SCIENTIFIC WORLDVIEW AND MORAL EDUCATION

V. S. Butochkin

The most important component of the education of the new person of communist society is moral education. In the process of moral education, scientific consciousness, scientific ideology, and the scientific worldview occupy a dominant place in the sphere of interaction among the various levels of awareness of social being, in the interaction and mutual penetration of scientific and everyday consciousness, ideology and social psychology. The urgent needs of forming the personality of communist society—the education of communist consciousness, deep ideological conviction, high moral qualities, and the task of forming a comprehensively developed personality—imperatively necessitate further study of questions concerning the correlation, interaction, and mutual penetration of the scientific worldview and morality, of the scientific-ideological factors of morality and its emotional-psychological aspect. Clarifying these problems constitutes, even at the present time, a broad field of activity, beginning with the formulation of the concept of the scientific worldview. In our literature the scientific worldview is characterized from four points of view. A generalized classification of these various definitions of the scientific worldview is set forth in the author’s abstract of A. Ya. Ermolov, The Role of Philosophy in the Formation of a Worldview (Moscow, 1964). In general outline it is presented as follows.

Proponents of the first point of view characterize worldview and philosophy as identical concepts. Here the scientific worldview is Marxist-Leninist philosophy, dialectical and historical materialism.

From the standpoint of the second point of view, worldview appears as the totality of all knowledge about the world developed by humanity. Its main part, however, is philosophy.

Adherents of the third point of view identify the scientific worldview with Marxism-Leninism. Philosophy appears here as the theoretical basis of the worldview.

According to the fourth point of view, the scientific worldview is formed on the basis of the theories of Marxism-Leninism, as well as on the basis of the most important achievements of natural science¹.

The author of this classification considers the latter point of view the most acceptable, for here worldview is regarded as a special, specific activity of consciousness, a qualitatively determinate form of reflection of the world, which cannot be fully identified either with philosophy or with any other form of social consciousness, or with their totality. One may agree that such an approach resolves this problem more rationally. But in that case the author’s criticism of the other three views is nevertheless not entirely well founded, for this criticism proceeds mainly in terms of volume, of the scope encompassed by all other forms of reflection. Representatives of the first point of view allegedly greatly narrow this sphere, while adherents of the second unduly broaden it, which leads to the loss of the qualitative specificity of worldview. In our view, the shortcomings in identifying the scope and specificity of the concept of scientific worldview arise chiefly from insufficient attention to the dialectic of the interconnection and interpenetration of worldview with other forms and structures of the reflection of being.

Worldview, including scientific worldview, cannot, on the one hand, be identified with any one of the forms or with any one of the levels of reflection, and, on the other hand, cannot be isolated from them abstractly and definitively.

The degree of interconnection between worldview and one or another form of reflection depends first of all on their social and ideological-political purpose, and also on the level of awareness of the essence of being. Thus, at the present stage in the development of modern class society, the core of worldview, including scientific worldview, is political ideology, political views, which in turn are based on such social sciences as history, philosophy, and political economy; whereas, in the process of carrying out the tasks of the direct construction of communism, the role of scientific, moral, aesthetic, and other forms of consciousness of real reality is steadily increasing.

The scope of worldview comprehension is also variable from the standpoint of awareness of the essence of being, since at certain stages of cognitive and practical activity some or other knowledge of real reality acquires a particular character and falls outside the sphere of worldview comprehension. Numerous data of the concrete sciences, people’s moral practice in the form of habitual actions, and so forth may serve as examples.

It is likewise improper to conceive of worldview views as given only at the level of scientific-ideological forms of reflection. One or another worldview may be based on various forms and structures of reflection. In terms of the degree to which the essence of being is expressed, it may rise “above” and fall “below” ideological forms of reflection. It may rise higher through the theoretical generalization of particular data of concrete ideological forms. It also descends lower, organically merging with the emotional-psychological factors of social consciousness. Thus, in the ordinary consciousness of the popular masses, scientific worldview may assume the form of emotionally colored notions about ideals, happiness, good and evil. Here, value notions may appear in the form of an image, or even of a psychological stereotype, in the designation and expression of the theoretical content of these concepts.

Scientific worldview, in our view, is above all a generalized system of materialist views on real reality, the basis of which is Marxism-Leninism. In the Program of the CPSU, where for the first time the task is posed of forming a scientific worldview among all working people of our society, it is stated that

the realization of this task must be based on the ideology of Marxism-Leninism “... as an integral and coherent system of philosophical, economic, and socio-political views”²).

In addition, those forms of knowledge that acquire the character of inner conviction, that become the basis of a person’s entire way of life and activity, may be regarded as worldview-related in the full sense of the word. A scientific worldview is not only an ideal image of the world, existing in the form of a system of knowledge, but also an active position in life, a volitional, emotional attitude toward the world, toward society, toward one’s rights and duties. Taking all these points into account, by a scientific worldview one must understand a generalized system, an aggregate of scientific philosophical, political, moral, and atheistic views, ideals, and convictions of people. Serving as the guide of a person’s life and activity, it expresses a correct conception—based on the achievements of modern science—of the basic laws of nature and society, a scientific understanding of man’s place in objective reality, and of his relation to society, to other people, to another person.

A scientific worldview, as a definite scientific system of generalized views on real reality, as a special, specific form of its reflection, is based on all the other forms of social consciousness of real reality and interacts with them. Being the result, the sum of correct scientific views, it performs a methodological role in subsequent cognitive and practical activity. As for the scope of this interaction, it is as inexhaustible and mobile as are the very needs of knowing and transforming the world.

The interaction and mutual penetration of the scientific worldview and other forms and structures of reflection, in turn, do not smooth away the specificity of these forms and levels and, accordingly, the inherent specificity of the worldview.

At the same time, in this complex interaction and mutual penetration it is necessary to see and single out the determining forms of reflection on which worldview comprehension and worldview methodology are based.

In view of the fact that social being is reflected from the standpoint of a definite class, its needs and interests, worldview is based first and foremost on ideological-political views and expresses them in an integral system.

The dominant role of ideological-political views appears quite clearly, for example, in moral consciousness, in moral education, and in moral practice. Here one cannot for a moment imagine the free, voluntary, conscious, convinced moral activity of the individual apart from its profound grounding in ideological-political, ideological necessity. It is no accident that ethics was often the core, the constituent and concluding part of pre-Marxian philosophical systems, from the ancient thinkers to Hegel and Feuerbach. In our view, attempts even in our time to remove ethics from the number of philosophical sciences are untenable: “Ethics and aesthetics,” write A. Verbin and A. Furman in this connection, “have approximately the same relation to philosophy. They do not solve the basic question of philosophy and are not sciences of general laws. Therefore ethics and aesthetics

²) Program of the CPSU. 1966, p. 118.

particular, and not philosophical, sciences. However, many authors continue to assign them to the philosophical sciences according to the old tradition”^3).

In fact, however, such a removal of ethics from the number of philosophical sciences is unfounded, since in ethics worldview and ethical problems are closely intertwined. Moral necessity and moral practice constitute an ethically “civilized” ideological-theoretical necessity and all of life practice. After all, it is no accident that in our socialist society, where objective and subjective possibilities for the realization of genuinely human ideals, goals, and aspirations of people are constantly developing, philosophy and morality acquire an enormous role in communist education. Philosophy and morality, in their unity, serve as the principal spiritual weapon in the formation of the scientific-materialist worldview of Soviet people. Moreover, it must be borne in mind that moral consciousness is inseparably connected with all other forms of social consciousness, with the entire spiritual life of society. Everything that constitutes one or another spiritual cultural value also has its moral significance.

One cannot even conceive of the good, welfare, justice, duty, conscience, and other basic moral motives outside scientific knowledge, goals, moral aspirations, and their social function. Science and all spiritual-cultural values are ultimately called upon to create this welfare, this good, to affirm justice and happiness—that is, practically to realize in the life of the human being and of society what is humane and morally useful. The moral principles of communism are manifested in various kinds and forms of social consciousness, political ideology, science, philosophy, and art. In revolutionary-political ideology, and in interpenetration with it, communist morality appears as a necessary component, for its norms and principles also speak of devotion to communism, of activity in the name of its affirmation, of the multiplication of socialist property, and of internationalism. In turn, all these principles and norms have found their scientific substantiation in revolutionary ideology. Communist morality permeates political ideas, giving them a highly moral, humanistic character. The strength of our moral conviction and devotion to the ideals of communism is based both on the experience of life and practice, and on the correctness of Marxist-Leninist science.

Art and literature are inseparably connected with the scientific worldview and the principles of communist morality. The scientific communist worldview and the principles of communist morality constitute one of the basic conditions for the realistic reflection in art of life phenomena, of its essential processes, and of relations among people. Communist ideological commitment and moral ideals are the soul of creativity. They exalt the human being and inspire him to accomplish great deeds.

Conversely, a false worldview, the absence of progressive moral ideals and moral truth, ruins artistic creativity and cannot serve the moral education of people. In artistic creativity what is needed is the truth of life, the moral force and attractiveness of the ideas of the struggle for communism. The harmonious unity of high ideological commitment, moral truth, and artistic perfection—such must be the true path of creation in artistic activity.

^3) A. Verbin, A. Furman. The Place of Historical Materialism in the System of Sciences. Moscow State University, 1965, p. 49.

There is a distinctive interconnection between the natural sciences and moral values, the principles of morality. Undoubtedly, physics, mathematics, astronomy, biology, geology, and other sciences of nature do not in themselves have moral content, are not directly connected with the principles of morality, and do not provide a justification for people’s moral actions. But all this does not mean that the natural sciences have no relation to people’s interests, to their moral ideals, and ultimately to the well-being and happiness of society and the individual. In our time, in our society, science is acquiring ever new functions; it is becoming the greatest means of social progress, raising the level of material, cultural, and spiritual well-being not of a chosen minority, but of all people, of the entire people, and ensuring their all-round development. Therefore the moral aspect, the humanism of scientific research and of its implementation in practice, is expressed quite clearly here. Science and morality interpenetrate, thanks to the humanistic foundation of our entire ideology.

Not the entire aggregate of knowledge about the world that exists at one or another stage in the development of society’s cognition is included in a worldview, but only that knowledge which expresses a general conception of the world, of man’s relation to it, and of his place in it. A worldview appears as an aggregate of principles that underlie the evaluation of particular phenomena of the world and that determine human behavior.

A scientific worldview is not itself a science as such. It is only based on scientific data; it generalizes the data of all other forms and levels of reflection of being. It is intended to express these data in a generalized scientific form, to create a scientific picture of the world, which is necessary for the further cognition and transformation of the complex, contradictory reality around us. It is intended to exert a dominant influence on the lower stages of the cognition of the world, to create in the builders of communism an ideological-emotional harmony in the work of knowing and transforming the existing reality.

A worldview as a specific system of views of the world arises before any science, including philosophy. A worldview relation to the world arises in man at the very earliest stages of the development of society and deepens together with the development of practical activity, the development of consciousness and self-consciousness. For example, a variety of spontaneous worldview is so-called naive realism, a spontaneously materialist conception of reality and of the place and role of man in it. At the stage of naive realism are people who are not acquainted with scientific-materialist views of the world. This worldview has many flaws and weaknesses, since it is oriented toward superficial observations, toward the data of people’s concrete-sensuous everyday practice. But even this practice already gives correct, generalized materialist ideas about reality: “The ‘naive realism’ of every healthy person... consists in the fact that things, the environment, the world exist independently of our sensation, of our consciousness, of our Self, and of man in general”^4). This concrete-sensuous everyday practical activity, this very experience, creates our conviction that things, the world, the environment exist independently of us. Such spontaneous concrete-sensuous ideas do not come into contradiction with scientific

^4) V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, vol. 18, p. 65.

worldview and serve as fertile soil for the consolidation of dialectical-materialist views. The very process of forming a scientific worldview is quite complex and many-sided. The tasks and possibilities of disseminating it differ at particular stages of revolutionary transformations, since mastering a scientific communist worldview is a process. After all, there is not immediately the possibility of making all the ideas of Marxism-Leninism and the generalized data of the concrete sciences the property of the masses. Thus, during the period of preparing and carrying out the socialist revolution, working people basically assimilate political views. In the course of socialist and communist construction, the development of the working people’s worldview requires not merely an expansion of the circle of political ideas, but an ever deeper understanding of them on the basis of the philosophical and economic views of Marxism, in indissoluble connection with all the principles of scientific communism. The further development of a scientific worldview proceeds along the line of including in it other forms of social consciousness: ethical, aesthetic, and others, since for their more or less thorough assimilation and introduction into practice a definite, higher level of culture among the members of society is already necessary. The very need for their introduction is created as the material conditions of society’s life develop. Therefore, work to form a scientific worldview consists not only in reaching a large number of people, but also in an ever greater mastery of the range of ideas of Marxism.

The unified system of scientific materialist views includes ideals, norms, principles of morality, and people’s moral convictions. The main goal of moral education is to achieve deep, stable moral convictions and habits of moral activity in people. Moral conviction, as the result of a person’s moral formation, is based on the entire complex of materialist views; it appears as the individual’s assessment of his own relation to the corresponding requirements of objective necessity, refracted in the demands of moral norms and principles. The tasks of education may be considered fulfilled to the extent that the whole complex of ideological influence upon the individual is consolidated in moral conviction: “It is necessary,” Lenin said, “that the whole cause of upbringing, education, and teaching of the youth of today should be the inculcation in them of communist morality”⁵.

It is no accident, therefore, that the problems of moral education appear to be the most difficult to carry out. In our days, when the building of communist society is proceeding successfully, the moral practice of the overwhelming majority of Soviet people corresponds to the norms and principles of communist morality.

The striving for spiritual enrichment, moral perfection, and moral purity in our time appears as an urgent need in carrying out the objective necessity of forming the new man. A fairly vivid testimony to the realization of this process is provided by the data of a questionnaire survey of students of the Tomsk Polytechnic Institute.

The purpose of the survey was to reveal the students’ conceptions of honor and conscience, their moral and aesthetic ideals.

In the overwhelming majority, the answers in the questionnaires are filled with great concern for moral purity, with a longing for spiritual enrichment.

⁵ V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, vol. 41, p. 309.

At the present time the affirmation of the principles of the moral code of the builder of communism is increasingly making incompatible those traits of character, feelings, thoughts, inclinations, and actions that do not correspond to the needs of the development of our society. This state of affairs is eloquently reflected in the answers to the questionnaire question: “What actions of my own and of my comrades do I consider dishonest, degrading to the dignity of a Soviet person?”

On this question 187 people expressed their views; of these, 70 people condemned such vices as lying, deceit, hypocrisy; 13 people spoke out against drunkenness; 12 against rudeness; 10 against a dishonest attitude toward girls; 8 against parasitism. In the remaining answers, from 5 to 2 condemn cynicism, vulgarity, tactlessness, greed, acquisitiveness, arrogance, conceit, faintheartedness, licentiousness, slackness, and pettiness.

On the question “Your idea of conscience,” 92 people expressed their views; 2 people pointed to the absence of such a moral measure. They believe that circumstances are higher than conscience, that conscience is merely a “convention of life.” Ninety people spoke positively. Their idea of conscience coincides with the basic definitions of Marxist-Leninist ethics. They believe that conscience must be assigned to the sphere of self-consciousness, that it is a person’s moral responsibility for his action: “Conscience is responsibility for one’s own actions and the actions of one’s comrades. One must not pass by facts of indifference, unconcern, or misfortune in the common cause of building communism in our country.” Conscience is characterized as an assessment, a measure, a regulator of a person’s moral activity. “Conscience is that quality of a person which regulates and directs, watches and restrains a person’s actions, directs them along the course of high morality, purity, and humanity.” Here it is also indicated that conscience acts before an action is committed, during its commission, and after it has been committed: “Conscience is the brake on immoral actions and the engine of noble, moral, and highly purposeful ones. A person’s conscience is the chief weapon against evil. A person must develop a truly human conscience, for he labors for the good of society.”

In the answers, the role of conscience is figuratively compared with a beacon: “Conscience is a kind of beacon that shines somewhere in the distance and serves as a guidepost on life’s path. For some people this beacon temporarily goes out in the thicket of life’s failures, and the person strays from the path, rolls downward. But then the beacon—conscience—lights up again, and the person once more finds the right path of an honest life.”

One hundred thirteen people expressed their views on the question: “In what do I see the honor and dignity of a student?” In their answers on this subject they indicate that the honor and dignity of a student must be manifested first of all in excellent study, in mastering knowledge, in a broad outlook, in the striving to know more and then to create, in pride in one’s science, technology, one’s institute, one’s profession, and in love for this profession. The honor and dignity of a student must be manifested in highly moral behavior, in the desire to cultivate in oneself the traits and qualities inherent in people of communist society, in the striving to be worthy of one’s Motherland, in the conscientious fulfillment of one’s duty to the people and the Party.

In order to bear honor and dignity highly, one must conduct oneself as befits a Soviet student, a future engineer. One must be erudite in science and technology, be industrious, conscientiously fulfill one’s duties, and actively participate in socially useful work. One should be sensitive and responsive to people, intolerant of—

to all acts unworthy of a Soviet person, to be principled and consistent in keeping one’s word, purposeful in one’s actions. Taking into account the predominant, dominant communist moral practice of Soviet people, their concern for constant moral improvement and striving for moral purity, it is nevertheless necessary to bear in mind that even in our days of the successful construction of communist society, moral consciousness lags behind other forms of social consciousness: political and aesthetic. In the consciousness of individual members of socialist society there is contradiction, duality; advanced socialist views not infrequently still coexist with backward moods, with philistinism. In the process of moral education it is necessary to bear in mind that moral practice, although it is based on a definite system, on the sum of correct scientific-ideological conceptions, still cannot be reduced to this simple sum of ideological factors known to a person. In reality, moral practice reflects one’s relation to ideological motives. Moral conviction, as the basis of conscious voluntary activity, appears in activity as a qualitatively definite structural whole. Like any other structural state, it cannot be reduced to a simple sum of its constituent quantitative components, nor can it be derived from this sum. It is precisely this that must first of all explain the gap between knowledge and conviction, word and deed, the presence of moral deviations among people who are knowledgeable in the ideological aspect of morality. Knowledge becomes part of a worldview only when it becomes an inner conviction, deeply thought-through personal conclusions. It becomes part of a worldview precisely when it corresponds to it not only in content but also in its very orientation. Our Marxist-Leninist worldview serves the aims of transforming reality, the aims of humanity’s progress, the creation of a truly just communist society. Knowledge that appears merely as a manifestation of external education, of erudition—passive knowledge—cannot be a constituent part of a worldview. Such negative phenomena as egoism, self-love, careerism can lead people to an external assimilation of the worldview of our society. The transformation of knowledge into convictions is inseparably connected with activity. Scientific knowledge becomes part of a scientific worldview only when it organically merges, combines with general-theoretical, philosophical principles, when convictions are created on its basis in the strength and truth of these principles. Moral convictions are a peculiar fusion of a person’s thoughts and feelings. They appear as the embodiment of the emotional-psychological and ideological aspects of social consciousness, to which the emotional and intellectual life of the person corresponds.

The process of forming a scientific worldview and the practice of moral education provide for the “implantation” of scientific, materialist ideas from without by various ways and means: instruction, propaganda, agitation, and so forth. For a more fruitful assimilation of these ideas by the individual, it is necessary, in turn, to improve the social psychology of people. As the lower, spontaneous sphere of reflection, it must appear in the form of a “field” oriented in the same direction as these ideas.

A very close and accessible means of influencing people’s social psychology may be the personal example of the educator,

whose role at the present time is constantly growing. Literature and art are widely accessible means of influencing audiences of millions.

The most important factors in the improvement of social psychology are the direct means of ideological influence. Here one must have in mind the study of Marxist-Leninist theory, its creative development and its implementation in life and practice, since it is precisely the theoretical grounding and depth of Marxist-Leninist ideas that draw into their channel a person’s feelings, inclinations, and emotions and give them a purposeful, stable character. All other purposeful means of influence must be placed at the service of demonstrating and consolidating scientific-ideological methods of activity. The chief and fundamental factor that forms genuine moral conviction is practical, labor-related, socially useful activity.

It is no accident that this truth is now being emphasized with particular force in the documents of our Party: the Program of the CPSU, the materials of the October (1964) and subsequent Plenums of the CPSU Central Committee, and the materials of the Twenty-Third Party Congress. At the basis of all these documents lies the idea of a scientific approach to the cognition and use of objective laws, to the improvement of economic levers and economic methods, for the purpose of the further, more perfected development of the productive forces of our society and the further growth of its well-being.

Here, too, the problems of educating the new person, including the problems of moral education, are placed on a more realistic footing: “The economic incentives for raising the productivity of social labor,” it is noted in the materials of the September Plenum of the CPSU Central Committee, “are a powerful means of moving the socialist economy toward communism. At the same time, the Party will continue unswervingly to pursue a course toward raising the communist consciousness of the working people and toward educating a communist attitude toward labor. Only with the conscious, initiative-taking, and creative approach of every worker to his task, with the careful, businesslike attitude of everyone toward the people’s property, is it possible to struggle for the building of communist society”^6). And in the documents of the Twenty-Third Congress of the CPSU it is stated directly that “...outside conscious labor and social activity there is not and cannot be communist education”^7).

The Twenty-Third Congress singles out such concrete and effective forms and means of education in labor as taking as one’s model “the people of the future,” fostering thrift, and strengthening labor discipline. Who are these people of the future? They are our foremost workers, the innovators of production. They are distinguished by the fact that they have already mastered technology to perfection and consciously serve society. They “...display high moral and ethical qualities, the spirit of collectivism and selflessly, with full dedication of their strength, fulfill their duties to the people”^8). The people of the future already work as everyone will work under communism. They are an example, a model that must be followed.

The education of thrift follows from the very essence of the communist attitude toward labor and socialist property. It is necessary to work in a businesslike way, to multiply our wealth by means of careful—

^6) Resolution of the September Plenum of the CPSU Central Committee, 1965. Pravda, October 1, 1965.

^7) L. I. Brezhnev, Report of the CPSU Central Committee to the Twenty-Third Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Pravda, March 30, 1966.

^8) Materials of the discussion on the role of research work in the education and upbringing of students. The multi-edition newspaper of the Tomsk Polytechnic Institute Za kadry, October 27, 1965.

attitude toward every kilogram of metal, coal, cement, oil, toward every ruble.

Alongside the factors that influence the individual from without, the process of education also presupposes self-education and self-improvement, for the success of education depends not only on objective factors and ideological work, but also on the individual himself. Self-education, a person who has educated himself, is not, of course, understood in the literal sense, since in society a person receives the material for improvement from other people, from society. Self-education in the process of education is a person’s own aspirations, his inner impulses, consciously directed toward the attainment and improvement of certain personal qualities—intellectual, physical, moral, and aesthetic. In the process of self-education a person must himself make the maximum effort to develop his abilities; a person himself is obliged to think and act for the purposes of moral, aesthetic, and other kinds of perfection. Therefore, communist education of working people sets itself, as one of its tasks, the awakening and development of activity, the striving independently to master knowledge, the communist worldview, and the norms of communist behavior. In the course of building communist society, the self-education of the individual proceeds among us under the determining influence of social conditions. Therefore the aims of education and self-education are one and the same among us; among us there is no antagonism between these processes, which is inherent in an exploitative society, since the moral demands of our society upon the individual do not contradict the development of a person’s abilities and his self-improvement. Among us the tasks of self-education are born of life itself. As we move toward communism, the demands upon the individual for the purposes of his self-education increase. The growing role of self-education at present is determined among us by a new attitude toward labor, toward social obligations, by a new discipline, a new morality. All this conditions the striving of our people toward moral and other kinds of self-improvement. The desire for self-improvement often comes together with the aspiration to imitate a respected person, people of the older generation, the leaders and participants of the revolution, and other best representatives of the people. A characteristic testimony to this proposition is provided by the answers to the question, in the questionnaire mentioned above: “My ideal of highly moral behavior.” 109 students shared their ideas about the best representatives of the working people. The absolute majority here belongs to V. I. Lenin. Twenty-one persons specifically pointed to him as an unsurpassed ideal for imitation: “…Lenin—that is my ideal… In life, Lenin; in art, Lenin; in literature, Lenin… If one were to take even a tenth part of Lenin’s life in the moral respect, a person would already be of highly moral behavior… I myself do not know. I do not dare to cite Lenin…” and so on.

In second place stand representatives of the old and young guard, tribunes of the revolution, prominent figures of the world communist movement: F. Dzerzhinsky, Julius Fučík, S. Kirov; heroes of the Young Guard; V. Mayakovsky, A. Gorky, N. Ostrovsky. A significant place in the questionnaire is also occupied by such names as M. Glezos, A. Chekhov, P. Tchaikovsky, J. London, N. Chernyshevsky, A. Makarenko, A. Tolstoy, the hero of two peoples F. Poletayev, the cosmonaut G. Titov, and others. In the overwhelming majority, the standards of highly moral behavior among heroes of literature and art are: Gusev from the motion picture Nine Days of One Year, P. Korchagin, Academician Dronov from the motion picture Everything Remains to People, Davydov, Ovod, Danko, Rakhmetov. Some see the ideal of highly moral behavior among those close to them, those around them. They name their parents, relatives, supervisors, former peda-

...enemies, friends. Eleven people indicated that, as yet, they have no particular definite ideal. Their ideal is a collective one, which is difficult to express.

Our life places before Soviet people complex and great tasks: to master the Marxist-Leninist scientific worldview, to develop within oneself communist ideals, deep and firm convictions, and practical skills as a fighter for the new and progressive. It is necessary to cultivate in oneself love of labor, respect for public property, and love for our Motherland. All this lies at the foundation of our tasks in education and self-education.

The process of education and self-education presupposes an inexhaustible variety of forms, means, and methods of influence on a person, and their application and use according to the will of the person himself. Above we discussed the main factors of influence on the personality. But in addition to these principal forms and means, in the practice of education and self-education, in one or another concrete situation, in the life and activity of a given collective, requests and needs for spiritual enrichment of a more specific, particular character may come to the fore, while having vital importance for that collective. Analysis of the effectiveness of particular forms and means, taking account of the concrete situation, is of decisive importance for the efficacy of education. In the concrete circumstances of the life and activity of one or another collective, one may rely on the principal forms, improve secondary ones, and disregard unacceptable forms and means of influence. Thus, students of the Tomsk Polytechnic Institute named the most diverse forms and means in answer to the question: “What forms of social influence most improve a person intellectually and morally?” One hundred and ten people pointed to such means and forms as universities of culture, cinema, theater, radio, books, good comrades, debates, lecture series, exhibitions of works of art, conversations, meetings, evenings of questions and answers, discussions, amateur artistic activity, literary circles, student research circles, student scientific societies, and so on. The greatest preference belongs to universities of culture (36). In second place are debates and discussions (11). Scientific research work by students is becoming an increasingly important form and effective means of education and self-education in higher educational institutions, since it fruitfully promotes the all-round development of the personality and cultivates a conscious and creative attitude toward study. Questionnaire data show that students engaged in scientific research work master the material of the curricula more successfully. The questionnaire data indicate that among those students who participate in this work, 60.4% passed their examinations with good and excellent marks in the spring session of the 1964/65 academic year, whereas among those not participating there were only 37.3%. Participation in scientific research work does not restrict students’ interests but, on the contrary, broadens them. Fifty-seven percent (of 608 people surveyed) in this category indicated that they are interested in literature, art, artistic creativity, and sport. Whereas among students not engaged in scientific work, only 35% stated that they have interests other than academic work.

The number of TPI students participating in scientific research work constantly exceeds 2–2.5 thousand people. Therefore it is no accident that the institute’s community has already repeatedly raised the question of “legalizing” this work, making it an integral part of the educational process, and transforming this amateur obligation into a universal one, necessary for every student, through the academic timetable and the institute’s charter.

Consequently, the process of forming a scientific worldview and communist morality presupposes the unity and inseparable connection of education and self-education, of external influence and one’s own efforts, of the activity of the individual in developing profound convictions and in struggling for a model of conduct in moral practice, in the struggle for the all-round enrichment of the human being. This entire process presupposes an inexhaustible diversity of various means, forms, methods, and shades of influence. At the same time, in the practice of education and self-education it is necessary to rely on the leading forms—the principal, determining, most effective ones, and those necessary for the concrete needs of the development of our entire society.

1. A. Ermolov, The Role of Philosophy in the Formation of a Worldview. Author’s abstract of a dissertation for the degree of Candidate of Philosophical Sciences. Moscow, 1964. ↩