«How is all-planetary humanity possible? What is the format of its existence? Philosophy is essentially designed to solve this type of problem», — Doctor of Philosophy Sergei Proleev
Sergei Proleev — Doctor of Philosophy, Professor, Leading Researcher at the Institute of Philosophy of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. President of the Ukrainian Philosophical Foundation, editor-in-chief of the scientific and theoretical journal «Philosophical Thought»
― Sergei, my first question for you will be in the following form: what, in your opinion, is happening in the world as a whole? The philosopher’s vision: the next stage of the crisis or something more? Perhaps some kind of civilizational scrapping? What do you think?
― Now we live in the era of globalization. It means that planetary humanity is learning to live together. All-planetary humanity is a very young phenomenon. Its appearance is associated with the phenomenon of globalization and, in fact, it is an extremely serious test. We can say that a person in his history lived in different formations.
And now, historically, I have come to this format of planetary humanity. And what will follow from this is hard to say. But one thing can be said for sure: either a person learns to live in the format of an all-planetary humanity, or an extraordinary shock and, probably, some kind of collapse awaits human history. I hope it will not happen, but, in any case, the process is difficult and traumatic.
― When you say «collapse», what can it be — in the worst cases? I’m not talking about environmental disaster or nuclear Armageddon. It’s about some kind of social and anthropological catastrophe.
― To understand this, you need to comprehend the essence of the collision-test, which is contained in this phenomenon of all-planetary humanity. So what does it mean? It means that a situation has arisen in the life of people (now we are not turning to its origins), in which not a single people, not a single person can live, realize their life otherwise than in the semantic horizon of all-planetary humanity. This is how it happened, let’s not go back to why.
What does this situation mean in this case? Why is she carrying an extremely severe test? This is a situation where fatal differences coexist: cultural, mental, historical. All this can be summarized by the concept of cultural differences if we understand the culture broadly enough. And the important thing is that these differences are irreplaceable.
They exist and reproduce, but at the same time, these very different ways of life need to coexist somehow. And the problem of planetary humanity is the problem of how to coexist so that this coexistence does not turn into a conflict, aggression, in the end, a war of self-destruction.
― Then I will have a clarifying question, possibly taking the conversation to another level. In fact, if you look retrospectively at the history of civilization, then there were periods not of globalization, of course, but of the mutual influence of high cultures. Let’s say, Arab culture, which brought both Plato and Aristotle to Europe and which, in a sense, assimilated both Indian and Chinese philosophical culture.
That is, there was some kind of interpenetration at high levels. If you look, then, in my opinion, there is now a very depressing situation, when the levels, horizons of high culture, philosophical culture, seem to shrink. But Husserl wrote about this, then Heidegger in his works on the transformation of philosophy into an academic discipline.
And there is a feeling — I remember Vargas Llosa’s work «The Civilization of the Spectacle» — that in the modern world showmen have taken the place of philosophers. Therefore, the question is: what, in principle, then can be the modern horizon of this global humanity in a situation in which, perhaps, I am a pessimist, but nevertheless the philosophical horizons are not only in oblivion, but also actively discarded.
― In your reasoning there are several completely different plots. In particular, you started with the interaction of cultures. Of course, it has always happened as long as there are people on earth. There was always interaction between them, cultural exchange, influence. This is undoubtedly sometimes a very strong influence, assimilation, absorption and so on — everything can be deciphered.
And the question is that the current situation differs, firstly, in the irreversibility of this interaction, since in previous epochs all these interactions and influences had a more or less local character, even if they turned out to be a drama of absorption of one culture by another, then all the same they were local dramas. This is the first thing.
Secondly, one should not forget that humanity has gone through the stage of that world-wide historical project, or, shall we say, that project «world history» that was generated and implemented by European, in fact, Western civilization. It is also worth remembering that the whole history took on a worldwide character also in the recent past. At best, we can talk about the beginning of the modern era, that is, the last 400-500 years — which is quite a bit in terms of history.
And the current state is the world of the epoch of world history in the sense that modernity gave it. Because the world history, engendered by modernity, is a universal history. This is a story that unfolds on a universal basis. Where humanity appears as a kind of unity. As a kind of unified human nature, if we recall the natural-legal paradigm of modernity. Therefore, both the vector itself and the system of mutually related values, priorities, and so on constitute certain elements of this universal project.
The era of globalization is a completely different situation. This is the situation after the project of universal history, when this project has exhausted itself, it has lost its effectiveness. Again, I’m not going to analyze why, I’m just stating the state of things. Therefore, the current situation and the situation of cultural interaction that takes place in it is always a cultural exchange not only between interacting agents, but also a part of global interaction.
That is, always, in every interaction, even at the level of the individual, not only the direct agent of interaction comes into play, the global world in various forms comes into play. Let’s say the current so-called «information environment», or the information world, is one of its hypostases.
Global peace is not just a mechanical combination of everything and everyone on our planet. This, in particular, is the modern global information environment. Further, I do not intend to develop this motive, I simply demonstrate how different the situation of this cultural interaction is today. This is the first plot. Another plot, as I understand you, relates to the effect of philosophy in the modern world.
― Yes, exactly about that. I said that the project of universality was inevitably based on philosophy. What follows from this?
― The fact is that philosophy has its own essential mission and it may well fulfill this mission with dignity in the modern world. That is, no one takes away from philosophy as such this possibility, this right, and cannot take away from the very essence of the matter. Another thing is the state of this essential vocation of philosophy today. And the way, the forms in which philosophical discourse is being carried out today is a different question. And if we raise this question, then, of course, there are many unpleasant symptoms here.
In particular, today philosophy exists primarily as a university philosophy. And this, on the one hand, is a fairly traditional form of education. Still, philosophy within the university is a stable form of the existence of philosophical thinking. But, on the other hand, one must take into account that the present university, its place in culture, its effect (cultural, social, intellectual) is something different from what it was 100-200 years ago. I do not go into more ancient times.
And today the university itself is rapidly degrading. It is known that it is in crisis, and the university has been talking about the crisis for decades. This is also true. In general, people have been talking about it since the 19th century. What does it mean? We have a very deep crisis of the university, not just as an educational institution. Namely, the crisis of the university in its social and cultural role. That is, it has practically lost the role that the European university played in relation to culture and, in many respects, in society.
Again, why and how is another matter. And this degradation of the university as an institution, I repeat, not just educational, but also social, intellectual, cultural, it undoubtedly affects what is university philosophy. That is, in a nutshell, university philosophy is more and more reborn into what the classics of the once influential doctrine in our vastness called «philistinism.»
It is into this philistinism, intellectual rationality, and today’s university philosophy is being reborn, with a very solid respectability, with quite visible well-being, although this well-being is also called into question by the current existence of the university.
In fact, philosophy is increasingly shrinking in terms of its presence, in the power of its influence at the university. But on the whole, it retains its respectability, no one drives itwith a stick. However, at the same time, it implicitly refuses more and more from the solution of those large problems that constitute the essence of philosophy itself. As a result, what is called philosophy, less and less in the world ceases to be it.
― That is, in a sense, we have a challenge, a global challenge. And this challenge is related to what the new semantic horizon will be. Who then will be able, and will be able at all, to answer the question, what will be the semantic horizons of this global unity? Considering that, as you said, this issue carries with it irreparable contradictions.
― The fact that we are talking about the crisis of philosophy does not mean its crisis. Philosophy, in its vocation, in its potential, in its capabilities, is not defective, it has not lost its relevance, effectiveness and significance. On the contrary, perhaps in the current circumstances it becomes extremely urgent and necessary.
The crisis of the current state of philosophy, or, I emphasize, the existence of institutional forms of modern philosophy, consists precisely in the fact that this mass community, which bears the name of philosophers, refuses, and quite deliberately, from solving its own philosophical problems in the modern world.
Now, if there is a request, but this request is not noticed, but deal with a host of other tasks. The academic field provides the opportunity for endless pursuits. Playing with glass beads can last as long as you like. And if you pose the question of what kind of intellectual power, intellectual practice can solve how all-planetary humanity is possible and what format of its existence is probable, then philosophy is essentially designed to solve this type of problem.
― Certainly.
― For this, one must not deviate from the philosophical vocation, from the authentic spirit of philosophy. To follow it and actually solve this problem is really impartial, unbiased, without looking back at the numerous social, cultural, educational contexts that dictate your answer.
When a thinker is in a certain situation in which the context of his existence dictates answers to him, and he listens to this and begins to be sensitive not to the challenge that he must solve, but to this whisper of the context, formalizing it with all the strength of his education, then and it turns out this crisis of the current state is more likely the bearers of the philosophical cause than of philosophy itself.
― And now I come to the central question. Ukraine, it turns out, is also involved in this crisis. In the crisis and in the challenge of planetary humanity, and in the crisis of the institutional forms of culture, and in the crisis of the university, in the crisis of the institutional form of philosophy, plus a state of war. And what prospects do you see for Ukraine regarding all these issues? Is there a resource?
― You see, if we talk about the prospects of Ukraine, we need to decide on the subject of the conversation. We need to decide what we are talking about when we talk about Ukraine. Because there can be completely different interpretations here. The fact that you have listed various crises should not lead us into a state of any panic or shock. In general, a crisis is a natural state of any movement. This is a transitional situation, where, of course, there is no need to play with words, there is a crisis of death, a crisis of growth. Crises are also different.
But the current state of humanity is by no means hopeless. It is early to panic. As for the Ukrainian situation, in fact, it is important to understand: all the collisions — I would use this word instead of the crisis — and the tests of Ukrainian society are inseparable from those of modern humanity, because no one can evade participation in the global world: not a single people, not one country, not one corporation, and even an individual, family, and so on. In what form it happens is another question, how indirectly it happens is another question.
But nevertheless, even if there is some native in the Amazon jungle who has American dollars somewhere in his belt, then he is also a participant in the global world. So, the peculiarity of the Ukrainian situation lies in the fact that Ukraine fell into this set of modern challenges, without first solving a number of other historical problems. We are talking about the university crisis. But what is called by this word in Ukraine is very far from what is essentially a university.
― I agree.
― That is, in Ukraine, by and large, the task is to create a university. Even in that classical Humboldt understanding, although the Humboldt model is not the only one, but nonetheless. In the Ukrainian so-called higher school, which is too much school and too little university, it is still necessary to grow to the level of the university itself. Although you should not measure everyone with one ruler.
― But there are trends.
― Yes, but we are talking about some kind of mass situation. And if there are some gratifying exceptions that fit closer to the model of universities, they are mostly exceptions. And this situation generally reflects all the other problems of Ukraine in the modern world. The problem is that our country is falling into a kind of double loop. She has not solved the basic problems in relation to many public institutions yet.
And here it is not only the university, but also the judiciary, for example. Courts, law and order, just a political system. In the end, it is just entrepreneurship, because in our country we do not have a basic initial distinction, which alone does business in the proper sense of the word — it is the separation of business from power. We have a completely archaic fusion of business and government. Then the phenomenon of free enterprise at its core is abolished altogether.
― That is, it seems to exclude the institution of private property.
― Yes, in other words, we still need to form the institution of private property. Because in our country private property is not guaranteed due to the fact that the so-called power, generally speaking, the usurper power that exists within the political system, can revise property relations at any moment, even if we are talking about the largest owners.
Therefore, the main problem of Ukraine is that many other layers are piled on one layer of unresolved problems. But this is not a reason for despair, for lamentations «everything is lost, everything is lost.» No, in its own way, this situation, if you approach it thoughtfully and honestly, contains sufficient potential for productive decisions. But these decisions must be made and implemented, and not engaged in continuous demagoguery, which, unfortunately, is being done by the parasitic political layer.
― Does Ukraine have a resource to do all this, what is your opinion? What is the source of your optimism?
― What do you even call a resource?
― I mean, first of all, at least a minimal nucleus of the intellectual elite or civil society, which could at least solve these issues. Because if you imagine that we have a desert instead of both, then theoretically there is simply no one to turn to.
― First, we, of course, do not have a desert; all sorts of apocalyptic head grabs, in my opinion, are inappropriate. Ukraine has very significant resources. But they themselves mean little. Because resources are only opportunities. And these opportunities need to be used. The problem of Ukrainian reality is not so much in the absence of resources, intellectual, social, natural, etc., as in how to use them fruitfully. Why this does not happen is another question.
― Are there any chances that someone, something, some force will be able to use these resources fruitfully?
― Let me finish my thought. So, this is the first feature. My experience of communicating with foreign colleagues and a number of other situations of adequate interaction showed me one thing that initially surprised me a lot. It showed that our native intellectuals have much better training and education than one might have expected. I am not talking about a mass situation, I am talking about a certain circle.
The paradox of the Ukrainian situation is that along with an extremely unhealthy environment with intellectual cadres, when the country is simply overloaded with simulations of intellectual life, pseudoscience, production of pseudoscientific cadres, we see a fairly tangible core or circle of people who have a very decent intellectual training. And here the criterion is simple: they can conduct a dialogue with their European colleagues on an equal footing. And if we have this indicator, it means that it shows something. This is the first thing that I would like to point out.
And the second moment, the predicate, is that the very situation of action gives rise to agents. You can’t think that somewhere in the towers there are great minds, and just call — they themselves will come, invent and do everything. This has never happened anywhere else. The very situation of action gave rise to outstanding figures, it found them, called on, recruited and eventually created them. Difficulties created great generals, artists, thinkers.
I will not refer to well-known examples, but, say, it is not for nothing that so many brilliant artists were born in Renaissance Italy. And there were so many of them, because the colossal cultural activity of the popes unfolded. Moreover, not only the popes, but also all influential persons competed with each other in this field. And this colossal request for artistic genius, in general, gave birth to this genius.
I do not want to simplify, they say, there will be a request, but geniuses will appear — everything is somewhat more complicated. However, it is important that ready-made actors outside the action situation are nonsense. And just the peculiarity of the state of affairs in Ukraine is that there is no such real demand for intellectuals. First of all, on the part of the state. As I began in one of my articles a long time ago: «Reason in Ukraine has no rights».
― I agree with you.
― One of the forces that are lacking in our country is the autonomy of reason. One of the cornerstones of European civilization. If we are truly making this movement to Europe, we need to take care of these cornerstones. Because if they are not in the foundation, then all this Europeanization of Ukraine will turn out to be fiction.
― Then we have a vicious circle situation. There should be a request from the state, but there is no indication that it will appear at all.
― No, the fact is that the request may be not only from the state. If we are talking about the current Ukrainian philosophy, then it is actively being ousted from university life, from the structure of university education. This process was especially active about 5 years ago, and it continues. It is associated not just with some kind of irrational hatred of philosophy, but above all with the constant reduction of the university pie, the teacher’s bread, when they begin to cut and divide into these rations. Philosophy is nowhere a core subject, it is thrown to the sidelines.
This situation is not only with philosophy, this is the case, for example, with the same mathematics. So, in contrast to this marginalization of philosophy in the structure of university education, we see in recent years the ever-growing demand of society and citizens for philosophy. And this request is acquiring an ever more solid, serious, solid form.
That is, it may well be, let us dream about this, that from this request philosophy will acquire those possibilities of its existence that the state has never provided — the possibilities of philosophical research and translation, philosophical education, philosophical reason in general, its application to the vital tasks of society. It may well be that the trend will be just the same we expected.
