Шрифт:
Finally, it is worth mentioning the widely known scientific papers, which are directly aimed at the subject considered. In the first place, these are the works by Jean Baudrillard, who identifies Evil with the repressive artificiality of consumer society that is inhumane and destroys the reality of genuine existence: "Thus, all our categories have entered the era of unnatural where the matter does not concern desire, but forcing to desire, it does not concern action, but forcing to do it, it does not concern cost, but forcing to cost (this can be exemplified by any advertisement), it does not concern cognition, but forcing to know, and, at last, the last but not the least - it does not concern pleasure but forcing to enjoy. < ...> Strong motives or, in other words, positive, selective, appealing impulses have disappeared. <...> And the complex of Evil will, rejection and disgust, on the contrary, have become brighter. <...> Perhaps, it is some new form of the Evil principle. <...>?" [Baudrillard, 2000].
This is quite an acute description of manifestations of Evil in consumer society, but unfortunately, it does not correspond to a somehow distinct strategy of its overcoming. On the
42 Future Human Image. Volume 7, 2017
Evil as a Subject of Sociological Cognition: Methodological Reflections by Temyr Khagurov
contrary, the logic of Jean Baudrillard about "metaphysical inseparability of Good and Evil" [Baudrillard, 2000: 156] leads eventually to the acceptance of "normality" of the evil: "An illusion that makes us think that it is possible to separate Good from Evil so as to develop one thing or another is just absurd (it dooms those, whose objective is to retaliate evil with evil, to weakness because eventually they do good)" [Baudrillard, 2000: 163].
Moreover, there is a profound and thorough research of an issue of Evil that was undertaken by Lars Svendsen in terms of critical rationalism [Svendsen, 2008]. Svendsen, along with all liberal individualists, obviously accepts a prejudiced approach to the facts of the Soviet-Russian history - for example, when talking about "the most serious war crimes committed by Russians in Chechnya since World War II" [Svendsen, 2008: 297]. However, he is much deeper and more "humanitarian" than his scientific colleagues Karl Popper and Friedrich Hayek. Consistently studying the problems of theology and anthropology of Evil, observing violence and cruelty as its main forms, Svendsen defends the praxeological aspect of his approach in researches of the evil: "It is also clear that, basically, none of us is insured against a nuisance of committing evil by oneself. <...> Evil is not "others", but also "we" are ourselves. <...> Evil, first of all, is a practical problem, but not theoretical. . <...> First of all evil should be referred to spheres of personal morality and politics. < ...> The necessity of fighting Evil is an axiom of any moral, it also has to be the same for politics" [Svendsen, 2008: 247, 292].
In conclusion to this fragmentary and inevitably superficial review of literature on the subject of the research (or rather the most noticeable tendencies of its development in the 20th century) some Russian scientists should also be mentioned.
First of all, the works of Yury Davydov - perhaps, the most prominent of the domestic social scientists, who touches upon the issues of Evil [Davydov, 1975; Davydov, 1989; History of Theoretical, 2002].
Interesting ideas about human Spirit and conflict Good and Evil in it we found in works of Andrey A. Ostapenko [Ostapenko & Shuvalov, 2012; Ostapenko, 2014].
The works of Alexander Panarin written with a profoundly Orthodox approach are qualitative theoretical papers and they are considered as a very serious research in the field of "political nature of the Evil" [Panarin, 2002].
Undoubtedly, the major theoretical and methodological achievement of the last several years are the scholarly writings of Sergey E. Kurginyan that correspond a profound analysis of forms and roots of Evil with praxeology and politics [Kurginyan, 2009].
The works of Sergey V. Gerasimov [Gerasimov, 1999] and Valeriy G. Gitin [Gitin, 2006] with their catchy titles and an obvious "marketing" way to present the information are also vividly interesting (but rather in the sense of a factual account than conceptualization).
To sum up such an extended introduction to the problem, it should be pointed out that the subject under speculation is immense, as well as the number of scientific reference sources on this topic. In our opinion, the original issue of Evil in deviantology lies in the pure ignoring of this subject, in its transformation into a marginal one. Meanwhile, without studying the Evil, it is impossible to fight against it. As the theologians of Modern age said: "The major victory of the devil is that everybody believes that it doesn"t exist". The "pure" science, which disregards an issue of Good and Evil and is looking only for the dispassionate Verity, became problematic in the world shaken with passions already at the level of physics: let us remember Oppenheimer"s tragedy. Even more, it is problematic at the level of sciences about society and a person. A person is a being that is not able to remain a person beyond the values, so can the science, which studies the one, remain beyond them? However, we
Future Human Image. Volume 7, 2017 43
Evil as a Subject of Sociological Cognition: Methodological Reflections by Temyr Khagurov
realize that the issue of introducing an evaluative discourse to science is by no means easy and it requires a careful and diplomatic dialogue. Thus, this article is an attempt to start this dialogue.
References
Berger, Peter Ludwig, and Thomas Luckmann. The Social Construction of Reality. The Treatise on Knowledge Sociology. Moscow: Medium, 1995.
Baudrillard, Jean. Transparency of Evil. Moscow: Dobrosvet, 2000.
Construction of Deviance. Compiled by Yakov I. Gilinsky. St. Petersburg: DEAN, 2011. Davydov, Yury N. Aesthetics of Nihilism: Art and "New Lefts". Moscow: Iskusstvo, 1975. Davydov, Yury N. Aesthetics of Love and Metaphysics of Willfulness: Problems of Moral
Philosophy. Moscow: Molodaya Gvardiya, 1989.
Derrida, Jacques. Round the Babel Towers. Commentaries. 1997. No. 11.