КРИТИЧЕСКИЙ РЕАЛИЗМ В ФИЛОСОФИИ

Critical Realism (in philosophy)

One of the schools of modern idealist philosophy which gained acceptance in the 1920s and 30s in some of the capitalist countries. Critical Realism combines elements of subjective and objective idealism.

In the USA, Critical Realism (Santayana, Lovejoy, Pratt, and others) originated by way of a reaction to neo-realism. The neo-realist thesis of the "immanence" of the object in consciousness, of the direct "interjection" of the object in consciousness is countered by the critical realists with the theory of the structure of the act of cognition, which comprises the three elements of subject, object and "datum" or "essence". It is this "essence" that is alleged to be the content of our consciousness.

The "essences", according to Critical Realism, unlike the object, are conveyed to us with direct certitude and unite within themselves all the products of our consciousness. Critical Realism attempts to present these essences as something objectively existing, like the universals of medieval realism. The "essence" possesses a reality of its own, different from physical reality; it is not to be measured by a spatio-temporal criterion. "Essences", according to Critical Realism, are by no means images or copies of things. Like neorealism, Critical Realism opposes the materialist theory of reflection.

Critical Realism recognises the existence of reality, this recognition being founded on instinct and "animal faith" (Santayana) in reality. The epistemological source of this alleged "realism" lies in its false interpretation of the difference between the material and ideal, the objective and subjective, and in regarding consciousness metaphysically as opposed to the objective world.

The name "Critical Realism" is also given to a school which formed towards the end of the 19th century in Germany (Driesch, E. Becher, A. Wenzl, and others). This school specialises in a theological interpretation of modern natural science, striving to reconcile knowledge with faith and to prove the "unsoundness" and "limitations" of science.

Критический реализм

Направление (метод) в реалистической литературе и искусстве 19-20 вв. Понятие К. р. воспринято советским литературоведением и искусствоведением от М. Горького, употребившего выражение К. р. (1934) для акцентирования обличительной направленности реалистической литературы 19 в. Однако обличительный пафос К. р. никоим образом не исключает в реалистическом искусстве 19-20 вв. утверждающего начала. См. в ст. Реализм.

Лит.: Лаврецкий А., О судьбе одного литературоведческого термина, «Изв. АН СССР. Отделение литературы и языка», 1957, т. 16, в. 1; Николаев П., Реализм как теоретико-литературная проблема, в кн.: Советское литературоведение за 50 лет, М., 1967.