Information function of science. The science

The functions of science as a social force in solving global problems   of our time are very important. An example of this is environmental issues. As you know, rapid scientific and technological progress is one of the main causes of such phenomena dangerous to society and man as the depletion of the planet's natural resources, air, water, and soil pollution. Consequently, science is one of the factors of those radical and far from harmless changes that are taking place today in the human environment. Scientists themselves do not hide this. Scientific data play a leading role in determining the scale and parameters of environmental hazards.

The growing role of science in social life has given rise to its special status in modern culture and new features of its interaction with various layers of social consciousness. In this regard, the problem of the peculiarities of scientific knowledge and its correlation with other forms of cognitive activity, art, everyday consciousness, is acutely posed.

This problem, being philosophical in nature, at the same time has great practical significance. Understanding the specifics of science is a necessary prerequisite for the introduction of scientific methods in the management of cultural processes. It is also necessary for constructing a theory of management of science itself in the conditions of scientific and technological development, since the elucidation of the laws of scientific knowledge requires an analysis of its social conditioning and its interaction with various phenomena of spiritual and material culture.

Science as a   socio-cultural phenomenon in modern conditions should take care not only about the discovery of objective impersonal regularities, but also about the co-evolutionary inscribing of all its achievements into the world. With this problem of particular importance in mind, it is necessary to consider the question of the social functions of science. The following main functions of science are distinguished /2/:

cultural and ideological;

The function of direct productive force;

function of social power.

The cultural and ideological function   manifests itself in the fact that many discoveries in the natural and exact sciences always carry a certain ideological load. Simply put, the sciences in the course of their development produce a certain amount of knowledge, thereby bringing greater clarity to people's existing ideas about the world.

The function of science as a direct productive force is manifested in the form of new technologies, principles of labor organization, new technical means and equipment.

Science assumes the function of social force in the sense that it   provides society with the necessary, useful knowledge, resources that are used by it in all spheres of life. In modern conditions, the methods and means of science are actively involved in the development of large-scale plans for economic, technical, social development, and are designed to regulate the so-called global problems and minimize their impact on the natural and social worlds.

In addition to the listed functions, one should not forget the group   of traditional functions inherent in it. Among them /3/:

Gnoseological   function;

explanatory function;

Logical-methodological   function;

predictive function.

The epistemological function   is aimed at building a system of objective knowledge about the properties of relations and processes of objective reality.

The explanatory function of science is aimed   at identifying cause-and-effect relationships and dependencies, building the so-called "world lines" (deriving a certain resultant of forces, energies, field structures).

The prognostic function of science is manifested in the creation, according to the criteria of scientific rationality, of promising models of the studied, any possible objects.

As in the philosophy of science, one should distinguish between the images   of the philosophy of technology as a direction of intellectual search and as an academic discipline. It is on what is understood by the philosophy of technology that the content of those tasks and functions that this branch of knowledge performs depends.

In the first case, the philosophy of technology - in connection with the emerging planetary nature of the development of technology - performs mainly /4/:

The cognitive function is given by the very essence of science, the main purpose of which is precisely the knowledge of nature, society and man, the rational-theoretical comprehension of the world, the discovery of its laws and regularities, the explanation of various phenomena and processes, the implementation of prognostic activity, that is, the production of new scientific knowledge.

An important function of the philosophy of technology is humanization, which allows revealing the humanitarian component in the technical culture itself. Modern engineers are increasingly aware that “their activity is not impersonal for society, nature or man, that it creates not only benefits and brings progress, but also destroys nature, mechanizes society, perverts the spirit.

In the second case,    understanding the philosophy of technology as an educational discipline, one should emphasize its ideological function, within which the student comprehends his future profession, its boundaries, realizes and critically analyzes technical (and humanitarian) culture, clarifies the problems and tasks that it are solved, understanding the specifics of technical thinking /4/. The main directions   of humanization are: the creation of a creatively oriented (creative) pedagogy; overcoming the scientist model of a student as a recipient of information; destruction of formalism in education; orientation in education to the whole world of culture, and not only to science; changing the purpose of education. All this in its cumulative action should help overcome the existing vices of engineering education and transform the student from an object into a subject of educational activity /5/.

The social functions of science are diverse and are of particular interest to scientists themselves and the general public. The merit of posing the question of the functions of science belongs to J. Bernal. In the book The Social Function of Science (1939), three goals of science were noted - psychological, rational and social (satisfying the curiosity of the scientist, exploring the outside world and applying knowledge to achieve human well-being). Bernal considered the social functions of science to be the satisfaction of people's needs, the impact on industrial production and the impact on social change.

Without going into lengthy discussions about the functions of science that have been going on in Russian scientific literature for many years, we will propose a model consisting of six main functions: cognitive, prognostic, worldview, production and practical, the function of science as a social force, and the humanistic function of science.

Cognitive function of science.

Since ancient times, the main goal of science has been associated with the production and systematization of objectively true knowledge. This is the main cognitive function of science. Science serves all branches of social production and many spheres of human activity thanks to the disclosure of the objective laws of nature.

The epistemological function is organically inherent in science as a creative activity in obtaining new knowledge. The task of science is to explain - to reveal the essence of the object being explained, which can be carried out only through the knowledge of its relations and connections with other entities or its internal relations and connections. Cognition can also manifest itself in the form of everyday knowledge, artistic and even religious exploration of the world (knowledge of the transcendent, supernatural, accessible only to initiates in the form of esoteric knowledge and mysticism). Even the primitive myth performed the function of explaining the world and adapting to it. But scientific understanding has a number of undeniable advantages over other types of knowledge.

Science supplies society with reliable, verifiable and systematized information. The most important advantage of scientific knowledge is its reproducibility and universality. Once received, the truth can be rechecked, but it does not need to be rediscovered. So, Newton's binomial is now known to every 8th grade student, and in this sense, scientific knowledge from its application is not erased and does not grow old. But even in the Middle Ages, scholastic scientists complained that the most difficult thing for them was the application of four arithmetic operations.

Cognitive activity depends on many external circumstances, including the prevailing worldview in a given society, the material resources of science, the number and professional training of scientific personnel, the perfection of research equipment and methods for processing the data obtained. Of particular importance in cognition are the subjective motives of scientific activity, primarily the irrepressible thirst for discoveries, the recognition of scientific merits by colleagues. Not the last role in the activities of modern scientists is played by the material reward of their work, scientific career, fame and honor, which society rewards the activities of scientists. But the main stimulus of scientific research has always been and remains social needs, social practice.

The cognitive function is equally performed by all sciences, contributing to the formation of a scientific picture of the world. But a special role is played by the philosophical generalization of the achievements of the fundamental sciences. As a result of such generalizations, not only a single picture of the world is formed, but also the most important component of the worldview is enriched (the naturalistic element as knowledge of the general laws of inanimate and living nature).

Note that the boundaries of knowledge do not exist. More than once, it seemed to contemporaries of outstanding discoveries in the field of physics and other sciences that there was nothing more to learn (as K. Lorentz believed when the electromagnetic picture of the world was created). Only a few years have passed and physicists began to explore the nucleus of the atom (E. Rutherford's experiments), and even later, in the late 20s - early 30s, through the works of N. Bohr, W. Heisenberg, E. Schrödinger, M. Born . L.D. Landau created quantum mechanics, and on its basis the main contours of a non-classical, quantum-mechanical picture of the world took shape. At the end of the XX century. on the basis of synergetics, relativistic cosmology, a new unified picture of the world arises (post-nonclassical, in the terminology of V.S. Stepin).

The predictive function of science.

In addition to describing, understanding and explaining, science is characterized by foresight, prediction and forecasting. Foresight comes in many forms, ranging from random guesses to reliable predictions.

The term "foresight" is used in two senses:

1. in the first case, it is understood as knowledge about the future, regardless of how this knowledge is obtained;

2. in the second, foresight is considered as a complex movement of cognition, as a research process, an integral operation, a cognition procedure.

Prediction is most often interpreted as a reasoning that has the form of a deductive conclusion, the basis of which is either a sample statement (empirical generalizations, laws or theories) or particular statements that characterize the conditions for applying general provisions in a particular case.

A variety of scientific foresight is forecasting - a special study of the prospects of a phenomenon. It is one of the scientific foundations of management (goal setting, planning, programming, design, management decisions).

For modern society, due to the aggravation of the global problems of mankind, primarily the severity of the environmental crisis, which called into question the very possibility of the survival of mankind and leading to extremely pessimistic conclusions. it is important to rely on the scientific forecast of the prospects for resolving the energy, food, economic and social problems of society. The forecast of prospects for the development of education and technology is also relevant.

The natural need of man has always been to know the future, his destiny. This served as the psychological basis for the popularity of astrology and palmistry, the activities of soothsayers and prophets. And only the successes of the exact sciences make it possible to predict with mathematical accuracy the relative positions of the planets, eclipses of the sun and moon, river floods, and climatic cataclysms.

Science, in its essence, is not only called upon to supply society with reliable knowledge, reflecting the world in laws, scientific principles and categories, but also to predict the future course of events. For the first time the predictive function of science declared itself in astronomy. But if in ancient times the ability to foresee the future inspired fear and awe in people, now accurate weather forecasts, long-term demographic forecasts, forecasts of future discoveries of science itself have become commonplace.

First of all, science predicts future inventions and discoveries using specific methods (the "Delphian oracle" method, based on the identification of the method of experts). Known, for example, are the activities of research groups that predict trends in the development of military equipment. In the context of the dynamic development of the economy, society has an urgent need not only to plan, but also to foresee the long-term consequences of its activities. know trends in urban planning, population migration, food needs. In a number of countries, the need to foresee events has given rise to a futurological boom. There are scenarios for the development of various regions of the world, geopolitical conflicts.

Much is now being said about sustainable economic growth, climate warming, the growing ozone hole, and so on. And if a group of scientists led by N. Moiseev managed to create a model of "nuclear winter" (the catastrophic consequences of using only part of the accumulated nuclear weapons) with the help of computers, then getting an accurate and reasonable forecast of social development remains an impossible task, due to the underdevelopment of forecasts in the humanities, and because of the complexity, multivariate development of society. Nevertheless, in economic science, the theory of "long economic waves", developed by V. Kondratiev, the works of V. Leontiev and L. Kantorovich, make it possible to forecast the sectoral development of the economy. On the basis of opinion polls, it is possible to quite accurately predict the results of the upcoming US presidential elections, the victory of one party or another in the parliamentary elections.

History knows numerous examples when futurologists were cruelly mistaken. It was not possible to foresee such an epoch-making geopolitical cataclysm as the collapse of the USSR. Therefore, it would be premature to declare the omnipotence of science in predicting social phenomena. Ultimately, the prognostic function is carried out only on the basis of the available reliable knowledge, and therefore some scientists consider it only a subfunction of the cognitive function of science.

Nevertheless, scientific forecasts based on extrapolation of development trends in the present for the foreseeable future are a real fact. The technique of forecasting will be improved with the progress of computer technology. In any case, the social order for forecasts from scientists, politicians, leaders of physical culture and sports organizations is a serious incentive for improving science itself as a tool for predicting the future.

The ideological function of science.

The ideological function of modern science lies in the fact that the worldview of a person and society in the era of scientific and technological revolution includes, along with ideals, principles, values ​​and norms (axiological component), generalized information about the world around and the person himself. Science exerts its influence on a person's worldview primarily through the scientific picture of the world, in which the general principles of the world order are expressed in a concentrated form. Acquaintance with them is one of the most important tasks of modern education, which forms the scientific outlook of the individual.

Recall that the main question of worldview is the question of man's attitude to the world. But the very attitude to the world, the surrounding natural and social reality depends on the completeness of knowledge about it. The mythological and religious worldview of the traditional society was based on primitive, often speculative and fantastic ideas about the world. Beginning with the scientific revolution of the 17th century, a mechanistic picture of the world began to form as the initial phase of the natural-scientific worldview. It was based on the principles of Newtonian mechanics, according to which the world is subject to the action of Laplacian determinism, and the world itself is like a clockwork, where all parts are fitted to each other. At the same time, the laws of science do not contradict the dogmas of the Holy Scripture, which I. Newton himself, in his declining years, wanted to substantiate mathematically.

In the future, the scientific worldview was supplemented by the evolutionary principle of self-development through natural selection (C.Darwin), knowledge of the patterns of the microcosm and relativistic ideas about space and time. The social picture of the world was enriched with materialistic ideas about society (K. Marx), ideas about the role of the unconscious principle in the human psyche changed (S. Freud). The methodological basis of the scientific conception of nature, society and man is the principles of dialectics and materialism.

One should not be deceived by the tremendous progress of the natural sciences in terms of their influence on the worldview of each person. Millions of people retain a religious worldview and do not have the slightest idea about the structure of the universe and about social laws. For example, representative surveys of US citizens showed that 60% of them do not know the reasons for the change of day and night, as well as the seasons. Despite all the achievements of the natural sciences, a large number of people are fond of magic, believe in the immortality of the soul, the influence of stars and planets on the fate of man.

So, philosophical principles, laws and categories still remain the core of the scientific worldview. The natural sciences make a decisive contribution to the modern natural-science picture of the world, that is, the naturalistic element of the worldview. The role of the humanities in the formation of the sociological element of the worldview is also great. Achievements of science fertilize and concretize abstract, extremely general provisions about the materiality of the world, the infinity of the Universe, the progressive development of nature, society and human thinking, the cognizability of the world.

At the same time, it is important to understand that only on the basis of natural science knowledge can a positivist-type worldview with the slogan "every science is a philosophy in itself" be formed. The worldview illiteracy of a scientist harms theoretical research, leads to errors when it comes to interpreting and explaining facts that do not fit into the traditional picture of the world. Then crises arise in science, which can be overcome only on the basis of a “philosophical disassembly” (V.I. Lenin) of the accumulated facts.

Production and practical function of science.

The main purpose of science, its ultimate goal is to serve the good of society. Modern science not only explains the world, but increasingly contributes to its transformation.

F. Engels wrote: “for the development of its industry, the bourgeoisie needed a science that would investigate the properties of physical bodies and the forms of manifestation of the forces of nature. Until that time, science was a humble servant of the church and was not allowed to go beyond the limits set by faith” (T. 22, p. 307).

For the first time, the process of turning science into a direct productive force was recorded and analyzed by Marx in the middle of the 19th century. He was able to see a new powerful impetus that science began to receive during this period for its development. According to K. Marx, “the application of science to direct production itself becomes for it one of the defining and motivating moments” (T.46. Part 2. P. 212). As a result, production itself becomes an experimental science, a technological application of modern science (Ibid. C221).

The conditions that contributed to the transformation of science into a direct productive force were the following:

Creation of permanent channels for the practical use of scientific knowledge;

The emergence of such branches of activity as applied research and development;

Creation of centers and networks of scientific and technical information.

In the 20th century, the increasing application of scientific knowledge became a prerequisite for the development of modern production. At present, the economic well-being of countries directly depends on the state of their sphere of science. Only those countries that pay serious attention to scientific research, successfully master science-intensive technologies, mobilize sufficiently powerful financial, informational, industrial, and intellectual means for this, and lead the modern political and economic race. Countries that do not stand up to such a competition (or do not participate in it at all) quickly fall into the "dead end" of social development and are doomed to forever play a secondary role in the international arena.

Science has a beneficial effect on all aspects of society, but above all, it proves its creative potential, embodied in the materialized power of knowledge in the form of production technology. Achievements in science fertilize and transform all elements of the productive forces - tools and objects of labor, labor force, and contribute to an increase in labor efficiency. In the conditions of the scientific and technological revolution, entire industries (nuclear, chemical, radio engineering, petrochemical, robotics production) are brought to life and are guided by outstanding scientific discoveries and technical inventions.

Biological sciences and medicine make a significant contribution to social progress. Thanks to their achievements, mortality from previously common and even incurable diseases is sharply reduced, life expectancy increases, and the successes of gerontology have made it possible to increase the active age of a person and delay the aging of the body.

Similarly, one should consistently prove the growing role of science in improving physical culture and sports. Thanks to scientific research, new technical means of training and rehabilitation of athletes have appeared, modern technical sports have arisen, technical equipment and equipment of athletes are being improved. Scientific recommendations allow coaches to increase physical activity, achieve new achievements and sports records in gymnastics, swimming, weightlifting, and skiing.

The function of science as a social force.

In the conditions of the scientific and technological revolution of the second half of the 20th century, science revealed another important function: science began to act as a social force.

Humanities and socio-economic sciences began to play a regulatory role in various areas of social activity. In the last decades of the twentieth century, the achievements and methods of science began to be widely used to develop large-scale programs in the field of economic development and in the social sphere.

The function of science as a social force has clearly manifested itself in solving the global problems of modern society. At present, when the threats of global crises in ecology, energy, raw materials and food are growing, the social role of science becomes especially significant. Based on the data and achievements of modern science, there is a search for ways and means to overcome these threats and thereby ensure the continued existence and development of mankind.

The humanistic function of science.

Some authors attribute to science a humanistic function - the function of the development of man himself. Let us preliminarily note that this function is carried out by culture, and science is only a part of culture. It would be more correct to talk about the humanistic potential of science, the use of scientific achievements for the development of social production, facilitating heavy physical labor, strengthening health, improving the well-being of citizens, improving life, prolonging life, educating the younger generations, and increasing sportsmanship. But for the implementation of these humane goals, not to mention the elimination of hunger and disease in the countries of Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia, appropriate social conditions and resource mobilization are necessary. And this is the business of politicians, not scientists. In other words, in solving the social problems of mankind, science has said its weighty word, but it is not omnipotent.

Moreover, in an inhumane society, under conditions of undemocratic political regimes, the achievements of science and technology can turn against the person himself. Science and technology in a totalitarian society (for example, in Nazi Germany) was used to establish world domination, destroy entire nations, manipulate people's minds, instill wild prejudices and myths in them. In itself, scientific knowledge is ideologically neutral, but can be used both for the good and for the harm of a person. In a humane, democratic society, the principle expressed by Leo Tolstoy should be fully embodied: "The business of science is to serve people."

Summing up, we emphasize that all the social functions of science are interconnected. Science as a social institution, through its utilitarian, cognitive, ideological, prognostic and other functions, fully realizes its creative role in society.

Philosophy abstract

The science- this is a historically established form of human activity, aimed at the knowledge and transformation of objective reality, such spiritual production, which results in purposefully selected and systematized facts, logically verified hypotheses, generalizing theories, fundamental and particular laws, as well as research methods. Science is both a system of knowledge and their spiritual production, and practical activity based on them.

modern science- an extremely ramified set of individual scientific branches. The subject of science is not only the world outside of man, various forms and types of motion of matter, but also their reflection in consciousness, that is, man himself. According to their subject, sciences are divided into natural-technical, studying the laws of nature and methods of its development and transformation, and social, studying various social phenomena and the laws of their development, as well as man himself as a social being (humanitarian cycle). Among the social sciences, a special place is occupied by a complex of philosophical disciplines that study the most general laws of development of nature, society, and thinking.

In the natural sciences, one of the main methods of research is experiment, and in the social sciences, statistics.

General scientific logical methods are induction, deduction, analysis, synthesis, as well as systematic and probable approaches, and much more. In each science, the empirical level is distinguished, that is, the accumulated factual material - the results of observations and experiments, and the theoretical level, that is, the generalization of empirical material, expressed in the relevant theories, laws and principles; evidence-based scientific assumptions, hypotheses that need further verification by experience. The theoretical levels of the individual sciences come together in a general theoretical, philosophical explanation of the open principles and laws, in the formation of the ideological and methodological aspects of scientific knowledge in general.

A sociological analysis of the activities of the institute of science in modern society gives grounds to assert that the main function of science is the production and multiplication of reliable knowledge, which makes it possible to reveal and explain the patterns of the world around

The above main function Science in modern society can be concretized and differentiated into a number of more private, closely interconnected.

1) worldview function;

2) technological;

3) the function of rationalizing human behavior and activities.

The ideological function of science- one of the oldest, it has always existed. But in pre-industrial society, this function was subject to the prevailing mythological and religious beliefs in society. It is singled out as an independent one, independent of religious values, only in the period of the formation of a modern industrial society with the progress of scientific knowledge and the secularization of religion.

Technological function of science. If the ideological function of science is closely connected with the desire of a person to understand the world around him, to know the truth, and the so-called Platonic ideal of science existed in previous eras, then the technological function began to clearly form only in modern times. Its herald is considered to be the English philosopher Francis Bacon, who declared that “knowledge is power” and it should become a powerful tool for transforming nature and society.

Function rationalization of human behavior and activities- is closely related to the previous one, with the only difference being that it refers not so much to the material and technical sphere as to the social and humanitarian one. It could only be realized in the last two or three decades thanks to achievements in the field of social sciences - psychology, economics, cultural anthropology, sociology, etc. Thanks to the success of these sciences, and primarily psychology, which is the basic discipline, it became possible to create and disseminate numerous social technologies - rational schemes and models of behavior with the help of which human activity brings more effective results.

Science performs important functions in modern social life. In general, the following functions of science can be distinguished: 1) cognitive - consists in the fact that science is engaged in the production and reproduction of knowledge, which ultimately takes the form of a hypothesis or theory that describes, explains, systematizes the acquired knowledge, contributing to forecasting further development, which allows a person to navigate in the natural and social world; 2) cultural worldview - not being a worldview itself, science fills the worldview with objective knowledge about nature and society and thereby contributes to the formation of the human personality as a subject of cognition and activity, while science is a public property, remaining in social memory and constituting the most important part of culture; 3) educational content fills the educational process, i.e. provides the learning process with specific material, science develops methods and forms of education, forms an education strategy based on the developments of psychology, anthropology, pedagogy, didactics, and other sciences; 4) practical - this function acquired a special role during the scientific and technological revolution of the middle of the 20th century, when there is an intensive "scientificization" of technology and "technization" of science, i.e. science becomes a direct productive force, participating in the creation of production at a modern level, while simultaneously penetrating into other spheres of society - health care, communications, education, everyday life, forming such branches of science as the sociology of management, the scientific organization of labor, etc.

The functions of science are distinguished depending on the general purpose of its branches and their role in the development of the surrounding world with a constructive purpose. Functions of Science- this is an external manifestation of any of its essential properties. They can be used to judge its ability to participate in solving the problems posed to society, and the ability to create more favorable conditions for people's lives and the development of culture.

The functions of science are distinguished according to the main activities of researchers, their main tasks, as well as the scope of the acquired knowledge. Thus, basic functions of science can be defined as cognitive, ideological, industrial, social and cultural.

cognitive function is a fundamental, given by the very essence of science, the purpose of which is to understand nature, man and society as a whole, as well as in the rational-theoretical comprehension of the world, explaining processes and phenomena, discovering patterns and laws, making forecasts, etc. This function is reduced to the production of new scientific knowledge.

Worldview function largely intertwined with the cognitive. They are interrelated, since its goal is to develop a scientific picture of the world and the worldview corresponding to it. Also, this function implies the study of a rationalistic attitude of a person to the world, the development of a scientific worldview, which means that scientists (along with philosophers) must develop scientific worldview universals and corresponding value orientations.

Production function, which can also be called a technical and technological function, is necessary for the introduction of innovations, new forms of organization of processes, technologies and scientific innovations in manufacturing industries. In connection with it, it turns into a kind of “workshop” that works for the benefit of society, in which new ideas and their implementation are developed and implemented. In this regard, scientists are even sometimes referred to as production workers, which characterizes the production function of science as fully as possible.

social function began to stand out especially significantly in recent times. This is due to the achievements of the scientific and technological revolution. In this regard, science turns into a social force. This is manifested in situations where the data of science are used in the development of social and economic development programs. Since such plans and programs are complex in nature, their development involves close interaction between various branches of the natural, social and

cultural functions science (or educational) comes down to the fact that science is a kind of cultural phenomenon, an important factor in the development of people, their education and upbringing. Achievements of science have a significant impact on the educational process, the content of education programs, technologies, methods, etc. This function is implemented through the media, journalistic and educational activities of scientists.

Structure and functions of science closely connected. Objective existence includes three main areas: and society. In this regard, three main elements are distinguished in the structure of science. According to the sphere of reality being studied, scientific knowledge is divided into natural science and social science (the sciences of man and the sciences of society).

Natural science investigates everything related to nature. It reflects the logic of nature. The structure of natural science teachings and knowledge is complex and varied. It includes knowledge about matter, the interaction of substances, chemical elements, living matter, Earth, Space. From here the fundamental natural-science directions develop.

Social science studies social phenomena, systems, their structures, processes and states. These sciences provide knowledge about various social relations and relationships between people. Scientific knowledge about society combines three areas: sociological, economic and state-legal.

A separate area is knowledge about a person and his consciousness.