as the architect of science goes back to the early Academy and is born out of interpretations of his dialogues. (shrink)

What determines the transition of a society from one level of development to another? One of the most fundamental causes is the global technological transformations. Among all major technological breakthroughs in history the most important are the three production revolutions: 1) the Agrarian Revolution; 2) the Industrial Revolution and 3) the Scientific-Information Revolution which will transform into the Cybernetic one. The article introduces the Theory of Production Revolutions. This is a new explanatory paradigm which is of value when analyzing causes (...) and trends of global shifts in historical process. The article describes the course of techno-logical transformations in history and demonstrates a possible application of the theory to explain the present and forthcoming technological changes. The authors argue that the third production revolution that started in the 1950s and which they call the Cybernetic one, in the coming decades, that is in the 2030s and 2040s, will get a new impetus and enter its final stage – the epoch of (self)controllable systems. There are given certain forecasts concerning the development in such spheres as medicine, biotechnologies and nanotechnolo-gies in the coming decades (the 2010s – 2060s). (shrink)

This article considers concrete manifestations of the politogenesis multilinearity and the variation of its forms; it analyzes the main causes that determined the politogenetic pathway of a given society. The respective factors include the polity's size, its ecological and social environment. The politogenesis should be never reduced to the only one evolutionary pathway leading to the statehood. The early state formation was only one of many versions of development of complex late archaic social systems. The author designates various complex non-state (...) political systems as early state analogues. The early state analogue posed a real alternative to the state for a rather long period of time, whereas in many ecologically marginal regions they could compete quite seriously with the state sometimes until recently. Thus, it was only in the final count that the state became the leading form of political organization of complex societies. The very pathways to statehood had a few versions. One may group them into two main types: ‘vertical’ and ‘horizontal’. Within the ‘vertical’ model the state formation took place in a direct way, i.e. directly from small pre-state polities to primitive statehood. Within the ‘horizontal’ model we first ob-serve the formation of early state analogues that were quite com-parable to the state as regards their complexity, whereas later those analogues were transformed into states . (shrink)

В настоящей статье рассматривается, как формировался, разви-вался и начал ослабевать мировой порядок, основанный на американской гегемонии, анализируются истоки установления современного мирового порядка. Дается анализ характерных черт и методов, которые используют США для поддержания своих позиций в мире. Автор показывает также, каким образом глобализация стала более выгодной для развивающихся стран, а не для развитых, а также как постепенно формировалось убеждение в неизбежности ослабления лидерских позиций США. В статье дается характеристика современной ситуации в международных отношениях как обстановки, в которой началась реконфигурация Мир-Системы. (...) Последнее должно означать наступление эпохи турбулентности и формирования новых коалиций. Это будет своего рода переходная эпоха к более устойчивому новому мировому порядку, установление которого будет нелегким делом. Во второй статье будет рассмотрено, в каком направлении и как этот новый порядок будет формироваться, каковы могут быть его принципы и возможные механизмы установления. (shrink)

The formation of the Afroeurasian world-system was one of the crucial points of social evolution, starting from which the social evolution rate and effectiveness increased dramatically. In the present article we analyze processes and scales of global integration in historical perspective, starting with the Agrarian Revolution. We connect the main phases of historical globalization with the processes of the development of the Afroeurasian world-system. In the framework of the Afroeurasian world-system the integration began a few thousand years BCE. In this (...) world-system the continental and supracontinental links became rather developed long before the Great Geographic Discoveries and thus, they could quite be denoted as global (albeit in a somehow limited sense). As some researchers are still inclined to underestimate the scale of those links in the pre-Industrial era, it appears necessary to provide additional empirical support for our statement. It also turns necessary to apply a special methodology (which necessitated the use of the world-system approach). We analyze some versions of periodization of globalization history. We also propose our own periodization of globalization history using as its basis the growing scale of intersocietal links as an indicator of the level of globalization development. (shrink)

Тема государства и государственности – одна из важнейших в социальных науках. В этом плане можно считать неслучайным рост интереса к такому аспекту, как национальное или государ-ственное строительство в молодых государствах, а также к про-блеме так называемых несостоявшихся или недееспособных госу-дарств (failed states). Эти вопросы важно рассматривать не толь-ко в современном аспекте, но также в исторической ретроспективе и в широком, мир-системном масштабе. В настоящей статье данные проблемы рассматриваются в различных аспектах, масштабах и ракурсах.

Революционные события 1917–1920 гг. в России не только потрясли мир в момент их совершения, но и существенно, даже круто изменили его, причем это влияние в течение десятилетий возрастало. Социали-стическая революция в России вызвала мощный резонанс в мире, стала новым направлением развития. Речь идет не только о силе примера, о повторении события в других обществах. Ее воздействие и шире, и глубже. Она существенно изменила систему мирового порядка в ХХ в. В статье рассмотрен аспект данного влияния на трансформацию миро-вого порядка в разные (...) периоды ХХ в., а также сделана попытка связать это влияние с общими тенденциями исторического процесса. (shrink)

This paper discusses continuity between ancient Pythagoreanism and the pseudo-Pythagorean writings, which began to appear after the end of the Pythagorean school ca. 350 BC. Relying on a combination of temporal, formal and substantial criteria, I divide Pseudopythagorica into three categories: 1) early Hellenistic writings ascribed to Pythagoras and his family members; 2) philosophical treatises written mostly, yet not exclusively, in pseudo-Doric from the turn of the first century BC under the names of real or fictional Pythagoreans; 3) writings attributed (...) to Pythagoras and his relatives that continued to appear in the late Hellenistic and Imperial periods. I will argue that all three categories of pseudepigrapha contain astonishingly little that is authentically Pythagorean. (shrink)

The paper discusses some aspects of integration of different regions and societies in the course of historical globalization. Within historical globalization one can observe a close correlation between such important processes as technological transformations, urbanization, political integration, struggle for political hegemony, etc. In the paper we analyze these correlations to associate historical globalization with phases of expansion. Within the expansion process we point out seven levels from the local level through the planetary one. The most significant changes were associated with (...) crucial technological breakthroughs, or production revolutions, and other related transformations like the Urban Revolution. The latter can be regarded as a phase transition of the Afroeurasian world-system to a qualitatively new level of complexity. There are also several periods which one can define as landmarks in the world-system history. The paper also offers some theoretical ideas about cycles of divergence and convergence. (shrink)

The deceptive clues in the impossible puzzle film confirm the viewer’s internal expectations and allow retrospective attributing. In the film, a transcendental object negates an internal expectation, causing a retrospective blockage. Retrospectivity does not stop there; the transcendental object reinterpreting deceptive clues in the associative area leads to repeated attribution. This article consists of three parts. First, it discusses impossible puzzle films in the context of complex narrative classification. The following section introduces the Jungian concept of synchronicity and illustrates how (...) it works. The article concludes with a case study of Long Day’s Journey into Night (2018), which contains more complicated puzzles and explains how mind-game narrative techniques create deceptive clues and induce deceptive retrospective attribution. (shrink)

В последние два-три года среди многочислен- ных проблем в отношении европейской и американской экономики все чаще стала упоминаться опасность дефляции. При этом в каче- стве примера рассматривается японская экономика, которая уже два десятилетия страдает от дефляции, несмотря на огромные раз- меры финансовых вливаний и усилия правительства разогнать ин- фляцию. В западных экономиках инфляция также низкая, времена- ми нулевая, переходящая в дефляцию. В целом есть основания счи- тать, что страны Европы заболевают «японской болезнью», а также что эта «болезнь» может прогрессировать либо (...) носить хрониче- ский характер. В США, хотя и в меньшей степени, также имеются признаки этой «болезни». В результате финансовые вливания мо- гут стать, как и в Японии, постоянными. В разделе показаны при- чины этой проблемы, объяснена неравномерность процессов инфляции – дефляции в мире, сделаны прогнозы. (shrink)

The article analyzes the technological shifts which took place in the second half of the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries and predict the main shifts in the next half a century. On the basis of the analysis of the latest achievements in medicine, bio- and nanotechnologies, robotics, ICT and other technological directions and also on the basis of the opportunities provided by the theory of production revolutions the authors present a detailed analysis of the latest production revolution which is denoted (...) as ‘Cybernetic’. There are given some forecasts about its development in the nearest five decades and up to the end of twenty-first century. It is shown that the development of various self-regulating systems will be the main trend of this revolution. The article gives a detailed analysis of the future breakthroughs in medicine, and also in bio- and nanotechnologies in terms of the development of self-regulating systems with their growing ability to select optimal modes of functioning as well as of other characteristics of the Cybernetic Revolution (resources and energy saving, miniaturization, and individualization). (shrink)

This article starts with a brief analysis of the causes of state collapse as states undergo the process of political evolution. Next, I describe and analyze the mechanisms of social-political crises arising in the process of modernization. Such crises are a consequence of the inability of many traditional institutions and ideologies to keep up with changes in technology, communication, system of education, medical sphere, and with the demographic change. This analysis suggests that an accelerated development can cause a system crisis (...) with potentially serious consequences to the society. It is important to take this aspect into consideration because some scholars insist that the economic reconstruction and development are necessary for nation-building. This actually implies a rapid economic advancement (otherwise, the economy could not be reconstructed and developed). However, one should not ignore the possibility that very rapidly developing countries may run the danger of falling into the trap of fast transformation. The present article describes several mechanisms that can contribute to sociopolitical instability, including social tensions arising from rapid urbanization, youth bulges, and ‘resource curses’. (shrink)

This article analyzes the global causes of the contemporary crisis and the possibilities to eliminate the most acute problems that have generated this crisis. It analyzes both the negative role of the world financial flows and their important positive functions including the ‘insurance’ of social guaranties at the global scale. In connection with the outcome of the crisis it analyzes the conditions of possible transformations of the world system and the possibility of various global scripts of its near future. It (...) gives a characteristic of the coming ‘epoch of new coalitions’; it gives some futuristic prognosis. (shrink)

The article analyzes the technological shifts which took place in the second half of the 20th and early 21st centuries and forecasts the main shifts in the next half a century. On the basis of the analysis of the latest achievements in inno-vative technological directions and also on the basis of the opportunities pro-vided by the theory of production revolutions the authors present a detailed analysis of the latest production revolution which is denoted as ‘Сybernetic’. The authors give some forecasts (...) about its development in the nearest five decades and up to the end of the 21st century. It is shown that the development of various self-regulating systems will be the main trend of this revolution. The authors argue that at first the transition to the beginning of the final phase of the Cybernetic Revolution will start in the field of medicine (in its some innovative directions). In future we will deal with the start of convergence of innovative technologies which will form the system of MBNRIC-technologies (i.e. the technological paradigm based on medicine, bio- and nanotechnologies, robotics, IT and cognitive technologies). The article gives a detailed analysis of the future breakthroughs in medicine, bio- and nanotechnologies as well as some other technologies in terms of the development of self-regulating systems with their growing ability to select optimum modes of functioning as well as of other characteristics of the Cybernetic Revolution (resources and energy saving, miniaturization, individualization, etc.). (shrink)

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifi cally the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfi lms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this (...) publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specifi c statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. (shrink)

The present article analyzes the world order in the past, present and future as well as the main factors, foundations and ideas underlying the maintaining and change of the international and global order. The first two sections investigate the evolution of the world order starting from the ancient times up to the late twentieth century. The third section analyzes the origin and decline of the world order based on the American hegemony. The authors reveal the contradictions of the current unipolar (...) world and explain in what way globalization has become more profitable for the developing countries but not for the developed ones. In the paper also explains the strengthening belief that the US leading status will inevitably weaken. In this connection we discuss the alternatives of the American strategy and the possibility of the renaissance of the American leadership. The last section presents a factor analysis which allows stating that the world is shifting toward a new balance of power and is likely to become the world without a leader. The new world order will consist of a number of large blocks, coalitions and countries acting within a framework of rules and mutual responsibility. However, the transition to a new world order will take certain time (about two decades). This period, which we denote as the epoch of new coalitions, will involve a reconfiguration of the World System and bring an increasing turbulence and conflict intensity. (shrink)

In the present paper, on the basis of the theory of production principles and production revolutions, we reveal the interrelation between K-waves and major technological breakthroughs in history and make some predictions about features of the sixth Kondratieff wave in the light of the Cybernetic Revolution which, we think, started in the 1950s. We assume that the sixth K-wave in the 2030s and 2040s will merge with the final phase of the Cybernetic Revolution (which we call the phase of self-regulating (...) systems). This period will be characterized by breakthroughs in medical technologies which will manage to combine many other technologies into a single complex of MBNRIC-technologies (med-bio-nano-robo-info-cognitive technologies). The article offers some predictions concerning the development of these technologies. (shrink)

The article offers forecasts of the geopolitical and geo-economic development of the world in the forthcoming decades. One of the main accusations directed toward globalization is that it deepens the gap between the developed and developing countries dooming them to eternal backwardness. The article demonstrates that the actual situation is very different. It is shown that this is due to the globalization that the developing countries are generally growing much faster than the developed states, the World System core starts weakening (...) and its periphery begins to strengthen. At the same time there is a continuing divergence between the main bulk of developing countries and the group of the poorest developing states. The article also explains why the globalization was bound to lead to the explosive rise of many developing countries and the relative weakening of the developed economies. In the forthcoming decades this trend is likely to continue (though, of course, not without certain interruptions). It is also demonstrated that this convergence constitutes a necessary condition for the next technological breakthrough. (shrink)

Some important correlations between medium-term economic cycles (7–11 years) known as Juglar cycles and long (40–60 years) Kondratieff cycles are presented in this paper. The research into the history of this issue shows that this aspect is insufficiently studied. Meanwhile, in our opinion, it can significantly clarify both the reasons of alternation of upswing and downswing phases in K-waves and the reasons of relative stability of the length of these waves. It also can provide the certain means for forecasting. The (...) authors show that adjacent 2–4 medium cycles form the system the important characteristic of which is the dynamics of economic trend. The latter can be upswing (active) or downswing (depressive). The mechanisms of formation of such medium-term trends and changing tendencies are explained. The presence of such clusters of medium cycles (general duration of which is 20–30 years) determines to a large degree the long-wave dynamics and the characteristics of its timing. Thus, not medium-term J-cycles depend on the character of K-wave phase as Kondratieff supposed, but the character of the cluster of J-cycles determines significantly the character of K-wave phases. (shrink)

In the present paper, on the basis of the theory of production principles and production revolutions, we reveal the interrelation between K-waves and major technological breakthroughs in history and make forecasts about features of the sixth Kondratieff wave in the light of the Cybernetic Revolution that, from our point of view, started in the 1950s. We assume that the sixth K-wave in the 2030s and 2040s will merge with the final phase of the Cybernetic Revolution (which we call a phase (...) of self-regulating systems). This period will be characterized by the breakthrough in medical technologies which will be capable to combine many other technologies into a single complex of MANBRIC-technologies (med-bio-nano-robo-info-cognitive technologies). The article offers some forecasts concerning the development of these technologies. (shrink)

Machery et al. presented data suggesting the existence of cross-cultural variation in judgments about the reference of proper names. In this paper, we examine a previously overlooked confound in the subsequent studies that attempt to replicate the results of Machery et al. using East Asian languages. Machery et al. and Sytsma et al. claim that they have successfully replicated the original finding with probes written in Chinese and Japanese, respectively. These studies, however, crucially rely on uses of articleless, ‘bare noun (...) phrases’ in Chinese and Japanese, which according to the linguistic literature are known to be multiply ambiguous. We argue that it becomes questionable whether the extant studies using East Asian languages revealed genuine cross-cultural variation when the probes are reevaluated based on a proper linguistic understanding of Chinese and Japanese bare noun phrases and English definite descriptions. We also present two experiments on native Japanese speakers that controlled the use of ambiguous bare noun phrases, the results of which suggest that the judgments of Japanese speakers concerning the reference of proper names may not diverge from those of English speakers. (shrink)

The role of China in the world economy is constantly growing. In particular we observe that it plays more and more important role in the support of theworld economic growth (as well as high prices of certain very important commodities). In the meantime the perspectives of the Chinese economy (as well as possible fates of the Chinese society) remain unclear, whereas respective forecasts look rather contradictory. That is why the search for new aspects and modes of analysis of possible development (...) of China turns out to be rather important for the forecasting of global futures. This article employs a combination of scientific methods that imply (a) the analysis at the level of Chinese economic model; (b) the analysis at regional level (at this level the Chinese economic model is compared with the regional East Asian model); (c) the analysis at the global level that relies on the modified world-system approach that allows to answer the question whether China will replace the USA as the global leader. It is important that the analysis is conducted simultaneously in economic, social, demographic, and political dimensions. As regards the analysis of specific features of the Chinese model as an especial type of the East Asian model (that is based on the export orientation, capital & technology importation, as well as cheap labor force), we note as organic features of the Chinese model the totalitarian power of the Communist Party and the immenseness of resources. As regards special features of the Chinese model, we note (in addition to “cheap ecology” and cheap labor force) and emphasize that China has a multilevel (in a way unique) system of growth driving forces, where, as opposed to developed states, the dominant role belongs not to native private capital, but to state corporations, local authorities and foreign business. This explains the peculiarities of the Chinese investment (or rather overinvestment), which determines high growth rate up to a very significant degree. A unique feature of the Chinese model is the competition of provinces and territories for investments and high growth indicators. As regards perspectives of the global hegemony of China, we intend to demonstrate that, on the one hand, economic and political positions of China will strengthen in the forthcoming decades, but, on the other hand, China, assuming all possible future success, will be unable to take the USA position in the World System. We believe that in a direct connection with the development of globalization processes the hegemony cycle pattern is likely to come to its end, which will lead to the World System reconfiguration and the emergence of its new structure that will allow the World System to continue its further development without a hegemon. Finally, the article describes some possible scenarios of the development of China. We demonstrate that China could hardly avoid serious difficulties and critical situations (including those connected with demographic problems); however, there could be different scenarios of how China will deal with the forthcoming crisis. We also come to the conclusion that it would be better for China to achieve a slowdown to moderate growth rates (that would allow China to go through the forthcoming complex transition period with less losses) than to try to return at any cost to explosive growth rates attested in the 2000s. (shrink)

Concerns about population ageing apply to both developed and many developing countries and it has turned into a global issue. In the forthcoming decades the population ageing is likely to become one of the most important processes determining the future society characteristics and the direction of technological development. The present paper analyzes some aspects of the population ageing and its important consequences for particular societies and the whole world. Basing on this analysis, we can draw a conclusion that the future (...) technological breakthrough is likely to take place in the 2030s (which we define as the final phase of the Cybernetic Revolution). In the 2020s – 2030s we will expect the upswing of the forthcoming sixth Kondratieff wave, which will introduce the sixth technological paradigm (system). All those revolutionary technological changes will be connected, first of all, with breakthroughs in medicine and related technologies. We also present our ideas about the financial instruments that can help to solve the problem of pension provision for an in-creasing elderly population in the developed countries. We think that a more purposeful use of pension funds' assets together with an allocation (with necessary guarantees) of the latter into education and upgrading skills of young people in developing countries, perhaps, can partially solve the indicated problem in the developed states. (shrink)

The monograph presents the ideas about the main changes that occurred in the development of technologies from the emergence of Homo sapiens till present time and outlines the prospects of their development in the next 30–60 years and in some respect until the end of the twenty-first century. What determines the transition of a society from one level of development to another? One of the most fundamental causes is the global technological transformations. Among all major technological breakthroughs in history the (...) most important are three production revolutions: 1) the Agrarian Revolution; 2) the Industrial Revolution; and 3) the Cybernetic one. The book introduces the theory of production revolutions which is a new valuable explanatory paradigm that analyzes causes and trends of dramatic shifts in historical process. The authors describe the course of technological transformations in history and demonstrate a possible application of the theory to explain the present and forthcoming technological changes. They analyze the technological shifts which took place in the second half of the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries and forecast the main shifts in the next half a century. On this basis the authors present a detailed analysis of the latest production revolution which is denoted as ‘Сybernetic’. They make some predictions about its development in the nearest five decades and up to the end of the twenty-first century and show that the development of various self-regulating systems will be the main trend of this revolution. The authors argue that the transition to the starting final phase of the Cybernetic Revolution (in the 2030–2040s) will first occur in the field of medicine (in some its innovative branches). In future we will deal with the started convergence of innovative technologies which will form the system of MANBRIC-technologies (i.e. the technological paradigm based on medicine, additive, nano- and bio- technologies, robotics, IT and cognitive technologies). The monograph gives an outline of the future breakthroughs in medicine and some other technologies (between the 2010s and 2070s). (shrink)

In the coming decades in the process of globalization the position of the USA and Europe will weaken, while the role of developing countries will increase. The role of the two largest emerging economies – China and India – will be of special significance. What future will these fast-growing giants face? The demographers agree that pretty soon India will lead the world in population and thus surpass China, while China will encounter serious ageing population problems. But economic and political scenarios (...) of the future are quite different: from resounding success and world leadership to collapse caused by demographic and socio-political troubles. Which of them is more feasible? In the present article I analyze the Chinese and Indian development models separately and comparatively and make a forecast of their perspectives in the 21st century. Such an analysis could be helpful for understanding Russia's ways of development. (shrink)

This paper studies the epistemic failures to reach understanding in relation to scientific explanations. We make a distinction between genuine understanding and its negative phenomena—lack of understanding and misunderstanding. We define explanatory understanding as inclusive as possible, as the epistemic success that depends on abilities, skills, and correct explanations. This success, we add, is often supplemented by specific positive phenomenology which plays a part in forming epistemic inclinations—tendencies to receive an insight from familiar types of explanations. We define lack of (...) understanding as the epistemic failure that results from a lack of an explanation or from an incorrect one. This can occur due to insufficient abilities and skills, or to fallacious explanatory information. Finally, we characterize misunderstanding by cases where one’s epistemic inclinations do not align with an otherwise correct explanation. We suggest that it leads to potential debates about the explanatory power of different explanatory strategies. We further illustrate this idea with a short meta-philosophical study on the current debates about distinctively mathematical explanations. (shrink)

The analysis of long economic cycles allows us to understand long-term worldsystem dynamics, to develop forecasts, to explain crises of the past, as well as the current global economic crisis. The article offers a historical sketch of research on K-waves; it analyzes the nature of Kondratieff waves that are considered as a special form of cyclical dynamics that emerged in the industrial period of the World System history. It offers a historical and theoretical analysis of K-wave dynamics in the World (...) System framework; in particular, it studies the influence of the long wave dynamics on the changes of the world GDP growth rates during the last two centuries. Special attention is paid to the interaction between Kondratieff waves and Juglar cycles. The article is based on substantial statistical data, it extensively employs quantitative analysis, contains numerous tables and diagrams. On the basis of the proposed analysis it offers some forecasts of the world economic development in the next two decades. The article concludes with a section that presents a hypothesis that the change of K-wave upswing and downswing phases correlates significantly with the phases of fluctuations in the relationships between the World-System Core and Periphery, as well as with the World System Core changes. (shrink)

In the coming decades in the process of globalization the position of the USA and Europe will weaken, while the role of developing countries will increase. The role of the two largest emerging economies – China and India – will be of special significance. What future will these fast-growing giants face? The demographers agree that pretty soon India will lead the world in population and thus surpass China, while China will encounter serious population ageing. But economic and political scenarios of (...) the future are quite different: from resounding success and world leadership to collapse caused by demographic and socio-political troubles. Which of them is more feasible? In the present article I analyze the Chinese and Indian development models separately and comparatively and make prognosis of their perspectives in the twenty-first century. Such an analysis could be helpful for understanding Russia's ways of development. (shrink)

Supporters of the Evaluative Judgment Theories of Emotion mainly explore emotions from the perspective of cognitive evaluation and advocate that emotions are evaluative judgments. The Perceptual Theories of Emotion have made some modifications to the evaluative judgment of emotions, attempting to propose better theories. The Perceptual Theories of Emotion advocate verifying the similarities between emotions and perceptions through analogical reasoning. However, the Perceptual Theories of Emotion also have their problems. Compared to the Evaluative Judgment Theories of Emotion and the Perceptual (...) Theories of Emotion, the Embodied Emotion Theory has significant advantages, mainly reflected in avoiding the drawbacks of over-intellectualize emotions by evaluative judgments; infants and animals can also understand emotions through non-conceptualized ways of self-awareness and understanding of social rules and norms; the core relational property of emotions revealed in the embodied emotion theory demonstrates the action orientation of emotions, connects the organism’s body and external environment, and integrates both biological and social aspects, further clarifying the complexity and diversity of emotions. (shrink)

Starting from the many-world interpretation of quantum mechanics, this work gives a holistic view of consciousness. The entirety is complete and does not possess any particular physical properties or subjective experience. It is the superposition of all possibilities. Its partition, however, gives rise to physical properties and subjective experience simultaneously. They play complementary roles to each other. The latter cannot be conveyed to a third person, and cannot be reduced to the former. It in fact fills the informational gap which (...) is impossible for the former to fill. The casual effect and the privilege of subjective experience are related to the role it plays, which is to identify the subject's self location. (shrink)

Мировой порядок как система определенных идей и правил, господ-ствующих в международной политике, стал формироваться в Европе начиная с XVI в., окончательно утвердившись в XIX столетии. Однако этот порядок держится обычно в пределах трех-четырех десятилетий, а затем под влиянием изменившихся обстоятельств и нового баланса сил меняется. В настоящее время мы как раз переживаем период смены ми-рового порядка и начала формирования новой его системы. В статье анализируется начало ослабления мирового порядка, основанного на американской гегемонии, рассматриваются характерные черты и методы, которые используют США (...) для поддержания своих позиций в мире. Автор показывает, почему не могла надолго установиться абсолютная американская гегемония, каким образом глобализация стала более выгодной не для развитых, а для развивающихся стран, как постепенно формировалось убеждение в неизбежности ослабления ли-дерских позиций США. В статье дается характеристика современного положения в международных отношениях как ситуации, когда началась реконфигурация Мир-Системы, что должно означать наступление эпохи турбулентности и формирования новых коалиций. Это будет своего рода переходная эпоха к более устойчивому новому мировому порядку, становление которого будет непростым. Автор высказывает идеи от-носительно того, в каком направлении и как этот новый порядок будет формироваться, о возможных принципах этого порядка и механизмах его установления. (shrink)

The present working paper analyzes the world order in the past, present and future as well as the main factors, foundations and ideas underlying the maintaining and change of the international and global order. The first two sections investigate the evolution of the world order starting from the ancient times up to the late twentieth century. The third section analyzes the origin and decline of the world order based on the American hegemony. The authors reveal contradictions of the current unipolar (...) world and explain in what way globalization has become more profitable for the developing countries but not for the developed ones. The paper also explains the strengthening belief that the US leading status will inevitably weaken. In this connection we discuss the alternatives of the American strategy and the possibility of the renaissance of the American leadership. The last section presents a factor analysis which allows stating that the world is shifting toward a new balance of power and is likely to become the world without a leader. The new world order will consist of a number of large blocks, coalitions and countries acting within a framework of rules and mutual responsibility. However, the transition to a new world order will take certain time (about two decades). This period, which we denote as the epoch of new coalitions, will involve a reconfiguration of the World-System and bring an increasing turbulence and conflict intensity. There are grounds to conclude that in 2011–2012 the World-System experienced to some extent a phase transition to a qualitatively new state of global protest activity. This phase transition is shown to bear some resemblance to the one which the World-System experienced in the early 1960s. The first (after 1919) phase transition of this sort occurred in the early 1960s and was related to the growth of global informational connectivity after the World War II, as well as the improvement of the means of protest self-organization due to the spread of television, portable radio receivers, portable electric loud-speakers and other technologies of the Fourth Kondratieff Cycle. The phase transition of the early 2010s was prepared by a new wave of growth of global informational connectivity, as well as the improvement of the means of protest self-organization due to the spread of various technologies of the Fifth Kondratieff cycle (the Internet, satellite television, Twitter and other social networks, mobile telephony etc.). Similarly to what was observed during the Fourth Kondratieff Wave, during the Fifth Cycle while the spread of these technologies was going on for many years before 2011, their internal colossal potential for generating and spreading protest activity was realized in one leap, as a phase transition. (shrink)

Основой первого технологического уклада стали прорывные инновации в текстильной промышленности. В 1730 г. Джоном Кеем был изобретен челночный ткацкий станок. В результате ткачество стало значительно опережать по объемам прядение. Наиболее быстрый процесс механизации прядения (а позже и других операций) начался в 1760–1770-е гг. Это было время изобретения Джеймсом Харгривсом прялки «Дженни» и Ричардом Аркрайтом – аппарата для механической фабрикации пряжи, используемого на его же фабриках. Но за этими успехами стоял труд немалого числа изобретателей предшествующих десятилетий (см.: Цейтлин 1940; Gri- nin, (...) Korotayev 2015), поскольку для начала технологического прорыва необходимо накопление усилий очень многих людей. (shrink)