IV. От отзывов к доносам

S. M. Gorodetsky 840 . Pavel Florensky “Imaginaries in geometry” 841 Along with the development of a materialistic worldview and its widespread dissemination, we often have the manifestation of the most unbridled obscurantism. Who would have thought that just in time for Copernicus’s anniversary in Moscow in 1923, a book would be published declaring his theory false and returning the reader to the Ptolemaic “firmament of heaven”? Meanwhile, this is exactly how the question is posed in the book of the most learned theologian and outstanding mathematician P. Florensky. The author's goal is to “expand the area of ​​two-dimensional images of geometry” and transfer imaginary quantities to the drawing. He introduces the concept of the versatility of a plane and states that the entire plane, on the one hand, is positive, and on the other, negative. He assigns imaginary quantities to the reverse side of the plane, and “without claiming full validity,” creates a speculative theory of inversion, supporting it with Dante’s worldview. Between the orbits of Uranus and Neptune, he believes, is “the limit of earthly movements” and the beginning of “celestial phenomena”, or “simply Heaven”, or the “Empyrean”. It is enough to somersault, and you find yourself in the other world, “into the realm of Plato’s ideas.” Glavlit placed its visa number 1987 on such obscurantism. N. N. Rusov 842. Florensky vs. Copernicus 843 In Moscow scientific circles, P. Florensky’s new book “Imaginaries in Geometry” is causing a great sensation. Expanding the field of two-dimensional images of geometry (Experience of a new interpretation of imaginaries)"... The main part of this work was written by Florensky, while still a student, and then reported to Prof. L.K. Lakhtin and N.N. Luzin, a friend of the author, now also a famous mathematician and professor. On October 10, 1921, this work, re-done, was reported at the next meeting of the All-Russian Association of Engineers in Moscow. In the summer of 1922, for publication, Florensky added to his report, now famous, paragraph nine - several fraught and meaningful pages... Anyone familiar with the works of Florensky must admit that our young philosopher, who barely has a decade and a half of literary activity behind him, is one of the strongest and most original minds of our century. The variety and tenacity of his spiritual exploits are remarkable. The book contains a list of printed works by P. A. Florensky in the amount of 50 titles. This list begins with the famous religious and philosophical poem “The Pillar and Ground of Truth. Experience of Orthodox theodicy in twelve letters" (Moscow, 1914). This book is exactly the cornerstone on which Florensky erects his next creative work in a strictly traditional spirit, on the basis of thousands of years of Eastern Christianity, but permeated with all the achievements of modern science and philosophical theory. Florensky is conservative, but also completely a son of our time, who breathes and feeds on its atmosphere, is charged with its electricity. But the most important thing is that Florensky’s theology is lyricism flowing from his heart, rich in experience, quests and doubts, wounded by victims. Florensky's philosophy is his confession, extremely interesting in the depth and significance of the confession and paths of the confessor... Florensky combines in himself a mathematician who paved the way for himself, and a creator-philosopher who holds mathematics together with metaphysics and the Fathers of the Church. In this regard, as a religious thinker, Florensky ranks like a half-brother with such names as Blaise Pascal, the great mathematician and author of Pensees, like Isaac Newton, 844 and like our contemporary Georg Cantor, according to whom the “mathematical,” absolute, self-sufficient actual infinity is God. Above all, Florensky from 1911 to 1917 edited the magazine “Theological Bulletin”, ed. Moscow Spiritual Academy... In 1921, he taught a course on the “Encyclopedia of Mathematics”... Poet, mechanic, and philologist, Doctor, painter, and theologian, Communities of Russian publicist, You are wise as a serpent, pure as a dove, - his friend D.N. Sverbeev wrote about Khomyakov. 845 And in fact, Khomyakov’s versatility was amazing, and even deep, insightful, but still lordly, amateurish, so to speak, wide open. Florensky was not ashamed of the drops of labor sweat on his intelligent brow. He does not forget little things, details, excursions, and carefully finishes every detail. His bibliographic research is quite conscientious, without omitting any journal article or note, etc. But one thing can be repeated about Florensky, as about Khomyakov: you are wise as a serpent, as pure as a dove... When I see Pavel Alexandrovich running swiftly along a noisy Moscow street, along the sidewalk, nimble among the crowded crowds, in the invariable priest’s squiff, wrapped in a cassock, and with a stack of books, I only manage to catch his long nose, scattered curls and the fleeting glance of absent children's eyes in a bashful smile. I will look after him and think: “May your life be favorable, full of work and thought...” The first eight paragraphs of Florensky’s book “Imaginaries in Geometry” present a lot of interesting and important things for specialists, as a new interpretation of imaginaries, which consists in the discovery of the reverse side of the plane, and in relating to this side the region of imaginary numbers, and as a generalization of the proposed interpretation of imaginaries from the plane to all kinds of surfaces. The presentation is accompanied by formulas and drawings. 846 But the final, ninth, paragraph goes beyond the specialty and relates to topics of global significance. I will allow myself to quote it almost in its entirety, not daring to retell it in my own words. And let the hammered, angular style of the author himself remain intact. Florensky then follows with an equally remarkable and bold discussion about the boundaries of terrestrial movements and terrestrial phenomena from the area of ​​celestial movements and celestial phenomena. 847 But we will stop here... A modest Polish canon, pondering his essay “Le revolutionibus” in the silence of the monastery cell, 848 in a God-fearing mood, almost five hundred years later received a blow from the same quiet, solitary and God-fearing man, who, in his modest house in Sergievsky Posad, in a cramped office lined with books, turns the worlds upside down, sitting at his desk in the priest’s room. bench... They say that Leo Tolstoy in the 80s intended to write an essay against Copernicus, but his friends dissuaded him. It turns out that Leo Tolstoy would not have completely missed the mark... Having read and thought about this § 9 of Florensky’s new book, it was as if a heavy burden had been lifted from my shoulders. The Earth is like an insignificant speck of dust, lost in an immeasurable, cold and lifeless space, in which extinct or flaming giants float - stars, without end and edge. The Earth, like a lousy and barely noticeable lump of dried mud among a whole ocean of majestic and royal luminaries, this Earth-planet offended by God, an insignificant satellite of the Sun, is far from the first, by some incomprehensible miracle it has absorbed into its son - man, all the power of imagination, thought, creativity, who contemplates and cognizes this boundless Universe, and even lays down laws for it. It is not the Sun that knows us, not the brilliant Vega, but we, the sons of the earth, point our telescopes at them. Ptolemy and Copernicus, some kind of earthly dust, ran through the Universe with their minds and turned out to be, as it were, its kings... Alexey Nikolaevich Tolstoy, in his unbridled, but rich and full-blooded imagination, will present us with humanoid life on Mars, but it will still be a fascinating novel. There is neither spirit nor life anywhere except our land. And this discrepancy between the astronomical position of our planet, provincial and poor, with its spiritual centrality as the only bearer of spirit and life in the world, has always amazed and burdened me. But if Ptolemy is right and our Florensky with him, this antinomy falls along with the Copernican system, and the meaning of life becomes clearer. E. Kolman 849 . Against the latest revelation of bourgeois obscurantism 850 Three hundred years ago, on June 22, 1633, after the intimidation in the torture chamber of the Holy Inquisition, kneeling in the Roman church of Sancta Maria sopra Minerva, 851 67-year-old Galileo Galilei 852 proclaimed the following renunciation: “...I was strongly suspected of heresy, namely that I defended that the Sun is at the center of the Universe and does not move, and the Earth is not the center of the Universe and moves. In order to absolve myself before your Lordships and every Catholic Christian of this grave and justified accusation that has arisen against me, I swear for the future, neither verbally nor in writing, to state or affirm anything that could again give rise to a similar suspicion regarding me...” Even then, the struggle of religion against science was carried out under the guise of the church. The Church acted as the “defender of progress.” She supported the teachings of Ptolemy against science with fires and prisons, while in her own interests in the service of the exploiting classes. This side of religion, noted by Lenin, as “the most resourceful instrument of exploitation,” is inherent in it now more than ever before. The more formidable economic and social contradictions collide, the more confused and hopeless the position of the ruling classes becomes, the more evasive and intricate religion is disguised, the more refined the religious poison is served in the sugar pills of “scientific” philosophical systems. For their part, religion and the church are doing everything to secure an alliance with science. It is known that the current Pope Pius XI 853 does not skimp on encyclicals. In them, he calls not only for crusades against the Land of the Soviets, actively supporting the intervention plans of German fascism, not only recommends prayer and fasting as a means of combating the global economic crisis, but also appeals to scientists throughout the Christian world - to put the latest achievements of science in the fight against destructive materialism. “Science also increasingly leads to the strengthening of pacification, since truly true systems are just as subject to the supernatural as is faith. Since such subordination is evident, then such a noble, solid and genuine science is expected to have the necessary support throughout the world. In our timelessness, on the contrary, it is clearly noticeable how this kind of subordination is increasingly neglected in scientific research. Moreover, science directly provides arguments against faith. But since God exalts the sciences, only his powers deserve trust. Nowadays such deplorable materialism is undoubtedly attacking the sciences. It is, there is no secret, in fact a frenzy of destruction, having its cause in economic disaster, and putting the peoples of the entire Earth under the threat of a revolution of all foundations and the horrors of torment.” 854 “Science” and “scientists” readily respond. There are dozens of universities, like Bryanovsky in the USA, that are specifically dedicated to the reconciliation of science and religion. From the end of the 17th century. there are special funds (for example, Gifford, Sulliman, etc.) for delivering courses of popular science lectures, and to this day the most outstanding scientists of Europe and America who, on the basis of natural science, prove the need for religion and the wisdom of the creator. The most striking example of how bourgeois scientists succeed in collaboration with religion is given to us recently by the fate of Max Planck, which is not without a certain tragedy. 855 Planck, the greatest of modern physicists, the founder of the theory of quantum, that theory which, even more than the theory of relativity, transformed all the basic concepts of the physical picture of the world, for decades he persistently fought against idealism, against Machism, and fought for materialism in physics. True, Planck was never a consistent, i.e., dialectical, materialist, but he always consciously defended materialism, albeit from a mechanistic position. But then the global economic crisis loomed, the temporary relative stabilization began to crack at all the seams, and the difficult winter of 1931 came for Germany. And Max Planck wrote a Christmas feuilleton in the Berliner Tageblatt, in which he defended the peaceful coexistence of science and religion. One might think that the newspaper speech was simply an accidental phenomenon, and that while allowing religion alongside science, Planck still did not raise the question of the subordination of science to the interests and dogmas of religion. After all, this view of the separation of pure and practical reason - science for the elite and religion for the crowd - is widespread in the circles of the bourgeois intelligentsia. This is the view of the “freethinker” Voltaire, who wholeheartedly hated the Black Risses, who cynically declared: “I want my supplier, my tailor, my wife to believe in God, because then I will be robbed and cuckolded less often.” This is the view of all former and modern bourgeois-Voltairians, who believe that “the people are always rude and stupid. These are bulls that need a yoke, a driver and food." But if Planck then, perhaps, stood only on this point of view, then by now he has managed to take a significant step forward. In the March issue of the international journal for scientific synthesis, Scientia, published in Bologna, Planck published an article “Causality in Natural Phenomena”, beginning with the famous words: “In an era such as ours, which in all areas of culture is causing the deepest ferment of minds, which is beginning to shake the most solid achievements of science, and thereby generally calls into question the feasibility of any satisfactory progress, it is doubly necessary for anyone who would look a little further to reflect on the starting point and on the foundations of human thought and research, and consider the question by what methods science works, and what degree of reliability we are entitled to attribute to its results.” (p. 153). And Planck gives a detailed critique of fashionable views on the “obsolescence” of causality. Planck successfully selects compelling arguments against indeterminism, which is widespread in modern physics. Planck is a champion of causality. From what positions? Only the last paragraphs reveal this to us. Having determined from the very beginning that “an event is causal if it can be predicted with certainty” (p. 154), further establishing that “the reliability of the prediction highly depends on the individuality of the predicting subject” (p. 162), so that, for example, “it makes a big difference whether tomorrow’s weather is predicted by an ignorant person, a practical farmer, or a scientifically educated meteorologist” (ibid.), Planck finally reaches the following conclusions: “The thought itself suggests itself that an ideal spirit, down to the last detail, knowing through and through all the physical processes of today in all places of the universe, would be able to predict tomorrow’s weather in every detail, with complete certainty, and the same can be said about any other prediction of physical events” (ibid.). Perhaps this “ideal spirit” was brought here by Planck only for greater clarity, like the famous supreme mind, who, knowing the initial positions and velocities of all the atoms of the world, and being able to solve the entire system of equations, could, as Laplace wrote, 856 foresee all the details of future development? But the fact of the matter is that if Laplace did not need his system to hypothesize the existence of God, as he proudly answered Napoleon, Planck leaves no doubt on this score. He continues: “The assumption of such an ideal spirit is not an extrapolation, which cannot be justified by logical conclusions, but also cannot be refuted from the very beginning, and which, therefore, must be judged not by whether it contains truth or not, but only by its methodological value.” “Man, with his sense organs and with his measuring devices, is himself a part of nature, to the laws of which he is subject, and from which he cannot escape, while for the ideal spirit there is no such kind of binding by the laws of nature.” “We must agree to one difficult condition: we must beware of the temptation to ask how the ideal spirit acquires the knowledge that gives it the ability to accurately predict future events. Such a question would be as meaningless as the question about the beginning of the world process. We have absolutely no reason to identify ourselves with the ideal spirit, but we must subordinate ourselves to it and believe in it. Scientifically, one can neither prove nor disprove its existence, but practically from the assumption of its existence arises the possibility of carrying out strict determinism in all phenomena of the natural and spiritual world. In the light of his all-penetrating knowledge, we people always think and act according to well-defined laws known to him alone. And this does not contradict our awareness of our own free will...” (p. 162‒163). One should not be surprised that mechanistic materialism leads to the recognition of the existence of an ideal absolute spirit, this “watchmaker” who winds up the mechanism of the universe, for this follows from the very essence of the mechanism if it is taken to its logical conclusion. It is also not surprising that such a sad evolution befell Planck during the period of Hitler’s rule, which brought about the union of the Mauser and the cross. At the meeting held on May 23rd. At the 22nd annual meeting of the Kaiser-Wilhelm Society for the Promotion of Science, its president, Max Planck, stated in his speech that “now no one in Germany can be allowed to stand on the sidelines, with a gun to his foot,” that “now the only password is the consolidation of all effective forces for the reconstruction of the Fatherland.” And Planck read the following appeal from the Society to Hitler: “The Kaiser-Wilhelm Society for the Advancement of Science requests permission to send respectful greetings to the Chancellor, and makes a solemn promise that German science is also ready to happily cooperate in the construction of a new national state.” It turns out that other bourgeois scientists, considered “left-wing”, in the face of the fact that hundreds of outstanding colleagues were expelled because of not entirely Aryan origin, or not a National Socialist spirit, hastened to complete the Gleichschaltung, 857 hastily adapted to the reaction, licking the boot of the third empire with equal joy as the sign of the cross. But one is involuntarily struck by the truly German accuracy with which Planck “justifies” not only the existence of God, but also all the most important dogmas of the Christian catechism directly according to the Creed, affirms God the Almighty, the creator of heaven and earth, omnipotent, omniscient, and even manages to speak out against pantheism, for the existence of this ideal spirit both outside of us and outside of nature. The “fortune” of being used for religious purposes can fall to the lot of every science. Mathematics is not immune to this either. Lenin wrote: “A well-known saying says that if geometric axioms affected the interests of people, they would probably be refuted. Natural-historical theories, which touch upon the old prejudices of theology, have caused, and still cause, the most furious struggle.” 858 And indeed, if not each individual position of mathematics and geometry, then mathematics as a whole, in its historical development, not only reflects the class struggle, but also becomes an instrument in the hands of the ruling classes, directly and indirectly providing a cover for religion, helping them realize their exploitative goals. This issue is extremely poorly covered in our scientific and popular science literature. Until now, with the exception of individual articles, almost nothing has been added to what the classics of Marxism gave. There was not a single brochure that would give in a generalized form what had already been revealed and extracted from general historical materials on this issue. There is no need to talk about solid scientific research on the Marxist history of mathematics, as well as natural sciences. It is all the more gratifying that the first sign has appeared - M. Orlov’s book “Mathematics and Religion”, 859 just published in Ukrainian by the party publishing house “Proletar” in Kharkov. Despite the extreme conciseness, the author, who himself is far from an ordinary mathematician, manages to present in an accessible form the most important aspects of the historical connection between mathematics and religion, and he manages to do this without vulgarization, from a Marxist-Leninist position. The starting point for the author is, on the one hand, the views of the founders of Marxism-Leninism on religion, on the other, on mathematics. Based on these views, having explained the above excerpts, showing the fundamental side of the issue, the author moves on to historical examples, which he takes first from the ancient Greeks (Pythagoreans, Plato), then from the Middle Ages and from Newton, and finally from pre-revolutionary Russia. Having dwelled in particular detail on the Bunyakovsky-Bugaev-Nekrasov school, the book leads us to an understanding of those remnants of the religious-mathematical school that, even after the Revolution, have not been completely eradicated to this day, and ends with a cursory sketch of mathematical fideism in capitalist countries. The conclusion to which the book leads: “Mathematics is just as partisan as all science, it is an arena of desperate class struggle,” is given not in the form of an unsupported declaration, but is substantiated by a number of successful, convincing specific examples. The appearance of M. Orlov’s book is not without relevance. 860 To reinforce the conclusions to which he comes, one can and should also take phenomena related to our present day in our Soviet reality. The certified lackeys of clericalism, under our very noses, use mathematics for the most disguised forms of religious propaganda, for the propaganda of idealism. Here is an article by P. A. Florensky “Physics in the service of mathematics.” This article, which talks about various mechanical hydrostatic, electrostatic and other methods used in mathematics (by the way, there is not a word about the most common, most rational calculating machines, but a lot of attention is paid to curiosities that have no practical significance), there is also its own introductory fundamental part. And in this part of the article the question is raised about the nature of mathematics. The author defends the “experimental basis of certain branches of mathematics,” which “has been repeatedly approved, and in relation to geometry can even be considered quite widely recognized” (p. 43). Wonderful! But Lenin taught us to be suspicious of the concept of “experience.” What does the author mean by “experience”? It turns out that it was intuition. He writes: “...And pure logic has intuitive roots, without which it would sit in us as a foreign, extra-vital, and therefore inimical to life formation. The entire composition of mathematical knowledge is based on intuition, and, moreover, perhaps the least conscious” (p. 44). Isn't it strange? Why would logic without intuition “sit in us like a foreign body”? What kind of intuition are we talking about, exactly? Maybe the author means sensory intuition? Then there would be no great sin in this. Or does he mean intellectual intuition, believing with the mystic Plato and the intuitionists (one of the modern idealistic movements) that the human mind is capable of contemplating concepts in the same way as sensible objects? To answer this question, let’s get acquainted with who P. A. Florensky is, the author of an article published in the fourth issue of the journal “Socialist Reconstruction and Science” (SO RENA) for 1932, in the organ of the NIS and Techprop of the NKTP of the USSR. Here is an excerpt about the printed works of P. A. Florensky: “On the symbols of infinity” (“New Way”, 1904, No. 9); “To the honor of the highest rank (character traits of Archimandrite Serapion)” (“Questions of Religion”, M., 1906, issue 1); “The Cry of Blood” (Moscow, 1906); “Issues of religious self-knowledge” (Serg. Pos., 1907); “The universal roots of idealism” (Serg. Pos., 1909); “The Salt of the Earth, that is, the legend about the life of the elder of the Gethsemane monastery, hieromonk Abba Isidore” (Serg. Pos., 1909); “Archbishop Nikon – Spreader of Heresy” (materials on the veneration of the name of God, 2nd ed. “M., 1913); "AND. Tannery. Course of theoretical and practical arithmetic" (review in "Theological Bulletin", 1913, No. 2); “The Pillar and Statement of Truth” (M.: Put, 1914); “The Meaning of Idealism” (Serg. Pos., 1914); “Letters to Prot. V. N. Amphiteatrova to the Mashkins” (Serg. Pos., 1914); “Service of Sophia - the Wisdom of God” (Serg. Pos., 1914); “Not Nepshchev’s admiration”; 861 “On the judgment of mysticism” (Serg. Pos., 1915); “About N. M. Solovyov’s book Scientific Atheism” (“Theological Bulletin”, 1915, No. 6); “About Khomyakov (critical notes)” (Serg. Pos., 1916); “On the bibliography of N. I. Nadezhdin” (“Theological Bulletin”, 1916, No. 2); “Letters from Prof. Moscow Theological Academy to A. A. Lebedev" (Serg. Pos., 1916); “In memory of Vl. Fr. Erna" ("Christian Thought", 1917, No. 11‒12); “Letters of Archimandrite Theodore (A. M. Bukhartsev 862) to Kazan friends” (Serg. Pos., 1917); “Data for the biography of the arch. Serapion (Mashkin)" (Serg. Pos., 1917); “The Trinity-Sergius Lavra in Russia” (in the collection “The Trinity-Sergius Lavra”, Serg. Pos., 1919); “Church performance as a synthesis of arts” (“Makovets”, 1922, No. 1); “Heavenly Signs” (“Makovets”, 1922, No. 2); “The Earthly Path of the Mother of God” (“Makovets”, 1922, No. 2). These are only half of the names, which seem to speak for themselves. P. A. Florensky is not just an ordinary priest, he is a most learned warrior of Black Hundred Orthodoxy, complete idealism, and hopeless mysticism. From 1911 to 1917, he edited the Theological Bulletin, and before that he published his professorial reviews of the dissertations of newly minted theologians in the Minutes of Meetings of the Council of the Moscow Theological Academy. However, P. A. Florensky sensitively perceives (intuition!) the spirit of the times. Interspersed with “Heavenly Signs” and “Church Action”, he published “Calculation of the electrical gradient on the turns of a transformer winding” (“Bulletin of the technical department of Glavelektro”, M., 1921) and “Imaginary in geometry” (M.: “Pomorie”, 1922). 863 This last book can serve as a true guide for us. From it we will figure out what, in fact, should be understood by “experience”, by intuition. There we read: “It seems that the interpretation proposed here of the imaginary connection with the special and general principles of relativity illuminates and substantiates in a new way that Aristotle-Ptolemaic-Dantean worldview, which is most completely crystallized in The Divine Comedy” (p. 45). “So, let us remember the path of Dante with Virgil. Both poets descend through the circles of a funnel-shaped Hell. The funnel ends with the last, narrowest circle of the Lord of the Underworld. At the same time, both poets maintain verticality during their descent - with their heads towards the place of descent, that is, towards Italy, and with their feet towards the center of the earth. But when the poets reach approximately the waist of Lucifer, both of them suddenly turn over, turning their feet towards the surface of the earth, from where they entered the underworld, and their heads in the opposite direction (“Hell”, canto XXIII, 76-‒94). When did we reach the point Where the thickness of the loins rotates the bulk of the hips, The leader toppled over there with his head, Where he stood with his feet, and on the reptile, Clinging to the wool, he began to climb into the mouth: I thought he was going back to hell again I looked up and thought I would find As before Disa, but I saw legs, Feet up in the ice. How amazed I was then in alarm, Let the mob who do not see judge What line did I pass on the road? Get to your feet, the piit spoke...” “The surface on which Dante moves is such that a straight line on it, with one reversal of direction, returns to the previous point in a straight position; into a straight line movement without inversion, returns the body to its previous point inverted.” “Dante’s space is very similar to elliptical space. This throws an unexpected beam of light on the medieval idea of ​​the finitude of the world. But in the principle of relativity, these general geometric considerations have recently received an unexpected concrete interpretation, and from the point of view of modern physics, world space is elliptical, and is recognized as finite, as well as time, finite, closed in itself” (pp. 47‒48). “The matter, however, does not end with this amazing anniversary gift to the Middle Ages from Galilean science, which was hostile to it. The question is about the rehabilitation of the Ptolemy-Dantean system of the world” (ibid.). “In the Ptolemaic system of the world with its crystal sky, the firmament of heaven, all phenomena should occur in the same way as in the Copernican system, but with the advantage of common sense and fidelity to the earth, earthly, truly reliable experience (that’s what “experience” is. - E.K.) with compliance with philosophical reason, and, finally, with the satisfaction of geometry. But it would be a big mistake to declare the Copernican and Ptolemaic systems to be equal methods of understanding; they are such only on an abstract-mechanical plane, but according to the totality of data, the latter turns out to be true, and the first is false” (pp. 49‒50). So, after three hundred years of “troubled” times of the dominion of Galilean heretical views over the minds, now, through the lips of Paul of Florensky, the truth of St. Inquisition, the earth is restored to the center of the universe, the “experience” of common sense solemnly lifts the eyes of the mountain to the firmament of heaven. It would seem that there is nothing more to add here. But Florensky has something else to say: “Turning to the Ptolemaic system, we see that its inner region with an equatorial radius R = (23 hours 56 minutes 4.1 seconds / 2 p) x 300,000 km where 23 hours 56 minutes. 4.1 s., is the duration of sidereal time according to the average, limits all earthly existence. This is the region of earthly movements and earthly phenomena, while at this extreme distance, and beyond it, a qualitatively new world begins, the region of celestial movements and celestial phenomena, simply Heaven. This demarcation equator, the division of Heaven and Earth, is not particularly far from us, and the earthly world is quite cozy. Namely, in astronomical units of length, the radius, R, is equal to 27,522 times the average distance of the Sun from the Earth. So, the region of celestial movements is 26.5 times further from the Earth than the Sun, in other words, its border is between the orbits of Uranus and Neptune. The result is amazing, because it confirms the Ptolemaic-Dantean idea of ​​the world even quantitatively, and the boundary of the world is located exactly where it has been recognized since ancient times. The border of the world was beyond Uranus, about which information was already vague” (p. 51). “On the border of Earth and Heaven, the length of any body becomes equal to zero, its mass is infinite, and its time, observed from the outside, is infinite. In other words, the body loses its extension, passes into eternity and acquires absolute stability. Isn’t this a retelling in physical terms of the characteristics of ideas, according to Plato - incorporeal, unextended, unchangeable, eternal essences? Are these not Aristotelian particular forms, or, finally, is this not the heavenly army contemplated from the Earth like stars, but alien to earthly properties? (p. 52). Now, it seems, it is clear what “experience”, what intuition Florensky has in mind, what worldview he defends. Of course, in 1922 he preached Ptolemy's views openly, and did so with the help of a private publishing house. Now, in 1932, he dodges, preaches the same views in an “innocent”, thinly disguised form, and does this on the pages of a Soviet magazine, which widely advertises itself as follows: “SORENA is published by a special resolution of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, and is the largest and most serious magazine on issues of science and technology,” as can be read on any magazine cover from 1931 to the present day. It turns out that some authors have become “wiser” over the years, and some editors of our magazines do not show a penny of vigilance. Instead of the necessary attraction in the specialty, a platform is given for the propaganda of idealism. In this regard, the case of Florensky is not unique. Scientists such as Vernadsky, Frenkel, 864 Gamov 865 and others are also involved in preaching idealism. It turns out that our editors were unable to figure out P. A. Florensky. But the well-known leader of truly Russian idealism, A.F. Losev, understood him perfectly. In his book “Ancient Cosmos in Modern Science” (Moscow, 1927, author’s edition), this mystic, referring to Florensky’s “Imaginary Geometry,” writes: “Thus, Platonic ideas, or rather bodies, as absolute carriers of ideas, or absolute embodiments of ideas, turn out to be completely conceivable mathematically. This is a body moving at the speed of light, massive to an infinite extent, and its time collected in all its infinity. All platonism is in this formula: provided v > c. On the other hand, thinking of v as big c, we obtain the imaginary length of the body, the inverse current time and its imaginary mass. What does it mean? This means that the body falls inside itself... This is the turning of the cause into the depths of itself, the semantic formation of the cause as an effect, that is, the cause turns into a goal, into an ideal... This, of course, is a way out of space...” (p. 212). And here is a kind of ideology that wrote the couplet of the psalm on its shield: Dark is the water in the clouds of heaven, There are bastards, there are countless of them... passes unnoticed in our Soviet magazines. Sometimes even the nastiest ones go unnoticed... The class struggle takes on special forms at this stage of socialist construction. Comrade Stalin gave an exhaustively complete analysis of the resistance of the class enemy, with all its cunningly disguised techniques. Anyone who believes that the class enemy is only a kulak and a subkulak, that he is hiding only under the guise of an accountant agitating for removal from the collective farm, is mistaken. Those who do not understand that the class struggle does not die out even at ideological heights are mistaken, who do not understand that the analysis given by Comrade Stalin must, correctly applied, be applied to the ideological struggle. Now we are talking about remaking the ideology of tens of millions of people, the remnants of capitalism in human consciousness are already being overcome, the transformation of all working people into conscious and active builders of a classless socialist society, and the struggle for ideological heights is of paramount importance. We cannot continue to tolerate that our scientific journals continue to pollute the brains of the Soviet reader with idealistic chaff, which gets into these journals the more easily the more pseudoscientific tinsel is put on display, and the more some editors rely on that pathetic “arch-idelerism” that Lenin so thoroughly and aptly ridiculed. We cannot continue to tolerate that, under the guise of “neutrality” and “objectivism,” and even more so, allegedly Marxist “dialectical” labels, they spread an idealistic infection among us. We are talking about the formation of a Marxist-Leninist worldview among millions who have hitherto lived on the fragments of a private property, petty-bourgeois, priestly worldview, who lived on superstitions, “at random”, according to the rule “everyone for himself”, people for whom all these former “foundations” have now irrevocably crumbled into dust or, and this applies to the overwhelming majority of the younger generation, who have no There were only some vague scraps of these “foundations.” This process should be reinforced by the widespread popularization of Marxism-Leninism. The point is to tell a popular story about political economy, about Leninism, about communist society, about the dialectics of nature, etc., but to tell it in such a way that it is truly understandable to every collective farmer who can read the local newspaper, to tell it in such a way that there is not the slightest vulgarization, and that the story pushes thought forward. Unfortunately, our Soviet scientists pay too little attention to the matter of popularization. The publishing houses have also not raised this matter to the required level; neither the public nor even the publishing houses themselves have mobilized attention around it. The vast majority, or rather almost all, popular science books and brochures are written by secondary authors, the opposite being the case with isolated exceptions. But there are often, in the literal sense of the word, hackwork works in which, under the guise of science, sensational cheapness is presented, designed to amaze the imagination, simplified distortions are given, or, finally, only the bare results of scientific research without indicating the path, the methods by which they were obtained. All this is happening at a time when it has been proven in practice that we have learned to publish exemplary popular books on technical issues. There are dozens of such books written by production workers. Why can’t you entrust the writing of a popular article, say, about the latest achievements of atomic physics or Mendeleev’s periodic system, 866 etc., to an outstanding physicist, chemist, etc.? Will our Soviet academicians and professors refuse to write to a mass workers' or collective farm newspaper? No, of course, but the editors will have to work with them, and this is much more troublesome than taking a ready-made article from a hack who has a reserve at the ready, writes equally “popularly” about protons, and about Kara-Bugaz, and about gravidan... Popular science literature for adults, if it is truly both popular and scientific, is always so expressively clear that it turns out to be in its style and language the sister of the best works of fiction, as can be seen in such classic examples as Marx’s “Wage Labor and Capital” or “Will the Bolsheviks Maintain State Power?” Lenin, as well as “Sound” by Tyndall, 867 “The History of Faraday’s Candle”, 868 “Life of Plants” by K. A. Timiryazev 869, etc. etc. That is why our fiction writers can provide significant assistance in the creation of popular science literature. It is necessary for our publishing houses to take up this matter with all Bolshevik assertiveness and begin work on creating scientific popular literature. It is impossible here to lag behind the general cultural growth of our country, and, consequently, from the greatly increased demands of the working people to deepen their knowledge in various fields of ideology and politics. This task can be successfully completed only under the condition of maximum strengthening of revolutionary vigilance on the part of editors and publishers, to the class enemy dressed in a scientific toga, who is trying with great force of resourcefulness and camouflage to preach a hostile ideology on the pages of Soviet magazines. Not weakening, but strengthening of revolutionary vigilance on the part of some of our editors, this is what is required to stop attempts to litter the consciousness of the builders of a classless socialist society with “ideological garbage.” Gorodetsky Sergei Mitrofanovich (1884‒1967) - Russian Soviet poet, prose writer, translator, playwright. He made his debut with the book “Yar” (St. Petersburg, 1907); then followed by the collections “Perun” (St. Petersburg, 1907); “Wild Will” (St. Petersburg, 1908), “Rus” (M., 1910). He made the evolution from an imagist to a singer of Soviet reality. Works: Poems and poems. L., 1974; About Armenia and Armenian culture. Yerevan, 1974; Life is untamed. M., 1984; Selected works: In 2 vols. M. 1987. In the book “My Way” (1958), Gorodetsky recalls: “In the fall, I left for my family in Baku. We drove for a month, over barely built bridges. It was necessary to study literature. I dove into the book “Materialism and Empirio-Criticism.” This month in the carriage with Lenin’s book in my hands became a real university for me... My first attempt at writing after Lenin’s studies was an angry review of Pavel Florensky’s book “Imaginaries in Geometry” (Gorodetsky S. M. Indomitable Life. P. 16). About the fate of the book “Imaginaries in Geometry” see the special article by M. Hagemeister (Nachala. 1993. No. 4. P. 129‒158). Published according to the first publication”: Krasnaya Niva: Literary and artistic weekly magazine. Ed. A.V. Lunacharsky and Yu.M. Steklov. M., 1923. No. 12. March 25. P. 28. Review reproduced in the book: Gorodetsky S. Life indomitable. Articles. Essays. Memories. M., 1984. P. 16. M.: Publishing house "Pomorie", 1922. Cover by prof. Favorsky. With 34 drawings. 67 p. Rusov Nikolai Nikolaevich - Soviet journalist and writer. Unfortunately, information about the personality and creative successes of N. N. Rusov could not be found. Reprinted from original publication: The day before. 1923. No. 45. Newton Isaac (1643‒1727) - English mathematician, mechanic, astronomer, physicist, creator of the picture of the world that dominated natural science until the appearance of the concepts of N. Bohr and A. Einstein. Sverbeev Dmitry Nikolaevich (1799‒1874) - memoirist close to Slavophiles. Works: Notes (1799‒1826): In 2 volumes. M., 1899. Next comes a long extract from “Imaginaries,” which we omit (“The above is more than 600 years old.” pp. 44‒50). The following is quoted from page 51 of “Imaginaries...”. This refers to the work of the great Polish thinker Nicolaus Copernicus (1472‒1543) “De revolutionibus orbium coelestium” (1543). Kolman Arnosht (Ernest) (1892‒1979) – mathematician, logician, historian of science, party functionary. Born into the family of a Prague postal official, he was influenced first by “his father’s Czech nationalism,” then by “Jewish, on his mother’s side.” Joined the Bar Kochba student organization; translated M. Buber’s book “Three Speeches on Jewry” into Czech. He studied at the Higher Polytechnic School and at the mathematics department of the Faculty of Philosophy of Charles University. Listened to lectures by A. Einstein; made acquaintance with M. Brod, F. Kafka, J. Hasek. Since the beginning of the 10s. became interested in Marxism. Was mobilized into the Austro-Hungarian army; in 1916 he was captured in Russia, in Tsaritsyn, then in Astrakhan. In Ivanovo-Voznesensk he took part in the events of 1917. Since 1919 he has known Lenin; was a member of the “troika” in the Cheka, head of the Soviet party school of Sibrevkom. In 1927 – head. publishing house "Moscow Worker"; founded the Roman Newspaper. Since 1929 worked in the Agitprop of the Central Committee, from 1931 - as a member of the Academy, head of the Natural Science Association. He worked as a consultant for the Comintern in the newspaper Svoboda. In 1922 was arrested in Germany, transported to Moscow and until 1929 was a member of the ICC. Cultural attaché in France, headed the protocol department in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (under Molotov). From August 1929 to March 1931 - at work in the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks. In the 30s prepared Marx's manuscripts for publication. Since 1932, Mr. Director of the Institute of Red Professorship, natural science sector. Since 1936 - head. Department of Science of the Moscow City Party Committee. In 1937 he published the book “The Subject and Method of Modern Mathematics.” Since 1934 – Doctor of Philosophy. Since March 1939 - at work at the Institute of Philosophy of the Academy of Sciences (senior researcher, head of the department of dialectical materialism). During the war he was evacuated to Alma-Ata and taught logic at a local university. In 1942 he published the book “Great Achievements of Central Asian Culture, and How the Nazis Are Trying to Appropriate Them.” In 1942 worked as a translator in the 7th department of the Political Administration of the Red Army (under Mehlis), collaborated in the party press (Rude Pravo, New Thought), in the public education system, and participated in a number of diplomatic missions. In September 1948 he was arrested, and in 1951 he was released and exiled to Ulyanovsk. Then, on the recommendation of Zhdanov, he taught at the Moscow Automechanical Institute; by decree of Malenkov he received an apartment in the capital. In 1953‒1959 worked at the Institute of History of Natural Science and Technology of the Academy of Sciences. In 1953, Kolman learned about the existence of cybernetics and became its propagandist (Questions of Philosophy. 1955. No. 4). In 1959 - director of the Institute of Philosophy of the Academy of Sciences in Prague. The events of August 21, 1968 marked a break with the Soviet authorities. In 1976, finding himself in Sweden, Kolman asked for political asylum and turned to Brezhnev with an open letter in which he announced his resignation from the CPSU. Op.: We shouldn't have lived like this. New York, 1982 (1st ed. - 1979). Obviously, it would not be amiss to remind the reader who was on the editorial board of the Bolshevik magazine: N. Bauman, N. Bukharin, A. Krinitsky, V. Molotov, N. Popov, P. Pospelov, K. Rosenthal, A. Stetsky, B. Tal, E. Yaroslavsky. The magazine was published with a circulation of 400,000 copies. Published from the original publication: Bolshevik. 1933. No. 12. P. 88‒96. St. Mary is higher than Minerva (Minerva is the ancient goddess of wise science) - the very name of the church is quite edifying. Galileo Galileo (1564‒1642) - Italian scientist and thinker, one of the founders of exact natural science. Pius XI - under this name began the pontificate of the Archbishop of Milan, Cardinal Achille Ratti, who replaced the deceased Benedict XV on the Holy See in 1922. On June 20, 1933, he concluded a concordat with Hitler and supported the Mussolini regime. Died on February 10, 1939. See: Fedotov G.P. Over the tomb of Pius XI. New Russia. Paris, 1939. No. 62. P. 4‒6. Acta Apostolicade Sedis, 1932, p. 14‒15. Max Planck (1858‒1947) – German physicist, founder of quantum theory, academician of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences (1913). Nobel laureate (1918). Laplace Pierre Simon (1749‒18270 – French astronomer, mathematician, physicist, classic representative of mechanistic determinism. Gleichschaltung – political unification (German). Orlov M. Mathematics and religion. Kharkov, 1933 (in Ukrainian), This book, with minor additions, should be translated into Russian and published. For readers who have not studied at a theological seminary, we explain that, according to the “Dictionary of the Church Slavonic and Russian Language” (1867, vol. 1, p. 939), nepshchevati - think, read, assume mentally. “Blessed is I to be” (Acts 26:2); “Let no one grieve any more for me than he who sees me or hears anything from me” (1 Cor. 12:6). Error. Correct: Bukharev (Alexander Matveevich, 1824‒1871) Russian spiritual writer; Florensky published his works and correspondence in “Theological Works” in 1913–1917. “Imaginary in geometry” - so by E. Kolman. Frenkel Yakov Ilyich (1894‒1952) – Soviet theoretical physicist. Georgiy Gamow (George 1904‒1968) is an American theoretical physicist of Russian origin. Mendeleev Dmitry Ivanovich 1834‒1904) – Russian chemist, teacher, historian of science, public figure. John Tyndall (1820‒1893) – English physicist. Michael Faraday (1791‒1867) - English physicist, founder of the doctrine of the electromagnetic field. “The Life of Plants” by the Russian Darwinian naturalist Klimenty Arkadyevich Timiryazev (1843‒1920) was published in 1878.