Great power status requires us to have great science

In December 2023, the State Duma adopted amendments to the Education Law, which affected only its introductory part, without changing the rules governing the specifics of educational activities. From now on, general value guidelines have been introduced into the law: “education in the Russian Federation must correspond to traditional Russian spiritual and moral values ​​and be focused on the tasks of development of the state and society.” Whether we like this formulation or not, this event marks the opening of the season for reconsidering the key value foundations of our activities, and this season opens precisely with education – a sphere traditionally mentioned along with science.

But what about science itself? On the eve of the 300th anniversary of the Russian Academy of Sciences, it would be appropriate to talk about its eternal values. The stereotype is firmly entrenched in the public consciousness that science is mainly a source of knowledge for the development of technologies that improve our lives and ensure safety. And even serious experts, although they feel that science is something more than just a source of knowledge for society, just as education is more than a source of various information and skills for an individual, they forget or do not dare to clearly formulate these theses. So, for example, reserve lieutenant general, State Duma deputy A.V. Gurulev (broadcast on Vesti FM radio, December 14, 2023) said the following: “For me personally [наиболее важно] is the development of science. In order for industry to develop, it needs its own (intonation emphasis by A.G.) science, both fundamental and applied, which will move it forward.”

For obvious reasons, achieving technological sovereignty is unthinkable without our own applied research. However, the respected military expert also notes the special role of his own fundamental science. Of course, there is no sharp boundary between fundamental and applied science, but if the potential practical usefulness of the expected result is not yet obvious or is visible only in a vague perspective, why do you need to create this result on your own, if anyway the volume of world science is much larger than Russian science, and in any case, most of our knowledge is and will be of “imported” origin? For a modern person, especially a taxpayer who is aware that most research is carried out at his own expense, it is not always easy to accept that the motivation of scientists can be much less rational, and historically generally differ radically from efforts to improve the practical side of human activity. Aristotle, in the first sentence of his Metaphysics, says: “All people by nature strive for knowledge,” and he finds proof of this thesis in the attraction “to sensory perceptions: after all, regardless of whether they are useful or not, they are valued for their sake themselves.” Let us clarify the ancient formulation a little: the key value, even today recognized by the scientific community, is knowledge rather than static knowledge as such. Speaking about science, we mean exclusively cognition within the framework of the so-called scientific method, which, despite its ponderousness, slowness, difficulty in mastering and extreme high cost compared to other methods of cognition, is the only one capable of generating such a structure of knowledge about the world that was would be reliable enough to be capable of unlimited (as it seems today) development and to provide a solid foundation for technical applications. Man’s natural inclination towards knowledge and its implementation in the last four hundred years through the scientific method have become one of the foundations of modern civilization, not only in the technological, but also, oddly enough, in the spiritual dimension.

The original value foundations of the so-called pure science include faith in the existence of objective truth, without which the scientific method loses its main advantage of reliability and validity, as well as the love of knowledge, which brings us closer to this objective truth. Both of these components are extra-scientific categories that are not included in the formal structure of science itself, but are accepted by most scientists as postulates given from outside (or from above?). It turns out that the basic foundation, one might say, the sacred basis of science, is faith and love, although somewhat specialized. These foundations in some way bring science closer to religion and make it possible for a relatively young science of the modern type in the historical sense to be built not only into the material, but also into the spiritual and worldview architecture of civilization. However, unlike religion, science does not include a comprehensive ethical concept; it does not evaluate the world, but only realizes the natural (or God-given) desire to understand it. Therefore, in order to generate public good, in addition to new knowledge as such, science must be applied to the general culture of society in a certain way, just as the general principles of architecture or fortification are applied to the terrain on which a city or fortification is built.

Russia’s awareness of itself as a civilization country and a great power requires the meaningful filling of this status for the realization of this civilizational self, for which we need our own science, inscribed precisely in our civilizational landscape.

As the famous political analyst, philosopher and unmanned aircraft enthusiast A. Chadayev noted in his Telegram channel, “the key marker that distinguishes a full-fledged civilization from a fake” is the ability to “transform friendly countries or regions into flourishing provinces of the Russian world.” In this regard, science and education are tools for friendly expansion and consolidation in new geographical and semantic spaces. Hence the need to maintain and develop its scientific presence throughout the territory of its country, as well as in friendly and even not very friendly countries and territories.

The same applies not only to the geographical, but also to the thematic aspect of scientific presence. The status of a great power, which we claim, as an indispensable attribute requires that we have great science, that is, one that covers with its competence the entire range of problems being developed in the world. We cannot concentrate all resources on several administratively designated “breakthrough” areas, give up on the gaps between these “strong points” and delegate entire areas to the conditional USA or China. A small country that is part of Western civilization can do this; but such a decision will put Russia in a dependent position associated with the loss of scientific subjectivity, even if it leads to success in short periods of time. Let us say that today only a few specialists are occupied with some issues. But it is fundamentally important that their small contribution to the world’s treasury of knowledge is always of high quality, since imitation of science, its profanation, simulation of results not only waste resources allocated for research, but contradict the basic values ​​of science and undermine its ability to be a source of public good.

A comprehensive scientific presence also serves as the basis for the successful perception and transmission in our country of scientific knowledge created in the world. Without this, fundamental academic education, which provides the student with a broad, without significant gaps, horizons in the chosen field, fails. Such education has miraculously been preserved in some of our universities, despite the active imposition of Western models focused on quick preparation for a specific type of activity. Classical education, based on a solid scientific presence, may well become our exclusive national product, which we can learn to do better than anyone else or better than most of our competitors.

The key tool for ensuring a broad scientific presence is fundamental science. But, unfortunately, an alarming trend over the past few years has been the desire to replace or dilute this concept, to gradually lower the status of fundamental science, to place it at a level below applied areas. For example, in 2020, the then President of the Russian Academy of Sciences A.M. Sergeev said at his press conference: “The Russian Academy of Sciences, together with the Ministry of Education and Science, proposes to create a new research institute in Russia – a center for fundamental virology, in which scientists would receive advanced equipment results necessary for the creation of highly effective means of diagnosis, prevention and treatment of infectious diseases caused by viruses.” That is, even the president of the Academy of Sciences did not dare to admit the possibility of creating a center whose priority would be the study of the nature and patterns in the world of viruses, and not “the results necessary to create means…”. Unfortunately, the center for fundamental virology was never created, even on such grounds.

Of course, in the current situation, an emphasis on technological developments is inevitable. Let the number of projects (institutes, grant lines, conferences) aimed at applied research be greater than initiatives in the field of fundamental science, but the latter must be present and visible.

In practice, building a wise policy in the field of science, a harmonious relationship between different approaches and the implementation of the numerous, sometimes unobvious functions of science in society requires an orientation towards certain common values ​​and principles. In contrast to the law on education, the law on science (127 Federal Law of August 23, 1996) does not spell out the postulates of values ​​and goal-setting at all; there are no other generally accepted social agreements on this matter either. I believe that the time has come to develop and write down the key value and semantic guidelines of Russian science, in which it is necessary to record the basic value of knowledge and, in addition to the main goals of generating knowledge and creating technologies, write down the less obvious goals of our science, including ensuring a comprehensive scientific presence, implementation its general cultural role, support of education and other tasks.