Abstract: The subject of the research is the definition of activity based on the summary of specific definitions of activity that are usually used in different spheres of thought including ordinary thinking (so called common sense), philosophy and various scientific disciplines ('life sustaining activity', 'tool use by animals', 'muscle activity', 'cyclonic activity', 'catalytic activity', 'volcanic activity', 'higher nervous activity', 'cardiac activity', etc.). Such a great variety of terms that have the word 'activity' raises a question whether the word 'activity' has a definite meaning. What if these are homonymous terms and the word 'activity' has absolutely different meanings? On the other hand, it is also possible that when someone is talking about 'volcanic' or 'play' activity, he or she observes common features of the general definition of activity. Therefore, there is a question whether there is a common definition of the word 'activity'. What does 'activity' mean? This is the question the present article is devoted to. The researcher builds the definition of activity as an abstract object based on common features of activity stated in different definitions of activity and spheres of culture according to the methodological orientation at sociocultural harmonization of terms in scientific disciplines and cultural subsystems offered by I. S. Alekseev. The scope of the sociocultural approach allows to cover all kinds of activity conceptualization and to define what they have in common. The definition of activity as an abstract object can be viewed as a general sociocultural definition used to reveal particular features of specific activities in different spheres of thinking. The novelty of the research is caused by the fact that the author demonstrates the process of anthropologization of philosophical definitions of activity that reduce it to human activity. The researcher also defines a range of definitions of activity in natural sciences in relation to different natural phenomena. The author also focuses on the general philosophical definition of activity in Kant's and Hegel's works. The author offers a definition of activity as a special kind of movement, i.e. reflective movement (the author uses the natural scientific definition of the term 'reflection').   

Keywords: activity approach, vital activity, sociocultural, human activity, reflection, movement, activity, action, anthropomorphism, philosophical anthropology

Abstract: In his article Safonov offers the integral paradigm of sociogenesis that explains social mechanisms of such socio-cultural phenomena of globalization as ethnic fragmentation of nations, actualization of ethnic communities, ethnicity and ethnic identity and systemic crisis of contemporary nations, national identity and national idea. The researcher also touches upon the problem of limits to applicability of primordialism and constructionism as the basic approaches to sociogenesis. Safonov puts forward the problem of defining the essential grounds and attributive features of globalization as a qualitatively new historical epoch that generates, among other phenomena, ethnic fragmentation of nations and actualization of ethnic identity. The researcher criticizes the one sided view on globalization according to which globalization is the process of establishment of the single global social community unifying ethnocultural differences. The methodological basis of the paradigm of sociogenesis offered by the researcher involves the definition of nation and ethnos as a long-existing nonidentical and ontologically different social communities an invidual simultaneously participates in. Globalization is views as a global systemic crisis that unites the world through the universal conflict of social communities and other actors of global changes who have antagonistic interests that objectively generate processes of social divergence, differentiation and social fragmentation including ethnocultural fragmentation. The main conclusions and the scientific novelty of the research include the following. In the era of globalization the phenomenon of ethnic fragmentation of contemporary nations and actualization of ethnicity is explained by  the fact that an individual simultaneously participates in both nation and ethnos. His simultaneous participation in ethnos and nation relates to different and community-specific spheres of social existence, the sphere of political existence for a nation and the sphere of everyday existence for an ethnos. Nation can be defined as a social community which is non-identical to ethnos but co-exists with ethnos. Nation first appeared when the state institution was established. Ontology, genesis and peculiarities of the development of the nation have been determined by the political life of the society which is best described by constructivist approaches. Ethnos can be defined as a social community which genesis and regeneration relate to the sphere of everyday life with its attributive social inheritance. This defines the main features of ethnos which are inertance, evolutionary development and relative independence from the political sphere.  Different historical forms of ethnos exist in all historical epochs including industrial and post-industrial eras and ethnos tends to be actualized in the era of globalization. Genesis and features of ethnic development are better explained by the primordialist approach to sociogenesis. Different stages of the historical development have had a particular balance and forms of the development of ethnic and national communities. Combination and interaction of these ethnic and national communities create a social structure of the society with all its complexity which ca be reduced neither to political processes with their domination of one subject nor ethnocultural processes with their evolutionism and inertance nor economic phenomena. The systematic crisis of contemporary nation as a result of globalization processes actualize commitment of an individual to his ethnos as a more inertial and sustainable community that is less dependent on the crisis of the political sphere or social institutions. Thus, ethnic fragmentation of the society caused by the crisis of nation as a more developed social community and the social progress of the XIXth - XXth centuries objectively generates the phenomena of social regress and archaization of soial relations which, in their turn, is the key factors of the further exacerbation of the crisis of nation, national state and national institutions. 

Keywords: ethnos, nation, globalization, global issues, sociogenesis, ethnogenesis, ethnic fragmentation, constructionism, primordialism , social community

Abstract: The subject of the research is the information and communication structure of new epistemology - epistemology of innovation. The author of the article examines the major ability of consciousness to generate not only the knowledge necessary in ordinary practice but also to create and translate epistemological structures that are necessary for all spiritual practices exercised by culture and society. It is underlined that the information and communication approach more and more asserts itself in modern natural science and humanities. The concept of information plays an especially important role in cognitive disciplines – neurology, cognitive psychology, sociology and artificial intelligence theories altogether forming the scientific basis of new epistemology. In his research Yakovlev has used the method of the reconstruction of the conceptual structure of Plato's dialogues 'Symposium' and 'Timaeus' and the method of the critical analysis of modern epistemological concepts and approaches to explaining the grounds of mathematics . The researcher also analyzes each level and stage of the development of science in historical, institutional and personal aspects. The novelty of the research is caused by the the following. The author describes the structure of new 'innovation' epistemology that is based on the information and communication approach to cognitive activity. The described conceptual structure of epistemology of innovation as a transformation of 'novation' into 'innovation' is confirmed by particular episodes of the development of new programs in modern physics and cosmology. The author also describes isomorphism of innovative communication and information processes of the genesis and establishment of science in culture, activity of academic communities and researches of particular scientists. 

Keywords: culture, information, epistemology, innovation, science, knowledge, communication, resonance, creativity, structure

Abstract: This article is some kind of continuation of Leo Strauss' article 'Persecution and the Art of Writing' and his eponymously named book the aforesaid article is the part of. In his article the political philosopher Leo Strauss describes his hermeneutic method which he called the method of 'careful reading'. In the book Leo Strauss gave a few examples of how this method can be used based on the analysis of works written by Maimonides, Halevi and Spinoza. The article 'On a Forgotten Kind of Writing' is the response to critical comments received by Strauss after he published his 'Persecution and the Art of Writing'. Strauss analyzes the two examples of such critical comments, the critical review written by D. Sabin and the article written by Y. Belaval. The philosopher rejects Sabin's critics by successively analyzing it and pointing out the minuses, inaccuracies and errors. He seems to be more disposed to Belaval who bases his critics mostly on the argument that Strauss is wrong being oriented at Medieval Eastern philosophy. According to Belaval, representatives of Medieval Eastern philosophy were more of scientists or analysts than philosophers. Belaval also states that Strauss' method is not quite accurate. Generally speaking, this article is neither 'breakthrough' nor fundamental. The main purpose of the article is to clarify several issues that haven't been covered in 'Persecution and the Art of Writing'. 

Keywords: Halevi, Maimonides, Leo Strauss, the art of writing, hermeneutics, political philosophy, persecution, historicism, Spinoza, Socrates

Abstract: The subject of the present research is Jacques Lacan's concept of the signifier in terms of his ideas about identification/alienation of the subject in the concept of the signifier as well as Lacan's references to his teacher Sigmund Freud. In this article Ilyin provides the socio-historical and materialist criticism of Lacan's concept from the marxist perspetive. Contextualization of the psychoanalytical concept of the signifier offered by Lacan allows to shed light on the social space transformation of capitalism (and the problems of the working class) that started in the second half of the XIXth century and the French philosopher involuntary became the theorist of. The methodological basis for this study involves the comparative historical approach that served as an important tool for defining similarities between provisions of Lacan's concept and the discourse of social space transformation of capitalism within the prescribed period. The other essential approach used in the research is the hermeneutical approach that has enabled to view Lacan's texts as the subject of contextualization. The main conclusions and results of the research are the following: lacanian psychoanalytical discourse has been related to the social space transformation of capitalism; the researcher has shown the genealogic relation between the idea of identification/alienation of the subject in the lacanian concept of the signifier and the psychological discourse of recruiting as well as psychologization of alienation at the beginning of the XXth century. 

Keywords: working class, psychology, psychoanalysis, social space, capitalism, Jacques Lacan, alienation, signifier, subject, materialism