History of Philosophy

What is Philosophy?

Moral Responsibility of the Philosopher

Although worldview paradigms and philosophical concepts, like scientific theories, are formulated by humans, philosophy is not merely the creation of imaginative minds. The task of both philosophers and scientists is not to invent new concepts but to uncover the truth. Isaac Newton did not establish the law of universal gravitation; he merely discovered it. God established the laws of the world when He created it, and brilliant scientists reveal and describe these laws. Therefore, it is customary to say that a scientist discovers and describes the laws of nature, rather than establishing them. A scientist can propose any theory, but only the theory that corresponds to reality is true. Throughout the history of science, there have been false theories, or even blatant pseudoscientific falsifications. Detecting and correcting scientific errors is extremely challenging. Sometimes a false theory dominates science for millennia; for example, Claudius Ptolemy's geocentrism was the prevailing astronomical theory for nearly two thousand years until Nicolaus Copernicus replaced it with his heliocentric theory. Both philosophy and science are tasked with not only formulating theories but also rejecting false ones.

Truth is singular and unchanging, whereas philosophical concepts are numerous, which implies that some of them are erroneous. The criterion for the truth of any theory is empirical evidence. For instance, a scientist might assert that a stone is lighter than water, but if the stone is thrown into water, it becomes evident that this hypothesis is false. Experience cannot generate a new theory; only the creative genius of a person can do that. However, experience can refute a false theory. A stone thrown into water will not give rise to a new theory, but it will disprove the notion that a stone is lighter than water. Similarly, experience does not produce philosophical concepts but can refute erroneous ones. For example, different countries base their economic activities on various economic theories. As a result, some countries are wealthy while others are poor. No country that built its planned economy on Marxism has become wealthy; all such countries are impoverished, and their people are destitute. If the goal of economics is to create wealth, and Marxist economic theory leads to poverty, then experience shows that it is false. It is impossible to launch an artificial satellite based on a false astronomical theory. Similarly, a sound economy cannot be built on a flawed economic theory. The sooner economists eradicate false theories and their consequences, the sooner the economy can establish a solid foundation and begin to develop. The same applies to law. No matter how many laws a parliament enacts, if they are not enforced, the people do not respect them, and state authorities do not ensure their strict implementation, all legislation loses its meaning. The fault lies with a flawed legal ideology that must be abandoned as quickly as possible in favor of a sound legal theory based on true principles of law, state relations, and legal consciousness.

If the truth of philosophical theories and worldview paradigms can and should be tested, a clear criterion for their truth must be established. To find this criterion, one must ask why people seek to understand the world, create philosophy, and develop science. Everything people do is aimed at living and being happy. People produce food to avoid starvation, make clothes to avoid freezing, build houses to protect against natural elements, create police forces to prevent crime, and establish pension and insurance funds to secure themselves when they lose their ability to work. Life is the universal criterion for the quality of any worldview paradigm. If a concept leads to death, it is false, and no speculative arguments can justify it. No matter how beautiful and logical Marxism may appear, it is an entirely flawed theory because it brought death: in all countries where Marxism was the dominant ideology, horrific terror resulted in the deaths of hundreds of millions of people worldwide. The Soviet Union, China, Cambodia, Angola, Chile, Spain, and all other countries where Marxism prevailed for any length of time were drenched in the blood of innocent people. The most glaring proof of the fallacy of Marxist ideology was the Holodomor. The same applies to Nazi ideology: there is no clearer evidence that Nazism is a false ideology than Auschwitz-Birkenau, gas chambers, and the Holocaust. The more than ten thousand deaths in the Russo-Ukrainian war, bloody massacres in Georgia, bombings in Syria, and so on are evidence of the fallacy of the Russian world ideology, which brings death, tears, and barbarism.

No social transformations occur spontaneously; they are all based on specific philosophical and worldview paradigms. The October Revolution and the Red Terror in the Soviet Union would not have happened if Karl Marx had not articulated and disseminated his ideas. There would have been no Nazi terror if Adolf Hitler had not formulated his destructive views. If an engineer, through malice or negligence, poorly connected an electrical device, causing someone's death, they are held criminally responsible. Therefore, those who justified the right of totalitarian regimes to take the lives of millions should bear even greater responsibility for their criminal doctrines. A philosopher bears moral responsibility for the consequences of their ideas. A pen can kill more people than a machine gun.

However, it is incorrect to place all the blame solely on the authors of harmful ideas. Usually, they did not forcibly make anyone accept and implement their ideas without appeal. If society has embraced these ideas, then the entire society must bear responsibility. Clearly, the intellectuals play a leading role in spreading any ideology. Who, if not university professors and school teachers, have convinced students and pupils of the validity of the ideologies they promote? If a professor convinced a student that the student had a class enemy, and then the student shot their class enemy, the blood of the innocent victim stains not only the executioner but also the professor who transformed an innocent youthful soul into an executioner. Nonetheless, the greatest guilt lies with those who attempt to justify flawed philosophical and worldview paradigms against empirical evidence and common sense. Even today, when the crimes of Nazism and Communism are widely known, there are those who seek to justify these criminal ideologies.

In most countries, governments respond to criminal ideologies by imposing restrictions on their spread. In Ukraine, which suffered from Communism, the "Decommunization Package" was enacted in 2015, which included: the Law of Ukraine "On Access to Archives of Repressive Organs of the Communist Totalitarian Regime 1917-1991," the Law of Ukraine "On Condemnation of Communist and National Socialist Regimes," the Law of Ukraine "On the Legal Status and Commemoration of the Struggle for Ukraine's Independence in the 20th Century," and the Law of Ukraine "On the Eternalization of the Victory over Nazism in the Second World War 1939-1945." Similar laws have also been enacted in many other countries, particularly those that became victims of totalitarian regimes.

The role of philosophical and worldview paradigms underscores the necessity of studying philosophy and the humanities. It is difficult to say today whether the dominance of flawed ideologies would have been possible if most people were well-versed in philosophy and could analyze the errors of these ideologies. Experience shows that the higher the level of humanistic education, the lower the society's susceptibility to dictatorship. Therefore, any government that enhances worldview education seeks to build a free and democratic society, while a government that restricts access to philosophical education aims to turn people into a thoughtless mass of submissive slaves.

Defining the quality of a philosophical-worldview paradigm is very challenging due to the interweaving of paradigms. Each person simultaneously embodies various paradigms in their personal and societal life: everyone holds metaphysical, religious, anthropological, legal, economic, political, and other views. Furthermore, the same person or the same society may rely on true theories in one area while relying on false ones in others. A vivid example of such a conflict is contemporary Western civilization. On the one hand, Western countries are wealthy, have high levels of social protection, and quality healthcare, resulting in high life expectancy and quality of life. This indicates that the economic theories on which Western countries base their governance are true. On the other hand, Western countries are experiencing a demographic crisis, meaning they are declining as nations. This suggests that some elements of their worldview-philosophical paradigm are flawed. To determine the worldview foundations that have led to the demographic crisis, a comprehensive philosophical analysis is necessary.