The influence of culture on human evolution

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УДК 165.9:130.2

THE INFLUENCE OF CULTURE ON HUMAN EVOLUTION

Kharkov State Academy

The overall popularity of the new theories in which the evolution and development of mankind is explained with natural factors has risen. The interest to exploring humanity as a cosmic phenomenon also increases. And it is not coincidentally that modern Western philosophy focuses on the identification of "internal and spiritual structure of the human mind, its spirituality, reflective consciousness, identity, individuality, as on the center of the principal species differences of Homo Sapiens and of each individual representative of humanity" [11]. In a society there is a growing understanding of the significance of spirituality, culture and human rights in the formation of a new complete picture of the world and man, of their energy-information evolution and nature.

At the present, a phenomenon of human cultural evolution requires a thorough and comprehensive exploring, because the future of humanity depends on the man itself, on orientation of his actions, thoughts, and nature of energy (positive or negative), via which it interacts with the environment and impacts the nature. Thus the question of a new understanding of content and basics of world view as the foundation of a new energy-information picture of the world and man, is a thing of current interest and it needs exploring.

The research objective is to study the human cultural evolution in the context of energy-information aspect that will allow exploring human culture as a process that guides the development and evolution of mankind.

Man is a subject of many disciplines. The studies of the classics of philosophy Aristotle and Plato, who explored the place of man in the system of nature, are the first and the most interesting studies in this field. Ancient Chinese philosophy that considered man as an object of nature, but not as its subject had a remarkable effect. This philosophy did not separate the man from natural environment; it gave him the place in the system of nature, developing its internal capacity within the natural. In the view of Chinese philosophy man must develop his internal capacity, mostly the energetic one, in order to fully and harmoniously coexist with nature, but in any case not to dominate it.

When exploring human on the basis of interaction of knowledge from various fields of science and culture, Russian cosmists N. Fedorov, N. Umov, P. Florensky, K. Tsiolkovsky, V. Vernadsky, A. Chizhevsky solved the problems associated with the life of man in society. In the philosophy of Russian cosmism man is described as a being that is in the process of its development, it is still not perfect, but it has the ability and the potential to creatively transform the surrounding world and his own culture. Relying upon the principle of energy origin of the process of self-organization of Cosmos, the researchers explained the phenomenon of human evolution level and human interaction degree with the cosmo-planetary energy to provide its development.

On studying the works of V. Vernadsky on the transition of the biosphere into the noosphere, it is seen that along with the scientific thought he estimated culture that is an important phenomenon of society, as a planetary phenomenon [5]. In his researches the scientist claims that the living substance is a carrier and the creator of the free energy - the biogeochemical energy, which causes the migration of chemical elements that build up the biosphere. The author believes that in the last millennium within the living matter, this new form of energy even greater in intensity and complexity is newly created and its importance is growing rapidly. This form of energy associated with life of human societies, raises a new kind of migration of chemical elements, the diversity and power of this energy leaves a conventional biogeochemical energy far behind. He called this new form of energy "energy of human culture", believing that it is just the form of energy, that creates a noosphere nowadays [4].

Over the history of society development the culture in that or the other aspect was the subject of studying of various philosophers, historians and writers. The term "culture" is one of the fundamental ones in modern science. It's hard to find another word that would have so many shades of meaning. Such expressions as "the culture of the mind", "culture of feelings", "culture of behavior" and "physical culture" sound quite familiar to us. In ordinary sense culture is a valuation concept and it refers to those personality traits that are more accurate to be called not culture, but a level of culture.

When studying the heritage of the Roerich, we will see that in human culture, they distinguished a special kind of energy, which they called "psychic energy" or "spirituality". They believed that the man is not only responsible for the Earth and all the creatures living on it, but also he takes part in their development, by means of his mental energy being a locomotive of the whole planetary evolution [10]. At the same time, if not realizing the role of his mental energy, man can become a brake for the evolution, according to the Roerich. If the energy of a man is in a state of chaos, everything that surrounds him comes into the same condition. And the product of human activity is not only man-made disasters, but also to a certain degree it is natural disasters. Roerich believed that the noosphere is already a reality and man is a driving force of it, which is still not enough aware of the creative and destructive power of his mind and psyche.

In the Living Ethics, the terms "cosmic evolution of man" and "the spiritual evolution of man" have almost the same sense. Cosmic evolution is impossible without the spiritual one, which automatically launches the cosmic. Inspiration of a man is not only his ethical and intellectual perfection, but also the transformation of flimsy, carnal, mortal, earthly "animal" into a powerful, spiritual, immortal, cosmic Being [1]. culture energy informational evolution

Thus, the man being active and creating entity, he is the single particle energy of the whole - of the universe, his energy is included into the energy-informational processes of the Cosmos and it is a source of culture as it is, it forms its values and beliefs. The energy of human culture is the only result and the cause of development of the internal sense of self and society in the whole and it contributes to its evolution.

It should be noted that the first evolutional theories were focused primarily on origin, existence and changes of biological species (J. Cuvier, J. Lamarck, Ch. Darwin, de Vries). In cultural anthropology the theory of evolution goes to the concept of Herbert Spencer, E. Taylor, and G. Morgan, who explored irreversible changes of cultural phenomena, caused by the need to adapt people organized in society to their natural environment [6]. Conjunction of natural science researches with socio-cultural ones (M. Harris, J. Stewart) contributed to emergence of the theory of specific evolution responsible for uniqueness and singularity of each culture.

The history of human culture within the framework of the culturological evolutionist concept of cultural development is understood by us as the evolutional process inherent to all peoples, the process of undergoing of the phases and stages of development, which are already passed in more developed nations. The main idea of the concept is that the tendency to change is initially laid in the culture and this is its essential feature, and the ultimate goal of development is internally reasoned.

The essential reorientation of evolutional views from the local to the global evolutionism occurred in science in the second half of the XX century. Works of V. Vernadsky, N. Fedorov, K. Tsiolkovsky, V. Behterev, P. Florensky, A. Chizhevsky, in which the universe and the man were studied as a single entity, a single, evolving in Space system that follows the general principles of universal, started a universal (global) evolutionism.

The term "universal evolutionism" and its concept were introduced for the first time by N. Moiseev in the book "Algorithms of Development" (M., 1987) and in the article "The logic of universal evolutionism and cooperativeness" (Problems of Philosophy, 1989, № 8), although he also expressed these ideas in 1986 - in "Strategies of reason" (Knowledge Is Power, 1986, № 10.)

There are three the most important modern scientific approaches that have contributed to justification of the idea of universal evolutionism: the theory of non-stationary universe, the concept of the biosphere and noosphere and the ideas of synergy.

Interaction of man and space and its evolution is being explored widely and diversely nowadays. The notion of man as a being capable to be creator and to create worlds is getting stronger. The principles and the rules of synergetic view of the world, the studies on quantum mechanics allow looking up at the concept of human evolution, which was suggested by P. Teilhard de Chardin [9] in a different way. The social nature of the human shows the experience of nature in its self-development and becomes a means of memory extension. Thus, a man appears as a being that has become who he is in a result of complications of the organic and the psychic.

The acceptance of the principle of general exchange of energy and information in the universe causes the recognition of the "intelligence of the world space". Informational universe is intelligent universe. For modern science, it means the ability to accept and to decode information. This situation is compared to the first principle of the Hermetic: "Everything is thought", "We live in mind, by mind and with help of mind" [7]. According to the scientists, who focus on energy-information theory, the informational matrix of the universe, which involves the evolutional program of the structure and development of matter, can also be called God.

The tradition of studying the human nature in the system of energy interactions was founded by Aristotle. The philosopher used the term "energy" to define the actual being of an object, its active action, linked to the transition from possibility to reality. Therefore, the "energy" differed both from the possibility or potentiality of this action, and from the implemented action full of realization or the result of this realization - entelechy [2].

Aristotle claimed that every entity contains an inner goal. Due to the target carried in the subject, the result exists in entity in a kind of latent state until its implementation. It shows itself only when the process is finished and the movement reaches its completion - the goal of development.

Hence, if we consider the energy as a power that provides some kind of interaction between objects and as a power that promotes opening a potential of a subject, it is culture that can be considered as an energy-informational method which may and should mobilize the energetic potential of individual to create that or the other values, properties, characteristics which display the effect of the real energy field phenomena that correct the processes of self-organization of mankind.

Since culture emerges and appears in various interactions (of society, of nature, of people), it is a process in fact. Cicero understood the culture as a process of enhancement and improvement. V. Ostwald in 1909-1911 suggested an "energetic" definition of culture as a process of "transformation of energy into the human-helpful energy, perhaps more saving use of energy without waste" [12]. According to A. Akhiezer, culture - is "an intense search of the man for himself and for his place in the world" [3]. At one time, E. Tylor, along with the well-known definition of culture, offered also such a formulation "from the perfect viewpoint the culture may be studied as a general improvement of the human race" [8]. This may also tell that culture is a definite process, which is entirely dependent on its carrier and it is evolutionary.

It may be confidently noted that the culture promotes the evolution; it is embodied in man and exists with him, appearing in a variety of interactions, in collective and individual activities, in cultural practices, in creation of that or the other objects. Such understanding of existence and implementation of culture, probably, corresponds to the hypothesis of the binary structure of the universe, which includes two layers of reality: the world of material objects and informational, or semantic field - a sphere of information that enables the existence and functioning of the sphere of spirit, of all that is supposed to be perfect.

Development and evolution of the human being as a cognizing and acting subject of cognition, and as a biosocial being indicates that the implementation of its potential is possible in a result of long and consistent stages of self-organization and self-improvement. Only on passing through these stages, man is able to open all his potential in its anthropological space content, gaining the experience of consistency of its actions aimed for self-development and humanity development in the whole. We believe that the biological evolution of man is directly connected with energy-information origin that is in a man. When an energy- information evolution of the system occurs, the qualitative characteristics of its biological parameters change and as a result of interdependence of these actions the process of cosmic evolution happens.

In day-to-day life, we do not realize the unity and interconnectedness of all the things and phenomena, separating the world to substantive objects and to segregate events. The principles of evolution make us look at the world as at a complex system of interactions of different parts of a whole. The interaction between man, nature and society needs to become perceived at this stage. Man must consciously interact with all of these structures, taking responsibility for the consequences of his actions and thoughts. He should understand the necessity of changes and be ready to bring them into his life. The problem of comprehension of the future is one of the most vexed and urgent problems of the present. Understanding of human nature and its role in the evolution of humanity is to cause noospheric coevolution of man and nature, and to their harmonious mutual development.

References

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2. Aristotle. Works in 4 volumes / Aristotle. Works: 4 volumes - Volume 1. - M: Thought - 1975. - 550 p.

3. Akhiezer A.S. Russia: the critique of historical experience. In three volumes / Akhiezer A.S. - M.: 1991. Volume I. - P. 32.

4. Vernadsky V.I. Thoughts of a Naturalist: In 2 books. / Vernadsky // USSR Academy of Sciences. Institute of Natural History and technique. Archive. M: Science, 1977. - Book 2 . Scientific thought as a planetary phenomenon / Comp.: Bastrakova M.S., Neapolitanskaya V.S., Philippova N. V.; Editorial Board.: Kedrov B.M., and others - 191 p.

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6. Gorbatov A.V. Major Schools and concepts of culturology / A.V. Gorbatov, Y.I. Mikhailov // School book. - Kemerovo: Kemerovo State University, 2000. - 83 p.

7. Leshkevich T. G. Philosophy of Science: Traditions and Innovations: school book for universities / T.G. Leshkevich - M.: "Publisher PRIOR", 2001. - 428 p.

8. Tylor E. B. Primitive Culture / E. B. Tylor - M. Sotsekgiz, 1939. - P. 15.

9. Teilhard de Chardin P. The phenomenon of man / Teilhard de Chardin P. - M: Science, 1987, 240 p.

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Abstract

A distinctive feature of the current stage of development is the fact that science is a synthesis of various disciplines in various fields of knowledge, and, in fact, it forms a holistic picture of the world, holistic world outlook, which is gradually replacing all the old paradigms. In this work the cultural evolution is considered in context of energy and information aspect, that allows exploring human culture as a process that promotes human development and evolution.

Keywords: culture, evolution, man, energy, development, process, space.

Статья посвящена анализу влияния культуры на эволюцию человека сквозь призму энергетического и информационного аспектов, позволяющих исследовать человеческую культуру как процесс, который управляет развитием человека и объясняет его эволюцию. Первыми интересными исследованиями в этом направлении являются труды Аристотеля и Платона, древних китайских философов. Отмечено, что новые теории, которые эволюцию человечества объясняют природными факторами, сейчас приобрели широкую популярность, что, в частности, отражено в трудах современных западных философов. Доказано, что только проходя через этапы самоорганизации и саморазвития, человек способен в полной мере раскрыть свой потенциал в его антропологическом космическом смысле, приобретя опыт согласованности своих действий, направленных на развитие себя и человечества в целом.

Ключевые слова: культура, эволюция, человек, энергетика, развитие, процесс, пространство.

Стаття присвячена аналізу впливу культури на еволюцію людини крізь призму енергетичного й інформаційного аспектів, що дають змогу досліджувати людську культуру як процес, який керує розвитком людини та пояснює його еволюцію. Першими цікавими дослідженнями в цьому напрямі стали праці Аристотеля і Платона, стародавніх китайських філософів. Зазначено, що нові теорії, в яких еволюція людства пояснюється природними факторами, нині набули широкої популярності, що, зокрема, відображено в працях сучасних західних філософів. Доведено, що тільки проходячи через етапи самоорганізації та самовдосконалення, людина здатна повною мірою розкрити свій потенціал в його антропологічному космічному змісті, набувши досвіду узгодженості своїх дій, спрямованих на розвиток себе і людства в цілому.

Ключові слова: культура, еволюція, людина, енергетика, розвиток, процес, простір.

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