The science. The main features of scientific thinking

Science includes scientists with their knowledge and abilities, scientific institutions and has as its task the study (on the basis of certain methods of cognition) of the objective laws of nature, society and thinking in order to foresee and transform reality in the interests of society. [Burgen M.S. Introduction to the modern exact methodology of science. Structures of knowledge systems. M.: 1994].

On the other hand, science is also a story about what exists in this world and, in principle, can be, but what “should be” in the world in social terms, it does not say - leaving it for choice by the “majority” humanity.

Scientific activity includes the following elements: subject (scientists), object (all states of being of nature and man), goal (goals) - as a complex system of expected results of scientific activity, means (methods of thinking, scientific instruments, laboratories), final product ( indicator of scientific activity carried out - scientific knowledge), social conditions (organization of scientific activity in society), activity of the subject - without the initiative actions of scientists, scientific communities, scientific creativity cannot be realized.

Today, the goals of science are diverse - this is a description, explanation, prediction, interpretation of those processes and phenomena that have become its objects (subjects), as well as the systematization of knowledge and the implementation of the results obtained in management, production and other areas of public life, in improving its quality.

Science is not only a form of social consciousness aimed at an objective reflection of the world and providing humanity with an understanding of patterns. Science, in fact, is a social phenomenon, its beginnings appeared in antiquity, about 2.5 thousand years ago. An important prerequisite for the formation of science as a social institution is the systematic education of the younger generation.

In ancient Greece, scientists organized philosophical schools, such as the Academy of Plato, the Lyceum of Aristotle, and engaged in research of their own free will. In the famous Pythagorean Union, founded by Pythagoras, young people had to spend the whole day at school under the supervision of teachers and obey the rules of social life.

“It is possible, instead of speculative philosophy, which only in retrospect conceptually dismembers a pre-given truth, to find one that directly proceeds to being and steps on it so that we gain knowledge about power ... Then ... realize and apply this knowledge for all the purposes for which they are suitable, and thus this knowledge (these new ways of representation) will make us masters and possessors of nature ”(Descartes R. Reasoning about the method. Izbr. Proizvod. M., 1950, p. 305).

It was in Western Europe that science arose as a social institution in the 17th century. and began to claim a certain autonomy, i.e. there was a recognition of the social status of science. In 1662, the Royal Society of London was founded, and in 1666, the Paris Academy of Sciences.

Important prerequisites for such recognition can be seen in the creation of medieval monasteries, schools and universities. The first universities of the Middle Ages date back to the 12th century, but they were dominated by a religious paradigm of worldview, teachers were representatives of religion. Secular influence penetrates the universities only after 400 years.

As a social institution, science includes not only a system of knowledge and scientific activity, but also a system of relations in science (scientists create and enter into various social relations), scientific institutions and organizations.

Institute (from Latin institut - establishment, device, custom) implies a set of norms, principles, rules, behaviors that regulate human activity and is woven into the functioning of society; this phenomenon is above the individual level, its norms and values prevail over individuals acting within its framework. R. Merton is considered to be the founder of this institutional approach in science. The concept of "social institution" reflects the degree of fixation of a particular type of human activity - there are political, social, religious institutions, as well as institutions of the family, school, marriage, etc.

The methods of social organization of scientists are subject to change, and this is due both to the peculiarities of the development of science itself and to changes in its social status in society. Science as a social institution depends on other social institutions that provide the necessary material and social conditions for its development. Institutionality provides support for those activities and those projects that contribute to the strengthening of a particular value system.

The social conditions of science are a set of elements of the organization of scientific activity in society, the state. These include: the need of society and the state for true knowledge, the creation of a network of scientific institutions (academies, ministries, research institutes and associations), public and private financial support for science, material and energy support, communication (publishing monographs, journals, holding conferences), training of scientific personnel.

At present, none of the scientific institutes preserves and embodies in its structure principles of dialectical materialism or biblical revelation, as well as the connection of science with parascientific types of knowledge.

Modern science is characterized by the transformation of scientific activity into a special profession. An unwritten rule in this profession is the prohibition of turning to the authorities in order to use the mechanism of coercion and subordination in resolving scientific problems. A scientist is required to constantly confirm his professionalism, through an objective assessment system (publications, academic degrees), and through public recognition (titles, awards), i.e. the requirement of scientific competence becomes the leading one for a scientist, and only professionals or groups of professionals can be arbitrators and experts in evaluating the results of scientific research. Science assumes the function of translating the personal achievements of a scientist into a collective property.

But until the end of the 19th century. for the vast majority of scientists, scientific activity was not the main source of their material support. As a rule, scientific research was carried out at universities, and scientists supported themselves by paying for their teaching work. One of the first scientific laboratories that brought significant income was the laboratory created by the German chemist J. Liebig in 1825. The first award for scientific research (the Copley medal) was approved by the Royal Society of London in 1731.

The Nobel Prize has been the highest prestigious award in the field of physics, chemistry, medicine and physiology since 1901. The history of the Nobel Prizes is described in the book The Testament of Alfred Nobel. The first Nobel Prize winner (1901) in the field of physics was V.K. Roentgen (Germany) for the discovery of the rays named after him.

Today, science cannot do without the help of society and the state. In developed countries today, 2-3% of the total GNP is spent on science. But often commercial interests, the interests of politicians influence the priorities in the field of scientific and technical research today. Society encroaches on the choice of research methods, and even on the evaluation of the results.

The institutional approach to the development of science is now one of the dominant ones in the world. And although its main shortcomings are considered to be the exaggeration of the role of formal moments, insufficient attention to the basics of people's behavior, the rigid prescriptive nature of scientific activity, ignoring informal development opportunities, however, the compliance of members of the scientific community with the norms and values accepted in science is supplemented ethos of science as an important characteristic of the institutional understanding of science. According to Merton, the following features of scientific ethos should be distinguished:

Universalism- the objective nature of scientific knowledge, the content of which does not depend on who and when it was received, only reliability is important, confirmed by accepted scientific procedures;

Collectivism- the universal nature of scientific work, which implies the publicity of scientific results, their public domain;

Unselfishness, due to the common goal of science - the comprehension of truth (without considerations of a prestigious order, personal gain, mutual responsibility, competition, etc.);

Organized skepticism- a critical attitude towards oneself and the work of one's colleagues, nothing is taken for granted in science, and the moment of denying the results obtained is considered as an element of scientific research.

scientific norms. In science, there are certain norms and ideals of scientific character, their own standards of research work, and although they are historically changeable, they still retain a certain invariant of such norms, due to the unity of the style of thinking formulated back in Ancient Greece. It is customary to call him rational. This style of thinking is based essentially on two fundamental ideas:

Natural order, i.e. recognition of the existence of universal, regular and accessible to reason causal relationships;

Formal proof as the main means of justifying knowledge.

Within the rational style of thinking, scientific knowledge is characterized by the following methodological criteria (norms). It is these norms of scientific character that are constantly included in the standard of scientific knowledge.

versatility, i.e. exclusion of any specifics - place, time, subject, etc.

- consistency or consistency, provided by the deductive way of deploying the knowledge system;

- simplicity; a theory that explains the widest possible range of phenomena, based on the minimum number of scientific principles, is considered good;

- explanatory potential;

- having predictive power.

Scientific criteria. For science, the following question is always relevant: what kind of knowledge is really scientific? In natural science, character is of the utmost importance. the validity of the theory by empirical facts .

When characterizing a natural science theory, it is not the term "truth" that is used, but the term "verifiability". The scientist must strive for the accuracy of expressions and not use ambiguous terms. The main criterion for the scientific character of natural science in this regard is the verifiability of the theory. The terms "truth", "truth" have a broader interpretation and are used in natural science, in the humanities, in logic, and in mathematics, and in religion, i.e. he does not express the specifics of natural science in comparison with the term "confirmability", which is of paramount importance for natural science.

In the humanities theories are ranked according to their effectiveness .

In the XX century. define two requirements of scientific knowledge:

1) knowledge should allow understanding the studied phenomena,

2) to carry out retrotelling of the past and prediction of the future about them.

These requirements are met by the natural sciences through concepts. hypothetical-deductive method and based on the criterion of confirmation , and the humanities - thanks to reliance on value representations, pragmatic method and performance criteria - which are the three main scientific foundations of the humanities.

There are many definitions, each of which reflects certain aspects of such a complex concept as science. Let's give some definitions.

The science is a form of human knowledge, an integral part of the spiritual culture of society.

The science is a system of concepts about phenomena and laws of reality.

The science is a system of all knowledge tested by practice, which is a common product of the development of society.

The science- this is the final experience of mankind in a concentrated form, elements of the spiritual culture of all mankind, many historical eras and classes, as well as a way of foresight and active comprehension using a theoretical analysis of the phenomena of objective reality for the subsequent use of the results obtained in practice.

The science- this is a special sphere of purposeful human activity, which includes scientists with their knowledge and abilities, scientific institutions and has as its task the study (based on certain methods of cognition) of the objective laws of the development of nature, society and thinking in order to foresee and transform reality in the interests of society [ Burgin and others.].

Each of the above definitions reflects one or another aspect of the concept of "science", some statements are duplicated.

As a basis for the subsequent analysis, we put the fact that science is a specific human activity [ Philosophy and methodology of science].

Let's take a look at what makes this activity special. Any activity:

Has a purpose;

The final product, methods and means of obtaining it;

It is directed at some objects, revealing its object in them;

It is the activity of subjects who, solving their tasks, enter into certain social relations and form various forms of social institutions.

In all these parameters, science differs significantly from other spheres of human activity. Let's consider each of the parameters separately.

The main, defining goal of scientific activity is to obtain knowledge about reality. Knowledge is acquired by a person in all forms of his activity - both in everyday life, and in politics, and in economics, and in art, and in engineering. But in these areas of human activity, the acquisition of knowledge is not the main goal.

For example, art is meant to create aesthetic value. In art, the attitude of the artist to reality, and not a reflection of it, is in the foreground. The same is true in engineering. Its product is a project, the development of a new technology, an invention. Of course, engineering developments are based on science. But in any case, the product of engineering developments is evaluated from the point of view of its practical usefulness, the optimal use of resources, and the expansion of the possibilities for transforming reality, and not by the amount of knowledge acquired.

From the examples given, it can be seen that science differs from all other activities in its purpose.

Knowledge can be scientific or non-scientific. Let's take a closer look distinctive features exactly scientific knowledge.

Science is a form of social consciousness, a special kind of cognitive activity. It is aimed at developing objective, systematically organized and substantiated knowledge about the world.

In scientific activity, any objects can be transformed - fragments of nature, social subsystems and society as a whole, states of human consciousness, so all of them can become subjects of scientific research. Science studies them as objects that function and develop according to their own natural laws. It can also study a person as a subject of activity, but also as a special object.

Science as knowledge

Science as knowledge is an extended association of cognitive units aimed at revealing objective laws.

From the point of view of the knowledge forming science, it is not integral. This manifests itself in two ways:

First, it includes content-incompatible alternative and sharply competing theories. This incompatibility can be overcome by synthesizing alternative theories.

Secondly, science is a peculiar combination of scientific and non-scientific knowledge: it includes its own history containing alternative knowledge.

Foundations of scientific character, allowing to distinguish between science and non-scientific knowledge: adequacy, absence of flaws, gaps, inconsistencies. The criteria for the scientific character of knowledge depend on various spheres and stages of knowledge.

According to V.V. Ilyin, science as knowledge consists of three layers:

1. "science at the forefront",

2. "hard core of science",

3. "history of science".

Cutting-edge science, along with the true, includes untrue results obtained by scientific means. This layer of science is characterized by information content, non-triviality, heuristic, but at the same time, the requirements of accuracy, rigor, and validity are weakened in it. This is necessary so that science can vary alternatives, play different possibilities, expand its horizon, produce new knowledge. Therefore, the science of the "cutting edge" is woven from the search for truth - premonitions, wanderings, individual impulses for clarity, and has a minimally reliable knowledge.

The second layer - the solid core of science - is formed by true knowledge filtered out of science. This is the basis, the basis of science, a reliable layer of knowledge, formed in the process of cognition. The solid core of science is distinguished by clarity, rigor, reliability, validity, evidence. Its task is to act as a factor of certainty, to play the role of prerequisite, basic knowledge, orienting and correcting cognitive acts. It consists of evidence and justification, embodies the most established, objective part of science.

The history of science (the third layer) is created by an array of morally obsolete knowledge that has been forced out of science. It is, first of all, a fragment of science, and only then - history. It contains an invaluable reserve of ideas that may be in demand in the future.

History of science

Stimulates scientific research,

Contains a detailed panorama of the dynamics of knowledge,

Contributes to the comprehension of intrascientific perspectives and opportunities,

Accumulates information about the ways to achieve knowledge, forms, methods of analyzing an object,

Performs protective functions - warns, prevents turning to dead-end trains of thought and ideas.

Science as a cognitive activity

Science can also be represented as a certain human activity, isolated in the process of division of labor and aimed at obtaining knowledge.

She has two sides: sociological and cognitive.

First fixes role functions, standard duties, powers of subjects within science as an academic system and social institution.

The second displays creative procedures(empirical and theoretical level), allowing to create, expand and deepen knowledge.

The basis of scientific activity is the collection of scientific facts, their constant updating and systematization, and critical analysis. On this basis, a synthesis of new scientific knowledge is carried out, which not only describes the observed natural or social phenomena, but also allows you to build cause-and-effect relationships and predict the future.

Cognitive activity involves people engaged in scientific research, writing articles or monographs, united in institutions or organizations such as laboratories, institutes, academies, scientific journals.

Activities for the production of knowledge is impossible without the use of experimental means - devices and installations, with the help of which the studied phenomena are recorded and reproduced.

The subjects of research - fragments and aspects of the objective world, to which scientific knowledge is directed - are distinguished and cognized by means of methods.

Knowledge systems are fixed in the form of texts and fill the shelves of libraries. Conferences, discussions, dissertation defenses, scientific expeditions - all these are concrete manifestations of cognitive scientific activity.

Science as an activity cannot be considered in isolation from its other aspect - the scientific tradition. The real conditions for the creativity of scientists, which guarantee the development of science, is the use of the experience of the past and the further growth of an infinite number of germs of all kinds of ideas, sometimes hidden in the distant past. Scientific activity is possible due to the many traditions within which it is carried out.

Components of scientific activity:

division and cooperation of scientific work

Scientific institutions, experimental and laboratory equipment

research methods

scientific information system

the total amount of previously accumulated scientific knowledge.

Science as a social institution

Science is not only an activity, but also a social institution. Institute (from lat. institution- establishment, device, custom) implies a set of norms, principles, rules, behaviors that regulate human activity in society. The concept of "social institution" reflects the degree of fixation of a particular type of human activity- so, there are political, social, religious institutions, as well as institutions of the family, school, marriage, and so on.

The functions of science as a social institution: to be responsible for the production, examination and implementation of scientific and technical knowledge, distribution of rewards, recognition of the results of scientific activity (transfer of personal achievements of a scientist into a collective property).

As a social institution, science includes the following components:

The totality of knowledge (objective, or socialized, and subjective, or personal) and their carriers (professional stratum with integral interests);

The cognitive rules

moral standards, moral code;

the presence of specific cognitive goals and objectives;

performance of certain functions;

availability of specific means of cognition and institutions;

· development of forms of control, examination and evaluation of scientific achievements;

finances;

· toolkit;

obtaining and upgrading qualifications;

communication with various levels of management and self-government;

existence of certain sanctions.

In addition, the components of science, considered as a social institution, are various instances, live communication, authority and informal leadership, power organization and interpersonal contact, corporations and communities.

Science as a social institution depends on the needs of the development of technology, socio-political structures and internal values of the scientific community. In this regard, there may be restrictions on research activities and freedom of scientific research. The institutionality of science provides support for those projects and activities that contribute to the strengthening of a particular value system.

One of the unwritten rules of the scientific community is the ban on appealing to the authorities with an appeal or request to use the mechanisms of coercion and subordination in resolving scientific problems. The requirement of scientific competence becomes the leading one for the scientist. Only professionals or groups of professionals can be arbitrators and experts in evaluating the results of scientific research.

Science as a special sphere of culture

Modern philosophy of science considers scientific knowledge as a sociocultural phenomenon. This means that science depends on the diverse forces and influences operating in society, and itself largely determines social life. Science arose as a socio-cultural phenomenon, responding to a certain need of mankind in the production and receipt of true, adequate knowledge about the world. It exists, having a noticeable impact on the development of all spheres of public life. On the other hand, science claims to be the only stable and "genuine" foundation of culture.

As a sociocultural phenomenon, science always relies on the cultural traditions that have developed in society, on accepted values and norms. Each society has a science corresponding to the level of its civilizational development. Cognitive activity is woven into the existence of culture. TO ultra-technological function science is associated with the inclusion of a person - the subject of cognitive activity - in the cognitive process.

Science cannot develop without mastering the knowledge that has become public property and stored in social memory. The cultural essence of science entails its ethical and value content. New opportunities open up tosa science - the problem of intellectual and social responsibility, moral and moral choice, personal aspects of decision-making, problems of the moral climate in the scientific community and the team.

Science acts as a factor in the social regulation of social processes. It affects the needs of society, becomes a necessary condition for rational management, any innovation requires a reasoned scientific justification. The manifestation of the socio-cultural regulation of science is carried out through the system of education, training and involvement of society members in research activities and the ethos of science that has developed in a given society. The ethos of science (according to R. Merton) is a set of moral imperatives accepted in the scientific community and determining the behavior of a scientist.

Research activity is recognized as a necessary and sustainable socio-cultural tradition, without which the normal existence and development of society is impossible, science is one of the priorities of any civilized state.

Being a socio-cultural phenomenon, science includes numerous relationships, including economic, socio-psychological, ideological, socio-organizational. Responding to the economic needs of society, it realizes itself in the function of a direct productive force and acts as the most important factor in the economic and cultural development of people.

Responding to the political needs of society, science appears as an instrument of politics. Official science is forced to support the fundamental ideological attitudes of society, to provide intellectual arguments that help the existing government to maintain its privileged position.

The constant pressure of society is felt not only because science today is forced to fulfill a social order. The scientist always bears moral responsibility for the consequences of the use of technological installations. With regard to the exact sciences, such a characteristic as secrecy is of great importance. This is due to the need to fulfill special orders, and in particular, in the military industry.

Science is a “communitarian (collective) enterprise”: not a single scientist can but rely on the achievements of his colleagues, on the total memory of mankind. Every scientific result is the fruit of collective efforts.

The word "science" in Russian has a very broad meaning. Science is physics, literary criticism, the teaching of welding (it’s not for nothing that there are welding institutes), science is also the art of weaving bast shoes (the turnover “he comprehended the science of weaving”, in Russian is quite acceptable, but there is no institute for the latest science just because it is not now relevant).

Ancient Greece can be considered the European homeland of science, it was there in the 5th century. BC. science arose as a demonstrative kind of knowledge, different from mythological thinking. The "scientists" of ancient Greek thinkers in the modern sense of the word were made by their interest in the very process of thinking, its logic and content.

Ancient science has given us a hitherto unsurpassed example of a complete system of theoretical knowledge. - Euclid's geometry. In addition to mathematical theory, ancient science created cosmological models(Aristarchus of Samos), formulated valuable ideas for a number of future sciences - physics, biology, etc.

But as a full-fledged socio-spiritual education, science has become since the 17th century, when the efforts of G. Galileo and, especially, I. Newton created the first natural science theory and the first scientific associations of scientists (scientific communities) arose.

Over 2.5 thousand years of its existence, science has become a complex entity with its own structure. Now it covers a huge field of knowledge with 15 thousand disciplines. The number of scientists by profession in the world by the end of the 20th century reached over 5 million people.

In general terms:

Science is a system of people's consciousness and activity aimed at achieving objectively true knowledge and systematizing information available to a person and society.

Science is a form of human knowledge, proven by practice, which is a common product of the development of society and an integral part of the spiritual culture of society; it is a system of concepts about phenomena and laws of reality;

In a private sense:

The science- this is a special sphere of purposeful human activity both to obtain new knowledge (the main goal) and to develop new methods for obtaining it; which includes scientists with their knowledge and abilities, scientific institutions and has as its task the study (on the basis of certain methods of cognition) of the objective laws of nature, society and thinking in order to foresee and transform reality in the interests of society. [Burgen M.S. Introduction to the modern exact methodology of science. Structures of knowledge systems. M.: 1994].

But the main defining goal of scientific activity is to obtain knowledge about reality, i.e. scientific knowledge.

Science in its modern sense is a fundamentally new factor in the history of mankind, which arose in the bowels of the new European civilization in the 16th-17th centuries. It was in the 17th century. something happened that gave grounds to speak of a scientific revolution - a radical change in the main components of the content structure of science, the promotion of new principles of knowledge, categories and methods.

The social stimulus for the development of science was the growing capitalist production, which required new natural resources and machines. Science was needed as the productive force of society. If ancient Greek science was a speculative study (in Greek, "theory" means speculation), little connected with practical problems, then only in the 17th century. science began to be regarded as a means of ensuring the dominance of man over nature. Rene Descartes wrote: “It is possible, instead of speculative philosophy, which only in retrospect conceptually dismembers a pre-given truth, to find one that directly proceeds to being and steps on it, so that we gain knowledge about power ... Then ... realize and apply this knowledge for all purposes for which they are suitable, and thus these knowledges (these new modes of representation) will make us the masters and possessors of nature.(Descartes R. Reasoning about the method. Selected works. M., 1950, p. 305).

Science with its special rationality should be considered as a phenomenon of Western culture of the 17th century: science is a special rational way of knowing the world, based on empirical verification or mathematical proof.

Science is a sphere of research activity aimed at the production of new knowledge about nature, about-ve and thinking, and includes all the conditions and moments of this production: scientists with their knowledge and abilities, qualifications and experience, about the division and cooperation of scientific labor; scientific institutions, experimental and laboratory equipment; methods of research work, the conceptual and categorical apparatus, the system of scientific information, as well as the entire amount of available knowledge, acting as either a prerequisite, or a means, or a result of scientific production. These results can also act as one of the forms of social consciousness. N. is by no means limited to natural science or the "exact" sciences, as the positivists believe. It is considered as an integral system, including a historically mobile correlation of parts: natural science and social science, philosophy and natural science, method and theory, theoretical and applied research. Nationality is a necessary consequence of the social division of labor; it arises after the separation of mental labor from physical, with the transformation of cognitive activity into a specific occupation of a special - at first a very small group of people. The prerequisites for the emergence of N. appear in the countries of the Ancient. East: in Egypt, Babylon, India, China. Here, empirical knowledge about nature and about-ve is accumulated and comprehended, the beginnings of astronomy, mathematics, ethics, and logic arise. This is the property of the East. civilizations was perceived and processed into a coherent theoretical system in Ancient. Greece, where there are thinkers who deal specifically with N., dissociating themselves from the religious and mythological tradition. From that time until the industrial revolution Ch. N.'s function is an explanatory function; her main the task is knowledge in order to expand the horizons of vision of the world, nature, a part of which is the person himself. With the advent of large-scale machine production, conditions are created for N. to become an active factor in production itself. As the main now the task of knowledge is put forward with the aim of altering and transforming nature. In connection with this technical orientation, the complex of physical and chemical disciplines and the corresponding applied research become the leader. Under the conditions of the scientific and technological revolution, a new, radical restructuring of science as a system takes place. So that N. could meet the needs of mature. production, scientific knowledge should become the property of a large army of specialists, engineers, production organizers and workers. In the very process of labor in automated areas, the worker is required to have a broad scientific and technical outlook, mastery of the basics of scientific knowledge. N. is increasingly turning into a direct productive force, and the practical implementation of the results of N. lies through its personal embodiment. With t. sp. prospects for communist construction, it no longer acts as a means, but as an end in itself. Hence the corresponding requirements for N., which is called upon to an ever greater extent as a guideline; to focus not only on technology, but also on the person himself, on the unlimited development of his intellect, his creative abilities, culture of thinking, on the creation of material and spiritual prerequisites for his comprehensive, holistic development. In this regard, modern N. no longer simply follows the development of technology, but overtakes it, becoming the leading force in the progress of material production.

It is formed as a holistic, integrated organism. The entire front of scientific research (both in the field of natural and social science) has a stimulating effect on social production. If before N. developed only as a separate part of the social whole, now it begins to permeate all spheres of public life: scientific knowledge and a scientific approach are necessary in material production, in the economy, and in politics, and in the sphere of management, and in the education system. Therefore, science is developing at a faster rate than any other branch of activity. In a socialist society, the successful development of science and the introduction of its results into production is the most important condition for accelerating scientific and technological progress and building the material and technical base of communism; here the task of combining the achievements of nationalism with the advantages of the socialist economic system is realized. For its full flourishing, N. needs the victory of communist social relations. But communism also needs N., without which it can neither win nor develop successfully, because the communist society is a scientifically controlled society, scientifically carried out social production, this is based on N. the complete domination of man over conditions of its existence.

Sources:

Philosophical Dictionary / Ed. I.T. Frolova. - 4th ed.-M.: Politizdat, 1981. - 445 p.