Once we have accepted that the philosophical
future* is an
aim of our society and consciousness, then this notion raises
further questions. Is the philosophical future a determined
goal of matter, beyond our consciousness ? If it is, then the
human efforts are inevitably exerted in this direction. In the
exertions towards a philosophical future, the human efforts may
be brought to failure by, say, a cataclysm or because society
turned out to be unable to use its stock of intelligence and will
to survive during the most hard period in its history. This failure
by external or internal accident would be a mere event in the
hosts of progressions made by all possible consciousness in the
universe towards the philosophical future. And in case after a
like accident on the earth, a new consciousness would originate,
then it will begin its progression towards the same philosophical
future anew. Does this mean that history is an automaton ? If
the philosophical future appears as an ultimate aim subtending
all aspirations cherished by the social consciousness and finally
all material constructions, then, ignoring happening, we may believe
that everything is subject to a strict determinism. This progression
is no doubt deterministic provided that we confine ourselves to
the materialistic canons of thought. However, in a dialectical
view, the deterministic philosophical goal should itself contain
an indeterministic constituent which is of the order of creation.
Indeterminacy is virtually given by information in the sense that
there exists an indefinite number of structuring possibilities.
Intelligence qua informational manifestation is the outcome
of the determinism pertinent to the laws of nature, but as soon
as it is at play, the possibilities of creation and action become
infinite. In this respect, determinism may end in a potential
indeterminacy. The final determined act must entail a new creation.
We may now righteously ask whether this creation is a possibility
for nature or for the consciousness. Or whether this final creation
transcends the historical automaton. If it does, then the ultimate
creation is being prepared during the whole history of the social
consciousness and history is never an automaton in its own right.
The artistic creation, which is so free an exertion of the human
mind and soul, is itself paving our way for great creative achievements.
These achievements will be made by the social consciousness in
the future and knowledge will become just the prime matter for
several determinations to be made by virtue of our aesthetic aspirations.
Art and knowledge will work together increasingly
in creation.
Of course, the philosophical experiments developed
during the second half of the 20th century together with a large
number of gains in contemporary science should be used in justifying
the above statements.
Certain barriers of our thought as instruments
for cognition have to be used in projecting a certain vision towards
the profundities of the existence. In this way, one may reach
the conclusion that we cannot confine ourselves to a world having
only four "coordinates" - three of which are space and
one temporal - and should admit a fourth additional "coordinate",
i.e. an orthoexistence so as to have a meaningful explanation
of the material world. The most difficult task is to imagine the
structure of orthoexistence as a source of our universe and maybe
of other universes with their own determinations. The concept
of orthoexistence could be approached using the notion of information.
Orthoexistence may contain a source material substance
and an informational material substance. This realm must
be the seat of a substance dictating the laws of nature. Why do
two bodies attract each other in our universe ? What programme,
what kind of information is responsible for this attraction ?
Restricting the discussion to electrical phenomena, we know that
negative and positive electric charges are subject to mutual attraction,
while those bearing the same sign are subject to mutual repulsion.
Pure electric charges, isolated from substance, have not been
found yet. The final drop of electricity was found in the electric
charge of the electron. Now, a smaller drop may be found in a
quark. But this is not essential for our argument. The electron
bears this electricity drop as if this were an emblem or a state
quantity, but is this not rather an information rooted
in the informational material substance of orthoexistence ? This
information is most likely hiding the secret of the force relations
between particles and of the laws of nature at large. However,
these items of information cannot be conceived unless they are
inscribed into a prime informational material substance which
may assume one form ar another. Who is the author of this inscription
? No divinity can inhabit orthoexistence from the very beginning
since orthoexistence is material. Consciousness appears in the
universe but it exists only by the universe against the background
of the material world. That is why man, society in particular,
assumes a paramount dimension. We ourselves are the consciousness
of the material world and can create within the confines of the
material world. Is then not our history aimed to reach accomplished
cognition and to prepare some major acts of creation ? For indeed,
exceeding accomplished cognition is tantamount to generating a
new universal experiment, i.e. a creation. This might be the intricate
play of the existence.
Assuming that this drive in history is towards
what we have called the philosophical experiment, and that there
exist other consciousness societies advancing inevitably along
the same lines, it would not be unlikely that these societies
would have gone as far as to generate a new creation. What we
know is that we are ignorant of the conditions regulating the
contact between the possible societies in the universe and the
effects of this contact on the extension and choice of a world
creation. This fact accounts for the sublime tinge in any human
effort. We are now living the daybreak of civilization and cognition.
The entire history of mankind is an exertion towards civilization,
knowledge and creation. However, this exertion is only possible
inasmuch as society assumes a sound social organization with an
associated production and management mode. The social system is
no doubt the basis of civilization, of knowledge and creation.
And history is likewise the work of an appropriate social system.
* The notion of philosophical future has a limited
significance related to the concept of the ring of the existence.
It does not replace a certain philosophical view on history.
History, Philosophical Futureand Science
30
