Knowing how to continue a sentence is power. Knowledge is power (aphorism)

Polemical notes. A “layman’s” view.

« » (Ecclesiastes 1:17,18).

Part I. Knowledge as an idol.

Knowledge as an object of worship and the foundation of a “bright future.”

Today, in recent, apostasy times, people who have moved away from Christianity are beginning to see more and more idols for worship. In the first place, of course, is Mammon - a deity personifying wealth and capital accumulation. You cannot serve God and mammon (Matthew 6:24), said the Savior two thousand years ago. Five centuries ago, a spiritual revolution called the “Reformation” took place in Europe, which legalized the worship of mammon. The bourgeois revolutions completed this legalization. The world has entered a phase of development commonly called capitalism.

I daresay that second in the pantheon of modern gods is knowledge. In Greek his name would sound like gnosis (gnosis) (γνώσις). This God has existed since time immemorial, but for a time when the world lived under Christianity, he went into the shadows. In modern times, the revival of gnosis began, and today this deity has occupied key positions in society. He has his own temples. Which? - Our universities and higher education institutions, which we often, without hesitation, call “temples of knowledge.” There is also a special holiday when mass worship of gnosis occurs - “day of knowledge” (September 1).

Theories of the “knowledge society” (another name is the “information society”) have been circulating in the West for a long time. According to these theories, it is no longer money and capital that will rule the world, but knowledge. Following the bourgeois revolutions come the so-called “ scientific and technological revolutions"(NTR). Such revolutions cannot be reduced only to a sharp increase in scientific discoveries and technological innovations. These are revolutions in human consciousness and worldview. Modern theories"knowledge societies" represent the rationale newest phase NTR - " knowledge revolution" In the pantheon of modern gods, according to these theories, there will be a reshuffle, and gnosis will take first place, pushing mammon to second. Knowledge will save humanity from crises, allow it to overcome social inequality, and subordinate not only earthly nature to it, but also the cosmos. They will also make a person perfect. And maybe even immortal. The latest desire of the “revolutionaries of knowledge” is manifested in the flowering of ideology transhumanism (from Latin trans - through, through, for and homo - person). It is primarily a philosophical concept, but also an international movement, supporting the use of science and technology to improve human mental and physical capabilities in order to overcome suffering, disease, aging and even death..

In the same “temples of knowledge,” future economists are taught that the highest and final stage of post-industrial society is “ knowledge economy" Courses are taught and textbooks are written on the “economy of knowledge,” and dissertations on this topic are defended. Some domestic representatives of the “corporation of scientists” say in all seriousness that Russia should immediately become a “knowledge society” from a raw materials semi-colony. In the words of the “classic” of Marxism, Russia, with the help of gnosis, can make a “leap from the kingdom of necessity to the kingdom of freedom.” Our intellectuals are accustomed to using terms that came to Russia “from there” and ending in “ism.” Given this habit, the mentioned model of society could be called “gnosticism.”

The concept " Gnosticism" is derived from the word "gnosis" and has existed since time immemorial. It has always denoted a certain set of philosophical and religious views (teachings), which we will talk about later. But today, in connection with plans to build a “knowledge society,” the term Gnosticism takes on additional meaning: a new type of society, ranking alongside “feudalism”, “capitalism”, “socialism”, “communism”.

The sages (also known as “ideological leaders,” “intellectual elite,” “scribes,” “outstanding thinkers,” etc.) have been teaching people the idea that knowledge can save and make humanity happy for a long time. Inexperienced citizens of our country are inclined to think that it all started in the USSR, where knowledge had a very high status. Typically, knowledge in the USSR always came with the definition of “scientific”. Respect and reverence for science actually meant the same reverence for knowledge. One of the largest circulation publications in the USSR was the magazine " Knowledge is power" True, reading this magazine regularly, many Soviet people thought that such a name was invented somewhere in the leadership of the CPSU. Only the most attentive and inquisitive knew that “Knowledge is power” is an aphorism of the English philosopher Francis Bacon (1561 - 1626).

From what I listened to at the institute in lectures on philosophy about Bacon (1969), I remember only the slogan of this philosopher: man must rule over nature. And we were also told in passing about the version that the works attributed to William Shakespeare are in fact the work of the brilliant Bacon. Already at the present time, becoming more deeply acquainted with the life and ideas of the English philosopher, I realized that Bacon is one of those who started the “revolution of knowledge” I mentioned above. In all encyclopedias and reference books he is included in the list of “founding fathers” of the scientific method of cognition, science in its modern understanding (he proposed the methods of induction and experiment). In all textbooks on philosophy he is ranked among the most authoritative representatives empirical line in philosophy New time.

Digging even deeper, I unexpectedly discovered that Bacon was also a prominent representative of Gnosticism. True, for some reason they don’t like to write about this in philosophy textbooks, but modern followers of Gnosticism proudly declare this. Here is what his modern Russian admirer writes about Francis Bacon himself: “Bacon, like Hermes, is the greatest and most mysterious figure among all the greatest scientists and mystics. The illegitimate son of Queen Elizabeth and the Earl of Leicester, he was a lord and held the titles Duke of Verulam and Viscount St Albany. Having become a major statesman, Bacon simultaneously studied science, literature, philosophy and alchemy, magic, astrology and other secret or mystical sciences. It is said that he was Newton's teacher and that Newton may actually be Francis Bacon." Although the author of the quoted material does not directly call Bacon a representative of Gnosticism, he lists signs that leave no doubt that the English philosopher belongs to this movement. With this in mind, you begin to perceive Bacon’s words, reproduced on the cover of a popular Soviet magazine, differently.

Knowledge, cognitive activity and mind.

What is knowledge? The range of definitions of the concept “knowledge” contained in textbooks, dictionaries, and encyclopedias is very wide. — Starting from primary empirical information received by a person through the five senses, as well as with the help of special technical means, to the final results of scientific research. That is, information in the form of “raw materials”, “semi-finished products” and “final products”. And all this information is “stored” on different “shelves” of a person’s memory. An important part of a person's life is primary cognitive activity - search, selection and “storage” of information.

Cognitive activity in a broad definition- not only the collection, selection and storage of knowledge in memory (“raw materials”), but also their processing with the help of the mind. In the language of economists, obtaining “added value” (increase in knowledge). The output is a new “final product”. The mind is even more important than knowledge. The mind has to produce “end products” every day (one might even say every second), which are called “solutions.” The solutions are very different. From choosing between good and evil or even between life and death. Before answering the question of what securities to invest your money in, or what to choose for dessert: cake or pie? By the way, the mind makes the final decision whether or not to store in memory the knowledge that comes into a person’s field of vision. Or what knowledge should be sought. If necessary, it can free the knowledge repository from unnecessary information. The mind, as we noted, reacts not only to current problems and challenges, but also constantly (every day, throughout life) tries to form a general picture of the world, or worldview. This the most important “end product” cognitive activity.

Because the mind is a rather mysterious sphere human existence, then not everyone can understand what it should be and how to improve it. There is often a substitution of concepts here. In some textbooks, the authors talk about ways to improve the mind, but in reality it turns out that they are talking about something else - improving the collection, selection and storage of information. It seems to me that throughout most of history man has paid more attention to the development of primary cognitive activity(collection, selection and storage of information) than the mind.

Knowledge as “process” and “bad infinity”.

I remember the words from my student days Heraclitus: « Knowing too much doesn't make you smarter" The ancient Greek philosopher warned people about the danger of a “distortion” between knowledge and intelligence. But, alas, such biases towards knowledge have always existed, but today they have become simply monstrous. By the way, some Europeans perceived Bacon’s famous formula “Knowledge is power” with caution. Yes, the English admiral Sydney Smith(1764-1840) played on Bacon’s formula as follows: “ Knowledge is strength, omniscience is weakness" Sounds even harsher than Heraclitus.

Hieromartyr Archbishop Hilarion (Trinity) in his article “Science and Life” (1913) he gives an instructive parable about a scientist. One day a young man, who has an elder mentor, comes to his teacher and enthusiastically reports that he has seen a real scientist. The elder asked the young man: what exactly did he see that impressed him? The young man replies that this scientist reads all the time. And in the morning, and during the day, and in the evening, and even at night. To which the elder asked the question: “When does he think?” After this, the student became confused and thought...

Archbishop Hilarion says that this parable dates back to ancient times. At the beginning of the twentieth century, everything was still more serious: “Isn’t that what we see now? Oh, of course, the same thing, even incomparably sadder, can be said about the learned man of our time. Humanity has accumulated too much knowledge up to now, and a scientist now needs to know too much. It seems at times that science has listened to the evil advice of the ancient tempter: you will be like gods, knowing everything. Omniscience is what science wants to be. Whether knowledge is necessary or not, whether it is useful or harmful, there is no question about this - just to know! With equal diligence and dedication, we study the curves along which ominous comets move in the boundless world space, and the digestive organs of the harmless May beetle, and the use of prepositions by the ancient Greek writer. Humanity already knows a lot: in the future it will learn even more.”

At all times, there were people who sought to accumulate knowledge as much as possible, but there were few of them (“bookworms”, “scribes”). Today there is an atmosphere in society that pushes most people to maximize the accumulation of knowledge. The passion for accumulating knowledge becomes for many even more exciting than the passion for accumulating wealth and capital. The accumulation of capital, as I have written many times, is an endless process, “bad infinity.” But the accumulation of knowledge is an even more “bad” process. This is man’s pathetic attempt to be “like God,” i.e. know all the secrets of the universe.

“We have become more learned, but also more stupid.”

Our greatest thinker of the 19th century, Konstantin Leontiev, was very suspicious of that “learning” that became fashionable and an object of admiration, first in Europe, and then spread to Russia. In many of his works, Leontyev notes (some with hints, and sometimes directly) that people in the era of decline of civilization (in the same Europe of the 19th century) become “more learned”, but at the same time... stupider. Here is a deadly phrase for the “average European” from the article “On Liberalism in General”: “ They have become neither better, nor smarter, nor happier!.. They have become smaller, more insignificant, more mediocre; more learned among the masses, that’s true, but also stupider».

In his work “The Average European as an Ideal and an Instrument of World Destruction,” K. Leontyev draws attention to the fact that most of the so-called “scientific” books are not worth reading. There is only harm from such books: “ Not considering myself obligated to read everything that is new in the world, finding it not only useless, but also extremely harmful, I even have the barbaric courage to hope that over time humanity will rationally and scientifically reach what they say Caliph Omar reached empirically and mystically, that is, before the burning of most colorless and unoriginal books. I caress myself with the hope that new societies will be established to purify the mental air, a philosophical and aesthetic censorship that will more readily allow the most terrible book to pass (only strictly limiting its distribution) than the colorless and characterless one." Well, K. Leontyev’s proposal to organize the burning of liberal books was not absolutely original. Similar proposals were made by others. famous people Russia. So, Griboyedov puts this idea into the mouth of his hero Famusov: “If evil was to be stopped, all the books would be taken away and burned.”(“Woe from Wit”) Skalozub’s phrase from the same play is no less expressive: “ You can't fool me with learning" I think that this phrase could well serve as an epigraph to a number of works by K. Leontyev.

Leontyev constantly repeats: there is “learnedness,” “scientificism,” and there is a higher mind that allows you to see the whole world in its integrity, with all its shades, with light and shadow. He wrote, in particular, “ that to be able to see the dark side of all these scientific arrogances is also intelligence, and even of the highest order(« Bishop Nikanor about the dangers of railways, steam and in general about the dangers of life moving too quickly») . The Holy Fathers, who had the gift of such reason, call this “sobriety”, “sobriety” of the mind. K. Leontiev, being the spiritual child of the elder Avmrosiya of Optinsky(canonized as a saint in 1988), understood better than many others what the difference is between “scientific arrogance” and “reason of the highest order.”

Accumulation of knowledge. "Intellectual" fraud.

The motives for cognitive activity may vary among people. Some want to increase their capital with the help of knowledge. Others need knowledge in order to increase their status rating. Still others need them in order to improve their qualifications (for example, teachers and people in science). The fourth are needed in order to achieve power. The fifth is to prolong life or even gain immortality. Most often, knowledge becomes a means of feeding human passions - love of money, vanity, lust for power, etc. People just often don't realize it.

However, today a real epidemic has become the accumulation of knowledge by people without clear justification for the ultimate goals of such accumulation. Something like “art for art’s sake.” This is a special form of mental illness. Some analogy can be drawn with Gogol’s hero Plyushkin from " Dead souls" He was saving for no one necessary items, turning your house into a garbage dump. During times Gogol buns were rare. Today's bunnies, thanks to the Internet, collect gigantic mountains of various information “garbage”. They first load it into their computer's memory, and then try to reload it into their own memory. Turning your head into a garbage dump.

The craving for the accumulation of information and “knowledge” can be called a new form fraud. The Holy Fathers called the passion for collecting property, acquiring and accumulating superfluous, unnecessary things “money-grubbing.” Priest Pavel Gumerov writes about money-grabbing in modern conditions: “The passion for hoarding, stinginess is a trait inherent not only in the rich. Quite often people ask the question: “What is money-grabbing?”, about which we read in the evening prayer of confession. Mshelomy is the acquisition of things that are unnecessary for us, when they become covered with moss from long storage and inactivity. Very poor people can also suffer from this sin, purchasing and hoarding dishes, clothes, and any other items, filling all the cabinets, shelves and closets with them, and often forgetting even what is where.” We can only add that today it is becoming much more common " intellectual fraud" - accumulation of any information in the storehouses of human memory. Firstly, unnecessary (“garbage”) information. Secondly, false information (“disinformation”). Thirdly, information that is harmful to the soul and even the body (“poisoned”). Against the background of modern “intellectual mischief,” what Gogol’s Plyushkin did can only be called an innocent “strangeness.”

In the West, which took the path of unbridled accumulation of “knowledge” before us, they are already forced to acknowledge the emergence of “information overload.” There they became a serious cause of human mental disorders, a decrease in the efficiency of management of companies and states, and the loss of all guidelines in life, even for those who have not yet ended up in mental hospitals. The term “information overload” is mentioned for the first time in the book Bertram Gross"Organization Management" in 1964, where he focused on the complexities of managing companies. This concept was popularized by the famous American sociologist and futurologist Alvin Toffler in his 1970 bestseller Future Shock.

In part, you can understand where this crazy craving comes from modern man to knowledge, "gnosis". He intuitively tries to fill his spiritual emptiness, which arises when he turns away from God. He is looking for some “special knowledge” that will give him peace and happiness. As a result, he fills his memory with “garbage” and his soul with poison.

Only in one case does knowledge not serve human passions, when a person, with its help, seeks the root cause of all things - God. Sometimes this happens intuitively, sometimes consciously. When a person understands (or feels) that it is in God that he can find salvation and eternal life. But this is a narrow path of knowledge. All other paths are like wide gates leading to hell. However, before going to hell, some people first end up in mental hospitals. In the first case, man’s guide is God himself; in the second case, his antipode, the “monkey of God,” the devil.

"Partial" knowledge.

As the volume of accumulated knowledge about the world around us grows, a person begins to experience more and more discomfort. He ceases to navigate the endless sea of ​​information, loses a holistic view of the world and even of himself. The person is overcome with horror. Similar to what occurs in a person who finds himself in sea water, and the shores are nowhere to be seen. Wise Solomon I have said more than once that knowing too much does not add to the mind, but it gives rise to additional sorrow and despondency: “ And I gave my heart to know wisdom and to know madness and stupidity: I learned that this too is languor of the spirit; because in much wisdom there is much sorrow; and whoever increases knowledge increases sorrow» (Ecclesiastes 1:17,18).

One of the defensive reactions of a modern person who has become a victim of an “information explosion” has been his withdrawal into “partial” knowledge. A person receives the illusion of psychological comfort when he takes the path of “intellectual” specialization. This is especially evident in science. In modern times, it began to split into more and more new areas, disciplines and specialties. One listing of which can take tens (if not hundreds) of pages of neat text. Over the past centuries, philosophy proudly called itself the “science of sciences” and declared that from a bird’s eye view it surveys the whole world in its completeness and integrity. But it seems that in the twentieth century philosophy “broke” too. In keeping with the spirit of the times, she took the path of specialization. Dozens of directions appeared within philosophy, and each direction, like a tree branch, managed to give a bunch of new shoots, small branches. Every year on these branches new “leaves” bloom in the form of schools and theories. In other words, most philosophers have also become “specialized”, “partial”.

Here is an interesting observation that leads St. Archbishop Hilarion (Trinity) in his article “Science and Life”: “Human consciousness only learns its boundaries, becomes convinced of its limitations. Libraries are huge, but how big is the library that an individual can read and the contents of which he can assimilate? Isn’t even the thought of a person who knows all the sciences ridiculous? People are not engaged in science or sciences, but only in fractional departments of sciences. With the modern specialization of knowledge, a man of science is a convict, chained to his wheelbarrow in one vein of a huge mine of knowledge, not knowing who and what is next to him, beyond the walls of his narrow hole. There is a well-known story about how the curator of one museum, a scientist, enthusiastically and passionately spoke to visitors about the objects of his treasury. "And what's that?" - asked interested listeners, turning to a nearby closet. In a dry and completely indifferent voice, the scientist answered: “I don’t know, this closet is not mine”... Yes, the knowledge of humanity is expanding, and the knowledge of man is becoming narrower. Man eats more and more of the fruit from the tree of knowledge, but only more and more does he become convinced that he is naked.” Our immediate ancestors still perfectly understood all the costs of narrow specialization. Kozma Prutkov gave this understanding in the form of the following formula: “ A specialist is like gumboil: its completeness is one-sided»

Today is “the century of triumph of “scientific and technological progress”. This is an age in which “professionalism” is considered the highest human dignity. But in 9 out of 10 cases, the word “professional” is used to emphasize that the person is a “specialist.” That is, someone who “specializes” in something. Station wagons are not held in high esteem today. They are like an endangered species, something like dinosaurs. Only the name of some universities - “university” - reminds us of universal (more precisely, holistic) knowledge. In the Middle Ages, universities truly lived up to their name. Firstly, they had only three or four faculties: theology, law, medicine, physics (or natural philosophy). Secondly, students from each of these faculties acquired a certain amount of knowledge from the programs of other faculties. Today everything is different. Today, for example, there are 39 faculties at Moscow State University. I think that even Rector Sadovnichy cannot list them all from memory. And within each faculty there are at least a dozen departments. And a fashion has long appeared (supported by regulatory documents of the Ministry of Education), according to which senior students are “assigned” to the corresponding departments, taking into account their specialty. For some reason, MSU reminds me of a tree with a very spreading crown (dozens of powerful branches, hundreds and thousands of twigs, countless leaves). But this tree has almost no roots. Probably there once was, but it was all rotten. By “root” I mean worldview. Neither science nor philosophy can be the source of a worldview. They just puff themselves up and pretend that they have a “worldview.” They are just branches, twigs and leaves. The root of the tree of knowledge can only be religion, religious knowledge.

Knowledge is like faith.

By the way, in a number of textbooks and scientific monographs the definition of knowledge is incomplete. And at the beginning of my thoughts I gave this “truncated” definition: information obtained by a person as a result of direct observation (using the five senses) and scientific (using special technical means). However, today the lion's share of information loaded into human memory comes from other sources. From the media, from textbooks and other literature, from teachers in schools and professors in universities, sometimes just from people “on the street.” The person who perceives such “secondary” information decides for himself which part of it is reliable and which part is not. Only to a small extent does he rely on logic. In most cases, however, he evaluates not the information itself, but the source of “secondary” information. In fact, the “filtering” of such information is based on trust in the source. Ultimately it is faith. No matter how rationalist a person considers himself, he is still forced to rely on faith. Very rational people try to “retrospectively” check “secondary” information using their five senses, and the most inquisitive people try to conduct a scientific study or experiment. But for the most rational person, 99% of the information stored in his memory entered there through “filters of faith.” In the conditions of the “information boom”, the importance of “faith filters” in the life of any person increases. It simply doesn’t even occur to many people to double-check some information. Since such double-checking requires special knowledge, special equipment, and a lot of time. Sometimes a lifetime is not enough to double-check just one fact or scientific conclusion. For example, several decades ago, a group of physicists and astronomers (Friedman, Lemaitre, Einstein, Doppler, Hubble, etc.) announced a discovery that was called in science the “expansion of the Universe.” According to their data, based on spectral analysis, all observable celestial bodies (stars and planets) move with acceleration from a single center in radial directions. This most important position of modern cosmogony has been questioned by many scientists. However, ultimately, the position of supporters of the “expansion of the Universe” theory prevailed. And not because their arguments turned out to be more convincing than those of their opponents. It’s just that the position of the former received a powerful “reinforcement” with the help of the media and other means that have nothing to do with scientific observation and experiment. Today, the hypothesis of the “expansion of the Universe” has already received the status of a completely respectable scientific theory, which can be read about in many school and university textbooks. But recognition is ultimately built on faith.

In addition to scientific knowledge, there is also religious knowledge. It is believed that the latter is 100% formed on the basis of faith. After all, there are no instruments that could, for example, prove or disprove the existence of the angelic world. And, even more so, to prove or disprove the existence of God. Based on this logic, it is proven that scientific knowledge is more reliable than religious knowledge. At first glance, one can agree with this conclusion. A person far from religion will agree with him without hesitation. Such people are usually called atheists or agnostics; the first deny the existence of God; the latter declare that the existence of God cannot be proven or disproved. But for a religious person who is in the Church, such logic is not acceptable. The fact is that religion is not only a “teaching”, not only a set of information about the visible and invisible world. This is practice. The practice of prayer, participation in divine services, the practice of the sacraments, the practice of ascetic life, etc. What does this mean? - This means that a religious person, taking many religious “axioms” on faith, is convinced that these “axioms” “work”. They are confirmed by the experience of religious life.

Even if information classified as “religious knowledge” is “secondary”, it tends to inspire more confidence in a person. Than “secondary information” belonging to the category of “scientific knowledge”. Why? - Here a psychological moment comes into play: a person receives such information, as a rule, from his parents, relatives, friends, and other people who inspire respect and trust in a person. “Secondary” information of a religious nature was passed down within the family from generation to generation. However, any “secondary” information stored in small societies was more reliable, since it was based on life experience, and not on the fantasies of philosophers and scientists. It was empirical knowledge.

However, over the last century, the power of the media and other institutions for relaying “secondary” knowledge, not based on empirical experience, has been steadily growing. And these institutions increasingly “drown out” the “secondary” information that a person receives in the family and other small societies (community, church parish, artel, etc.). This information of small societies - “cells of society” - is a “memory” that contains the “civilizational code” of a nation. Today, the media, schools, universities, and scientific organizations in our country largely act as relays of such “secondary” knowledge, which destroys the code of Russian civilization.

"Scientific knowledge" as a religious sect.

I have already written about the topic outlined in this subtitle. In particular, in the book " Russian sociological thought at the turn of the 19th - 20th centuries", where I examine the work of such outstanding Russian thinkers as L.A. Tikhomirov, K.N. Leontyev, V.S. Soloviev, S.N. Bulgakov, S.F. Sharapov. All of them, to one degree or another, assessed contemporary science, especially social science, as a type of religious consciousness. K. N. Leontiev especially passionately debunked science as an object of religious worship. In this regard, I will reproduce a fragment of my book with the statements of the said thinker:

“To make Leontyev’s attitude towards this “scientific public” clear, I will cite an extensive excerpt from the work of Konstantin Nikolaevich, which is called “ About universal love. Speech by F.M. Dostoevsky at the Pushkin holiday"(1880): « So, having experienced everything possible, even the bitterness of the socialist system, advanced humanity must inevitably fall into the deepest disappointment; the political state of societies always responds to both higher philosophy and the general, semi-conscious worldview wandering in the air; and higher philosophy and the philosophy of instinct equally respond, sooner or later, to science itself.

Science will therefore inevitably have to take on a more disillusioned, pessimistic, as I said, character. And this is where her reconciliation with positive religion is, this is where her theoretical triumph is: in the consciousness of her practical powerlessness, in courageous repentance and humility before the power and rightness of heartfelt mysticism and faith.

This is something the Slavs would do well to take care of! This is not contrary to progress; on the contrary, if we understand the progress of thought not in a spirit that is necessarily pleasantly egalitarian and kindly democratic, but in the sense of improving only thought itself, then such a strict and fearless attitude of science towards earthly life should be recognized as a huge step forward... “Seek consolation in whatever you want ; I’m not imposing God on you - that’s none of my business - I’m just telling you: don’t look for consolation in my former radically charitable claims that so stupidly worried the last 19th century. I can only help you palliatively.” That’s what science should say!”

A brilliant and very witty description of the science that prevailed in Russia. Especially, of course, Leontiev’s assessments relate to social science and sociology. For some reason, speaking about the reasons for the “Russian” revolutions of the beginning of the last century, the involvement Russian Empire During the carnage of the First World War, we extremely rarely remember the Russian social “science” that made its significant contribution to these tragic events. However, not without the help of the education system, through which the ideas of this “science” were promoted to the people (I apologize to the reader, I cannot help but put quotation marks on the word “science” in this context).

And here Leontyev once again emphasizes that contemporary science has signs of religion. More precisely this - religious sect, which has great destructive potential. How can it not be a religion if it is based on faith? “into the mind of collective humanity, which must sooner or later create paradise on earth”! Science replaced Christianity, and many of its adherents hoped to change people for the better. It was assumed that in this way the society itself would improve. Sooner or later heaven will come on earth. In the history of the Church it was heresy of chiliasm(however why was, this heresy is extremely widespread today). However, the heretics did not wait for the kingdom of God on earth. And then people turned their hopes and gaze towards science. The nominal members of the Church turned away from Christianity because they expected that through it they would find heaven on earth. This terrible heresy ended in godlessness, or rather a change of god: instead of Christ, people began to worship an unknown god called “science.”

One of the tenets of godless sociology: science is called upon to begin with changing the living conditions of people. Then " hearts will inevitably get used to goodness when it is impossible to do evil" Science must take care of changing both the physical conditions of human life and his social environment. The first problem is solved by natural sciences, the second by public (social) sciences. Science (pure reason) suffers " utilitarian and optimistic bias, which runs through the majority of modern scientists" This, according to Leontyev, is the extremely negative, destructive role of science, which sows dangerous illusions in society.”

V.Yu. Katasonov, prof., doctor of economic sciences, chairman of the Russian Economic Society named after. S.F. Sharapova

See: Varakin L. E. Global information society: Development criteria and socio-economic aspects. - M.: International. acad. communications, 2001; Castells M. Information era: economics, society and culture: Transl. from English under scientific ed. O.I. Shkaratana. - M.: State University Higher School of Economics, 2000; “Concepts of the “knowledge society” in modern social theory.” Collection of scientific papers. Institute of Scientific Information for Social Sciences. M., 2010 (

Nick Bostrom. A History of Transhumanist Thought // Journal of Evolution and Technology (Vol. 14 - April 2005). For more details, see: Chetverikova O. The dictatorship of the “enlightened”: about the spiritual roots and goals of transhumanism (http://communitarian.ru/publikacii/novyy_mirovoy_poryadok_metody/diktatura_prosveschennyh_o_duhovnyh_kornyah_i_celyah_transhumanizma_24092013/).

See, for example: Chentsova M.V. Features of the formation of a knowledge economy in modern conditions. Abstract for the candidate's scientific degree. economic sciences. - M., 2008 (http://www.ifap.ru/library/book350.pdf).

Expression by Friedrich Engels from Anti-Dühring (1878).

Began publishing in 1926. Its publication continues today, but the circulation is only a few thousand.

Along with Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, George Berkeley, David Hume - in England; Etienne Condillac, Claude Helvetius, Paul Holbach, Denis Diderot - in France.

A. Koncheyev. Francis Bacon // Samizdat magazine (http://www.koncheev.narod.ru/bekon_text.htm).

Here is one of the definitions of the concepts “knowledge” and “cognition”, taken from a textbook: “Knowledge is the totality of information received from the outside world (or resulting from introspection) acquired by a person. The process of assimilation itself, which usually includes awareness of the connections and patterns inherent (or, in any case, attributed) to objects of information, i.e. objects and phenomena of both material and spiritual nature is called knowledge” (http://mydocx.ru/1-99103.html).

A rough analogue of the human mind is the “processor” of a computer. However, this is not a literal, but rather an allegorical comparison.

Archbishop Hilarion (Trinity). Without the Church there is no salvation. - M.: Sretensky Monastery, publishing house “Znamenie”, 1999, p. 284-285.

Konstantin Leontyev. Slavophilism and the future fate of Russia. - M.: Institute of Russian Civilization, 2010, p. 27.

Konstantin Leontyev. Decree. op. With. 242.

Konstantin Leontyev. Decree. op. With. 269.

By the way, Toffler is one of the founders of the concept of post-industrial society, on the basis of which the theory of the “knowledge society” we mentioned grew up.

Archbishop Hilarion (Trinity). Without the Church there is no salvation. - M.: Sretensky Monastery, publishing house “Znamenie”, 1999, p. 286.

The 101st aphorism from the collection of thoughts and aphorisms “Fruits of Thought” (1854) by Kozma Prutkov.

See: Ivan Ilyin. Axioms of religious experience (http://azbyka.ru/aksiomy-religioznogo-opyta).

Valentin Katasonov. Russian sociological thought at the turn of the 19th - 20th centuries. - M.: Native country, 2015.

Valentin Katasonov. Russian sociological thought at the turn of the 19th - 20th centuries. - M.: Native Country, 2015, p. 96-98.

“The only path leading to knowledge is action.” - Bernard Show

“Language is a building, learning it is construction.” — Kato Lomb

“It’s not a matter of age, but a matter of culture of communication and level of intellectual development.” - Winston Churchill

“Every day on which you have not supplemented your education with at least a small, but new piece of knowledge for you... consider it fruitless and irrevocably lost for yourself.” Konstantin Stanislavsky

“Knowledge and only knowledge makes a person free.” — Dmitry Pisarev

“If I know that I know little, I will strive to know more.” - Vladimir Lenin

“The root of learning is bitter, but the fruit is sweet.” — Leonardo da Vinci

“Proving to a person the need for knowledge is the same as convincing him of the usefulness of vision.” - Maksim Gorky

“The greatest tragedy of man is the cooling of the passion for knowledge.” — Evgeniy Bogat

“A person is afraid only of what he does not know. Knowledge conquers all fear."
— Vissarion Belinsky

“One should strive for knowledge not for the sake of profit, fame, power or other goals, but in order to be useful in life.” Francis Bacon

“He who knows little can teach little.” — Jan Komensky

“A language that is wise with knowledge will not falter.” — Menander

“To digest knowledge, you need to absorb it with appetite.” — Anatole France


“Knowing many languages ​​means having many keys to one lock.” — Voltaire

“Knowledge without a moral basis means nothing.” - Lev Tolstoy

“Knowledge humbles the great, astonishes the ordinary, and inflates the little man.” Lev Tolstoy

“The speaker does not speak the truth, but defends and justifies his position, and also motivates people.” — Aristotle

“The great bond of humanity is language. Words are the only thing that lasts forever." - Winston Churchill

“In days of doubt, in days of painful thoughts about the fate of my homeland, you alone are my support and support, O great, mighty, truthful and free Russian language.” Ivan Turgenev

“Education is not the answer to a question. Education teaches you to find answers to all questions yourself.” — Bill Ellen

“I am convinced that self-education is true education.” - Isaac Asimov

“If a person lightens his wallet in favor of his mind, then no one will take away his mind. Investments in knowledge always bring the best returns." - Benjamin Franklin

“You need to learn good, calm, intelligent speech for a long time and carefully - listening, memorizing, reading, studying. But even though it is difficult, it is necessary, necessary. Our speech is the most important part of the soul, the mind, our ability not to succumb to the influences of the environment if it drags on.” Dmitry Likhachev

"Intellectual dissatisfaction is the main driving force civilization." — Eugene Debs

“The only way to win is to learn faster than everyone else.” — Eric Ries

“Attention is easier for a mind that is rich in knowledge, free and original. A mind that is not supplied with material - frozen, ordinary - is unlikely to be able to think about anything for a long time. — William James

Humanity is replenishing its knowledge bank every second, and the development of technology has led to the fact that any of us, if desired, can immediately find out about it. A huge flow of information falls on us from everywhere, which our brain, as recent research shows, still does not assimilate: the volume of information entering the brain from the five senses is truly colossal - it is approximately 400 billion bits per second; our consciousness cannot cope with this volume; we perceive an insignificant part of it - about 2000 bits per second.

How a person can carry out knowledge of the world: lying on the sofa in front of the TV, absorbing information junk from it, or consciously making a choice among sources of knowledge and filtering incoming information - this is up to each of us. In this article I would like to make some arguments in favor of the latter.

At the end of the 17th century English philosopher Francis Bacon formulated his famous aphorism: “ Knowledge itself is power"(lat. Scientia potentia est), in translation - " Knowledge itself is power».

At all times, people have strived to master this power, but do we need to take part in this race recklessly?

“Whoever owns the information owns the world,” we hear from everywhere, but is this true?

I really liked the opinion on this issue Napoleon Hill, which was reflected in his famous bestseller "Think and get rich"‒ a book first published in 1937 and reprinted 42 times in the US (and that’s just in the US, not counting the rest of the world):

Education - this is your own image created by you. A person finds it himself necessary knowledge. Follow a simple plan and you won't start from scratch.

There are two types of knowledge - fundamental knowledge And special knowledge. Fundamental, that is, general knowledge, no matter how deep or varied it is, you will hardly need to save money. The largest universities collectively possess almost all types of fundamental knowledge available to civilization. However, most professors are not among the richest people on earth. They specialize in teaching knowledge, but no one can say that they specialize in the problem of using knowledge.

Reminding this simple thing leads to millions of people continuing to believe in the common misconception that “ knowledge is power».

Nothing like this!

Knowledge is just potential power!

It becomes a real force only if it is processed into a clear plan of action and aimed at the final result.

This “missing link” in the educational system is especially noticeable in the futile attempts of all kinds of educational institutions to teach students to organize and use the knowledge they have already acquired. People make the mistake of thinking that Henry Ford was not an “educated” man because he spent very little time in school.

Those who think in this way completely do not understand the true meaning of the word “ education"(English - education). To understand its meaning, it is enough to refer to the etymology of this word. It comes from the Latin root " educo", i.e. “develop from within.”

Think about it: education means identifying internal, that is, hidden, abilities and DEVELOPING THESE ABILITIES.

An educated person is not necessarily stuffed with knowledge, whether fundamental or special.

Educated person - this is someone who has developed the abilities of his mind, who can perceive and acquire everything he wants, everything he seems to need, without violating the rights of other people.

But really: knowledge is just potential power! A person can accumulate this power all his life, but never use it! The question is then asked: “ Why do we need her like this?».

You can consciously or unconsciously cram knowledge of certain things into your consciousness as much as you like, but if this knowledge is not used, then in the end it is worthless.

By the wisdom of the Almighty, this knowledge is conveyed to believers in the text of the Holy Quran:

Those who were instructed to adhere to the Taurat (Torah) and who did not adhere to it are like a donkey carrying many books. How bad is the comparison with people who consider the signs of Allah to be lies! Allah does not guide unjust people. [The People of the Book failed to fulfill their assigned mission and, as a result, lost all honor and praise. They are like a donkey laden with wise books. But can a donkey benefit from the books he carries on his back? Does this do him credit? Isn't it his destiny to just carry a heavy load? The same can be said about learned Jews and Christians who do not follow the commandments of the Torah, the greatest of which is the command to follow the Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings of Allaah be upon him) and believe in the Holy Quran brought by him. Such disregard for the Torah and its covenants will bring them nothing but damage and disappointment, for they will be deprived of any justification for their unbelief. Indeed, the image of a donkey laden with books suits them perfectly. How nasty it is to compare people who reject the signs of Allah, each of which testifies to the sincerity of the Messenger and the truthfulness of his teachings. Verily, Allah does not lead the wicked on a straight path, does not direct them to what will bring them real benefit, until they themselves renounce injustice and cease to persist in disbelief].*

Holy Quran, 62:5

How accurate is this analogy with a donkey loaded with books! What's the use of having so many smart books?! Why thoughtlessly acquire knowledge and then not apply it?

Taking into account the Russian mentality, the answer to this question could be formulated as follows: “ In reserve, maybe it will come in handy" But it’s one thing to gain basic school knowledge in all subjects in order to have an idea of ​​the universe and then, based on this knowledge, develop in the direction in which a person sees himself. And it’s completely different, for example, to read the tabloids or watch programs like “Dom-2” and then only think about who, whom, where and how.

And how many people receive higher education only in order to receive a coveted diploma, and then not work in their specialty at all, because... Are they not interested? How much knowledge did they learn during their studies that, unfortunately, they will never apply in life?! And how much benefit could these people bring if they immediately studied what they like and what will be useful to them later in life?!

I know from myself that much of what I studied at the university has been “safely” forgotten by me... On the other hand, how brilliantly the Creator created our brain, that knowledge that is not used in life is soon forgotten, otherwise we would simply go crazy from it excess.

From an early age, it is necessary to give children the opportunity in various areas of our lives and mark for themselves those areas that are interesting and like them, and when determining certain areas of study in adolescence, facilitate their choice, and not force them to study in areas that are priority for you , making them unhappy, at least for the period of training.

Consider also this continuation of Hill’s thought, formulated in the same “Think and Grow Rich”:

Knowledge in itself has no value. But once knowledge is obtained, it needs to be systematized and made suitable for use to achieve a specific goal. And for this you need, as you remember, a plan of practical action.

If you are considering the possibility of obtaining additional education, first determine why you need it, and then find out where you can do it.

People who succeed in any type of activity never cease to be interested in specialized literature related to their business or profession. Vice versa. There is a common mistake that most losers make, naively believing that they have already received all the knowledge at school. In fact, the education system only shows the way in which a person can acquire the knowledge he needs, including practical knowledge.

That is, you need to constantly develop and improve! Life does not stand still and the knowledge gained yesterday may become outdated tomorrow. Therefore, in the area in which you have determined for yourself that you are interested and doing this, in addition to earning a living, also gives you pleasure and joy, then in this area you must become a professional and continuously acquire specialized knowledge.

REMEMBER that only he becomes the best who has worked hard for at least 10,000-12,000 hours to achieve his goal!

Also in “Think and Grow Rich” there is an interesting idea that free education relaxes and to some extent hinders human development: when a person pays for his education, he has an incentive to learn and gain knowledge in return for the money spent.

So, to summarize all of the above, knowledge is only potential power, and without practical application in our life it is difficult to call them necessary.

Verily, the guidance and knowledge with which Allah Almighty and Great sent me [to people] are like rain falling on the earth. Part of this land was [fertile], absorbed water and gave birth to many [all sorts of] plants and herbs. [Another part] of it was dense and retained water, but Allah turned it to the benefit of people who began to use this water for drinking, watering [livestock with it] and using it for irrigation. [Rain] also fell on another part of the earth, which was a plain, which did not retain water and did not give rise to [any] plants. [These parts of the earth] are similar to the one who comprehended the religion of Allah, who turned to his benefit what He sent me with, [thanks to which the person] himself acquired knowledge and passed it on [to others], and to the one who did not turn to it himself and did not accept the guidance of Allah with which I was sent.

Hadith from Abu Musa al-Ash'ari,

Holy Hadith of Muslim (1540)

Pay attention to " acquired knowledge himself and passed it on"! In this hadith, according to theologians, what is meant is the practical application of acquired knowledge and the transfer of it to others. For a better understanding, I will cite another hadith:

May Allah please (that) person who hears something from us and conveys it (to another) exactly as he heard it, because it may happen that the one to whom (something) is conveyed will understand (it) better than the one who heard it.

Hadith from Ibn Mas'ud,

Holy Hadith of at-Tirmidhi

The Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) taught that the deeds and actions of believers in practice should not diverge from their words and knowledge. It is preferable before the Lord to constantly use one thing rather than to know about many things but not use anything in life:

No one will be able to move on the Day of Judgment until he is asked about his life - how he spent it; about his knowledge - how he used it ; about his wealth - how he earned it and what he spent it on; and about his body - how he used it.

Hadith from Abu Barzakh, St. hadiths of at-Tirmidhi

For example, We all know that, but there are not many who use it when meeting!!!

May Allah Almighty help us in comprehending true, valuable knowledge for us, which we will apply and pass on to others!!!

Rinat Mallyamov

Mahalla No. 1

*With comments by Sh. Alyautdinov

Virtual exhibition

"Knowledge is power, power is knowledge"

to the 455th anniversary of the birth of Francis Bacon

The Library and Information Complex (LIC) presents a virtual exhibition dedicated to the 455th anniversary of the birth of Francis Bacon.

Francis Bacon (January 22, 1561 - April 9, 1626) - English philosopher, historian, politician, founder of empiricism.

In 1584 he was elected to parliament. From 1617 Lord Privy Seal, then Lord Chancellor; Baron of Verulam and Viscount of St. Albans. In 1621 he was put on trial on charges of bribery, convicted and removed from all positions. He was later pardoned by the king, but did not return to public service and devoted the last years of his life to scientific and literary work.

Francis Bacon began his professional life as a lawyer, but later became widely known as a lawyer-philosopher and defender of the scientific revolution. His works are the foundation and popularization of the inductive methodology of scientific inquiry, often called Bacon's method.

Bacon outlined his approach to the problems of science in the treatise “New Organon”, published in 1620. In this treatise, he declared the goal of science to be increasing man's power over nature. Induction gains knowledge from the world around us through experiment, observation, and testing hypotheses. In the context of their time, such methods were used by alchemists.

Scientific knowledge

In general, Bacon considered the great dignity of science almost self-evident and expressed this in his famous aphorism"Knowledge is power". However, many attacks have been made on science. After analyzing them, Bacon came to the conclusion that God did not prohibit the knowledge of nature, as, for example, theologians claim. On the contrary, He gave man a mind that thirsts for knowledge of the Universe.

People just need to understand that there are two types of knowledge: 1) knowledge of good and evil, 2) knowledge of things created by God. The knowledge of good and evil is forbidden to people. God gives it to them through the Bible. And man, on the contrary, must cognize created things with the help of his mind. This means that science must take its rightful place in the “kingdom of man.” The purpose of science is to increase the strength and power of people, to provide them with a rich and dignified life.

Method of cognition

Pointing to the deplorable state of science, Bacon said that until now discoveries had been made by chance, not methodically. There would be many more of them if researchers were armed with the right method. Method is the path, the main means of research. Even a lame person walking on the road will overtake a normal person running off-road. The research method, developed by Francis Bacon, is an early precursor to the scientific method. The method was proposed in Bacon's Novum Organum (New Organon) and was intended to replace the methods that were proposed in Aristotle's Organum almost 2 millennia ago.

At the core scientific knowledge According to Bacon, induction and experiment must lie. Induction can be complete (perfect) or incomplete. Complete induction means the regular repetition and exhaustibility of any property of an object in the experience under consideration. Inductive generalizations start from the assumption that this will be the case in all similar cases. In this garden, all lilacs are white - a conclusion from annual observations during their flowering period. Incomplete induction includes generalizations made on the basis of studying not all cases, but only some (conclusion by analogy), because, as a rule, the number of all cases is practically unlimited, and theoretically it is impossible to prove their infinite number: all swans are white for us reliably until we will not see a black individual. This conclusion is always probable.

Trying to create a “true induction,” Bacon looked not only for facts that confirmed a certain conclusion, but also for facts that refuted it. He thus armed natural science with two means of investigation: enumeration and exclusion. Moreover, it is the exceptions that matter most.

Using his method, Bacon, for example, established that the “form” of heat is the movement of the smallest particles of the body. So, in his theory of knowledge, Bacon strictly pursued the idea that true knowledge comes from experience. This philosophical position is called empiricism. Bacon was not only its founder, but also the most consistent empiricist.

Obstacles on the path of knowledge

Francis Bacon divided the sources of human errors that stand in the way of knowledge into four groups, which he called “ghosts” (“idols”, Latin idola). These are “ghosts of the family”, “ghosts of the cave”, “ghosts of the square” and “ghosts of the theater”. “Ghosts of the race” stem from human nature itself; they do not depend either on culture or on a person’s individuality.

“The human mind is like an uneven mirror, which, mixing its nature with the nature of things, reflects things in a distorted and disfigured form.” “Ghosts of the Cave” are individual errors of perception, both congenital and acquired. “After all, in addition to the errors inherent in the human race, everyone has their own special cave, which weakens and distorts the light of nature.”

“Ghosts of the Square” are a consequence of the social nature of man - communication and the use of language in communication. “People unite through speech. Words are set according to the understanding of the crowd. Therefore, a bad and absurd statement of words besieges the mind in a surprising way.”

“Phantoms of the theater” are false ideas about the structure of reality that a person acquires from other people. “At the same time, we mean here not only general philosophical teachings, but also numerous principles and axioms of the sciences, which received force as a result of tradition, faith and carelessness.”

Followers of Francis Bacon

The most significant followers of the empirical line in modern philosophy: Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, George Berkeley, David Hume - in England; Etienne Condillac, Claude Helvetius, Paul Holbach, Denis Diderot - in France.

In his books “Experiments” (1597), “New Organon” (1620), Bacon acted as an apologist for experienced, experimental knowledge serving the conquest of nature and the improvement of man. Developing a classification of sciences, he proceeded from the position that religion and science form independent areas. This deistic view is also characteristic of Bacon’s approach to the soul. Distinguishing between the divinely inspired and bodily souls, he endows them with different properties (sensation, movement - for the bodily soul, thinking, will - for the divinely inspired one), believing that the ideal, divinely inspired soul is the object of theology, while the object of science is the properties of the bodily soul and problems , arising from their research.

Arguing that the basis of all knowledge lies in human experience, Bacon warned against hasty conclusions drawn from sensory data. Bacon called errors of knowledge associated with the mental organization of man idols, and his “doctrine of idols” is one of the most important parts of his methodology. If, in order to obtain reliable data based on sensory experience, it is necessary to verify the data of sensations by experiment, then to confirm and verify conclusions it is necessary to use the method of induction developed by Bacon.

Correct induction, careful generalization and comparison of facts that support the conclusion with those that refute them, makes it possible to avoid the errors inherent in reason. The principles of the study of mental life, the approach to the subject of psychological research, laid down by Bacon, were further developed in the psychology of modern times.

Life path and works of F. Bacon

Dushin A.V. The idea of ​​education in the empirical philosophy of Francis Bacon // Problems and prospects for the development of education in Russia. - 2013. - No. 18.

Kondratyev S.V. Natural philosophical and political arguments in the unionist discourse of Francis Bacon / Kondratiev S.V., Kondratieva T.N. //Bulletin of Tyumen State University.-2014.-No. 10.

Poletukhin Yu.A. Materialistic justification of law in the concept of Francis Bacon // Bulletin of the South Ural State University. Series: Law.-2006.-No. 5.

Smagin Yu.E. Knowledge as power in the philosophy of F. Bacon // Bulletin of the Leningrad State University. A.S. Pushkin.-2012.-T.2, No. 1.

Plato and Bacon: a dispute through the centuries. The greatest paradox of the phenomenon of knowledge is that, being ideal in its nature, in its essence, in our time it has turned into a powerful material force, the economic force of society. Indeed, knowledge is an ideal product. They are not directly perceptible to the senses; they cannot be touched, seen, or heard, but they can be possessed. And to those who own them, they give power, not only intellectual, but also material. The conclusion seems obvious. Humanity comprehended this seemingly simple truth very difficultly and for a long time.
During the period of formation of capitalist relations in Europe, the famous English philosopher Francis Bacon, who lived at the turn of the 16th-17th centuries, proclaimed: “Knowledge is power.” For us now, such a statement is something very familiar and, as it were, taken for granted. In our country, the all-Union youth magazine “Knowledge is Power” has been published for several decades.
However, when this formula was proclaimed, it became a fundamentally new word in the very understanding of the goals of knowledge, the tasks of science, the essence of human knowledge and its role in society. It was an innovative, revolutionary vision. We can confidently say that Bacon’s predecessors simply could not understand how knowledge, invisible, inaudible, can become “power”? By whose power?

The fact is that ancient thinkers They looked at knowledge and its role in society completely differently. Knowledge, for example, for the greatest ancient Greek philosopher Plato, is primarily the result of contemplation of the external world, discussions and conversations on high topics, one of the manifestations of a person’s wisdom, an element of his spiritual, internal perfection.
Plato, for example, did not raise the question at all about the tasks of transforming nature on the basis of its knowledge, nor did he raise the question about facilitating people’s work and improving their lives through knowledge and transformation of nature. He connected knowledge with a person’s abilities for a correct, purposeful, moral life. Knowledge is, first of all, the source of wisdom and high morality both for an individual person (of course, a free person, not a slave), and for an entire state.
And Francis Bacon, an English philosopher, proclaims that “man is the servant and interpreter of nature. He can do and know as much as he has comprehended in its order by deed or reflection, and beyond this he does not know and cannot.” And further: “Knowledge and human power coincide.” The true task of the sciences “cannot be other than to endow human life with new discoveries and benefits.” But, he added bitterly, “the vast majority of people in science don’t understand anything about this. This majority are only teachers and doctrinaires, and only sometimes it happens that a master with a sharper mind, desiring glory, rushes to some new discovery. He does this almost at a loss to his property.”
Notice how modern Bacon's words sound. But they were first published in 1620, that is, almost 370 years ago. Bacon called for new thinking for his time, substantiated the deepest reform of the sciences, human knowledge, which

the swarm should be built not on speculative deductions or on divine revelation, but on the basis of an experimental study of real things and processes, on the basis of experiment.
Knowledge, science and technology are designed to empower human life new discoveries and benefits, to ease and improve the situation of people, and the truth -
this is the daughter of time, not authority - such was his credo. Bacon's ideas became one of the greatest intellectual achievements of mankind.
Knowledge is important and valuable not only and not so much in itself. And first of all, because it can and should be embodied, transformed into material force. It must serve man in all his practical activities, primarily in transforming nature - this is the philosophical, spiritual premise of the material-transformative practice of people, which became dominant in Europe, and then in other parts of the world, actually starting with Bacon.
Invisible, inaudible, intangible knowledge, it turned out, can be turned into a powerful material force. Knowledge of the laws of mechanics can be used in the creation of various types of machines, ranging from a steam boiler, steam locomotive, steamship to the most modern machines and machine tools. Knowledge of the laws of electricity can be used in the creation of a mass of material objects and things that facilitate human work, giving him more comfortable living conditions - electric light, electric motors, all kinds of devices both in everyday life and in production * Knowledge of chemical laws has even made it possible to create materials that are not found in nature in their natural form, materials with predetermined, desired properties - all kinds of plastics, etc.
In short, the entire development of science, technology, and industry in subsequent centuries served as an excellent illustration of this Baconian idea that knowledge can and should be transformed into material power.
The embodied power of knowledge. However, the most comprehensive, deep and consistent production
The powerful power of knowledge was revealed by K. Marx, F. Engels and V. I. Lenin. First of all, the views of K. Marx are very indicative in this regard.
Summarizing the experience of the industrial revolution in Europe at the end of the 18th - beginning of the 19th centuries and predicting further trends in scientific, technical and economic development, K. Marx formulated the idea that knowledge in a developing industrial society becomes a productive force. Bacon's formula that knowledge is power was more ideological, general philosophical in nature. Marx poses the question primarily as an economist, examining the main factors of the capitalist production process. K. Marx wrote: “Nature builds neither machines, nor locomotives, nor railways, nor the electric telegraph, nor self-factory stations, etc. All these are products of human labor, natural material, transformed into organs of human will, which rules over nature, or human activity in nature. All this is the organs of the human brain created by a human hand, the embodied power of knowledge.” And he goes on to point out that the development of these products of human labor “is an indicator of the extent to which general social knowledge (Wissen, Knowledge) has become a direct productive force...”
First of all, note that Marx chooses surprisingly capacious, precise and at the same time non-standard expressions. At first, his idea seems obvious. Cars, roads, electricity, and now we would add a lot more to this list - cars, various machine tools, automatic machines, aviation, etc. - all these are creations of human hands. They are, as it were, a multiplication of a person’s physical strength, an extension of his arms, legs, and his entire body. A lot of
multiply his production capabilities, the productive power of his labor. All this is very understandable and familiar.
However, Marx does not stop there and expresses a number of unusual, innovative thoughts. He says that the products of human labor are the embodied power of human knowledge. How should this be understood?
But the whole point is that the products of human labor are not just things, objects, or anything material in general. This is at the same time knowledge, as if frozen, if you like, solidified knowledge. They embodied, materialized the energy of knowledge, the power of knowledge. Knowledge embodied in machines, in technology, becomes a material productive force. It is embodied in this technique, “works” in it. And not only knowledge in the literal sense of the word, but also a person’s practical skills, his will, even his temperament. It is no coincidence that Marx emphasizes that the products of human labor turn into organs of human will.
How much human knowledge and will (and not just physical effort, physical labor) is concentrated in any machine - from a steam locomotive to an airliner and a space rocket! And the more of them are embodied in technology, in technology, the more developed the productive forces of society become, the higher the technical level of production and its efficiency. It is not difficult to see that in modern automatic factory lines more knowledge is embodied than in Watt's steam boiler and the machines driven by it, in a modern ocean liner - more than in a sailing ship, in an airliner - more than in hot-air balloon, etc.
One of the most important features of the modern scientific and technological revolution is that

that technique and technology increasingly depend on the amount of knowledge available in society and on the efficiency of its materialization, the speed of its transfer from the head of the worker into the product of labor.
There is another side to which Marx also draws attention. Knowledge is embodied in everything that a person creates through his labor. But first of all
it is embodied in the person himself. And no matter how it materializes in the products of labor, it is inseparable from man as from its fundamental principle. Here we see one of the brightest manifestations of that remarkable property of any knowledge, which we have already talked about: a person can give his knowledge to other people as much as he likes or materialize it in the products of his labor, but at the same time the stock of his knowledge is in no way depleted. And maybe in some cases it even increases somewhat: by transferring knowledge to other people, a person becomes more aware of it, understands it better. It is not for nothing that scientists often say that The best way To master any scientific discipline is to teach it to students.
We should especially think about what Marx means when he says that general social knowledge is transformed into a direct productive force. What does general public knowledge mean?
It is obvious that Marx does not understand knowledge about society by this expression. Social knowledge in this case is the knowledge that is socially necessary to create this or that object, machine, thing, etc. The productive power of labor depends in general on the level of competence, consciousness, will of the performer, and production experience of the worker. And this applies to all professions, to all specialties - to the worker and rural worker, peasant, engineer and builder, manager and scientist, etc. Not only scientific knowledge has productive power, but also practical knowledge, the whole sum of practical skills and abilities. , which are used by the employee in the labor process.
K. Marx’s thoughts on the transformation of universal social knowledge, including science, into a direct productive force constituted an entire era
in understanding the role of science and technology in the progress of modern society. They were supported and further developed by F. Engels and especially V.I. Lenin. Based on their fundamental principles, the policy of the CPSU is being built in the field of scientific and technological progress, transferring the entire national economy to the rails of intensification, accelerating the socio-economic development of the country.
Science as a productive force. Once upon a time, the great French thinker Saint-Simon said: for France, the loss of fifty of its best physicists, mathematicians, mechanics and engineers - the flower of science - would mean remaining a body without a soul.
Although Saint-Simon was a utopian socialist, these words are extremely realistic. Let's fast forward to our time and imagine for a moment what would happen to us, our country, if we did not have, for example, I. V. Kurchatov, S. P. Korolev, M. V. Keldysh, P. JI . Kapitsa, N. N. Semenov, N. I. Vavilov, V. I. Vernadsky, I. P. Pavlov, N. E. Zhukovsky, K. E. Tsiolkovsky.
I named only the names of ten major Soviet scientists who, with their scientific works, discoveries, and their ascetic, heroic work, contributed to the transformation of our Motherland into a great industrial, scientific and technical power, which raised the level of spirituality of the entire people very highly. What would happen if we didn't have them? You will say - there would be others. Of course, if we consider the issue from the point of view of historical necessity, then there is no doubt that there would be others.
But if you nevertheless imagine, at least for a few moments, that we did not have these scientists and that we could not have acquired the knowledge that they had in any other way, then it is not difficult to see
how much poorer our country would be. We would not have had either theoretical or practical cosmonautics, aircraft manufacturing, the nuclear industry, and many of the most important sections in the chemical industry. We would have a much worse idea of ​​the geological and biological processes. We would not know what conditioned and unconditioned reflexes are in humans and throughout the animal world. In other words, we would be poorer both economically and technically, and in terms of the volume of knowledge, and in the sense of the absence of great personalities who presented the whole world with examples of serving the truth and the people.
This thought experiment is, of course, completely arbitrary. You cannot remove from history what happened. However, this assumption clearly shows the enormous importance of science, scientific knowledge in the life of modern society, in the life of each of us.
The most important thing, perhaps, is that the process of development of production - industry, agriculture, and construction - depends on scientific knowledge, on its constant, systematic growth. Science in our time is increasingly revealing itself as a direct productive force of society. Scientific and technological progress is now the main means of increasing production efficiency.
The transformation of science into a direct productive force as a real process has its own history. Its beginning is usually associated with the industrial revolution of the 18th - early 19th centuries, when large-scale machine production began to develop at a rapid pace. Its essence was the transfer of human physical and labor functions to machines. The very manufacture of machines (for example, weaving, drilling, milling machines), the organization of the production process with the help of machines require the application of science. All this
caused the formation of applied branches of natural science, directly serving the needs of production - the formation of technical sciences. Technical schools and colleges are also emerging in which relevant research is carried out and personnel are trained.
From about the middle of the 20th century, with the development of the modern scientific and technological revolution, the use of scientific knowledge in production has become regular, science is paving new paths for technical and economic progress. Almost all new industries are the result of the implementation of scientific ideas, scientific knowledge - the radio industry, automotive industry, aircraft manufacturing, electronics, production of artificial materials, etc. Thus, science has become a direct participant in the production process. Production itself is increasingly becoming a consistent technological application of science. This applies to all modern developed countries of the world.
Perestroika creates particularly favorable conditions for the development of science and its transformation into a direct productive force. The XXVII Congress of the CPSU, subsequent decisions of the CPSU Central Committee and the Soviet government set the task of transferring the economy, the entire national economy of the country, to the path of intensive development.
This means that more final products should be obtained with less input of raw materials, human labor and time. In other words, produce more (products, goods, etc.), and make less various costs.
In principle, such intensification is possible and necessary in every branch of industry, agriculture, and every enterprise. But it is possible only when every production

the process will be built on a scientific basis and constantly absorb the latest scientific achievements. It is possible to obtain 8-10 centners of wheat from 1 hectare, probably, without any science. But to get 30 or more centners is impossible to achieve without the use of scientific knowledge.
This is how the decisive chain of the modern intensive economy develops: science - technology - production. It means that scientific ideas(knowledge) is transformed into technological developments, and these latter are introduced into mass production. Such a chain is easy to observe throughout the modern national economy, in all sectors of the economy. Moreover, the more clearly defined the links in the chain are and the more firmly they are connected to each other, the more developed the production is, the more modern and efficient it is.
It is obvious to everyone that if some link in the chain works poorly or the connection between links is weak, then the entire chain functions poorly. But still, the practice of our country and other developed
countries shows that the leading link in the chain needs to be identified. And that is what science is. It is precisely this that generates new knowledge and ideas, gives impetus to the creation of new technological solutions, new production principles. Continuous renewal of ideas leads to systematic updating of technology and further to an increase in the production of goods, things, machines, and an increase in labor productivity.
If you carefully observe the nature of the activities of our advanced research and production associations, you will find the following. Under other normal conditions, the scientific background, the bank of knowledge, the bank of new ideas that could be recommended for implementation in technological developments with subsequent implementation in mass production are of paramount importance for them. The constant formulation of new ideas becomes the real fundamental basis for the stable work of scientific and production associations, an indispensable condition for maintaining their products at high level. And this suggests a conclusion: highly qualified specialists who are capable of generating new, non-standard, non-trivial ideas, ideas that can be embodied in new technology, should be valued very highly!