Lipskiy B. I. "Causal and Normative in Scientific Knowledge"

Lipskiy Boris Ivanovich – Doctor of Philosophy, Professor, Head of the Department of Ontology and Epistemology of the Faculty of Philosophy and Political Sciences at the Saint-Petersburg State University.

After a few centuries of attempts at creating a science of nature based on the idea of a purely causal order, it is the impossibility of a normative order being reduced to a causal order that comes to light. However, the idea of a causal order being completely immersed in a normative order appears to be just as inadequate. The main point here is to understand that there can be different ways of the world being orderly and, hence, that there is no universal way equally suitable for solving all arising problems.

Key words: law of nature, communication, scientific revolution, norm, paradigm, order, cause and effect, rationality.