A philosophy as a positive science. E.V. Ilienkov about a subject of philosophy

Abstract

The most important criterion of definition of philosophy as a science is the existence of a certain subject of research and of an appropriate method. The Soviet philosopher E.V. Ilyenkov proposed understanding of the subject of philosophy as the logic of human thinking reflecting dialectics of the essence and laws of being, and expressed in the most general categories and concepts. On the one hand, his view of philosophy differed from the positivist concept of philosophy as the “science of sciences”. On the other hand, he criticized the prevailing view of philosophy in the USSR as a science that studies directly the world as a whole, i.e. the most general laws of nature, society and thinking. Philosophy, from the point of view of Ilyenkov, explores thinking not as combination of processes occurring in the brain of an individual, but as universal logical forms of social practice, that develops historically. Ilyenkov denied conceptualization of philosophy as abstract scheme installed above other sciences and regulating their activities (in the form of Kuhn’s paradigm, etc.). According to Ilyenkov, philosophy is a positive science, and only in collaboration with other sciences it develops a scientific worldview. Dialectics is intrinsic to every science, and philosophy should allow scientists to produce a correct, dialectical understanding of their subject.