Этос креативности и интеллектуальный класс

Abstract

The article offers a cultural and anthropological analysis of the existence and functioning of the ethos of creativity as a social phenomenon and a way of human existence. The author maintains that the ethos of creativity should be considered in the socio-ontological and existential-personalistic dimensions. The ethos of creativity is viewed as a concept which encompasses a historically defined collection (ensemble) of intellectual practices in all types of creativity: in logic, aesthetics, ethics, theology and personal search for religious transcendence. It is important to emphasize that participation in the ethos of creativity is inherent to all, from a first-grader to a renowned scientist. The personality is found in it to come out of it and to become an invention itself, turning the natural chaos into a social cosmos. The ethos of creativity determines the personalistic attraction to culture, by analogy with the natural-anthropological vitality — i. e., the individual and generic attraction to life. The concept of intellectual class includes the idea of cultural diversity, cultural dynamics, and interaction of cultures. The intellectual class is an open system because it is dominated by reason. And faith, morality and aesthesis must be reasonable. The ethos of creativity that forms the intellectual class is a highly competitive environment in which competition is based on Golden rules. For the mind, the Golden rule is the logical-epistemological norm of scientific search and the relevant formality of its results. For faith, it is theological honesty — i. e., a cultural and anthropological understanding of religious practices, and refrainment from diminishing or destroying others’ sanctuaries. The Golden rule of esthesis is an ontological and anthropological requirement for affirmation and retention of life-creating tendencies in various forms of aesthetic creativity. In the context of a holistic historical process, the ethos of creativity and the intellectual class are another name for the “spirit” of Hegel and the “cultural idealism” of neo-Kantianism. In other words, culture is predetermined and inevitable as the revelation of a specific immanent principle: the ethos of creativity.