Eternal Questions Research Articles

БОГОИСКАТЕЛЬСТВО В ПРОЗЕ П. ЛАГЕРКВИСТА

Thematic justification for the article is the growing interest of researchers for so called minor literatures, including Swedish literature, as well as for the philosophical and religious themes in literary texts. The choice of topic is also motivated by the small number of research papers on Pär Lagerkvist’s works in Russian, despite the importance of his legacy for global culture. The goal of the article is to analyze the motif of god-seeking in Pär Lagerkvist’s prose and its transformation throughout his body of work. In the article the following conclusions are drawn: The motif of God-seeking, which is linked to the search for the truth and answers to eternal questions, plays an important role in P. Lagerkvist’s works, and its transformation reflects the evolution of his religious and philosophical views. While in the beginning of his literary career Lagerkvist thought it possible to give answers to eternal questions, later in his life searching and doubt themselves take on greater and greater importance and are interpreted as the human condition. The article offers a classification of the motif of god-seeking in relation to P. Lagerkvist’s body of work: outer (“The Eternal Smile”, “The Hangman”) and inner manifestations (“Barabbas”, “Guest of Reality”). In relation to the motif of god-seeking an especial importance of the figure of Jesus Christ, who symbolizes the humanistic and Christian ideal, is noted as one of the key elements of P. Lagerkvist’s poetic style.

Anthropological Issues in the Work of Ibn Sina

The article analyzes the scientific and philosophical heritage of Ibn Sina, one of the most prominent representatives of the Middle East philosophy. Ibn Sina, an outstanding scientist and physician of the Eastern Renaissance, is among the first-class scholars in world culture, science, philosophy and medicine. The problem of man takes a central place in the creative work of a scientist. The creative work of Ibn Sina, especially his anthropological teaching, promotes finding answers to questions arising in the process of knowing some aspects of nature and the very essence of man, and partly on the global challenges of the modern world. It is precisely in his work that the eternal questions of human existence are addressed and resolved. Ideas of Ibn Sina were and remain genius, he considered a man in terms of a holistic approach, laid the foundations for modern medical ethics, defined a system of fundamental ethical concepts that have specific medical, biological and clinical content. He regarded man as the inseparable unity of spirit, soul and body. The scientific and philosophical heritage of Ibn Sina is a very important link of the only cultural tradition of mankind. The scientist introduced new ideas in many fields of scientific activity

THE IMAGE OF CONTEMPORARIES IN THE ORALKHAN BOKEI’S STORY «BARI DE MAIDAN»

The article deals with the essence and meaning of Oralkhan Bokei’s stories and narratives. The ways of creating images of heroes in the Oralkhan Bokei’s stories and narratives are analyzed. The writer poses an issue going through time and remaining relevant. O. Bokei, through a contemporary hero, presents the problems of contradictory person who is eager to know the meaning of life. O. Bokei was able to show a deep and dramatic processes of destruction of harmony in the relationships, leaving of man from the earth. The characters of such heroes as Aka, Alma, and Kumyray are depicted in tense moments of crisis: choice, self-knowledge, memories, and frustration. The search for answers to eternal questions about the meaning of life and the continuity of generations requires the writer to analyze the feelings and innermost spiritual experiences of a contemporary. In the spiritual and moral quest, each of the characters shows their own nature. The modern Bokei’s hero reflects the situation of moral and cultural vacuum: traditional values developed by the millennial way of life were devalued in the eyes of young people. This is the reason for the tragedy of a whole generation of our contemporaries, masterfully reflected in the Oralkhan Bokei’s wok.

Концепт сердца: размышления свт. Феофана Затворника в контексте русской религиозной философии XIX в.

The paper presents the author’s study of the concept of the Heart in the philosophical and theological thought of the largest figure in Russian culture of the 19th century – St. Theophan the Recluse (G.V. Govorov). Pointing to the broad semantic context of religious and philosophical thought, in which the thoughts of St. Theophan are immersed, the author refers to the works of I.V. Kireevsky, A.S. Khomyakov, I.A. Ilyin, P.A. Florensky, B.P. Vysheslavtseva et al. dedicated to the philosophy of the Heart. The position of St. Theophan is distinguished by a consistent practical appeal to the Christian mystical-ascetic tradition of the seeker. According to St. Theophan, the conceptual and philosophical recognition of the Heart is a symbol of the innermost being of the Russian soul and also the instance of self-knowledge (“human self-awareness”); the retention of this instance in the horizon of self-knowledge allows us to avoid the dualism of a rationalistic and/or sensualistic understanding of human nature. St. Theophan prefers not theoretical or modeling approaches to human research but a holistic, practical understanding of the vital completeness of human experience, the fundamental openness of real human existence up to the dialogical appeal to the Primary Image, in the sympathetic equality of faith and truth and in the hope of finding answers to eternal questions related to the purpose and meanings of human being. The work concludes that the practical conceptualization of the Heart, outlined by St. Theophan, remains relevant for modern philosophical and anthropological research, in the era after postmodernism, when the processes of a return understanding of historically different anthropological paradigms are really activated.

Общие черты жизни иранской и русской элиты на примере жизни Джалала Але Ахмада и Л. Н. Толстого

In this scientific work, we consider the role of educators in the Iranian-Russian cultural societies by bringing up examples of the life of two famous writers: Jalal Ale Ahmad and L. N. Tolstoy. The years of the life of both thinkers are twisted by eternal questions about the social state of life of their people and the welfare of their homeland. They both came to the conclusion that the role of teaching is a lot in the destiny of man. Parenting forms the personality of a person. Both thinkers began to work as teachers in schools. Like major writers and educators, both of them belonged to the elite layers of their society. They expressed their thoughts through the prism of their literary works. They both dropped out: Jalal dropped out of his higher education in his final year of postgraduate studies in Persian literature; L. N. Tolstoy could not adapt himself to the education system of Kazan University. Both writers delve deeply into the issue of religion. In the last years of their lives, they left their homes: Tolstoy abandons his house at the age of which he is so fragile and even cannot stand the freezing weather of Winter; he falls ill and succumbs to death at Astapovo station. In the last years of his life, Jalal and his wife went to live in a village in Gilan province. With this decision, they were both trying to change their life condition.

Pandemic and the Figure of Philosopher

The article explores the philosophical discourse that has formed in the context of the development of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. The role of philosophy in evaluating a number of socio-political problems caused by this pandemic is evaluated and various forms of attitude to the pandemic among philosophers are analyzed. It was shown that the coronavirus pandemic gave impetus to rethinking the foundations of philosophy and was used as an informational occasion and a tool for conceptualizing and promoting a number of philosophical ideas, in particular, such as “camp”, “state of emergency”, and “biopolitics” (in particular, this is characteristic for the position of J. Agamben). At the same time, in the context of the pandemic, the position of suspending philosophical expert judgments was articulated, due to the limited knowledge of the pandemic and the particular rooted philosophy in important “eternal questions”, but not able to respond urgently to urgent (G. Harmann), and the relevance of the moral act of silence, expressing solidarity with the people who took the blow of the tragic situation (K. Malabo). In addition, the article explores the problem of revising philosophical concepts that were especially common during the coronavirus pandemic. The polysemantic complexity of the concept of “exception” is noted. In particular, broad connotations of the concepts of “exclusion” and “exclusivity” were considered. It is demonstrated that the practice of exclusion causes a process of biopolitical isolation. Exception transgresses into self-exclusion, and it, in turn, echoes the concepts of racial, caste, ethnic purity. An exception in the biopolitical sense, considered in the narrow context of quarantine measures taken and provoking protest from J. Agamben, may be adjacent to the existing violent mechanisms of sociocultural exclusion and ontological exclusion. Consideration of the various positions of philosophers made it possible to explicate in the context of the emerging discourse on a pandemic an association associated with the well-known thought experiment, the “Mary's room” by F. Jackson, widely discussed among representatives of the philosophy of consciousness.

The narrative in vocal music: the genre aspect

The narrative in vocal music: the genre aspect

Evolution of perception of “living” in religious and philosophical discourse

Modern scientific discourse, basing on the postnonclassical scientific world picture and on the permanent-transitive fluctuations of the postmodern period, still includes such eternal questions as the problem of a man, human life and health, the fundamental factors of the world and human being in the world. Life is the only biologically possible way of human being in the world. Its value lies not only in the specificities of existing biological forms and various manifestations, which are nevertheless a unique phenomenon of being in their totality, but also in the possibility of self-reflection, conscious experience of the phenomenon itself and the ability to form symbolic pictures of the existential world on this basis. The purpose of the article is to examine the transformation of scientific discourse on the concept of “living” within the framework of the formation and development of religious and ethical studies. To achieve this purpose, the author analyzes the categorical framework of the concept of “living”. Analyzing classical philosophical and modern scientific approaches to the definition of the concept of “living”, the author distinguishes two main approaches to the definition of life: substrate and functional. In the article the main attention is focused on the analysis of religious and bioethical discourses in the study of “living”. Bioethical discourse proceeds from the need for identifying moral norms and imperatives that can answer the question of the limits of the existence of “living” and determine the moral possibilities of impact (expansion or narrowing) on these limits. One of the fundamental problems of bioethics is the problem of life as a value. In modern bioethical discourse there are two main points of view in this regard. The first may be named the ethics of the sacrality of life or life as the highest value (sanctity of life), the second – the ethics of the quality life (quality of life). The sacrality of life implies an attitude to the phenomenon of “living” as to the object of exceptional weight, of the most important value, and on this basis requires a reverent attitude to it. This approach has the most clear and full representation by modern religious discourse. The religious content of the bioethical discourse on “living” is manifested, firstly, in approval of the objective ontological status of the human personality by the Christian personalism; secondly, in the teachings of Christian theologians who claim the beauty and righteousness of life created by God, where nature and human are understood as something sacral, and therefore the actions against them are sinful and unacceptable; thirdly, the basis of human life is rooted in the spiritual world of human himself related to the divine transcendence. In is concluded that modern religious and ethical discourse forms a system of categories and concepts that describe applied ethical conceptual constructs in order to form a person’s moral attitude to all living. The proposed author’s approach allowed establishing the essence of modern bioethical discourse in the study of “living”.

ETHICS IN TEACHING

A teacher, an educator, a professor, an instructor is a noble profession. The twenty-first century has its own challenges, demands and needs to be tackled. Medieval literature and the beginnings of Slavic literacy in Macedonia are the aspects we are addressing. How to adjust the distant ninth century to today's modern times in a versatile way, interesting to students? How to conduct an exegesis of St. Clement's teachings, the hymnographical verses of St. Naum of Ohrid, the lives of a great many Saints? These are the challenges of the medievalists in the course of studies related to such programme contents. Medieval literature is for the most part theological, excepting the apocryphal literature which is non-canonical. Can the biblical phrase "Be perfect" be perceived in the modern living, and what aspects of interpretation can there be? Does perfection exist, or is there only the feat, the struggle for one's constant self-improvement and advancement towards ontological values? Sophists asked questions such as: Who am I?; Why am I?; What is the meaning of my existence? Existentialists further deepened these questions. We, once again, in the modern age, ask these eternal questions. How to convey the moral aspects of St. Clement of Ohrid in contemporary teaching? How to explain the eternally current issues related to ethics and the code of living in times of "lack" of ethics or its reduction? In St. Clement's didactic teachings, the ethical aspect is not only theological, but universal. In fact, St. Clement of Ohrid, as well as the most prominent educators and their teachers St. Cyril and St. Methodius of Thessaloniki, are cosmopolitan figures. Their aspects are universal codes of life directed towards continuous learning, progress and the light of human existence. Permanent personal growth is a lifelong process in which ethics is at the forefront, along with the remaining contemporary ethical norms of living. Learning ennobles the human personality. Enlightenment in Slavic literature proved that knowledge is the most powerful weapon of mankind.

Между долгом и блаженством: древнегреческие моральные императивы, мифология и современный американский кинематограф

The article treats the reception of ancient Greek mythology and history in modern American cinema. Modern directors do not just illustrate ancient narratives, but update them, enriching them with additional readings and subtexts. In the films considered, eternal questions are posed: life and death, duty and moral choice, the destiny of man and desire to become equal to the gods, but they are reinterpreted. It demonstrates that the ancient Greek myth continues its life in the modern cinema, which serves as a kind of contemporary mythology. In the V. Petersen’s film “Troy” man finds true immortality, embodied in heroism and glory. The director’s version of the Iliad still contains the spirit of the Homeric epic, but in doing so conveys later themes through it as well. Homer's tales of the heroes of Troy are filled with new breath, not least due to the anthropocentrism of the film. In O. Stone’s film “Alexander” not only the mythologization of ancient history can be seen, but it can also be comprehended through an even more ancient mythology. The mythological structure of the film is further emphasized by the cyclicity of the narrative, but the film is topical at the same time.

Digital Transformation in Aeronautics through the ICARUS Aviation Data and Intelligence Marketplace

Today, digital transformation has drifted all industries with its proven capacity to improve operations and boost revenues while building a value chain ecosystem. The aeronautics ecosystem is almost unanimously invested in some way into a digital transformation strategy in which data typically plays an instrumental role. However, despite the vast quantity of data across myriad parameters that never stop flowing across the aircraft-passengers-luggage-cargo journeys, the aviation-related stakeholders are still at a relative disadvantage in terms of data gathering and sharing, especially since the eternal questions of “who owns the aircraft” and “who owns the passenger” remain open. In this contact, the present paper focuses on the design and delivery of the ICARUS data and intelligence platform that aims to enable trusted and fair data sharing and insightful data analytics in an end-to-end secure manner. The methodology followed during the implementation of the ICARUS platform is defined, the aviation data value chain is elaborated, the ICARUS Minimum Viable Product is outlined and the theoretical foundations of the ICARUS data management and value enrichment methods are introduced, giving way to a brief reference to the ICARUS unique selling points and platform implementation.

Stephen Cherry, God-Curious: Exploring Eternal Questions; Vincent Strudwick with Jane Shaw, The Naked God: Wrestling for a Grace-ful Humanity

Stephen Cherry, <i>God-Curious: Exploring Eternal Questions</i>; Vincent Strudwick with Jane Shaw, <i>The Naked God: Wrestling for a Grace-ful Humanity</i>

Pensar el presente (En busca del sentido perdido)

En cierto sentido, cabría afirmar que la incertidumbre respecto al sentido del propio presente ha acompañado al ser humano desde siempre. Pero la sola persistencia de la cuestión no la convierte automáticamente en una de esas cuestiones eternas, que nunca dejaremos de plantearnos a pesar de saber que no tienen respuesta, como dio en decir un clásico (Kant). Acaso fuera mejor afirmar que no son eternas, pero sí persistentes, y que su interés reside en el hecho de que, a pesar de que el enunciado pueda haberse mantenido durante largo tiempo, lo que sin ningún género de dudas ha ido variando ha sido precisamente el tipo de respuestas que ha recibido. Respuestas que buscaban no solo entender lo que nos pasa, sino también dilucidar qué debemos hacer para que nos pasen mejores cosas de las que nos pasan. Lo que es como decir que, lo haya reconocido o no, la filosofía siempre ha ido de la mano de la política, y hoy no podía ser de otra manera. De ahí la diferencia entre las dos intervenciones que siguen. En la primera se habla de algo de lo que nos pasa, bajo el rubro “política”, mientras que en la segunda se aborda, bajo el rubro “filosofía”, la cuestión del destilado de conocimiento (o de desconocimiento) que obtenemos de dicha experiencia.

The Authenticity of Appropriation: One Hundred and Seventeen Synonyms as Proof

One of the eternal questions in the visual arts, including architecture, is that of the distinction between invention and tradition. Appropriation – copying, or borrowing – is a mechanism accepted in contemporary art and common for nineteenth-century Beaux-Arts architects, but is now loaded with cultural anxiety for contemporary architects. This alphabetical list of English language synonyms for appropriation aims to show just how far the horror and delight in copyright infringement is embedded in our fears, and also in our desires.

Eternal Questions of Gifted Education from the Aspect of University Teachers

Almost every man has different conception about the meaning of talent. The situation is similarly complicated among the professionals: Talent has so many definitions that it needs to create different categories to organize them. Hence “talent” has no official unified definition, characteristics of talent gives a knotty question even to the professionals who care with the investigation of talent, not only for laymen. Is it coded into our genes? Is it a privilege just for some persons? Could it be measured objectively? Such and similar questions (seven) were integrated into the questionnaire of this research. The main goal was to explore the opinion of the university-teachers (N=273) who have experience about the cooperation with talented students. After a general investigation, I have compared the attitudes among different science-areas. After that, I have compared it with a miscellaneous (in the aspect of the science-area) control group which consisted from German professors (N=48). 3Due to the ANOVA-results, we can conclude that there was concordance among the scientists of the different areas about the eternal dilemmas: In the cases of six questions from the seven, there was no significant difference among the groups (science-areas). The only exception was the question about the appearing-time of the talent (early or late?).

The Search for the Intersection of Form and Function: Looking for Clues into What Has Determined How, Why, and When Animals Came to Move the Way They Do.

The Search for the Intersection of Form and Function: Looking for Clues into What Has Determined How, Why, and When Animals Came to Move the Way They Do.

“Was he right?” R. G. Collingwood’s Rapprochement between Philosophy and History

Abstract R. G. Collingwood’s declaration that belief in “eternal questions” in philosophy is “merely a vulgar error, consequent on a kind of historical myopia which, deceived by superficial resemblances, failed to detect profound differences” has been vigorously discussed over the last sixty years, thanks partly to its resurrection by Quentin Skinner. But another of Collingwood’s provocative claims has been relatively neglected. If the claims and arguments of classic authors in the history of philosophy provide answers to questions that are not ours, but that are in fact limited to the context of their own time; and if the purpose of history is to illuminate those answers in light of their historical contexts, should historians ask – as Collingwood claimed they “must” – not only “what was So-and-so’s theory on such and such a matter?”, but also “was he right?”? Should the historian of ideas in a world of changing questions nevertheless describe a theory as “false” or “true”, as Collingwood does, or is truth assessment no proper part of the history of philosophy? This essay draws on the full range of Collingwood’s writings, and presents his strongest case for the claim that historians “must” ask “the truth question” about old philosophy.

Decisions in the Shadow of Finitude of Life: "Guided Decision-making" - A Classical Concept Adapted to Modern Times

In this essay, important factors affecting decision-making in the care of cancer patients are identified and discussed in the face of actual socio-economic changes. The article is based upon a book chapter in German describing recent changes in Germany and other European countries and it expresses personal opinions that can be used as a basis for further discussions. The fundamentally altered practical framework of patient-care in oncology, its ethical dimension and practical significance are elucidated. These changes have profound influence on patient-doctor communication and have to be taken into account in the education of medical students in this area of their future profession. This is especially true in the confrontation with eternal questions about the finitude of life and how to find a good ending with the most recent developments in medical oncology that force patients to make decisions on how they want to be treated. In this context, the ethical dimension of the patient-doctor dialogue is presented and a proposal is made to adapt the classical "shared decisionmaking concept" to a guided decision-making model.

Philosophy of religion: eternal questions, classical texts, new interpretations

Philosophy of religion: eternal questions, classical texts, new interpretations

GUEST EDITOR’S NOTE ON THE THIRD ANNIVERSARY OF THE REFERENDUM IN CRIMEA

As well-known phrase of Hugo Grotius sounds “law is that which does not contradict fairness.” Obviously, one of the eternal questions is whether it is always true. The question of the correlation between existing positive law (“the black letter of the law”) and reality, as well as historical fairness, is of current interest for all legal systems. This question is especially important as regards international law. The latter is to be the primary instrument for the international community, which has set ambitious goals for itself in the UN Charter, among them “to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained” (Preamble). Moreover, the principles of justice and international law are designated as the basis for the maintenance of peace and security of mankind (pt. 1, Art. 1). The issue of the correspondence of the “letter of law” and fairness (justice) sharply manifested itself in the problem of Crimea, which arose for lawyers, political scientists, historians more than three years ago. From the collapse of the USSR in 1991 until March 2014, little attention was paid by the international community to the Crimean people but, since its reunification with Russia, the Crimean peninsula has become an object of intense geopolitical interest. And all this time the debate on the legal assessment of the events and actions that have taken place has not abated. This issue of the Russian Law Journal is mainly devoted to the situation regarding Crimea over the past three years.