Modern philantropy

              (Open letter to G. Soros about “My philantropy”)

 

A.   Voin

                                                                     24.7.11

 

        Dear Mr. Soros!

   You write that mankind needs today to new ideas. And «We need ... recognize that half-truths are misleading». In my understanding, this means that humanity needs today a new large, all-encompassing philosophy and, in particular, the new macroeconomics. And I say that I've created both.
     I laid foundations of my philosophy in the book "Neorationalism." It described my theory of cognition, the theories of determinism, freedom, optimal morality and the rational theory of spirit. Later I developed my philosophy and built the beginning of macroeconomic theory. I will not list everything I did, but point out only to those areas that should be of interest to you.
     On the basis of my theory of cognition I have developed a unified method of justification of scientific theories and wrote about 20 articles developing this method and give its application in various fields. Finally, I wrote a book about this method.
     The unified method of justification of scientific theories gives an answer to the question: what distinguishes science from non-science or pseudo-science. The importance of this issue is commensurate with the importance of science itself to modern society. It is further enhanced by the fact that modern philosophy is dominated by the theories (the main ones are existentialism and post-positivism, but there are many more), relativized scientific cognition, claiming the unreliability of knowledge produced by science, no unified method in science studies, etc. etc. This has led to far-reaching consequences, both in science and in society at large. In science, especially in humanitarian sciencies, where the criterion of practice does not work, this has led to the penetration of huge amount of mediocrity, which, taken advantage of the absence of objective scientific criteria, just flood the scientific journals by pseudo-scientific babble. It is, moreover, that reduces the effectiveness of science, but leads to the fact that really valuable scientific works drowning in the flood. Yet it leads to subjective assessments by the scientific officialdom of important papers on new directions, as was in the Soviet Union in the case with genetics and cybernetics.  
     With regard to society and mankind as a whole, the lack of a recognized unified method of Justification resulted primarily to the phenomenon of pluralism, understood not as the right of everyone to defend his conception of truth but as the existence of many equal truthes, diferent for every person, people, Country, etc. But because truth is important for us not only in the abstract issues such as how many devils can fit on the end of the needle, but also in vital and often conflicting issues, it turns out that not one who really is right considered as right, but that who is stronger or who have powerful tools of mass propaganda. The absence of the recognized unified method of justification also leads to a lack of common language in the negotiations for the peaceful settlement of various international conflicts. This in turn leads to the fact that either sides in conflict can not agree or a solution imposed by one side by the force and dissatisfaction associated with a sense of injustice of decisions accumulate, leading eventually to a new explosion. Without recognition of a unified method of justification the resolution of problems such as finding a common language and reconciliation between different religions and faiths, and many others also is hampered. Finally, the non-recognition of a unified method of justification and the related depreciation of the value of the fundamental theory is reflected in the political life of western countries. It leads to the substitution of a policy based on ideology, in turn based on the fundamental theory, for politic  of populism, based on political technologies.

     In my works on the unified method I refuted the arguments of the post positivists and other relativists of  science and showed that science still has a unified method justification of its theories and that is what distinguishes it from non-science, pseudoscience, etc. This method has been developed the most rational science during its development, but until now existed only on the level of stereotype of scientific thought and theories of reference like Newtonian mechanics. I generalized this method, refined it and introduced explicitly. Based on the method I have defined more accurately the concept of scientific theory, gave way to determine the limits of its applicability and clarified the difference between theory and hypothesis, which has now become blurred, even in physics.
     In addition, this method, even at the level of stereotype of scientific thought, exists today only in the natural sciences themselves. Humanities still did not know it at all. The natural sciences due to possessing of the unified method have evolved: some hypotheses are taking by the entire scientific community as a proven theory, and some, also by the whole community, knocking. Humanities, especially philosophy, likened to religion. Like religion divided into many denominations, among whom there is no common language, so humanities are divided into many schools, between which there is no meaningful dialogue. Therefore, in these, especially in philosophy, there was no progressive development, and they are not able to solve problems facing society, while society, humanity, today more than ever needs a philosophy to resolve the global problems standing before it. I showed the possibility of using a unified method of justification also in the humanitarian sphere, and even in religion (in the interpretation of scripture, ie, in hermeneutics), as well as in economics and a number of other areas.
     In my work on macroeconomics, I showed that the main problem of modern macroeconomics is that it does not know the limits of applicability of its theories. This problem exists in all other disciplines and, as I said, the solution of it gives only the unified method of justification, but in economics it is much sharper. This is due to the fact that the economic reality in which we live, is changing much faster than, say, physical. The last we can take over almost as unchanging: gases continues to be expanded according the laws of Boyle - Marriott and Gay Lussac, and even communist party in former Soviet Union was unable to change it. But in the economy all the time there are new forms of relationships, new institutions, new legal laws governing economic activities, new financial instruments and all this changes the economic reality, changes the laws that apply to it, changes the behavior of its players. As a result, macroeconomic theory, which worked successfully at one time (Smith and Ricardo, Keynes, Friedman), in the new conditions become unsuitable, beyond its applicability. And it is the using such models beyond their applicability was the main reason of all previous economic downturns. The solution to this problem, as I said, gives only a unified method of justification.
     I also showed the difference between a modern oligarchy and oligarchies of the past and what was its role in the latest global financial and economic crisis. I showed the increasing role of morality in economics. If at the stage of early capitalism, the economy was almost independent of the morality of its participants – players and Adam Smith was right (for its time), arguing that the market will regulate everything, but today it is not so. For example greed of bankers played a significant role in the latest crisis. Finally, on the basis of my works (such as "The evolution of crises," etc.) I have formulated a formula - a necessary condition for crisis-free economic development. The formula requires further clarification, but what I did creates the basis for work in this direction.
     I also wrote a number of papers relating to the global crisis of humanity and a way out of it. In these papers, I found that one of the main causes of this crisis is the lack of uniform for all peoples, justified and accepted by all, the optimal system of values. I have shown that such system can be designed and laid the beginning of it. In addition, I have shown that scientific and technical progress gives rise to conditions that pervert the system of values actually adopted in the community. ("The global crisis of humanity and scientific and technical progress"). This has far-reaching consequences, in particular, leads to the degradation of modern democracy. ("Modern Democracy"). Way out is to plan the development of scientific and technological progress, to limit development in some areas and to increas in others. (I pointed out this aries). And in shifting the center of gravity from the scientific and technological development to the spiritual. First and foremost on the development and adoption of best values.
     I go back to your message. You write that you are putting the interests of humanity above your personal interests. The same is said of any politician, social activist and an official in any field, including philosophical. Nevertheless, the recognition of my philosophy run against the prevalence of self-interest above the interests of humanity from philosophers, politicians and others. As for the sincerity of your statement, do you serve the good of mankind or do use your philanthropy for the success of your financial transactions, I can only judge on the facts ("By their works ye shall know them"). And these are facts.
     More than once I turned to you with letters about my philosophy and ask you to support it in the name of the goals that you proclaim, and never received a response. Moreover, from a certain moment and at today, what would your e-mail I did not send an email, I get a Mail Delivery, that the system does not pass my letter. I do not know whether it was your instructions to put block on access of my letters to you or someone else carefully cut off the possibility of my contact with you. But I double-spread on the Internet an open letter to you to all who can bring their content to you, do it. Hard to imagine that you remain in ignorance.
     I also turned in your organizations Open Society Foundation and INET. From the Open Society Foundation I also never received a response. In INET, I applied for a grant, based on my macroeconomic theory, and was refused on the pretext that this category is filed too many claims. Why from all these applications did not choose me, but, for example, one in which the was proposed study the relationship between economics and Buddhism, was not said. Moreover, the same day, when I was refused, I received another letter from INET, in which I was asked to answer the question why economic models do not help prevent the global financial crisis. But it is precisely this question gave answer my rejected application for a grant. More detail the story I outlined in the article "Economics and a unified method of justification of scientific theories." (http://philprob.narod.ru/philosophy/Economun.htm).
     Of course, I have no evidence to suggest that leadership INET acted in this case to your direct instructions. But you write that created by you philanthropic organizations tend to see their main purpose in sharing your allocated funds for them among the members of management and their neighbors. I can only confirm that your assertion  basing on my experience with philanthropic organizations in general and in particular to your. And not just with INET, but for example, you funded Ukrainian Fund "Renaissance", which is run totally incompetent philosopher E. Bystritsky. You - smart enough man to not understand that this kind of philanthropy is not for the good of mankind, and just the opposite. Grown on your salary and grant pseudo philosophers and thinkers have become insurmountable obstacle to the acceptance of really important ideas. They are fighting against the recognition of these ideas because they are parasites and can exist only in the dim light idle chatter. As a result some philosophical journal editor, who in other circumstances would publish the work of a talented author, will refrain to do so, knowing that this will cause the wrath of the Bystritsky, from fund of which he occasionally receives handouts.

     Pseudo philosophers and scientists, pseudo economists, in particular, climbing to high positions, tend not only to prevent acceptance of important ideas, but if it is possible to steal them. At first glance it might seem that questions such as I got from INET, and which INET sends to scientists, thinkers, etc., posting their responses on the forum, this is a good thing for humanity. That is to say, a collective search for solutions to important problems, brainstorming, etc., in general, is democratic and fashionable. But such forums are useful only for discussing issues of foreign and domestic policy, social problems, human rights, etc. They are not useful for scientific, philosophical, or macroeconomics problems, which requires a deep study, which can only be done in serious articles, not in forum’s chat. We should not forget that important ideas are produced by the talented ones, not the masses. "Even a thousand monkeys a hundred years of knocking on the keys of typewriters, will not produce a single Shakespeare sonnet." If the leaders of INET, asking questions, in such a way searched for talented creators of ideas and then allow them to expand and justify their ideas, it would be certainly in the interests of humanity. But if they only want to get the answers that would be lost among the many others on their forum, while ignoring the grant application and detailed article (I sent also the article), which can give grounted answer on their questions, this leads to the suspicion that they just want to steal these ideas.
     To stop this endless flood of half-truths and all kind of pseudo in philosophy, economics, generally in the humanitarian field and partly even in the natural sciences, the flood, which is the main cause of today's global crisis, it is possible only through the recognition and use of the unified method of justification of scientific theories. Unfortunately, despite the fact that I managed to publish several articles on the method and its application in philosophical journals and collections, despite the fact that I have a positive feedback using the method on a number of venerable philosophers, I can not get a broad discussion of the method. I can not get even publishing a book on the method, despite the fact that this book has been ordered to me as a textbook for high schools by the Ministry of Education of Ukraine. And I have no money to publish the book at my own expense, because opponents of my philosophy, including the Ukrainian authorities, made sure that I did not have them, depriving me of earning not only in philosophy, but also in any other fields.
     Should you published at this my book in English and extend it with your network, you did for humanity more than do INET together with Ukrainian fund “Renessance”. At the same time you will spend on that an amount of money indistinguishable in comparison to what you spend daily on philanthropy.
     Yours!
     Alexander Voin, PhD, Head of the International Institute of Philosophy and social issues.