Matter as a philosophical category to designate objective reality. Philosophical category of matter and its fundamental role in understanding the world and man

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5. The concept of matter in philosophy, its ideological and methodological significance.

The category of matter is a fundamental philosophical concept. The definition of matter was given by V.I. Lenin: “Matter is a philosophical category for designating objective reality“, which is given to a person in his sensation, which is copied, photographed, displayed by our sensations, exists independently of them.” In this definition, 2 main features are highlighted: 1) Matter exists independently of consciousness 2) It is copied, photographed, and displayed by sensations. The first characteristic means recognition of the primacy of matter in relation to consciousness, the second recognition of the fundamental knowability of the material world. This definition does not contain references to specific properties and types of matter, nor does it list any of its specific characteristics. There were other definitions in the tradition of materialism. For example, many materialists of the 18th and 19th centuries defined matter as a collection of indivisible corpuscles (atoms) from which the world is built. It makes no sense to define matter by listing its known widows and forms, because: the development of science will lead to the development of previously unknown properties of types and forms of matter. An example of such a crisis was the situation that arose in physics at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. It was a time of revolution in natural science, associated with a radical breakdown of previous ideas about the structure of matter. One of the most important was the discovery of the divisibility of the atom. Thus, there is only one way to define matter - to identify such an extremely general sign that characterizes any type of matter, a sign, regardless of whether they have already been known or will only be known in the future. So common feature is the property of “being an objective reality, existing outside our consciousness.” By defining matter through this attribute, dialectical materialism does not explicitly assume the endless development of matter and its inexhaustibility. The divisibility of the atom from these positions does not mean the destruction of matter, but the expansion of the horizon of our knowledge about the mother and the discovery of its new types. Defining matter through the attribute “to be an objective reality, to exist outside of our consciousness” does not yet provide explicit knowledge of how matter is structured. However, it implicitly already assumes that matter is inexhaustible, exists in an infinite number of types and properties, and therefore has a certain, albeit very complex, structure. A specific idea of what this structure is, what the structure of matter is, develops in the process of cognition and practice.

Matter The development of this concept is due to the fact that philosophers in the classical period of the development of philosophy always sought to solve the main question of philosophy: what comes first, matter or consciousness in this world. This is something that depends on human consciousness or something that is outside of his consciousness. Using the concept of matter, philosophers, in principle, were talking about the basis that lies outside human consciousness. However, ideas about the essence of matter changed during the development of philosophical thought.

IN ancient philosophy The definition of matter was based on the concept of “material”, from which all things (water, fire) were, as it were, fashioned. Aristotle: Matter is the universal possibility of objective diversity. The reality of material diversity, its stimulus and goal is form as a constituent principle.

Middle Ages: Aristotle's Dualistic concept (matter as a passive, passive principle, spirit as an active principle, took a dominant position. In the mechanistic materialism of modern times, the definition of matter is no longer based on the concept of “material”, but on the basic primary unchanging properties common to all material objects: extension, movement, figure, heaviness (their combination gives the body).

For Diderot, matter is an abstract category that abstracts from all material objects their universal properties and qualities.

All disagreements and difficulties in the definition of matter could not be resolved without combining an objective dialectical and theoretical-cognitive disclosure of the essence of this concept. Matter can only be defined in relation to practice or to the immaterial. The only relatively different quality from matter is consciousness. Based on this methodological aspect, LENIN, in his work “Materialism and Imperiocratism” (1908), gave a definition of matter through consciousness.

3. Today modern science is talking about the existence of 3 systems of matter (non-living, living, social). Each system has its own structural organization.

Levels of nonliving matter:

*level of electron particles and fields

*atomic-molecular level

*macro and megabodies

Levels of living matter:

*DNA and RNA molecules

*Cells

*Fabrics

*Organs as a taxonomy of living organisms

The lowest structural level of matter at the end of the 90s is considered to be the level of leptons and quarks (hypothetical elementary particles with a fractional charge) Ideas about their existence were first put forward in 1963 by Gehl-Mann. Currently, physicists are talking about the existence of 6 types of quarks. Today science distinguishes 3 types of matter (known): Matter, antimatter, field. Matter is everything that has rest mass. Antimatter consists of antiparticles (positrons, etc.) and really exists. Fields - gravitational and electromagnetic. Everyone considers plasma to be a special state of the world (a partially or completely ionized gas in which the densities of positive and negative charges are the same)

The concretization of the concept of “being” is carried out, first of all, in the concept of “matter”. It is clear that the problems of matter, including its concept, were developed primarily by materialist philosophers from ancient to modern. The most complete and profound development of these problems is contained in the works of modern materialists. In materialist philosophy, “matter” acts as the most general, fundamental category in which the material unity of the world is fixed; various forms of being are considered as generated by matter in the course of its movement and development. The definition of the concept of “matter” was given by V.I. Lenin in his work “Materialism and Empirio-Criticism” (1909).

“Matter,” wrote Lenin, “is a philosophical category to designate objective reality, which is given to man in his sensations, which is copied, photographed, displayed by our sensations, existing independently of them.”

Let's take a closer look at this definition. The category “matter” denotes objective reality. But what does “objective reality” mean? This is all that exists outside of human consciousness and independently of it. So, the main property of the world, fixed with the help of the category “matter,” is its independent existence, independent of man and knowledge. The definition of matter essentially resolves the main question of philosophy, the question of the relationship between matter and consciousness. And at the same time the priority of matter is affirmed. It is primary in relation to consciousness. Primary in time, because consciousness arose relatively recently, and matter exists forever; It is also primary in the sense that consciousness is a historically emerging property of highly organized matter, a property that appears in socially developed people.

Matter is primary as the object of reflection is primary in relation to its reflection, as the model is primary in relation to its copy. But we know that the main question of philosophy also has a second side. This is the question of how thoughts about the world relate to this world itself, the question of whether the world is knowable. In the definition of matter we find the answer to this question. Yes, the world is knowable. Lenin in his definition focuses on sensations as the primary source of knowledge. This is due to the fact that in the named work Lenin criticizes empirio-criticism, a philosophy for which the problem of sensation was of particular importance. Although, in essence, we are talking about the problem of the cognizability of the world, the cognizability of matter. Therefore, we can give a shorter definition of matter: matter is a knowable objective reality.

Of course, such a definition is very general and does not indicate any other properties of matter other than its existence outside and independent of consciousness, as well as its cognition. However, we have the right to talk about some properties of matter that have the nature of attributes, that is, properties that are always and everywhere inherent in both all matter and any material objects. These are space, time and movement. Since all things exist in space, move in space, and at the same time the very existence of a person and the things around him takes place in time, the concepts of “space” and “time” were formulated and used quite a long time ago.

The categories “space” and “time” are among the fundamental philosophical and general scientific categories. And naturally, they are such primarily because they reflect and express the most general state of being.

Time characterizes, first of all, the presence or absence of existence of certain objects. There was a time when I, writing these lines (as well as you, dear reader), simply did not exist. Now we are. But the time will come when you and I will not be there. The sequence of states: non-existence – existence – non-existence is fixed by the category of time. The other side of existence is the simultaneous existence of different objects (in our simple example, this is mine and yours, reader), as well as their simultaneous non-existence. Time also fixes the relative periods of existence, so that for some objects it can be greater (longer), and for others it can be smaller (shorter). In the famous parable from " The captain's daughter"A.S. Pushkin determined the lifespan of a raven to be three hundred years, and that of an eagle to be thirty. In addition, time allows us to record periods in the development of a particular object. Childhood - adolescence - youth - adulthood - old age - all these phases in human development have their own time frame. Time is an integral part of the characteristics of all processes of existence, change, and movement of objects, without being reduced to any of these characteristics. It is this circumstance that makes it difficult to understand time as a universal form of existence.

The situation with the understanding of space is somewhat simpler if it is taken in the ordinary sense, as the container of all things and processes. More complex problems associated with the evolution of physical concepts of space and time will be considered below.

We find a philosophical analysis of the problems of space, time and motion in ancient philosophy. These problems began to be considered and discussed in more detail in science in the 17th century, in connection with the development of mechanics. At that time, mechanics analyzed the movement of macroscopic bodies, that is, those that were large enough to be seen and observed both in the natural state (for example, when describing the movement of the Moon or planets) and in experiment .

The Italian scientist Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) was the founder of experimental-theoretical natural science.

He examined in detail the principle of relativity of motion. The movement of a body is characterized by speed, i.e., the size of the path traveled per unit of time. But in the world of moving bodies, speed turns out to be a relative quantity and dependent on the reference system. So, for example, if we are traveling in a tram and pass through the cabin from the back door to the driver’s cabin, then our speed relative to the passengers sitting in the cabin will be, for example, 4 km per hour, and relative to the houses the tram passes by, it will be will be equal to 4 km/h + tram speed, for example, 26 km/h. That is, the definition of speed is associated with a reference system or with the definition of a reference body. Under normal conditions, for us such a body of reference is the surface of the earth. But as soon as you go beyond its limits, the need arises to establish that object, that planet or that star, relative to which the speed of movement of the body is determined.

Considering the problem of determining the motion of bodies in general view, the English scientist Isaac Newton (1643-1727) followed the path of maximum abstraction of the concepts of space and time, expressing the conditions of motion. In his main work, “Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy” (1687), he poses the question: is it possible to indicate a body in the Universe that would serve as an absolute body of reference? Newton understood that not only the Earth, as it was in the old geocentric systems of astronomy, cannot be taken as such a central, absolute body of reference, but also the Sun, as was accepted in the Copernican system, cannot be considered such. An absolute reference body cannot be specified. But Newton set the task of describing absolute motion, and not limiting himself to describing the relative speeds of motion of bodies. In order to solve such a problem, he took a step that was apparently as ingenious as it was erroneous. He put forward abstractions that had not previously been used in philosophy and physics: absolute time and absolute space.

“Absolute, true, mathematical time by itself and by its very essence, without any relation to anything external, flows uniformly and is otherwise called duration,” wrote Newton. In a similar way, he defined absolute space: “Absolute space, by its very essence, regardless of anything external, always remains the same and motionless.” Newton contrasted sensory observed and recorded relative types of space and time with absolute space and time.

Of course, space and time as universal forms of existence of matter cannot be reduced to certain specific objects and their states. But one cannot separate space and time from material objects, as Newton did. A pure container of all things, existing on its own, a kind of box in which you can put the earth, planets, stars - that’s what Newton’s absolute space is. Since it is motionless, any fixed point of it can become a reference point for determining absolute motion; you just need to check your watch with absolute duration, which again exists independently of space and any things located in it. Things, material objects studied by mechanics, turned out to be adjacent to space and time. All of them in this system act as independent components that do not influence each other in any way. Cartesian physics, which identified matter and space and did not recognize emptiness and atoms as forms of existence of things, was completely rejected. Advances in explaining nature and the mathematical apparatus of new mechanics ensured Newton's ideas for a long reign, which lasted until the beginning of the 20th century.

In the 19th century The rapid development of other natural sciences began. In physics, great success was achieved in the field of thermodynamics, the doctrine of the electromagnetic field developed; The law of conservation and transformation of energy was formulated in general form. Chemistry progressed rapidly, and a table of chemical elements was created based on periodic law. Biological sciences received further development, and Darwin's theory of evolution was created. All this created the basis for overcoming previous, mechanistic ideas about movement, space and time. A number of fundamental fundamental provisions about the movement of matter, space and time were formulated in the philosophy of dialectical materialism.

In his polemics with Dühring, F. Engels defended the dialectical-materialist concept of nature. “The basic forms of being,” wrote Engels, “are space and time; being outside of time is the same greatest nonsense as being outside of space.”

In his work “Dialectics of Nature,” Engels examined in detail the problem of motion and developed a doctrine of forms of motion that corresponded to the level of development of science of that time. “Movement,” wrote Engels, “considered in the most general sense of the word, that is, understood as a way of existence of matter, as an attribute inherent in matter, embraces all the changes and processes occurring in the universe, starting from simple movement and ending with thinking.”

Engels considered simple movement in space to be the most general form the movement of matter, on top of which, as in a pyramid, other forms are built. These are physical and chemical forms of motion of matter. According to Engels, the carrier of physical form is molecules, and the carrier of chemical form is atoms. Mechanical, physical and chemical forms of motion form the foundation of a higher form of motion of matter - biological, the carrier of which is living protein. And finally, the highest form of motion of matter is social form. Its carrier is human society.

“Dialectics of Nature” was published only in the late 20s and early 30s. of our century and therefore could not influence science at the time when it was created. But the methodological principles that were used by Engels in developing the classification of forms of motion of matter retain their significance up to the present day. Firstly, Engels brings into correspondence the forms of motion and the forms or types of structural organization of matter. With the advent of a new type of structural organization of matter, the new kind movements. Secondly, the classification of forms of movement contains a dialectically understood principle of development. Different forms of movement are genetically related to each other; they not only coexist, but also arise from each other. At the same time, higher forms of motion include lower ones as components and conditions necessary for the emergence of a new, higher form of motion of matter. And finally, thirdly, Engels strongly objected to attempts to reduce completely qualitatively unique more tall forms movement to lower forms.

In the 17th and 18th centuries. there was a strong tendency to reduce all laws of nature to the laws of mechanics. This trend is called “mechanism.” But later the same word began to denote attempts to reduce biological and social processes, for example, to the laws of thermodynamics. With the emergence of Darwinism, sociologists appeared who were inclined to explain phenomena public life one-sidedly interpreted biological laws. All these are manifestations of mechanism.

Here we are faced with contradictions inherent in the process of development of cognition, when the features inherent in one type of structural organization of matter are transferred to other types. However, it should be borne in mind that in the course of studying different types of organization of matter and different forms of movement, some general, previously unknown circumstances and patterns are revealed that are characteristic of the interaction of different levels of organization of matter. As a result, theories arise that cover a wide range of objects belonging to different levels of organization of matter.

The end of the 19th – the beginning of the 20th century. became a time of a sharp change in ideas about the world - a time when the mechanistic picture of the world, which had dominated natural science for two centuries, was overcome.

One of the most important events in science was the discovery by the English physicist J. Thomson (1856-1940) of the electron, the first intra-atomic particle. Thomson studied cathode rays and found that they consist of particles with an electrical charge (negative) and very low mass. The mass of the electron, according to calculations, turned out to be more than 1800 times less than the mass of the lightest atom, the hydrogen atom. The discovery of such a small particle meant that the “indivisible” atom cannot be considered as the last “building block of the universe.” Research by physicists, on the one hand, confirmed the reality of atoms, but on the other hand, they showed that a real atom is not at all the same atom that was previously considered an indivisible chemical element, of which all the things and bodies of nature known to man at that time consist.

In fact, atoms are not simple and indivisible, but consist of some kind of particles. The electron was the first to be discovered. Thomson's first model of the atom was humorously called "raisin pudding." The pudding corresponded to a large, massive, positively charged part of the atom, while the raisins corresponded to small, negatively charged particles - electrons, which, according to Coulomb's law, were held on the surface of the “pudding” by electrical forces. And although this model was fully consistent with the ideas of physicists that existed at that time, it did not become long-lived.

Soon it was supplanted by a model that, although it contradicted the usual ideas of physicists, nevertheless corresponded to new experimental data. This is the planetary model of E. Rutherford (1871-1937). The experiments in question were carried out in connection with another fundamentally important discovery - the discovery at the end of the 19th century. radioactivity phenomena. This phenomenon itself also indicated the complex internal structure of the atoms of chemical elements. Rutherford used bombardment of targets made of foil of different metals with a stream of ionized helium atoms. As a result, it turned out that the atom has a size of 10 to the -8 power of cm, and the heavy mass carrying a positive charge is only 10 to the power of 12 cm.

So, in 1911 Rutherford discovered atomic nucleus. In 1919, he bombarded nitrogen with alpha particles and discovered a new intra-atomic particle, the nucleus of the hydrogen atom, which he called the “proton.” Physics has entered new world– the world of atomic particles, processes, relationships. And it immediately became clear that the laws of this world differ significantly from the laws of the macroworld we are accustomed to. In order to build a model of the hydrogen atom, it was necessary to create a new physical theory - quantum mechanics. Note that in a short historical period, physicists have discovered a large number of microparticles. By 1974, there were almost twice as many of them as the chemical elements in Mendeleev’s periodic table.

In search of a basis for classifying such a large number of microparticles, physicists have turned to the hypothesis that the diversity of microparticles can be explained by assuming the existence of new, subnuclear particles, various combinations of which act as known microparticles. This was a hypothesis about the existence of quarks. It was expressed almost simultaneously and independently of each other in 1963 by theoretical physicists M. Gell-Mann and G. Zweig.

One of unusual features quarks should be that they will have a fractional (when compared with an electron and a proton) electric charge: either -1/3 or +2/3. The positive charge of the proton and the zero charge of the neutron are easily explained by the quark composition of these particles. True, it should be noted that physicists were unable to detect individual quarks either in experiment or in observations (in particular, astronomical ones). It was necessary to develop a theory explaining why the existence of quarks outside hadrons is now impossible.

Another fundamental discovery of the 20th century, which had a huge impact on the entire picture of the world, was the creation of the theory of relativity. In 1905, a young and unknown theoretical physicist Albert Einstein (1879-1955) published an article in a special physics journal under the discreet title “On the electrodynamics of moving bodies.” This article outlined the so-called private theory relativity. Essentially, this was a new concept of space and time, and new mechanics were developed accordingly. Old, classical physics was quite consistent with practice that dealt with macrobodies moving at not very high speeds. And only studies of electromagnetic waves, fields and other types of matter associated with them forced a new look at the laws of classical mechanics.

Michelson's experiments and Lorentz's theoretical works served as the basis for a new vision of the world of physical phenomena. This concerns, first of all, space and time, the fundamental concepts that determine the construction of the entire picture of the world. Einstein showed that the abstractions of absolute space and absolute time introduced by Newton should be abandoned and replaced by others. First of all, we note that the characteristics of space and time will appear differently in systems that are stationary and moving relative to each other.

So, if you measure a rocket on Earth and establish that its length is, for example, 40 meters, and then from Earth determine the size of the same rocket, but moving at high speed relative to the Earth, it turns out that the result will be less than 40 meters. And if you measure the time flowing on Earth and on a rocket, it turns out that the clock readings will be different. On a rocket moving at high speed, time, in relation to earthly time, will flow more slowly, and the slower the higher the rocket’s speed, the closer it approaches the speed of light. This entails certain relationships that, from our usual practical point of view, are paradoxical.

This is the so-called twin paradox. Let's imagine twin brothers, one of whom becomes an astronaut and goes on a long space journey, the other remains on Earth. Time passes. The spaceship is returning. And between the brothers there is something like this conversation: “Hello,” says the one who remained on Earth, “I’m glad to see you, but why haven’t you changed almost at all, why are you so young, because thirty years have passed since the moment you flew away.” “Hello,” the astronaut replies, “and I’m glad to see you, but why are you so old, I’ve only been flying for five years.” So, according to the earth's clock, thirty years have passed, but according to the astronauts' clocks, only five. This means that time does not flow the same throughout the Universe; its changes depend on the interaction of moving systems. This is one of the main conclusions of the theory of relativity.

The German mathematician G. Minkowski, analyzing the theory of relativity, came to the conclusion that we should completely abandon the idea of space and time as existing characteristics of the world separately from each other. In fact, Minkowski argued, there is a single form of existence of material objects, within which space and time cannot be isolated or isolated. Therefore, we need a concept that expresses this unity. But when it came to denoting this concept with a word, a new word was not found, and then a new one was formed from the old words: “space-time.”

So, we need to get used to the fact that real physical processes occur in a single space-time. And it itself, this space-time, appears as a single four-dimensional manifold; three coordinates characterizing space and one coordinate characterizing time cannot be separated from each other. But in general, the properties of space and time are determined by the cumulative effects of some events on others. Analysis of the theory of relativity required clarification of one of the most important philosophical and physical principles - the principle of causality.

In addition, the theory of relativity encountered significant difficulties when considering the phenomenon of gravity. This phenomenon could not be explained. It took a lot of work to overcome the theoretical difficulties. By 1916, A. Einstein developed the “General Theory of Relativity!” This theory provides for a more complex structure of space-time, which turns out to be dependent on the distribution and movement of material masses. The general theory of relativity became the basis on which later they began to build models of our Universe. But more on that later.

Astronomy has traditionally played a large role in the formation of a general view of the world. The changes that took place in astronomy in the 20th century were truly revolutionary. Let us note some of these circumstances. First of all, thanks to the development of atomic physics, astronomers learned why stars shine. The discovery and study of the world of elementary particles has allowed astronomers to construct theories that reveal the process of evolution of stars, galaxies and the entire Universe. The ideas about unchanging stars that existed for thousands of years are forever lost in history. The developing Universe is the world of modern astronomy. The point here is not only in the general philosophical principles of development, but also in the fundamental facts that were revealed to humanity in the 20th century, in the creation of new general physical theories, primarily the general theory of relativity, in new instruments and new observation possibilities (radio astronomy, extraterrestrial astronomy) and, finally, , is that humanity has taken its first steps into outer space.

Based on the general theory of relativity, models of our Universe began to be developed. The first such model was created in 1917 by Einstein himself. However, this model was later shown to have shortcomings and was abandoned. Soon the Russian scientist A. A. Friedman (1888-1925) proposed a model of the expanding Universe. Einstein initially rejected this model because he believed it contained faulty calculations. But later he admitted that Friedman’s model as a whole is quite well founded.

In 1929, the American astronomer E. Hubble (1889-1953) discovered the presence of the so-called red shift in the spectra of galaxies and formulated a law that allows one to determine the speed of motion of galaxies relative to the Earth and the distance to these galaxies. Thus, it turned out that the spiral nebula in the constellation Andromeda is a galaxy whose characteristics are close to the one in which our Solar system is located, and the distance to it is relatively small, only 2 million light years.

In 1960, the spectrum of a radio galaxy was obtained and analyzed, which, as it turned out, is moving away from us at a speed of 138 thousand kilometers per second and is located at a distance of 5 billion light years. The study of galaxies led to the conclusion that we live in a world of expanding galaxies, and some joker, apparently remembering Thomson's model, proposed an analogy with a raisin pie that is in the oven and slowly expands, so that each raisin -the galaxy moves away from all others. However, today such an analogy can no longer be accepted, since computer analysis of the results of observations of galaxies leads to the conclusion that in the part of the Universe known to us, galaxies form some kind of network or cellular structure. Moreover, the distribution and densities of galaxies in space differ significantly from the distributions and densities of stars inside galaxies. So, apparently, both galaxies and their systems should be considered different levels of structural organization of matter.

Analysis of the internal mutual connection between the world of “elementary” particles and the structure of the Universe directed the researchers’ thoughts along this path: “What would happen if certain properties of elementary particles differed from those observed?” Many models of Universes have appeared, but it seems that they all turned out to be the same in one thing - in such Universes there are no conditions for living things, similar to the world of living, biological creatures that we observe on Earth and to which we ourselves belong.

The hypothesis of an “anthropic” Universe arose. This is our Universe, the successive stages of development of which turned out to be such that the prerequisites were created for the emergence of living things. Thus, astronomy in the second half of the 20th century. encourages us to look at ourselves as a product of the multibillion-year development of our Universe. Our world is the best of all worlds, but not because, according to the Bible. God created it this way and saw for himself that it was good, but because in it such relationships were formed within the systems of material bodies, such laws of their interaction and development that in certain parts of this world conditions could have developed for the emergence of life, man and mind. At the same time, a number of events in the history of the Earth and the Solar system can be assessed as “happy accidents”.

American astronomer Carl Sagan proposed a visual, human-oriented model of the development of the Universe over time. He proposed to consider the entire existence of the Universe as one ordinary earthly year. Then 1 second of a cosmic year will be equal to 500 years, and the entire year will be equal to 15 billion earth years. It all starts with the Big Bang, which is what astronomers call the moment when the history of our Universe began.

So, according to Sagan’s model, out of a whole year of the development of the Universe, our human history accounts for only about an hour and a half. Of course, the question immediately arises about other “lives”, about other places in the Universe where life, this special form of organization of matter, could exist.

The problem of life in the Universe is most fully posed and discussed in the book of the Russian scientist I. S. Shklovsky (1916-1985) “The Universe. Life. Mind,” the sixth edition of which was in 1987. Most researchers, both natural scientists and philosophers, believe that in our Galaxy and in other galaxies there are many oases of life, that there are numerous extraterrestrial civilizations. And, naturally, before the advent of a new era in astronomy, before the beginning of the space age on Earth, many considered the nearest planets of the solar system to be inhabited. Mars and Venus. However, neither the devices sent to these planets nor the American astronauts who landed on the Moon found any signs of life on these celestial bodies.

So the planet should be considered the only inhabited planet in the solar system. Looking at the closest stars to us within a radius of about 16 light years, which may have planetary systems, satisfying some general criteria possibility of the emergence of life on them, astronomers have identified only three stars near which there may be such planetary systems. In 1976, I. S. Shklovsky published an article that was clearly sensational in its focus: “On the possible uniqueness of intelligent life in the Universe.” Most astronomers, physicists and philosophers do not agree with this hypothesis. But for last years no facts appeared to refute it, and at the same time, it was not possible to detect any traces of extraterrestrial civilizations. Except that sometimes “eyewitness accounts” appear in newspapers who have established direct contact with aliens from outer space. But this “evidence” cannot be taken seriously.

The philosophical principle of the material unity of the world underlies the idea of the unity of physical laws operating in our Universe. This encourages us to look for such fundamental connections through which the variety of physical phenomena and processes observed in experience could be derived. Soon after the creation of the general theory of relativity, Einstein set himself the task of unifying electromagnetic phenomena and gravity on some unified basis. The problem turned out to be so difficult that Einstein did not have enough time to solve it throughout the rest of his life. The problem was further complicated by the fact that during the study of the microworld, new, previously unknown relationships and interactions were revealed.

So a modern physicist has to solve the problem of combining four types of interactions: strong, due to which nucleons are pulled together into an atomic nucleus; electromagnetic, repelling like charges (or attracting unlike ones); weak, registered in the processes of radioactivity, and, finally, gravitational, which determines the interaction of gravitating masses. The strengths of these interactions are significantly different. If we take strong as one, then electromagnetic will be 10 to the power of -2, weak - 10 to the power of -5. and gravitational – 10 to the power of -39.

Back in 1919, a German physicist suggested to Einstein that he introduce the fifth dimension to unify gravity and electromagnetism. In this case, it turned out that the equations that described the five-dimensional space coincided with Maxwell’s equations that described the electromagnetic field. But Einstein did not accept this idea, believing that the real physical world was four-dimensional.

However, the difficulties that physicists face in solving the problem of unifying the four types of interaction force them to return to the idea of space-time of higher dimensions. Both in the 70s and 80s. Theoretical physicists turned to calculating such space-time. It was shown that at the initial moment of time (defined by an unimaginably small value - 10 to the power of -43 s from the beginning of the Big Bang), the fifth dimension was localized in a region of space that is impossible to visualize, since the radius of this region is defined as 10 to the power of -33 cm.

Currently, at the Institute of Graduate Studies in Princeton (USA), where Einstein lived in the last years of his life, there is a young professor, Edward Whitten, who created a theory that overcomes serious theoretical difficulties that have hitherto been encountered quantum theory and general relativity. He managed to do this by adding… six more dimensions to the known and observable four-dimensional space-time.

Thus, we got something similar to an ordinary, but only completely unusual, ten-dimensional world, the properties of which determine the entire known world of elementary particles and gravity, and, consequently, the macroworld of things that are ordinary for us, and the megaworld of stars and galaxies. The point is “small”: we need to find a way that expresses the transition from the 10-dimensional to the 4-dimensional world. And since this problem has not yet been solved, many physicists view Whitten's theory as a game of imagination, mathematically flawless, but not corresponding to the real world. Well aware of the complexity and unusualness of the theory, called string theory, Whitten says that string theory is a part of 21st century physics that accidentally ended up in the 20th. Apparently, it is the physics of the 21st century. will pronounce its verdict on string theory, just as XX physics pronounced its verdict on the theories of relativity and quantum theory.

Science in the 20th century has advanced so far that many theories of modern scientists, confirmed by practice, would seem just fantasies to scientists of the 19th century. and seem fantastic to most people who are not involved in science. This also applies to general physical theories that describe space, time, causality in different spheres of the material world, at different stages of the structural organization of matter and at different stages of the evolution of the Universe.

So, we see that in the process of development of scientific knowledge, ideas about matter and its attributes: space, time and movement significantly change, expand and become more complex. At each level of the structural organization of matter, its own characteristics in the movement and interaction of objects, its own specific forms of spatial organization and the course of time processes are revealed. Therefore, recently people have increasingly begun to pay attention to these features and talk about different “times” and different “spaces”: space-time in physical processes, space and time in biological processes, space and time in social processes. But the concepts of “biological time” and “social time” must be accepted with reservations. After all, time is a form of existence of matter, expressing the duration of existence and the sequence of changes in states in any material systems, and space is a form of existence of matter, characterizing the extension, structure, topology of any material systems. And in this sense, space, time and movement are as general and abstract concepts as matter, which, of course, does not exclude specific conditions of relationships in material systems of various types. Just as higher forms of organization are built up over simpler ones in the process of development, not excluding the latter, but including them, so the corresponding forms of movement, becoming more complex, give rise to new types of relationships in these more complex material systems. When building a hierarchy of systems, we distinguish first of all the microworld, macroworld and megaworld.

And on our Earth, in addition, there is the world of living beings, which are the bearer of a new, biological form of movement of matter, and the world of man - society, with its characteristics and its own specific laws.

Matter should be considered primarily as a substance on and thanks to which all relationships and changes in the world, including consciousness, are built.

The category of matter itself, like any general concept, is an abstraction, a creation of pure thought. But this is not nonsense, but a scientific abstraction. It is futile to try to find matter in general as some kind of material or incorporeal principle. When the goal is to find uniform matter as such, a situation is created similar to that if one wanted to see fruit as such instead of cherries, pears, apples, instead of cats, dogs and sheep, etc. - mammal as such, gas as such, metal as such, chemical compound as such, movement as such. The modern philosophical concept of matter should reflect the universal features of the infinite number of sensory things. Matter does not exist apart from things, their properties and relationships, but only in them and through them. It is therefore important to fix such properties of matter that would fundamentally distinguish it, within the framework of the main question of philosophy, from consciousness as its own opposite. This definition of matter was proposed by V.I. Lenin in the book “Materialism and Empirio-Criticism”: “Matter is a philosophical category to designate objective reality, which is given to a person in his sensations, which is copied, photographed, displayed by our sensations, existing independently of them.” In this definition, the idea that had already emerged in Holbach and was developed by some other thinkers (in particular, N.G. Chernyshevsky and G.V. Plekhanov) was completed.

Here matter is defined through a comparison of the spiritual and material. Matter is eternal, exists outside of human consciousness and is completely indifferent to what we think about it. The concept of matter is only an approximate reflection of this objective reality. That is, the concept of matter in general is not a formal designation, not a conventional symbol for many things, but a reflection of the essence of each of them and their entire totality, the basis of being, existing in everything and giving rise to everything that exists. Philosophy / ed. Yu.A. Kharina. - Mn., 2006..

So, matter is, first of all, reality, objective reality, existing outside and independently of man, but this is a reality that can only be detected through sensations (of course, sensory reflection can be direct or mediated by instruments - be it a microscope, a telescope, a synchrophasotron and etc.). This definition of matter expresses the essence of materialism as a doctrine. It is a further development of the main question of philosophy, and this is its ideological significance.

Matter, being an objective reality, is primary in relation to consciousness. It does not presuppose any cause or condition for its existence, but, on the contrary, is itself the only cause of consciousness. Matter is what B. Spinoza called the cause itself. At the same time, matter is not some kind of supersensible, supernatural reality; it is given to a person in sensations (directly or indirectly with the help of instruments), which, in turn, makes it accessible to knowledge.

Matter, as the root cause of everything that exists, realizes its essence through an infinite set of concrete existences, starting from elementary objects of inanimate nature and ending with the most complex social systems.

In the analyzed definition of matter, two aspects are revealed - ontological and epistemological. From an ontological point of view, matter is the only subject of all existence. Things, properties, interactions, bodily and spiritual processes have their final cause in matter. An absolute opposition between the material and the spiritual is therefore possible only within the framework of the fundamental question of philosophy. From an epistemological point of view, matter is an object, subject and means of cognition, and sensations and thinking are its product.

The category of matter is the most important methodological regulator, since the consistent defense of the materialistic worldview turns out to be essential in concrete scientific research. One should not confuse here the philosophical concept of matter with historically changing natural science concepts of the structure and properties of certain fragments of the observable world. Science can reflect with mathematical accuracy the details of the structure and state of individual systemic material objects. The philosophical approach is characterized by the fact that it abstracts from the properties of individual things and their aggregates, and sees its material unity in the diversity of the world. Philosophy / ed. Yu.A. Kharina. - Mn., 2006..

The methodological role of the category of matter has important, firstly, because as concrete sciences progress, old questions arise about the understanding of the objective world and its laws, about the relationship of concepts and theories to objective reality. Secondly, the study of specific material forms, along with particular questions, raises a lot of problems of a philosophical nature, such as the relationship between discontinuity and continuity of being, the inexhaustibility of cognition of objects.

Matter (from the Latin materia - substance) is a philosophical category to designate a physical substance that has the status of origin (objective reality) in relation to consciousness (subjective reality); matter is reflected by our sensations, existing independently of them.

Matter is the fundamental initial category of philosophy and denotes objective reality, the only substance with all its properties, laws of structure and functioning, movement and development. Matter is self-sufficient and does not necessarily need anyone to be aware of it.

The category "matter" was introduced into philosophy to designate objective reality. There are several definitions of this philosophical category, but the following can be recommended as a basic one: matter is an objective reality that exists independently of human consciousness and is reflected by it.

Materialist philosophy has always been based on the achievements of science, and its own level development was determined by the level of development of science as a whole. The concept of matter itself did not remain unchanged at various stages of the development of materialism; it always developed and improved, reflecting objective reality more deeply and more accurately with each stage. The history of philosophy shows that the understanding of matter in various philosophical teachings is in strict accordance with how these teachings coordinate the idea of the unity of the world with the diversity of its manifestations, how representatives of one or another form of philosophy understand the relationship or relationship between the general and the individual.

In general, if the subject of study is one or another category, then it is necessary to trace the history of its development. It is necessary to show how this category arose, how it developed, how it was filled with modern content. The study of categories in their historical connection, in their formation and development makes it possible to better understand their modern content and helps their most correct use in the practice of thinking. Studying the history of the concept of “matter” is also extremely important because it acts as a certain model that allows us to show some problems in the historiography of concepts.

In accordance with the level of development of the method of production, practice and science in the formation of the materialistic concept of matter, three main stages can be pointed out:

naive-materialistic - matter is what things are made of and what they turn into, their “beginnings” or “elements”;

mechanical - matter is mass or substance, the things themselves, consisting of elements (particles, atoms, molecules, etc.);

dialectical-materialistic - matter is an objective reality that exists in the form of an infinite variety of naturally interconnected and interacting with each other in space and time, qualitatively and quantitatively, its different types and forms of existence, micro- and macro-bodies and systems.

The philosophers of Ancient Greece built their doctrine of the material world on the basis of the same elements that are characteristic of the Indian philosophy of the Charvakas (that is, water, air, fire and earth), but they went further in this matter. They understood matter as a reality that exists independently of consciousness. They believed that matter is a kind of building material from which the objects of the world are built and sought to reduce all the diversity of the objective world to one substance: to water (Thales), to air (Anaximenes), to fire (Heraclitus), to an indefinite element - apeiron (Anaximander), which, in their opinion, are the first principles, the first bricks of the world. They could not yet abandon the concrete, material idea of matter, but they persistently and persistently followed the path of overcoming this materiality.

The ancient Greek materialists did not have a general concept identical to the category of matter. The philosophical terminology we use today is a product of long-term development; it was created in the process of formulating and solving philosophical problems. In this case, as a rule, development proceeded from concrete concepts, often borrowed from everyday non-philosophical thinking, to more abstract and general concepts. Ancient Greek philosophers contributed to a large extent to the creation of the materialistic category of matter.

Thales's position that the fundamental principle of everything is water seems to our modern thinking to be both close and distant. The naivety of this thought of Thales is obvious, but his formulation of the question was such that the answer to it should someday lead to the creation of the category of matter. Anaximander’s concept of “apeiron,” on the contrary, is already more abstract. Anaximenes, instead of the indefinite matter of Anaximander, again presented the absolute in a definite form of nature, putting air at the basis of all things.

The views of representatives of the Milesian school developed and changed in different directions. Empedocles synthesized them in his doctrine of the four “roots” (fire, air, water, earth). Although this teaching was a departure from the idea of a single basis for all things, it was nonetheless a progress insofar as it explained the emergence of dismembered phenomena through the combination of four “roots.” Thus, Empedocles for the first time reveals an attempt to understand the difference between phenomena as the difference in their construction.

The emergence of the atomistic philosophy of Leucippus and Democritus is a great step forward in the history of ancient Greek materialism. They believed that all natural phenomena, earthly and celestial bodies and their properties are the result of a combination of shape, order and position of different in size and weight, invisible and indivisible, in the eternal movement of “primary particles” of matter - atoms. Democritus taught that there is nothing in the world except atoms and emptiness. Democritus explained sensory impressions by the difference in the order, form and position of atoms acting on the sensory body. Democritus very clearly reveals the main line, the main task of materialism, which is to explain the world of consciousness based on the analysis of the material world. The strength of the teachings of Democritus, like all ancient Greek materialism, lies in the attempt to reduce all the diversity of the world to a single material basis. The views of atomists deserve attention because of their high conceptual abstraction, and the revival of these views in the 17th century was very important for the creation of the new concept of “matter”.

Epicurus and Lucretius, continuing the teaching of Leucippus and Democritus about atoms and emptiness, argued that everything in nature is material, as are all the properties of inanimate and living bodies. They believed that the limitlessness of the number of atoms and their combinations determines the limitlessness of worlds in the Universe.

However, not only the strength, but also the weakness of ancient Greek materialism is visible. Firstly, he replaced the idea of the world as a whole with the idea of some part of this world. Secondly, this materialism essentially dissolved the ideal in the material, the elements of consciousness - in the elements of being. It turned out that the really existing problem of the relationship between matter and spirit, being and thinking turned out to be absorbed by the general doctrine of being. Since everything that exists was reduced only to water or only to fire, or only to atoms and emptiness, then there seemed to be no room left for the problem of the relationship between objects and their images, being and thinking.

The largest representative of the ancient Greek idealistic schools opposing materialistic views was Plato, who argued that ideas really exist and are fundamentally different from things. He argued that it is impossible to reduce everything that exists only to material things, as the ancient Greek materialists did. Thus a serious obstacle arose on the way to the formation of a single, all-encompassing concept of “matter”. Aristotle refuted the division of the world into the world of things and the world of ideas; he argued and emphasized that ideas are images of reality, of being, which cannot be doubled or divided into two parts. Aristotle identified two sides of being: matter and form. Matter is potency, the substrate of a single being, and form is the actuality of a single being, the eidos of every thing. The matter of our world is formed, so there is no matter without form in it, as well as form without matter. The merit of Aristotle is that for the first time in the history of philosophy he introduced the concept of “matter” in an abstract logical form.

The concept of matter received its further development in the works of metaphysical materialists, who, like the ancient materialists, could not sufficiently focus attention on the philosophical aspect of the problem of matter and, mainly, revealed its physical properties. They understood that matter cannot be identified with what is observed in nature specific types substances. However, like the ancient materialists, matter seemed to them to be the fundamental basis of all natural objects. Matter was understood as an atom, the hypothetical smallest particle of matter. By this time, developing classical mechanics had identified a series physical properties substances. This prompted metaphysical materialists to identify the concept of matter with ideas about matter, with its mechanical properties. Among such properties, materialists began to include heaviness, inertia, indivisibility, impenetrability, mass, etc.

The idea of a materialistic category of matter, collectively reflecting objective reality that exists outside of our consciousness and independently of it, becomes a permanent component of European thinking in an era when the synthetic summation of the phenomena of objective reality into one category was facilitated by the one-sidedness of philosophical and scientific thinking.

For the materialist philosophers of the 17th century, “matter” was already a category that in its basic and essential features coincides with our concept of matter: it was a highly generalized reflection of objective reality, it was a category that reflected all objective reality.

In the natural sciences of the 19th century, the level of development of science imposed certain restrictions on the understanding of matter - it was defined from the position of mechanical atomism and, as a rule, was identified with one type of matter - substance. Matter (substance) was considered by pre-Marxian materialists as consisting of indivisible, unchanging, simple particles-atoms that have no qualities. Qualitatively different objects of the material world were represented by them as various spatiotemporal combinations of these atoms. Matter was prescribed absolute discreteness, the presence of unchanging, eternal properties, such as mass, inertia, etc.

A new stage in the development of the category “matter” begins with the application of this category to the field of social phenomena by K. Marx and F. Engels. Previous materialists viewed matter only from one side, only as a source of the formation of consciousness. Now the development of matter had to be considered not unilaterally, not passively, but as an active two-way process; one must see that not only matter creates consciousness, but consciousness, in turn, acts on matter. An idea becomes a material force when it takes hold of the masses. The ideal in practical life can specifically, in its own way, give rise to the material. Not only does the material transform into the ideal, but also vice versa.

The dialectical-materialist idea of matter and its properties was developed on the basis of the outstanding achievements of science in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

The most important of these discoveries were: the discovery of the law of conservation and transformation of energy by R. Mayer, the periodic law of chemical elements by D. I. Mendeleev, the theory of electricity and magnetism (Faraday and Maxwell); discovery of the electron, its structure and properties; radium and radioactive radiation. These outstanding discoveries are united by the principle of recognizing the materiality of all phenomena and processes of the objective world. Thanks to them, a qualitatively new, dialectical-materialistic idea of matter and its properties has developed in science.

Thus, the dialectic of the formation of the scientific concept of matter found its expression in its historicity; in the conditionality of its occurrence and changes by the level of development of science and technology, the general level of people’s knowledge about the phenomena of the objective world at each given stage of the development of social

At different stages of scientific knowledge, there were different models of understanding matter:

atomic model (Democritus);

etheric model (Descartes);

real (Holbach).

In the material understanding, the substantial basis of the world is matter. Until the 20th century, it was believed that there were two types of matter: substance and field (mechanistic, electromagnetic field - Faraday). The fall of the mechanical model led to the creation of a new model.

The understanding that in addition to matter there is another type of matter - a field - began to take hold. And this led to the idea that it is incorrect to identify matter with one of its types. Modern scientists propose to consider the basis of everything that exists as a unity of matter and field on the one hand, information on the other hand, and energy on the third.

The philosophical understanding of matter is that matter is an abstract concept that is used to designate objective reality, i.e. all the diversity of the world around us that exists outside, before and independently of human consciousness.

In philosophy, reality means everything that exists in reality. There is a distinction between objective and subjective reality. Objective reality is what exists outside of human consciousness: space, time, movement; subjective reality can be defined as the phenomenon of consciousness, sensation, human perception of something and everything that is connected with it.

To define objective reality, which a person can feel, copy, photograph, display (but which exists outside of his consciousness and sensations), in philosophy there is the concept of matter. Conditionally, matter can be divided into two groups: that which is cognized by man and that which is beyond his knowledge, however, this division is very conditional, meanwhile, its necessity is obvious: speaking about matter, we can only analyze what is cognized by man.

What is primary - thinking or being, nature or spirit, what precedes what: the material world of consciousness or consciousness to the material world? Depending on the solution to the main question of philosophy in the history of philosophy, two main lines, two main camps are distinguished - materialism, which considers nature, being, matter to be primary, and idealism, which sees the fundamental principle in spirit, consciousness.

Matter is a generalization of the concepts of material and ideal, due to their relativity. The concept of matter is one of the fundamental concepts of materialism and, in particular, of such a direction in philosophy as dialectical materialism.

The methodological role of the category of matter is important, firstly, because with the progress of specific sciences, old questions arise about the understanding of the objective world and its laws, about the relationship of concepts and theories to objective reality. Secondly, the study of specific material forms, along with particular questions, raises a lot of problems of a philosophical nature, such as the relationship between discontinuity and continuity of being, the inexhaustibility of cognition of objects.

If we say that matter means the external world that exists independently of our consciousness, then many will agree with this approach. It also correlates with ideas at the level of common sense. And unlike some philosophers, who thought it frivolous to reason at the level of everyday thinking, materialists accept this “natural attitude” as the basis of their theoretical constructions.

But, agreeing with such a preliminary understanding of matter, taking it for granted, people do not experience a sense of surprise and admiration for its deep meaning, the wealth of methodological possibilities that open up in its content. A short historical analysis of previous concepts of matter and understanding of the essence of this category will help us evaluate its significance.

The limitations of 18th century materialism. in the understanding of matter was expressed primarily in the absolutization of achieved scientific knowledge, attempts to “endow” matter with physical characteristics. Thus, in the works of P. Holbach, along with the most general understanding of matter as a world perceived through the senses, it is said that matter has such absolute properties as mass, inertia, impenetrability, and the ability to have a figure. This means that the main principle of materiality was the materiality, the physicality of the objects surrounding a person. However, with this approach, beyond the limits of materiality were such physical phenomena as electricity and magnetic field, which clearly did not have the ability to have a figure.

There was also an understanding of matter as a substance, which is especially characteristic of the philosophy of B. Spinoza. Substance is not the world surrounding a person, but something behind this world that determines its existence. Substance has attributes such as extension and thought. At the same time, it remained unclear how a single, eternal, unchanging substance is connected with the world of changing things. This gave rise to ironic metaphors, comparing a substance with a hanger on which various properties are hung, leaving it unchanged.

The limitations of the understanding of matter in both of its variants were clearly revealed in the 19th century. Usually the main reason that necessitated the transition to a new understanding of matter as a philosophical category is the crisis of the methodological foundations of physics at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. As is known, the most significant achievement of the philosophy of Marxism was the discovery of a materialist understanding of history. Social existence, according to this theory, determines social consciousness. However, economic relations only ultimately determine the functioning and development of society; social consciousness and ideology are relatively independent and also influence social development. This is how Marxist theory differs from “economic determinism.”

In Marxist theory, the boundaries of materiality seem to be expanded, which includes not only the objects themselves with their materiality and physicality, but also properties and relationships (not only fire, but also the property of heat, not only people themselves, but also their production relations, etc.). d.). This is precisely the contribution of Marxism to the understanding of matter, which has not yet been sufficiently studied.

Understanding matter as an objective reality that exists independently of man and is not identical to the totality of his sensations contributed to overcoming the contemplative nature of previous philosophy. This is caused by the analysis of the role of practice in the process of cognition, which allows us to identify new objects and their properties, included at this stage of historical development in objective reality.

The peculiarity of this understanding of matter is that not only bodily objects are recognized as material, but also the properties and relationships of these objects. Cost is material because it is the amount of socially necessary labor spent on producing a product. Recognition of the materiality of production relations served as the basis for a materialistic understanding of history and the study of objective laws of the functioning and development of society.

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Introduction……………………………………………………………………………….
1. Definition of matter………………………………………………………
2 Revolution in science and change in scientific pictures of the world………………………..
3. Modern natural scientific ideas about the structure of matter and its properties………………………………………………………………………………….
4. Worldview and methodological significance of the concept of matter for the development of philosophy and special sciences………………………………………………………
5. Matter, motion and development…………………………………………….
Conclusion…………………………………………………………………….
List of sources used………………………………………………………...

Introduction

What is the world around us - this is the first philosophical question. Let’s take a mental look at the objects and phenomena of nature. Here are the smallest particles and giant star systems, the simplest single-celled organisms and highly organized living beings. Objects differ in size, shape, color, density, structural complexity, composition and many other properties.

The material world surrounding a person represents an infinite variety of objects and phenomena with a wide variety of properties. Despite the differences, they all share two important features:

1) they all exist independently of human consciousness;

2) capable of influencing a person and being reflected by our consciousness.

In pre-Marxist philosophy, various concepts of matter developed: atomistic (Democritus), ethereal (Descartes), material (Holbach). “...Matter in general is everything that somehow affects our feelings” (Holbach. System of nature). Common to all concepts was the identification of matter with its specific types and properties or with the atom, as one of the simplest particles underlying the structure of matter.

Developing scientific definition matter, K. Marx and F. Engels meant the objective world as a whole, the entire totality of its constituent bodies. Based on the dialectical and historical materialism of Marx and Engels, V.I. Lenin further developed this teaching, formulating the concept of matter in his work “Materialism and Empirio-criticism”. “Matter is a philosophical category to designate objective reality, which is given to a person in his sensations, which is copied, photographed, displayed by our sensations, existing independently of them.”

It is necessary to distinguish natural scientific and social ideas about its types, structure and properties from the philosophical concept of matter. The philosophical understanding of matter reflects the objective reality of the world, and natural scientific and social concepts express its physical, chemical, biological, and social properties. Matter is the objective world as a whole, and not what it consists of. Individual objects and phenomena do not consist of matter; they act as specific types of its existence, such as inanimate, living and socially organized matter, elementary parts, cells, living organisms, production relations, etc. All these types of existence of matter are studied by various natural, social and technical sciences.

The universal attributes and basic modes of existence of matter are movement, space and time. Matter is internally active, it is capable of qualitative changes, and this indicates that it is in motion. Movement is not accidental, but an integral property of matter, and “embraces all changes and processes occurring in the universe.”

1. Definition of matter

First of all, let us pay attention to the fact that the above definition is a dialectical-materialistic solution to both sides of the main question of philosophy: matter exists outside and independently of any (individual or transpersonal) consciousness and, acting on the human senses (as and any other objects) directly or indirectly produces sensation.

The definition of matter is the most important element of its philosophical understanding (although the latter, naturally, cannot be reduced only to definition). Therefore, let's dwell on some of its features.

In logical terms, we note that the definition of the concept “matter” as an extremely broad concept to some extent goes beyond the usual definitions of formal logic: it is defined through contrast with another extremely broad concept - “consciousness”.

Therefore, it may seem that here we are dealing with a vicious circle: to know what matter is, you need to know what consciousness is (otherwise the definition does not know the meaning of the term “objective”), but to know what consciousness is, you need to know that is matter (for materialism interprets it as a property of matter). In this regard, it is necessary to find out what the framework of the usual definitions of formal logic is, in what sense and how far Lenin’s definition of matter goes beyond them (especially since similar questions arise when defining all other philosophical categories).

Formalological (deductive) definition is the derivation of a particular (species) concept from a general (generic) concept by indicating a distinctive feature. A donkey, for example, is an animal with distinctive features known to everyone (in particular, long ears).

In this regard, let us recall: knowledge of what contradicts (and what does not) the laws of reality is a prerequisite for purposeful human activity. But the law is general and essential in the relations of objects, phenomena, processes. Therefore, knowledge of the general and essential is extremely important. But they are inaccessible to direct sensory reflection. It is here, when you need to know something that is inaccessible to sensation (and instrument), that the need for conceptual knowledge arises. The indication of a generic concept in the definition fixes, let us pay attention, the general (and thereby essential) in the object (or class of objects) under study.

Since every object has both general and individual properties, its conceptual description must include the fixation of not only the general, but also the individual, specific - to understand something, we emphasize, means to understand it as a special manifestation of the general. That is why the meaningful definition of any concept includes an indication as a general (generic concept), i.e. fixation of the class to which the thing being defined belongs, as well as the individual, i.e., specific differences (distinctive feature).

Taking this into account, it is clear that, in essence, a deductive definition is a definition through opposition, negation. For what is a distinctive feature? This is a fixation of what the person being defined has and what the other does not have. Here we have, therefore, the opposition of the determined to the other. Therefore, we emphasize that every definition contains an element of limitation, opposition, and negation. Definition through opposition, negation is not a vicious circle.

“If the form of manifestation and the essence of things directly coincided,” noted K. Marx, “all science would be superfluous” - because here, when defining, say, object A, non-A appears. We have a vicious circle if the definition of A contains an indication of A, i.e. on what exactly needs to be determined.

The point is that it is possible to capture with a concept only that which in reality differs from the rest - if, for example, all animals in nature were donkeys, then from the concept “animal” it would be impossible to derive the concept “donkey” - in In this case, “animal” and “donkey” coincide in volume and content, being not different concepts, but only different words, that is, synonyms.

Why can’t we do without negation when defining a concept? Yes, because conceptual knowledge is one of the forms of reflection of reality, but in the latter opposition, as is known, they condition each other. Therefore, they can be understood, that is, expressed in concepts, only within the framework of correlation with each other.

Let us pay attention to the fact that definition through the negation of the opposite is definition through the negation of the negation. Only in this way do we obtain, Hegel emphasized, a genuine statement. To make this clear enough, let us compare the following, for example, judgments: “One can say that...” and “It is impossible not to say that...”. Which one is the true statement?

Returning to the definition of matter, we note that it is impossible to define all concepts deductively: firstly, there is an extremely broad concept; secondly, the attempt to define all concepts deductively leads, as is easy to understand, into “bad” infinity.

Therefore, in a logical sense, the definition of the concept of matter does not go too far beyond the usual definitions of formal logic - from the content side: both are given through opposition, negation, and the latter are moments not only of difference, but also of identity; from the formal side: this definition is generic. Aristotle also found out that the concept of “reality” cannot be interpreted as generic. For in a deductive definition, the generic concept cannot coincide either with the specific concept (which has already been noted) or (which is obvious) with the distinctive feature. An “animal” (let’s return to our example) is not a “donkey” or long ears. Therefore, if we try to take the concept of “reality” as a generic one, then neither any distinctive feature nor any specific concept can be considered as existing. This situation is quite understandable, - after all, the concept of “reality” as an extremely general abstraction that captures only the existence of certain (objective or subjective) objects, phenomena, processes was obtained by abstracting from the specifics of the latter, by abstracting from everything concrete. (Accordingly, existence, pure being, in essence does not differ, as has already been clarified, from non-existence). That is why it is impossible to deduce anything from the concept of “reality”. It is clear, therefore, that the definition of matter as an extremely broad substantive concept can only be given through opposition to another extremely broad substantive concept - “consciousness”; the content of these concepts is given precisely by the indication of the difference between the objective and the subjective, the material and the ideal.

The foregoing makes it possible to understand that the philosophical concept of matter cannot be identified with private scientific ideas about its structure and properties: matter as a subject of philosophical research is defined through its opposition to consciousness, and the subject of natural science is the stable properties of objects and the remaining connections between them. The subject of natural science, in other words, is defined through opposition to change. (The latter, of course, does not mean that natural science does not study change; however, in processes of change, it strives to identify, first of all, certain invariants).

2. Revolution in science and change in scientific pictures of the world.

Science - sphere human activity aimed at identifying, first of all, what is natural in the existence and development of objects, phenomena, processes (or some of their aspects). Modern science is a complexly organized system.

A revolution in science occurs when phenomena are discovered that cannot be explained within the framework of existing scientific views (or when a phenomenon predicted by a theory is not discovered).

Then there is a need for a radical revision of the corresponding theory, a radical change not only in the content of knowledge, but also in the style of scientific thinking. It is not easy to realize the inconsistency of a fundamental theory, which until recently seemed completely reliable. But something else is even more complicated. After all, if the previous theory functioned as a theory, then it meant that it really explained something, i.e. contained elements of objective truth. And these elements must be identified, otherwise further development of the theory will be impossible.

Therefore, the revolution in science has two sides: the destruction of the previous scientific picture of the world, the stereotypes of thinking associated with it (by discovering erroneous ideas) and on this basis the formation of new knowledge that more accurately reflects objective reality. This is where dramatic ideological collisions arise. After all, parting with habitual views is very difficult... And when the need for this becomes quite obvious, the temptation is great to simply discard the previous concept as unsuccessful. Only a dialectical approach can help in such situations, considering, let us recall, continuity as a condition for development. “Not naked negation... - noted V.I. Lenin, - is characteristic and essential in dialectics, which... contains an element of negation and, moreover, as its most important element - no, but negation as a moment of connection, with the retention of the positive ...".

Here it is important to take into account that truth as the correspondence of thought and object is a process, since in the course of his activity a person changes both reality and his understanding of the laws of its existence and development. In the course of the dialectically complex process of cognition, science penetrates deeper into the essence of the phenomena under study and reflects reality more and more accurately.

Therefore, a revolution in science, associated with a radical breakdown of old and the formation of new ideas about certain areas of reality, is a natural stage in the development of scientific knowledge. As a result, there is a change in the scientific picture of the world, which is the result of generalization and synthesis of knowledge in various fields of science. This picture of the world (based on the philosophical picture of the world as its holistic and most general model) is formed under the predominant influence of the most developed ("leading") science - the "leader" in particular scientific knowledge. For a long time, this was physics (today it shares this role with a number of other sciences), whose achievements are associated with mechanical, electromagnetic, and quantum relativistic pictures of the world. In the development of science (in its modern understanding), first of all, it is necessary to highlight the following revolutions: the 17th century (the formation of classical natural science, which studies mainly objects and their simplest systems); the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries (the emergence of non-classical science aimed at studying complex systems); which began in the middle of the 20th century (the formation of post-non-classical science that studies complex self-organizing, self-developing systems).

The modern revolution in science is still far from complete and the problems associated with it are extremely complex. Therefore, we will briefly consider the features of revolutionary stages in the development of scientific knowledge using the example of the revolution in natural science of the late 19th - early 20th centuries.

The most profound revolutionary changes occurred during this period in physics. They were so fundamental that they not only gave rise to a crisis in physics, but also very seriously affected its philosophical foundations. Among the most important discoveries that undermined the foundations of the mechanical picture of the world were, in particular, the discovery x-rays(1895), radioactivity of uranium (1896), electron (1897). By 1903, we note that significant results had been achieved in the study of radioactivity: its explanation as the spontaneous decay of atoms had received some justification, and the convertibility of chemical elements had been proven.

It was not possible to explain these (and some other) discoveries within the framework of a mechanical picture of the world; The insufficiency of the classical-mechanical understanding of physical reality became increasingly obvious. This caused some confusion among a number of prominent physicists. Thus, A. Poincare wrote about “signs of a serious crisis in physics”, that before us are the “ruins” of its principles, their “general defeat”. Some physicists believed that this indicates that the latter are not a reflection of reality, but only products of human consciousness that do not have objective content. After all, if the fundamental principles of classical natural science (primarily physics) had such, then how could there be a need for their radical revision?

Overcoming the difficulties faced by physics required (as always happens during a period of revolutionary changes in science) an analysis of not only physical, but also epistemological problems. As a result of intense discussions in physics, several schools emerged that radically diverged in their understanding of ways out of the crisis situation. Some of them began to focus on an idealistic worldview (although most physicists, naturally, stood in the position of spontaneous materialism), which representatives of spiritualism and fideism tried to take advantage of. This led to the revolution in physics developing into a crisis. “The essence of the crisis of modern physics,” wrote V.I. Lenin, “is the breaking of old laws and basic principles, the rejection of objective reality outside consciousness, i.e., the replacement of materialism with idealism and agnosticism. “Matter has disappeared” - this is how one can express the main and typical difficulty in relation to many particular issues that created this crisis" 24.

To understand what meaning some physicists put into the words “matter disappeared,” you need to consider the following. The atomistic worldview was established in natural science for a long time and with difficulty. At the same time, an atom (in the spirit of Democritus) was understood as an absolutely indivisible (having no parts) elementary particle. The point of view according to which matter consists of atoms, which were considered as a kind of “unchangeable essence of things,” by the end of the 19th century was shared by the majority of natural scientists, including physicists. Therefore, discoveries indicating the complexity of atoms (in particular, radioactivity as their spontaneous decay) were interpreted by some scientists as the “decay” or “disappearance” of matter. On this basis, conclusions were drawn about the collapse of materialism and the science oriented towards it.

IN AND. Lenin showed that what actually took place here was not the collapse of materialism as such, but only the collapse of its concrete, original form. After all, matter, understood as a certain unchanging essence of things, is matter without movement, a category of undialectical materialism. In this regard, V.I. Lenin noted: “The recognition of any unchangeable elements, the “unchangeable essence of things,” etc. is not materialism, but is metaphysical, i.e., anti-dialectical materialism.” Dialectical materialism considers matter as moving matter and therefore “insists on the approximate, relative nature of any scientific position about the structure of matter and its properties.” 28 Accordingly, this type of materialism is not associated with the specific content of physical concepts. The only important thing for him is that moving matter is the substantial basis of reality, reflected by human consciousness. “Recognizing a theory,” emphasized V.I. Lenin, “as a snapshot, an approximate copy of objective reality, is what materialism consists of.”

Therefore, the discovery that the structure of matter is much more complex than previously thought is by no means evidence of the failure of materialism. IN AND. In this regard, Lenin explained: “Matter disappears” - this means the limit to which we knew matter until now disappears... such properties of matter disappear that previously seemed absolute, unchangeable, original... and which are now revealed as relative, inherent only in certain states of matter. For the only “property” of matter, with the recognition of which philosophical materialism is associated, is the property of being an objective reality, of existing outside our consciousness.”

The dialectics of the process of cognition, we note, was deeply understood by Hegel. He developed, in particular, the concept relative truth as limited truth, i.e. which is true only within certain limits. Materialist dialectics developed these ideas into the doctrine of objective truth, understanding it as the process of bringing knowledge closer to reality, during which the synthesis of what is positive in individual relative truths is carried out. Objective truth is the unity of the latter, where they are present in a sublated form, complementing and limiting each other. Classical mechanics, for example, is true if it is applied to macro-objects with non-relativistic velocities. The theorems of Euclid's geometry are true when we are talking about space with zero curvature. And modern physics includes classical mechanics, but, what is important, with an indication of the limits of its applicability. Modern geometry in the same way includes the geometry of Euclid. And so on.

Analysis of problems associated with new discoveries in physics, as shown by V.I. Lenin gives arguments against metaphysical materialism and in favor of dialectical materialism. But in order to understand this, to generally understand the essence of the problems generated by revolutionary changes in science, it is necessary to master the dialectical-materialist methodology. “By denying the immutability of the hitherto known elements and properties of matter,” noted V.I. Lenin, “they (physicists not familiar with dialectics - V.T.) slipped into the denial of matter... Denying the absolute nature of the most important and fundamental laws, they slipped into the denial of any objective regularity in nature, into declaring the law of nature a simple convention... Insisting on the approximate, relative nature of our knowledge, they slipped into the denial of an object independent of knowledge, approximately correctly, relatively correctly reflected by this knowledge.”

In other words, one of the reasons that gave rise to the crisis in physics is the understanding by some scientists of relative truth as only relative (this is epistemological relativism, which originated and was largely overcome in ancient philosophy). However, what is essential is that “in every scientific truth, despite its relativity, there is an element of absolute truth.” IN AND. Lenin analyzed a number of other circumstances that contributed to the emergence of “physical idealism.”

An important role was played here by the complexity of epistemological problems associated with the mathematization of physics. In particular, the complication (in comparison with classical mechanics) of the mathematical apparatus of electrodynamics. As a result, the physical picture of the world lost its former clarity, and the connection between physical theories and experience became much more indirect. By the beginning of the twentieth century, in addition, theoretical physics in a number of its branches became mathematical physics. But mathematics, due to its inherent high degree abstractness, characterized by much greater independence from experience than is the case in most other sciences. Therefore, a number of scientists considered the nature of mathematics to be purely logical, and its subject matter to be an arbitrary creation of the mathematician’s mind. Today the vulnerability of this position is quite obvious 35 .

Concluding the consideration of the analysis of V.I. Lenin's crisis of physics, let us pay attention to the following. His statement that “the only “property” of matter, with the recognition of which philosophical materialism is associated, is the property of being an objective reality” is sometimes perceived as an indication that, according to materialist dialectics, matter has only this single property. But this is not so: the point here is only that the only “property” of matter, the non-recognition of which is associated with philosophical idealism, is objectivity. Therefore, it is appropriate here to once again emphasize the inadmissibility of identifying the dialectical-materialist category “matter” with natural scientific ideas about its structure and properties. The lack of understanding of this by the majority of scientists (who stood mainly in the position of spontaneous materialism) at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries was one of the main reasons for the crisis in natural science.

These questions have been well studied. But even today there is a repetition of the considered epistemological errors. So, I.D. Rozhansky, touching on some of Plato’s thoughts on the structure of matter, writes: “We can say that here we are present at the birth of the concept of matter, and that is why Plato’s statements are so cautious and vague. But let’s try to ask ourselves: how far have we gone from Plato in understanding matter? "We say in philosophical terms that matter is an objective reality that exists independently of our consciousness 36 and is given to us in our sensations. But what is matter in physical terms? In the last century, it was much easier for physicists to answer this question... Now , in the 20th century, when physics operates with such concepts as virtual particles, states with negative energy... the concept of physical matter has become much more vague, and physicists can relate with involuntary sympathy to Plato’s words that “by designating it as invisible , a formless and all-perceiving species, participating in the conceivable in an extremely strange way and extremely elusive, we will not be very mistaken.

As for the first of the questions posed here, it needs to be answered quite definitely: materialist dialectics in the understanding of matter has gone quite far from Plato. So much, in any case, not to say that the concept of physical “matter” in the 20th century “became much more vague.” “Matter” in the physical plane is a specific substrate basis of the interactions studied by physics, quantitatively and qualitatively determined, possessing the attribute of action. For a physicist, it is “elusive, invisible and formless” only insofar as it is unstudied. Raising the question of the universal substantial basis of physical research necessarily takes us beyond the framework of physics into the field of philosophy. If we identify the philosophical concept of matter with natural scientific ideas about its structure and properties (and even from the point of view of the limitations of these ideas), then the inevitable result of such an operation is indeed, as V.I. Lenin, is the transformation of matter into something invisible, formless and extremely elusive - in a word, “the disappearance of matter.”

Considering the problems associated with the crisis of natural science at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries, let us draw attention to the fact that crisis situations arose in it before, ending with a revolutionary transition to a new, deeper level of knowledge. Fundamental difficulties arose whenever science, deepening its analysis of the essence of phenomena, revealed a contradiction that the existing theory could not explain. The need to remove it determined the intensive development of a new theory, a new scientific picture of the world. (Dialectics, we recall, considers contradiction as a source of development).

Aristotle, for example, believed (and it was believed in science for two thousand years) that motion at a constant speed requires the action of a constant force. This point of view came into conflict with the material of natural science of the New Age, which Newtonian physics resolved. At the same time, the absolute opposition between movement and rest was removed. This situation is typical. Thus, the special theory of relativity created by A. Einstein removed the incompatibility (in classical mechanics) of the principle of relativity and the principle of the absoluteness of the speed of light.

This is important to highlight, since the crisis of physics at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries. was associated, in particular, with the discovery of the phenomenon of radioactivity, which seemed incompatible with the idea of \u200b\u200bthe atomic structure of matter. A very difficult situation has arisen.

On the one hand, there was a lot of material, both empirical and theoretical, in favor of the idea of the indivisibility of atoms. Let us highlight one of the considerations expressed by Democritus. He pointed out that recognizing matter as infinitely divisible means asserting that every material object has parts. But for these to be truly different parts, they must be separated from each other by empty spaces... In other words, if matter is infinitely divisible, then at any point of any object we will find an empty space. Matter thus disappears. This idea was repeated by S. Clark (and in fact, Newton) in a polemic with G. Leibniz. It is also important to remember that outside the framework of the assumption of discreteness of matter, motion, space and time, it is impossible to overcome Zeno’s arguments.

On the other hand, the discovery of radioactive decay cast doubt on the indisputability of the empirical foundations for understanding atoms as indivisible. (But, let us note, it did not call into question the views of Democritus - it simply turned out that particles that were not atoms were considered as atoms). As for theoretical doubts about the possibility of the existence of Democritus’ atoms, they have existed since the time of Plato. The fact is that absolutely indivisible (structureless) atoms cannot have sizes and shapes and, accordingly, interact with each other, forming an extended variety (thing), since they can neither touch parts (which they do not have) nor coincide.

Thus, by the beginning of the 20th century. In physics, a very difficult situation really arose: from the point of view of both empirical and theoretical material at its disposal, matter could not be recognized as either infinitely or finitely divisible... Not finding ways to resolve this contradiction, some scientists began to lean toward understanding radioactive the decay of atoms as the decay of matter, which, in fact, led to a crisis in natural science. If its representatives had mastered dialectics, the revolution in natural science might not have been accompanied by a crisis. Dialectics, we note, in such situations can serve as a very significant methodological guideline, for it “is the study of contradictions in the very essence of objects” 40 - it has accumulated and generalized enormous experience in analyzing contradictions and ways to overcome them. And the problem of the relationship between the discrete and the continuous in general form was essentially resolved by Hegel.

3. Modern natural scientific ideas about the structure of matter and its properties.

The main thing here is that the philosophical approach to matter cannot be identified with the natural science approach, or replace one with the other (this has already been discussed above). But it is unacceptable to separate them from each other, much less to oppose them. The fact is that the philosophical concept of “matter” expresses the most general property of material phenomena - to be an objective reality that has the attribute of action, while natural scientific ideas about the structure and properties of matter are associated with the consideration of specific aspects of objects. Therefore, the relationship between the philosophical and the natural sciences in the understanding of matter can be briefly characterized as follows: unity, complementarity and mutual enrichment, for the individual and the general are in dialectical unity.

The core of the problems discussed is the doctrine of the inexhaustibility of matter. Its essence, materialistically rethinking Hegel’s dialectics, was formulated by F. Engels: “The new atomism differs from all previous ones in that it ... does not assert that matter is only discrete, but recognizes that discrete parts of different stages (atoms of the ether, chemical atoms, masses, celestial bodies) are different nodal points that determine different quality forms existence of universal matter..." This is how dialectical-materialist philosophy solves the problem of the structure of matter. This means recognizing the multi-quality and multi-component nature of both matter as a whole and any material object.

Already the Milesian school showed that a substance can be neither of the same quality nor without quality: in both cases, it, being devoid of internal differences, turns out to be homogeneous, incapable of self-motion, of generating any relatively distinguished objects. Thus, as the substantial basis of the variety of changing things, matter must be multi-quality and multi-component.

Therefore, when making a philosophical analysis of modern natural scientific ideas about the structure of matter, attention must first of all be paid to the question of the relationship between matter and field. It is not difficult to verify that the latter are in dialectical unity.

Thus, a field does not exist without matter, because every field has a material source. And matter does not exist without a field: denying this inevitably leads to the idea of long-range action. Its unacceptability for science was already well understood by Newton (although he was forced to use it). “To assume,” he noted, “that... a body can act on another at any distance in empty space, without the mediation of anything transmitting action and force, is... such an absurdity that is unthinkable for anyone who knows enough understand philosophical subjects." If we talk about modern physics, the following is important: “In classical mechanics, a field is only a certain way of describing... the interaction of particles. In the theory of relativity, due to the finite speed of propagation of interactions, the state of affairs changes significantly. The forces acting in this moment on particles are not determined by their location at the moment. A change in the position of one of the particles affects the other particles only after a certain period of time. This means that the field itself becomes a physical reality."

In addition, the field and matter transform into each other. The transformation of a particle and antiparticle into electromagnetic radiation during their interaction is called annihilation. In this case, there is no transformation of matter “into nothing” at all: it is not “matter” that is transformed, but substance, and not into “nothing”, but into an electromagnetic field, subject to the fulfillment of conservation laws. Attempts at an idealistic interpretation of this phenomenon that are sometimes made are groundless. Both before and after “annihilation” we have moving matter: both matter and field are objective reality, given to us in sensation. There is also a reverse reaction of the generation of matter and antimatter by an electromagnetic field.

What needs attention here is the modern physics unity of corpuscular and wave properties of matter (corpuscular-wave dualism): every material object has both corpuscular and wave properties. The degree of their manifestation depends, naturally, on the nature of the object and the conditions in which it is located.

According to the dialectical-materialist doctrine of the inexhaustibility of matter, every material object is multi-quality and multi-component. This obviously cannot be fully confirmed or refuted empirically. Therefore, let us pay attention to the following.

Let us assume (taking the point of view of Democritus) that the substantial basis of material things is absolutely elementary particles. An absolutely indivisible (and, therefore, having no parts) object cannot have size and shape, because its “beginning” is in no way separated from its “end”... (According to Euclid, recall, a point is “that which has no parts "). Therefore, we note: the extent of an object expresses its structure. It is also important that an absolutely elementary object, which does not have an internal structure, a specific structure, cannot have any properties at all. Indeed, within the framework of the assumption under consideration, there is no answer to the question: why “does this elementary entity have exactly these properties? That is, what “more elementary” qualities lead to these properties of the object in question?”

Here it is necessary to pay attention to the fact that Democritus's (and Newton's) criticism of the assumption of the possibility of infinite divisibility (infinite complexity in the intensive sense) of matter contained two assumptions that are not necessary.

Firstly, Democritus believed that the parts of an object can only be different when they are separated by emptiness. Thus, he considered atoms as homogeneous, having no internal differences. And if they are thought of as corporeal, finite and having a form, then the external condition that posits the separateness of their existence necessarily appears as an infinite and formless negation of corporeality (absolute emptiness). Therefore, the atomistic concept is not the result, but the premise of Democritus’ reasoning: it contains a vicious circle.

Secondly, Democritus believed that a part is always less than the whole. Today it is clear that this is not always the case. In natural science terms, it is enough to refer to the mass defect. In terms of philosophy, we note: to exist means to interact, and therefore an absolutely isolated object does not exist for the outside world, but a quasi-isolated one interacts with it to the extent of its openness. Therefore, it is possible that the “elementary” particles of modern physics (the structure of some of them has been established) are huge, but almost closed material systems (freedmons).

Thus, the inexhaustibility of matter does not mean its “bad” continuity (although it contains the latter as a subordinate moment) - this is essentially what Democritus proved. In other words, he “only” proved that matter of one quality cannot be infinitely divisible, that every quality exists within certain quantitative limits. This is very important for understanding the dialectic of quantity and quality. The inexhaustibility of matter means that its structure is infinitely complex both quantitatively and qualitatively - “bad” continuity is present in the dialectical-materialistic understanding of matter only as a sublated moment.

Thus, we are talking about the unity of discontinuity and continuity in the structure of matter, and the thesis about the structural nature of any object cannot be reduced to indicating only its infinite complexity in quantitative terms, infinite divisibility. If only the latter took place, then the world would be unknowable (Aristotle already understood that in this case the knowledge of any phenomenon would inevitably go into “bad” infinity). Therefore, let us pay attention that the solution of a certain cognitive task involves studying the structure of an object to a certain limit. IN AND. Lenin emphasized that the study of the causes of phenomena requires the discovery of the substantial basis of the latter. It makes no sense, for example, to study the structure of the atom when studying biological objects: although these objects are composed of atoms, their properties are relatively independent of the properties of the atoms. Atoms are the substantial basis of biological objects - both herbivores and carnivores (for example) consist of the same atoms, and therefore the explanation of their features should not be sought in the properties of atoms...

Therefore, we must not forget about the integrity and systemic nature of the properties of the objects under study. A system property is a property inherent in a system, but not inherent in its elements, and therefore cannot be reduced to the sum of their properties. The properties of water, for example, are very different from the properties of the molecules that form it, and even more so, the atoms. Therefore, quite a lot was known about its properties long before it was found out what H 2 O is. At the same time, only knowledge of the structure of an object allows us to understand its properties as a manifestation of its structure. Therefore, the concept of substance cannot be absolutized. The “essence” of things or “substance,” noted V.I. Lenin, are also relative; they express only the deepening of human knowledge of objects, and if yesterday this deepening did not go further than the atom, today - further than the electron and ether, then dialectical materialism insists on the temporary... nature of all these milestones in the knowledge of nature... The electron is as inexhaustible as atom, nature is infinite.

The substantiation of the thesis about the inexhaustibility of matter once again shows the unacceptability of defining this category through the enumeration of “elementary” particles studied by physics - mixing the philosophical and the particular scientific will always (with the discovery of “more elementary” particles) lead to the unlawful conclusion about the “disappearance” of matter.

4. Worldview and methodological significance of the concept of matter for the development of philosophy and special sciences.

Let us draw attention to the fact that the role of the worldview and philosophical attitudes of a scientist is by no means an episodic role. It is also very significant in his analysis of specific cognitive problems, setting a certain angle of view on them and determining the approach to solving them. There is a lot in the history of science bright examples on this score. Thus, the focus on the subjective-idealistic aspects of Kant’s philosophy prevented K. Gauss from understanding the real meaning of his results in the study of the axiomatics of geometry. Only N.I. Lobachevsky, having obtained the same results later, managed, based on Schelling's dialectics, to create non-Euclidean geometry. The greatest scientists W. Ostwald and E. Mach never recognized, due to their subjective idealistic attitudes, the existence of atoms. W. Pauli was helped to predict the discovery of the neutrino by his conviction in the uncreatability and indestructibility of matter...

In light of the above, it is quite obvious that the role of Lenin’s definition of the concept of matter, understanding the latter as inexhaustible for constructing a scientific picture of the world, solving the problem of reality and knowability of objects and phenomena of the micro- and megaworld is very important.

The dialectical-materialist doctrine of matter is extremely significant for the scientific analysis of social phenomena and processes: the materialistic understanding of history is based on it (and in society there is an objective reality - relations associated with material production and its material elements), which forms the basis of social development, which is reflected human consciousness. (Here it is important to pay attention to the fact that the materialist thesis “being determines consciousness” can only be justified for a social person, that is, only in the form of the thesis “social being determines social consciousness”).

5. Matter, motion and development

Matter is an objective reality, the essence of which is represented by different kinds movement, which is its attribute. Thus, there is nothing in the world except movement; all available building material is movement. Matter is woven from movement. Any particle of any substance represents an ordered movement of micro-movements; any event is a certain movement of the elements of the movement system. Any phenomenon, event or substance can be mentally decomposed into various types of motion, just as any phenomenon, event or substance of Matter is synthesized from various types of motion in accordance with certain Laws. Therefore, in order to know how this happens, it is necessary to study the Laws that govern the various types of movement of Matter.

Until now, the movement of Matter is mainly associated only with its movement in space and time, while the attention of researchers has been mainly focused on the technical problems of calculating and measuring spatial distances and time intervals, neglecting the fundamental problems of space and time.

However, as is known, the first fairly clear positive ideas about what Space and Time represent were expressed by thinkers of Greece of the classical period (the geometry of Apollonius, Euclid, Archimedes, ideas about time of Aristotle and Lucretius). Since the time of Galileo, and especially since the time of Newton, space and time have become integral parts of the World and the scientific view of the World. Moreover, physical space began to be interpreted using Euclidean geometry, and time was interpreted by analogy with geometric coordinates. The purpose of science was to describe and explain things and their changes in space and time. Space and time were mutually independent and constituted an objective, precisely defined background given to us from the very beginning. Everything could change except the space-time coordinate system itself. This system seemed so immutable that Kant regarded it as a priori and, moreover, as a product of intellectual intuition.

An understanding of the relativity of motion was achieved already in the time of Descartes, since all equations of motion and their solutions were written in certain coordinate systems, and a coordinate system is a conceptual, not a physical object. Therefore, although the movement was relativized in the coordinate system, the latter was considered as fixed in absolute space.

And only about a hundred years ago the idea was first expressed that any movement should be attributed to some kind of reference system. And although what was proposed was a model of a physical reference system made using a geometric coordinate system and therefore did not entail any change in mathematics, but was only a semantic change, it was enough to discard the concept of absolute space. Figuratively speaking, after this it was already possible to assume that if there were only one body in the Universe, it could not move, because movement is possible only relative to some material reference system. That is why, completely independently of the acting forces, the concept of motion began to be implied for a system having at least two bodies. And if the Universe were completely empty, then there would be neither space nor time. Physical space exists only if physical systems exist (bodies, fields, quantum mechanical entities, etc.). In the same way, time exists only insofar as these systems change in one way or another. A static Universe would have spatial features, but would be devoid of time.

Thus, a reasonable philosophy of space and time, in contrast to the purely mathematical theory of space and time, began to proceed from the assumption that space is a system of specific relations between physical objects, and time is a certain function of the changes occurring in these objects. In other words, it became a relational rather than an absolute theory of space and time.

The next stage in the evolution of the theory of motion was Einstein’s special theory of relativity, created in 1905, which showed:

a) that space and time are not mutually independent of each other, but are components of a certain unity of a higher order, called space-time, which breaks down into space and time relative to a certain frame of reference;

b) that extensions and durations are not absolute, that is, they are not independent of the reference system, but become shorter or longer depending on the movement of the reference system;

c) that there are no longer purely spatial vector quantities and simple scalars: three-dimensional vectors become spatial components of four-dimensional vectors, the temporal components of which are akin to the old scalars. In this case, the fourth coordinate is assigned a completely different meaning than the other three coordinates, and the time component of the space-time interval has its own sign, opposite to the sign of the spatial components.

For these and other reasons, time in the special theory of relativity is not equivalent to space, although it is closely related to it. The special theory of relativity added practically little to the specification of the concept of motion, since space and time do not play a more significant role in it than in pre-relativistic physics; this theory doesn't really say anything about what spacetime is other than its metric properties. The philosophical aspect of space and time is not affected by it. Einstein's theory of gravity, or general relativity, written in 1915, contributed to the knowledge of the physical properties of space-time motion.

According to this theory, space and time are not only relational (rather than absolute) and relational (that is, relative to a frame of reference), but they also depend on everything that the world is made of. Thus, the metric properties of space-time (that is, the space-time interval and the curvature tensor) must now be considered as dependent on the distribution of matter and field in the Universe: the higher the density of matter and field, the more curved space is, the more curved the ray trajectories and particles, and the faster the clock ticks. According to the general theory of relativity, a body or a ray of light generates gravitational fields, and the latter react to the former. The interaction affects the structure of space-time. If all bodies, fields and quantum mechanical systems disappeared, then, as predicted by the fundamental equations of general relativity, spacetime would not only continue to exist, but would also retain its Riemannian structure. But it would not be physical space-time. What would remain would be a mathematical frame of reference and would not have any physical meaning. In general, the general theory of relativity, due to its mathematical apparatus difficult to understand, has not yet received a corresponding philosophical generalization.

In fact, the same can be said about physical research that studies the processes occurring in the Universe as a whole. In recent decades, cosmology has ceased to be a separate independent science and has turned into the highest applied field of physics - megaphysics, dealing with the problems of space-time in its entirety: outer space and eternity in general. However, in order to imagine the evolution of the Universe as a whole over several time periods and give preference to one of the many defended hypotheses of its formation, astrophysical argumentation is not yet enough and this can only be done with the help of serious philosophical research, excluding various anti-scientific guesses.

Thus, human knowledge has now reached such a limit when our ideas regarding space and time cease to be purely natural science and are increasingly turning into philosophical problems, the solution of which will finally allow us to answer such fundamental questions: what is space and time, how they are related to being and becoming, what is their role in the development of material forms in general.

For a dialectical understanding of the structure and development of matter, it is necessary to emphasize the following: movement in space is closely connected with movement in time - without movement in time there can be no movement in space. Movement in space has a dual character. Firstly, it includes the movement of a material point or system relative to another point or frame of reference, that is, relative spatial motion. It can only occur in a larger volume of space compared to the elements of movement and is characteristic only for material points or subsystems moving within this space. At the same time, the own spatial volume of the movement elements themselves remains constant and they only sequentially occupy the volume required for them inside hyperspace, freeing up exactly the same volume behind them. Examples of a relative type of motion in space-time include the relative movements of units of a photon, molecule, car, or planet.

However, the movement of these material points and bodies, considered in isolation from the entire system of units homogeneous to them, is a special case of the movement of the elements of this system in hyperspace. In other words, if a molecule of a gaseous substance, moving, occupies successively the same volume of space S (at the same time, and the occupied volume itself, that is, is constant, is equal to a conventional unit), then a system of molecules - a conventional gas, scattering in different directions, in the absence of volume closure, it occupies more and more space (for each time interval, and the speed of propagation in space is equal). Such spatial movement should be called absolute and it characterizes the spatial area occupied by a material system of homogeneous interconnected units. An example of this movement is the diffusion of gases and liquids, the scattering of light photons from their source, etc. If in natural science research mainly the first, relative type of movement in space is studied, then for the philosophical understanding of the Dialectics of Matter its second type, absolute, is more important, that is, the total spatial movement of all systemically interconnected homogeneous elements. Finishing short excursion into “space”, let us clarify its relative commensurability for various systemic formations. In everyday practice, an ordinary "meter" is used to measure space. However, the distance to one of the visible distant galaxies is already expressed by a value of 10 25 m. At the same time, the diameter of a proton is 10 -15 m. Therefore, there is no reason to disagree with the logical conclusion that all the extents of space surrounding us can be expressed by any of the values from 10 - n to 10 n meters, where n can take any value from 0 to. This lies the universality of space, and with it the forms of existence of Matter: from infinity deep into infinity into the hypersphere. IN Everyday life usually operate with values from 10 -4 m (the thickness of a sheet of paper) to 10 6 m. However, since we are not able to measure distances less than 10 -30 and more than 10 30 m, it would be wrong to assume that the forms of motion of Matter in spatial intervals at does not exist.

Matter as a philosophical category to designate objective reality. Philosophical category of matter and its fundamental role in understanding the world and man

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