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The Essence of a Person as the Interaction of Three Components:
Biological, Social, Spiritual
Arkadiy A. Tuman-Nikiforov*
Krasnoyarsk State Agrarian University, 90 Mira, Krasnoyarsk, 660049 Russia 1
Received 3.06.2011, received in revised form 11.06.2011, accepted 17.06.2011
The article deals with the essence of a person from the point of view of dialectical methodology. The essence is regarded as a unity of three components: biological, social and spiritual. The greatest attention is devoted to the spiritual component of human nature. This is due to the fact that modern humanity is in a state of acute spiritual crisis, to overcome which it is necessary to study properly a phenomenon of spirituality in all its manifestations. The second reason is that from the spiritual side of his/her nature the person influences himself/herself, society and the surrounding.
Keywords: human existence, spirituality, individuality, personality, categories, opposition, essence, phenomenon.
Objectives: To consider the essence and nature of a person, personality - as a set of social and spiritual, and the essence - as a combination of biological, social and spiritual qualities.
Tasks: To analyze the philosophical,
psychological and other approaches to understanding and studying personality, to develop a generalized (philosophical and psychological) approach, to show the person’s essence as a complex, dynamic system which consists of three major subsystems, as well as a variety of relationships and connections between them.
Methodology: the dialectical method is used, in particular, in the identification and analysis of the conflicting parties and trends (the unity and struggle of the opposites) when considering the bipolar scientific categories.
Discussion: Consideration of the person’s nature as the interaction of not two but three constituent parties does not contradict the dialectical and materialist methodology. It may seem that the categories interrelation scheme in the dialectical tradition must contain only paired categories acting in a contradictory unity with each other. Indeed, in Marxist philosophy it is usual to oppose the following pairs:the individual - the social, the spiritual - the corporal, and the ideal -the material. The second and the third pairs are sometimes identified with each other. However, it should be noted, that the identification of solid and tangible in this case is improperly. The material should be understood as the biosocial, as the social is also the material, as well as the natural. And then contrasting the material - the
* Corresponding author E-mail address: ATuman-Nikiforov@yandex.ru
1 © Siberian Federal University. All rights reserved
spiritual (in this case it just may be identified with the ideal, as the owner of the spirituality is “an ideal subject”, who is by himself in the subject-object relations), we can understand the person’s essence just as a unity of the material and the spiritual, and the material can be treated as a combination of the biological and the social. Then the person’s essence consists in the unity of the biological, the social and the spiritual.
But what does the biological mean? What is the social? What is the spiritual?
What should be taken as biological aspect of human? Is it possible to equate biological aspect to natural? “Nature” is a really polysemantic word. If human “nature” is considered as conditions, sufficient for his existence and development, it means that in this case, nature should be identified not with biological but with biosocial (spiritual aspects are also involved in human essence, but it is doubtful that spiritual could be referred to natural). However, if “nature” is regarded as: environment (or geographical environment at planet’s scale); complex of natural conditions (social conditions are to be considered as artificial); aggregate object of natural science; as an existence pattern (opposed to social), it means that natural could be equated to biological. In this context, nature should be considered primarily as a complex of physical and chemical reactions. As far as physical and chemical in living forms transform to biological, natural (from the viewpoint of natural science) can be qualified as biological.
Biological aspect of human essence involves: biological body, which specifies human’s objective (labor) activity by its design; mortality, dependence on external environment - temperature, air pressure; oxygen concentration; dietary; muscular load, landscape, regimen, susceptability to diseases; biological necessities like energy, oxygen, essential nutrients, water, rest, comfort
temperature, desire for having children, protection from external hazards and hostile environment, areal comfort and activity; biological level of human’s mind - irritability, reflexes, instincts, sexuality. All these factors compose biological aspect and every social and mental activity implies these circumstances.
What should be referred to social aspect of human and his personality? This question merits detailed consideration because supporters of biosocial interpretation tend to affiliate with social aspect some factors that are going to be included in spiritual aspect. It is rather difficult to separate social from mental just because spirituality as well as personality are forming and developing during the processes of sociogenesis (spirituality of patrimonial man) and socialization (spirituality of individual). Let us recall that interdetermination doesn’t mean equality. Therefore, while analyzing human it is essential to distinguish social and spiritual. From social point of view, human primarily is a member of society that is included in the system of social relations.
The social aspect implies many factors like human’s inability to live segregated from society, participation in system of social relations, social correlation with collective actions of individuals as well as community spirit, mutual support, cooperativeness, self-denial, attempts to rebuild society, to eliminate social drawbacks and to create righteous society. In the context of social aspect human acts as a citizen - a member of society. How does the peculiarity of a citizen as an individual with sociality come out? Firstly, a human is presented as a subjected of social relations, which cannot be actualize without becoming a matter of human’s activity by interacting with other members of society. The analysis of relationship among categories as well as human’s role in it is connected with scheme of society analysis.
So, social aspect, as opposed to spiritual, means a variety of different social forms of interaction that are shaped into social relations and can finally coincide with a scheme of society. Social man is a sum of social relations, which can be present or former, material or ideal. From this point of view, every socialized individual is a citizen, who exhibits particular characteristics of sociality. Social aspect is manifested in the fact that formation and development of personality is impossible without processes of antroposociogenesis (personality as patrimonial trait) and socialization (individual personality) It is also obvious that personality cannot exist without society, because it is implied in social relations and capable of mutual support, selfdenial, trying to eliminate social drawbacks and to create righteous society. Thus, personality is formed by society and depends on it and its deterministic influence, on the one hand, and on the other hand, it has an impact on society, forms and rebuilds it, makes society dependent on collective actions of individuals.
Spiritual aspect is not only an extension (or application) of social aspect, but its dialectical opposition, which has self-sufficient content, importance and value and is equal to any other aspect. What is the difference between social and spiritual in a human? The distinguishing criterion is the following: social features (like sociability or asociality, collectivity or egoism,
morality or immorality and so on) could be
realized on a desert island as contrasted to spiritual features like rationality , optimism, courage, diligence, creativity, will. What should be referred to spiritual aspect of human personality? Does this spiritual aspect exist apart from social aspect? Or is it right to consider personality as only a social characteristic of individual, as a system of his social relations and roles, which are represented during the process of working activity as well as to regard spiritual as
automatic manifestation (continuance, addition) of social aspect?
Word “spirituality” also has different meanings. From Christian and Islamic point of view, spirituality means intimacy with the Lord, a permanent correlation between Commandments and human’s deeds and thoughts, an attention and preparation to the afterlife. Hindus and Buddhists believe that spirituality implies observance of different spiritualdisciplines,primarily meditative disciplines like Yoga. Religionists would be in doubt about “spirituality of atheists”. However, this word is used by materialistic philosophy. In this context, spirituality is connected with ideal “interior” of a person, including mental characteristics and psychological constitutions.
D.S. Tsyvanyuk defines spirituality as “the highest level of personality development and self-supervision, which consideres superior human values as main motivational and conceptual controllers”(Tsyvanyuk, 2009: 334). I.A. Shulgina believes that the most notable definition of spirituality sounds like “Spirituality is a complex of fundamental characteristics of person’s mentality (his soul), which expresses ethic, esthetic, intellectual, cognitive and ecological content that maintains genuinely human in person (principles of humanity) and also helps to overcome earthliness in worldview and culture; the essence of spirituality is made up of Faith, Hope and Charity, Sophia (the Holy Wisdom), Beauty, Justice, Harmony” (Kosichev, Platonov, 1998: 17). From this definition, I. A. Shulgina drew the conclusion that “it is mistake to equate spiritual and rational (in its Scientist interpretation). That is not the same. At the turn of the Millennium, spiritual and rational should be considered as oppositions (Shulgina, 2004: 344). I don’t agree with this point of view.
Spiritual and rational (conscious) are not identical, but there is no opposition between this aspects. Rational is a part of spirituality (in
a general sense). And spirituality in a narrow sense (implying active, creative, volitional part of human’s mind) is much similar (but not opposed) to rationality and soulness as a part of spirituality. Of course, all this manifestation like creativity, will and so on could also be irrational. However, there is a bond between consciousness and spirit, rational and spiritual. In addition to it, Shulgina notices that “the basis of new spirituality is Love as attitude” (Shulgina, 2004: 344). I can admit that it is true if we use “spirituality” in the widest sense. Love is one of the acmes of soulfulness as an emotional attitude to world, as a reaction (Hate could also be a reaction, but Love is much more productive) to the outside world, other people, respond to himself, to society and nature, Universe and Existence. If this reaction is represented in the form of Love, it could become a basis of Soulfulness as well as Spirituality, just because Soulfulness is a part of Spirituality.
E.V. Sennitskaya supposes that spirituality in general terms is an ability to go through different states (Sennitskaya, 2003: 259). In my opinion, this definition is better suited to soulfulness. And spirituality in narrow sense could be described as an ability to exhibit activity and creativity, and in general sense (as a segment of personality) -a person’s inner world, an anthropic, over-bestial elements of mentality, a mental phenomena and processes that couldn’t be traced to biosocial aspects. This definition of “spirituality” is in accordance with the framework of materialism, which interprets “spirituality” in the same way. The only thing that raises doubts is an idea of regarding spiritual as a consequence, a manifestation and a part of social aspect, which is typical of Marxism and different materialistic trends. From my point of view, spirituality is of importance to personality structure and even to its essence, which is completely irreducible to biological and social aspects.
Spirituality can be divided to individual and collective. Collective spirituality is connected with a spiritual sphere of social life as well as with unifying spiritual activity, oriented to production of nonmaterial benefits and values of intellectual culture. Individual spirituality is involved with a self talk, a discourse as well as with processes of reflection and self-consciousness, when “a person leaves himself to himself” (Polezhaev, 2004).
Spirituality is regarded as the highest, humanistic levels of human’s mind that set it apart from animal’s psychology. It is supposed that there are three levels: perception of reality, emotional response to it and a level of creative activity (connected with creative transformation of reality). First level is associated with consciousness, the second -with a soul and the third one - with spirit. I figure that there are no other levels that distinguish (compose spiritual aspect) human’s mind apart from animal’s psychology and make it (mind) unique. That is why spiritual aspect is revealed as a complex of consciousness, soul and spirit or perception of reality, emotional response to it and dynamic actions towards it. As a follower of dialectic materialism, I don’t want to become suspected of idealism or religiosity while speaking about soul and spirit. However, I think that these two words are not indicative of idealism and religiosity and don’t have only idealistic connotation. According to P.V. Smirnov: “Even if we don’t share religious and mystical concepts of soul, it is still impossible to avoid such concepts as soulfulness or indifference, spiritual riches or soullessness, spiritual culture, enlargement of mind and spirit, spiritual needs. From a perspective of information need’s approach to mental and behavioral analysis, soul and spirituality are realities of human’s inner world, which could be explained by materialism” (Smirnov, 1989: 68).
Soviet philosophy tended to refer spirituality to consciousness as well as to consider the
latter as social characteristics. “The fact of classifying a concept of spirituality as a part of consciousness has become really specific for the past decades in our country” (Minasyan, 2004: 183). “Consciousness is the highest level of mental activity of human as a social subject” (PED, 1983: 622). From sociological point of view, consciousness is considered as spiritual life of society including all forms like science, philosophy, art, morality, religion, legal awareness, social psychology” (PE, 1970: 43). Confirming relations between social and spiritual characteristics and dependence of spiritual characteristics on processes of socialization (in the context of ontogeny) and sociogenesis (in the terms of phylogeny), I also consider this kind of characteristics not as only invariant of social characteristics (as it is supposed by biosocial conception), but as a dialectic breakthrough, a completely new phenomenon, which, in spite of its connections with social and biological, is completely different from both. Therefore, I consider human essence as an inseparable integration of three aspects: biological, social and spiritual. Spiritual aspect, in its turn, can be regarded as dialectic unity of consciousness, soul and spirit.
There were different models of human’s integrity (consisting of three parts) during the history of philosophic thought. Plato believed that human is a controversial unity of body, mind and soul. Christianity (especially Paulicians and Gnostics) distinguished body (flesh, soma, biota), soul (psyche) and spirit (pneumatics). According to L. Feuerbach human is a unity of material, sensual and spiritual (rational and moral) existence. However, the model represented in my study is different from all these models. It is especially different form the second one, my model is extremely materialistic, not idealistic regardless of using traditional idealistic concepts like “soul” and “spirit”. This model is close
to biosocial conception, but there is one big difference. Spiritual characteristics are not regarded as invariant of social characteristics, but are believed to be special aspect of human existence.
From my point of view, mind (consciousness), soul and spirit that were pointed out by ancient and Christian thoughts are elements of spiritual aspect, which in turn is revealed as a part of human essence. Body (biological aspect) is its second part. But social part as one of the most important aspects wasn’t pointed out by ancient and Christian tradition. Although, Aristotle defined a human as a “political animal”, he didn’t developed this conception. However, the idea was amplified by philosophy of Marxism that pays a lot of attention to analysis of relations between human and social world.
N.N. Chomutova wrote: “The ratio of two levels of the human existence - the individual and the social - always brings the researchers to the analysis of the human relationships with the social world”. (Chomutova, 2004: 558). We can agree with this but only with the significant reservations. The juxtaposition of the individual and the social, although it is often found at the philosophical literature - wrongly, as it opposed to the spiritual and the corporal. The corporal should be contrasted with the uncorporal (which can be understood as a set of energy and information flows which are not clearly defined, or physicality. This definition of the uncorporal does not contradict the understanding of the materialist tradition, while the abstract opposition of the spiritual to the corporal has obvious tone of idealism), organic corporeality can be opposed to the inorganic. The individual confronts the collective, but not the social because the latter is a broader concept and is not limited only by the collective of people, but also includes other diverse qualitative manifestations, in particular the individual social (V.V. Mironov, calls it
as “the individual properties of the sociality” (Mironov, 2005), A.S. Panarin writes about the social and representational functions of the individual (Panarin, 2002)). Firstly, it is “the society, reflected in a person”, and, secondly, the role and the place of a person in society. In ontological terms of social counters the natural, as a qualitatively different structure of the essence, in socio-axiological terms - antisocial, as the destructive processes and phenomena that lead to the destabilization of the society, to its destruction and death, but in anthropological terms - the spiritual, as the individual inner essence opposed to its external (social) essence.
Thus, the human essence has not two but three levels - biological (natural), social and spiritual essence, as well as two sides - individual and collective essence. The analysis of the human relationships with the social researchers world displays, firstly, the ratio of two sides of human existence - individual and collective, and, secondly, the ratio of two levels - spiritual and social human being. The latter is especial because the individual does not fully enters into various relationships with the social, natural world, namely the spiritual aspect of his/her personality, his/her individual consciousness, the individual soul (emotional perception and emotional contact), individual spirit (the creative impact on the surrounding (including the social) world, but is also inextricably linked with willful exposure).
In the same source N.N. Chomutov notes that genuine human existence that reflects his uniqueness, his thoughts and feelings - this is the individual being. In my opinion, “an individual being, reflecting the uniqueness of each, his thoughts and feelings” (by N.N. Chomutova) is not necessarily true, just as the collective is not necessarily untrue. The first indicators are quite applicable to A. Hitler and many others (smaller) evildoers, and the second to millions
of ordinary Soviet (and not Soviet) people, together with those who built socialism, were involved in industrialization, collectivization, who fought against Adolf Hitler, etc. It is hardly legitimate to recognize the essence of the former as more authentic than the essence of the second. Authenticity or non authenticity of life and human essence is defined not by the individuality or collectivity, uniqueness or typicality, but it is defined by it’s all consistent with what an individual is, what it is for him is “be himself”. For some people it is individualism and even selfishness, and for other people, on the contrary, it is collectivism and altruism. Some tend “to live for themselves” and others, on the contrary, for other people, for society, some tend to stand out, to emphasize their uniqueness, and for other people it is more important “to be like everyone and not to stand out”. When a person realizes in his life what he actually is and that he is close to, it can be characterized as his “true” essence, but when, due to some reasons, he is forced to adapt and conceal “his true face”, it can be characterized as “not true” essence. However, his thoughts and feelings are really important because while pretending to have their words and deeds in his mind he is still “himself”.
But here another aspect appears. “True” and “not true” existence can be understood in two senses, and “true” and “not true” being in one more. Every time when we think about the person’s humanity and inhumanity, when we ask: “Is he a person?” or ascertain: “This couldn’t be done by normal people”, - we mean truly human existence as person’s tribute existence, corresponding to how, from our point of view, the person’s behavior and existence should be. Then the existence and activities of Adolf Hitler and alike cannot be called as a truly human existence. However, from this point of view, the person’s true and non true behavior and existence must be determined, again, not by individuality or
collectivity, uniqueness or typicality, but how they conform to their fullest expression and disclosure of the nature and person’s essence. The person’s essence should be disclosed in his existence. True person’s existence implies optimal realization of his biological, social and spiritual qualities. And at the same time his thoughts and feelings are very important, not in themselves, but as a manifestation of his spiritual component, without which there cannot be truly human (in the axiological sense) existence.
However, spirituality canbe multidirectional. Not every spirituality has a direct relationship to a truly human existence, but only the positive oriented spirituality, which carries the strong positive charge, aiming to serve the ideals of goodness, justice, truth, love and beauty, and even more broadly directed for good, not evil deeds, to serve not only his individual goals and interests, but the goals and interests of society and mankind as a whole. Thoughts and feelings (emotions) of a true person as well as his character and will, his activity-creative expression and his biological and social skills should be directed to it.
On the one hand the social in a person can be combined with a biological concept of a united term “material in person”. But at the same time, the social and spiritual can be combined to define the unity by the term “personality”. It should be said that the term “personality” was established in philosophy, sociology, psychology and other sciences long ago, but the first thing that immediately catches the eye and wary when you start to get acquainted with the relevant literature on personality - a variety of definitions, with different, sometimes significantly different positions, treating the content of this notion. Here are just some of them (Tuman-Nikiforov, Tuman-Nikiforova, 2008).
1. “Personality - the human individual as a product of social development, the subject of
labor, communication and cognition, determined the specific historical conditions of society”, and at the same source: “the concept of personality represents the whole man in the unity of his individual abilities and social functions (roles) carried by him”.
2. “Personality is an everyday and scientific term for the human individual as the subject of relationships and conscious activities (face, in the broadest sense) or a stable system of socially significant features that characterize the individual as a member of a society or community. Although these two concepts as the integrity of the person (Latin persona) and the personality as his social and psychological image (Latin personalitas) -terminology are quite distinguishable, they are sometimes used as synonyms”, and at the same source: “... in general psychology personality often means a core integrating principle which binds various mental processes of the individual that inform his behavior with the necessary consistency and stability.”
3. “Personality - a human being with a multitude of social instincts, the social responsible individual.”
4. “Personality - is the partner of the historical process, one of the five billion people living on the planet Earth (I wonder who is it? It seems, 4999999999 people are not personalities), the holder of the identity”.
5. “Personality - individual focus and expression of social relations, and functions of people, the subject of knowledge and transform of the world, the rights and responsibilities, ethical, aesthetic, and all other social norms”.
6. “Personality - a person taken in their certain aspect as a member of a particular social group”.
7. “Personality - is not just a carrier of specific historical social relations, but the person who has an active influence on them according to their individual abilities and inclinations,
consciousness and organized nature, labour and socio-political activity”.
8. “Personality - a multi-dimensional and multi-level system of psychological characteristics that provide the individuality, the temporal and situational stability of the person’s behavior”.
9. “The person acts as a consolidated set of related internal conditions through which all external influences are refracted (these internal conditions also include psychic phenomena -mental properties and states of the personality. The most important psychological component of these internal conditions is the properties of the central nervous system)”.
10. “Focus - the system forming factor of the personality structure”.
B.S. Bratus represents the personality as a systematic education, existing in levels, reflecting in each of them in a special way: “the level of existence” - is the level of activities changing each other, “the level of culture” - a level of the values system, “the level of meanings” - it’s a level of dynamical consciousness systems which include the person’s relation to reality (Bratus, 1998).
As you can see, there isn’t even a rough consensus in this area. Maybe the personality -is not a scientific term? But in the philosophic encyclopedic dictionary it is clearly indicated that the personality is an“everyday and scientific term” (PED, 1983: 314). Maybe the fact is that, as it is written by L. H’ell D. Ziegler: “The conceptual meaning of the personality is multifaceted - it covers a wide range of internal mental processes which reason features of the person’s behavior in various situations. In dealing with such a complex concept, it is impossible to imagine any of its simple conceptual definition” (H’ell, Ziegler, 1999: 22). The concept “personality” is very complex and broad, it is difficult to define it. However, while the researchers have not found a more or less clear and unambiguous definition
which adequately reflects the essence of the personality as a phenomenon and its essence and inner content, it is impossible to continue the research in the direction associated with the personality and his manifestations.
The second thing that catches your eye when you begin to study the personality’s problems, the lack of certain integration between different aspects of its study, primarily between the philosophical and social sciences on the one hand and the psychological on the other. In PED the first definition of the term is “everyday and scientific”, but much lower, there is what is meant by a personality in psychology, thereby implicitly separating the psychological concept of personality from scientific (PED, 1983: 314315). In PE the first subsection is “personality in philosophy and sociology”, and then subsection “a personality in psychology” (PE, 1964: 196201, 201-202).
Any phenomenon must be studied from different sides, but obviously there must be a synthesis of different approaches, generalization, integration. Philosophy should just act as a link between the sociological, psychological and other aspects of the personality study. There should not be a separate philosophy or the personality philosophical notion. It is good idea to consider a personality from the different aspects, but it should also be understood as something united in the sense of the phenomenon, essence, concepts (definitions). Philosophy is to combine different aspects to consider and study the personality and, hence, these aspects may be relatively independent of each other, but should not be separated from philosophy, from a philosophical approach to the study of personality. But in practice it is not so. In fact, philosophy and sociology are combined into a single philosophical and sociological approach which studies the personality as a social individual in the unity of his social qualities, properties, links, etc., and the psychological approach
exists in isolation and interacts weakly with the philosophical and sociological approaches.
This suggests one of the following explanations for this: 1) the philosophy, sociology and psychology study some different (minimum two) phenomenon, the term personality is used by them in different meanings and in reference to different phenomena, 2) psychology deals with (at best case) some minor and insignificant researches in this area, the main researches are limited by the philosophical and sociological directions. The first conclusion is in fact confirmed if we look at the first seven of the above definitions, taken from philosophical literature and the last three, taken from the psychological. In psychology, a personality means an integrating principle linking different mental processes of the individual and informing his behavior the necessary stability and in philosophy and sociology - human individual as a subject of public relations and conscious activities, such as social quality of the individual. Integrating understanding of the personality, combining philosophical, sociological and psychological approaches have not been occurred by me.
This situation cannot be considered normal. Definition of the personality should reveal the meaning and content of this notion, to emphasize the qualitative differences of personality from all the rest (of the non-personality), the differences which form the personality as it is rather than other phenomena. Most of the above mentioned definitions do not meet these criteria. They list the characteristics inherent to this phenomenon, fix facts reflecting how the personality may appear in certain specific conditions, the result (product) of which it is, on which it depends, etc. But all these facts only characterize one or the other side of the personality, but not the whole personality, not the meaning and content of the concept. Moreover, the meaning and content, must obviously be disclosed with some common
positions rather than in isolation from its social and its internal characteristics.
If we turn to the personality understanding in modern psychological science and psychological theories of the personality, so there is not any discernible unity in understanding and interpretation of what is the personality and, especially, in understanding and interpretation of the reasons according to which the personality theory must be formed. The same L. H’ell and D. Ziegler separate fifteen directions of the modern personality theory. If even in psychological science there is no common understanding and interpretation of the personality, then, is it possible to find a common understanding by synthesizing philosophical, sociological, psychological and other aspects of its research? Or should we agree that each time speaking about the person, we will definitely specify what one of its numerous meanings we have in mind?
One more problem to solve - whether each person is a personality? Some people believe that not, the others claim otherwise. From my point of view, the personality is every person, and since the personality of one person is not identical to the personality of another, complementary concepts that stress this distinction must be understood - “personal identity” and “individual inherent personality”. Thus - “a person in general” should be understood as something general, that is inherent in absolutely all people (and perhaps not only them, if we admit the possible existence of other individuals in space or other dimensions) independently on their individual (including individual- personality) differences; individual (personal) inherent personality (individual personality) - as a single manifestation of general, occurring in a single unique copy only of the individual, personal identity - as a special personality, as a measure of dissimilarity of one person to another. The category of “personal identity” is a “person in
general” in its actual, individual embodiment and at the same time, “personal identity” in its unity with the common, i.e., in comparison with other personal personalities. The personal identity includes not only individual manifestations (like individual personality), but also the personality individual features, what exactly stands it out among the other personal personalities and how it is separated. A comparison is possible in both quantitative (smarter, kinder, more active), and qualitative (good - bad, great - not great (void)) aspects. “Nobody is born a personality, a person becomes a personality during the complex process of development, socialization and selfactualization” (Vinogradova, Kazanova, 2004: 133), i.e., in the process of social (socialization) and spiritual (self-actualization) development.
G.F. Nikiforova raises the important problem of the uniqueness and the personality universality (Nikiforova, 2004). This problem is solved as follows: the personality universality is that a personality (a set of social and spiritual qualities) is every adult, mentally normal person, in this sense, a personality is a universal, essential quality of a person closely associated not only with the individual, but with “a man in general”; but, at the same time, every individual is a unique personality, different from the personality of other individuals, a unique individual combination of social and spiritual qualities. That is the uniqueness of each individual. The term “personality” itself emphasizes its universality, but in order to emphasize its uniqueness, it is desirable and feasible to introduce some additional terms: “individual personality”,
“personal identity”, “personal individual”. The personality is universal, but its concrete, individual embodiment - personal uniqueness (personal identity) - is always unique.
However, what makes the personality of each person, and what exactly not have those who cannot be considered a person (children
“Mowgli”, for example)? It seems that at the turn of philosophy, sociology and psychology in the psychological and philosophical areas of research a person and his personality, the following understanding of the personality can be formed: the personality - the unity of the two closely related but distinct aspects - the social and spiritual (relatively independent sphere of the spirit, psyche, which does not always fully manifest externally (in public relations, relationships, activities, actions), and has its own mental-emotional being) on the material basis of the biological. The unity of the social and spiritual (just in the person’s personality) is that spirituality is not possible without the processes of socialization, and socially is impossible without social consciousness (which in turn is impossible without individual), and the difference is that social - is social relationships and spirituality -is higher, human layers of the psyche. The social and spiritual divorce as follows: social - is external - the set of links and relationships with other people, society, and spirituality - is inner -the mental-emotional being of the individual.
What is traditionally called a personality in philosophy and sociology more correspond the term “citizen”, and what is called personality in psychology - the term “individuality”, a personality in this sense is a combination of both of them. The combination of the citizen and individuality is a set of general and special. The citizen - a combination of all social relations, individuality - is, first and foremost, man’s inner world through which refracts the combination of all external influences (and hence the combination of all social relations). As a result each time it turns out the personal response to them. The phrase “a good citizen” refers to the relationship of the spiritual and social. Conscientiousness refers to spirituality, but if a person consciously strives to be a citizen, his citizenship is formed faster, better and more positive.
Generalization of philosophical, sociological and psychological approaches to the study of personality must include the study of the social transition to the level of spiritual (psychological) and spiritual transition to the level of social, their mutual interdependence and determinism. Reduction of the spiritual to the social which is common to certain philosophical trends, including Marxism, lead to random theories of backwardness (by virtue of their social status), the believer, religious peasants and non-believers, anti-religious, conscious (again by virtue of their social status) proletariat. Actually it is not so simple and just social status does not explain the spiritual features of the individual or the whole class, social group, layer, their religion or atheism, belief or unbelief.
It should be emphasized that to identify a personality with an individuality and analyze them as the internal, mental-emotional being of the individual, as a set of internal conditions through which all the external influences on an individual are refracted, is common to the modern psychological science. I analyze the personality as a measure of dissimilarity of one individual to another, and this individuality may appear in any of the three aspects of human nature - biological, social and spiritual. It is an inner, spiritual, mental and emotional being of an individual which I term as “intellectual”, “intelligence”.
So, the meaning and content of the concept “personality” are disclosed by the understanding of the personality as a unity of “external” (outside social image, social status, social roles and qualities of the individual) and “internal” (what the individual is in fact, an internal “something” (the latter is defined by me as the spirituality), determining the nature of the human interactions with the world). The sociality and spirituality are united in the sense that spirituality does not arise out of the sociality processes, regardless of sociogenesis (the spirituality of the ancestral
person) and the processes of socialization and enculturation (the spirituality of the individual), but the sociality is impossible without the social and individual consciousness, without the spiritual spheres of the society, the society itself is impossible without its spiritual component and without consciousness as it is. But the sociality and the spirituality differ in the sense that the sociality - is the “external world” of a man, his relationships with other people, his social properties and relations, and spirituality - is the “inner world” of a man, his thoughts, emotions, desires, etc. (all of them have their own mental-emotional being, not always fully realized and manifested outwardly, in public relations and communications).
“Mowgli” children have neither one nor the other, but they are, in our perception, not full human beings not only because they are not included in our society and have no social qualities, but primarily because they do not have spirituality, inward, higher, actually human psyche layers. Of course, their lack of spirituality is explained by the fact that they have not passed the process of socialization, and this once again confirms the idea that the man’s sociality and spirituality exist not separately and not together, but “joint-separated”, i.e. there are two distinct sides, aspects of one phenomenon - the personality. In the man’s nature the biological is in unity with the social and spiritual, and personality - a combination of social and spiritual, biological and it is not at all. Indicating that the biological is the material basis of personality, we draw attention to the fact that personality, at least, the person’s identity is not possible outside the biological body, while at the same time, the foundation is not in the nature and content of the individual, the body belongs to the essence rights, but does not apply to his personality, his citizenship and intelligence. And speaking specifically about the person, we should recognize that a personality
as a special phenomenon is one for everybody (no reservations are relevant as long as the term “personality” is used. It does not contain direct reference neither to the person’s personality, nor even to the personality of an individual), but if you want to specify the differences, we should say, firstly, the person’s personality, the alien’s personality, the humanoid’s personality, etc., and, secondly, if you need to identify the individual personality differences of different people, personal differences of the individuals, you can use one of the following terms: “the personality of the individual”, “personal individual”, “individually peculiar personality”, “personal personality”, “personal individuality”, etc.
In addition, stressing that the personality is constructed on the basis of biological material, I mean, first of all, it is the person’s personality, which is not possible in isolation from its biological body, but, nevertheless, the body is not a part of the person’s personality, the person’s personality -it is his sociality and spirituality. With regard to the aliens’ personality, it can be constructed on the material basis of not biological, but something else (and even if the biological, this biological may differ significantly from the person’s biological body), but there cannot be the absence of the material basis of the personality, otherwise we will have to acknowledge the correctness not of the materialistic, but of the idealistic and religious understanding of the personality. However, the differences between the material basis point just to the difference of the humans and aliens essence, the personality is identical (if not identical, then
it is not a personality but a qualitatively different phenomenon needed to by called by a special term). Thus, a person’s personality is based on the biological, and the spirituality - on the material (biosocial), but just as the biological is not included in the structure of the personality, the same way the biosocial is not a part of the spirituality, as well as the spiritual is not included in the structure of the biosocial (as the supporters of the person’s biosocial conception believe), and has its own mental-emotional being.
Results: All the qualities and properties of a person are considered by us as a system consisted of three major subsystems, as well as various relationships and connections between them. When studying a person, it is necessary to consider all these subsystems both individually and in combination, their mutual influence on each other. The greatest attention should be paid to the study of the spiritual component of the person’s nature. This is due to the fact that modern humanity is in a state of the acute spiritual crisis. To overcome the crisis it is necessary to study a phenomenon of the spirituality in all its manifestations and the fact that it is the spiritual side which influences the person himself, society and the surrounding world as a whole. It should be understood how a spiritual component of person influences him, society and the world as a whole (understand that a person as a free acting being can and should make of himself (and not only of himself) himself) in order to optimize this influence to achieve its maximum effectiveness and positivity.
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Сущность человека как взаимодействие
трех составляющих:
биологической, социальной, духовной
А.А. Туман-Никифоров
Красноярский государственный аграрный университет Россия 660049, Красноярск, ул. Мира, 90
Статья посвящена рассмотрению сущности человека с позиций диалектической методологии. Сущность рассматривается как единство трёх составляющих: биологической, социальной и духовной. Наибольшее внимание уделяется изучению духовной составляющей сущности человека. Это связано и с тем, что современное человечество находится в состоянии острого духовного кризиса, для преодоления которого необходимо как следует познать феномен духовности во всех её проявлениях, и с тем, что духовной стороной своей сущности человек воздействует на себя самого, на общество и окружающий мир.
Ключевые слова: сущность человека, духовность, индивидуальность, категории, противоречие, сущность, феномен.
