Man and the World (About the Philosophy of Sergei Leonidovich Rubinstein)

Abstract

The article is a reflection on the new edition of the work “Man and the World” by the outstanding Russian scientist, psychologist and philosopher S.L. Rubin­stein (1889–1960), which for the first time fully presents the integral system of his philosophical views. It is shown that the title of the work, in which being expands to the world, consciousness expands to man and man, and not the world, comes first, adequately expresses the architectonics of the entire philosophical system, according to which conscious human activity acts as a new way of exis­tence of the Universe itself. Rubinstein does not separate ontology from anthro­pology, but gives it an anthropocentric character, considering man in the unity of his natural and historical dimensions as the starting point of the entire philo­sophical coordinate system, and in addition to the general ontology, he identifies a differential ontology, by which he understands the comprehension of a living human life in real space and time. This life is reflected in a variety of knowledge and spiritual aspirations. Differential ontology at the philosophical level acts pri­marily as ethics. Rubinstein sees the ethical edge of his philosophy in an accen­tuated critical approach to his subject, which consists not only in embracing life in its philosophical integrity, but at the same time improving reality through criti­cism and overcoming its ethical perversions, raising this criticism to a philosoph­ical level. He concludes his work with a study of the suppression of the ethical principle of life by the political practice of the Soviet state, which turns out to be fatal for the latter. As for the grandest communist experiment, Rubinstein charac­terizes it as an optimistic tragedy.