Grand Doctor of Philosophy, Doctor of Philological Sciences, Professor, Academician A.N. Jesuitov.
VIOLENCE IS MADNESS
“Philosophy of interaction (“bialism”)” (PV) is essentially a philosophy of a world without violence. At the same time, the phenomenon and concept itself must be investigated from a philosophical point of view in order to reveal its theoretical and practical meaning and to establish its real practical application.
Nowadays, much is said and written about violence, and it is constantly making itself felt in reality. At the same time, some recognize and affirm violence as a positive and significant phenomenon, even useful for people’s lives. Others reject violence unconditionally and unequivocally. However, both are very subjective and eclectic, vague and inaccurate in their interpretation of violence as a phenomenon and concept, and do not explain it in any way. Meanwhile, in order to accept or reject something, one must clearly understand what exactly is accepted and what exactly is rejected. This is in the real life interests of a person, of everyone.
Frequent and constant repetition of the word “violence” as a phenomenon and concept will not make it clearer and more precise. What is needed is a philosophical comprehension and explanation of violence. This is what the FV will attempt to do.
First of all, it is necessary to explain the meaning of the terms used by FV.
Mind means the fundamental ability of man to think. Mind refers to the natural capacity of human beings to think, to know and to understand.
Mind also exists in a broad sense as a special natural phenomenon. Mind implies the choice of a goal and its achievement. The goal and the way of achieving the goal can be very different. In a broad sense, as scientific experiments show, microbes can become “altruists”, ceding their lives to the strongest individuals, and photons, which can become “intelligent”, as some of them from the beam of quanta immediately fall into the holes in the screen standing in front of them.
Reason means the ability of a human being to think sensibly and soberly, the ability to understand reality as it is. Homo sapiens means a reasoning person, not a rational person.
Summarizing the terms given in various modern dictionaries, we can say that violence is traditionally defined as the lawless use of coercion as physical force in various forms and to anyone, up to terror, for acquisition and conquest. For FV, there are many inaccuracies and incongruities in such a definition of violence.
From the point of view of the FS, violence, in essence, is the interaction of material (physical) and spiritual principles, which is consciously realized in life by forcing someone materially (physical force) and spiritually. In this case, the force itself is formed by the interaction of material and spiritual principles, with the most important role of the spiritual beginning. Violence as forceful coercion (material and spiritual) cannot be legal in principle. Coercion has a special content and different forms of its expression. The extreme expression of violence as an interaction of material and spiritual principles is terror as an interaction of the same principle principles. Violence brings material and spiritual suffering in their interaction. The purpose of violence is to attack and retain what has been seized through violence. Violence has both external and internal sources, genetic and functional, in turn as an interaction of material and spiritual principles, with the most important and guiding role of the spiritual principle. It is wrong to think that only barbarians and savages resort to violence. We can say that civilization has already surpassed them in the use of violence of various kinds.
Violence does not have any a priori restrictive measures for real impact, material and spiritual, as coercion, material and spiritual, on man. It is truly limitless in its concrete manifestation and impact. Military and all armed violence is particularly dangerous to life.
Any violence begets new violence. This can go on for a very long time. The one who is temporarily defeated by violence on the part of someone else will himself strive to defeat the temporary victor with his own violence. This will be repeated until the opposing sides are completely annihilated. Violence as a final and irrevocable problem must be abandoned as an illusion, and the sooner it is abandoned, the better for humanity. The involvement of “peacemakers” who believe that they can overcome violence is deceptive. It is not without reason that it is said that “appeasement” always leads to war. It even accelerates its beginning.
Madness as a phenomenon and concept is currently treated in a very eclectic way and without any correlation, much less interaction with such a concept and phenomenon as violence.
Madness is considered to be insanity, loss of reason and loss of sanity, recklessness, insanity, mindlessness, mindlessness, lack of mind, insane acts.
FW believes that madness is a special spiritual state, which in certain conditions, objective and subjective, can arise in a person, a specific internal reference point that directs and determines the behavior of a person, his actions.
Insanity is traditionally regarded as the loss of human reasoning ability to logical and creative thinking as the most important stage of the process of cognition for a person. FV believes that when violence dominates the thought process, the various faculties of the individual are internally attuned to and reinforce the violence.
A special insanity can strike people who are sensitive to all violence. One can become insane from the grief caused by violence.
In insanity, it is often said “he is out of his mind.” Insanity does take a person outside of his or her own inherent nature. It is violence that produces such insanity.
Insanity is not the same as madness as a mental disorder that is amenable to psychotherapeutic and psychiatric treatment. Insanity refers to the loss of the sense of danger. In insanity it is seen as fear.
Insanity that interacts organically with violence is not treated by clinical medicine.
Insanity is especially closely related to the activity of the intellect, its deformation. The mind as the ability to think is in principle preserved in insanity, although in a specific form. Correlates insanity with reason, its violation. Insanity is essentially rational.
Insanity is correlated with stupidity, which means a conscious decision that does not correspond to reality.
“With the strong, the powerless is always at fault.” Violence in this case threatens insanity for both the strong and the powerless. Insanity is both the result and the cause, the source of violence, material and spiritual, being in interaction, material and spiritual. Insanity includes various manias: greatness, persecution, infallibility, invincibility, self-righteousness, omniscience, etc. They too are not treated by clinical medicine, but are overcome by active and real spiritual influence on a person from the outside and spiritual self-overcoming by the person himself.
Insanity caused by violence is not a clinical medical disease. It is a special and significant spiritual shift, medically significant, in the inner world of the person, in his brain, giving the person a spiritual attitude toward violence. Violence, in turn, conditions a special insanity as a spiritual shift in the person’s inner world, in his brain, giving the person a certain spiritual attitude.
There is a concept of “mentally ill” meaning the destruction of exactly the spiritual beginning of a person, caused by violence against a person as his special spiritual state.
Insanity is not identical to such a phenomenon and concept as madness, which excludes all violence against other people and against oneself.
Madness is the conscious and voluntary self-forgetfulness of man, material and spiritual, as an example for other people, above all a spiritual example.
Madness is worthy of singing. M. Gorky wrote: “the folly of the brave is the wisdom of life. To the folly of the brave we sing songs.”.
Madness, in fact, is manifested in the name of the vital interests of other people, material and spiritual, without considering the threat to their own lives. Madness is man’s overcoming his own fear in the face of danger and even death. Allegorically, “uzh” did not and could not become “mad”. Like the “falcon.”
Madness needs to be eliminated by special and largely internal overcoming by man himself and spiritual influence on him from outside.
The human brain is an interaction of material and spiritual principles, with the dominance of the spiritual beginning. The brain receives through various sensory organs as the interaction of material and spiritual principles of different nature and orientation information as the interaction of material and spiritual principles, which require from a person an immediate and effective solution, material and spiritual. If the information perceived by a human being receives in the brain an internal attitude to violence, material and spiritual, then the natural interaction in the brain of material and spiritual beginnings, with the dominance of the spiritual beginning, is violated and even destroyed. In the brain the negative spiritual beginning begins to dominate as an attitude to the real use of violence, material and spiritual, by man. This is madness.
Man’s inner attitude to violence really manifests itself in his violent actions towards reality, from which he receives an informational impulse for the real manifestation of his violence. Man himself increases by this violence in reality, which more strongly and visibly forms and manifests in his brain the inner attitude to violence, makes it more solid and stable for human activity as violence interacting with insanity.
This process will go on for a long time if it is not really stopped. Madness expressing itself in violence can become manic, which is particularly life-threatening.
Here is what the actual mechanism of the formation of violence as insanity looks like.
A certain person, predisposed to violence that is attractive to him, wants to commit violence in his life himself, having received an internal attitude for this. By committing violence thereafter, the person thereby contributes to its increase in reality, and from reality the person again receives the now more impressive purposeful attitude of violence. Such is the process of the formation of insanity from violence and the role of violence for the formation of insanity. Violence and insanity mutually stimulate each other.
There are different types of violence and insanity, from the mini to the maxi. Violence can be private, insignificant, or it can become ruthless and merciless terror, individual and state.
The real apologist of terror during the Great French Revolution was M. Robespierre, who believed that “terror is nothing but swift, strict, unyielding justice”. F. Engels justifiably objected to Robespierre, believing that “terror is fruitless cruelties committed for their own comfort by people who themselves feel fear”. Terror, by its very nature, is incapable of being justice, and it does create fear on one side expecting violence on it from the other side. Fear drives violence in its extreme expression as terror, and violence in turn drives fear, which drives terror.
FV disagrees with the sociologist Pitirim Sorokin’s assertion that “public administration” presupposes the most brutal terror, which generates “general psychosis,” i.e., virtually insanity. Such “public administration” is essentially criminal. It is blatantly inhuman.
There is also a special kind of violence, caused by a kind of madness, caused by man himself. For example, immoderate starvation as violence of a person over himself causes a serious mental disorder bordering on madness (anorexia), which is dangerous for human life.
Insanity gravitates to violence and is stimulated by drugs. Violence causes insanity, insanity causes violence.
No violence can in principle become any kind of justice. Real justice is essentially the interaction, material and spiritual, of opposing parties.
Various attempts have long been made by one of the warring parties to justify its own violence against the other. Thus, back in ancient Rome, the Romans justified their brutal cruelty towards the Druid priests (Gaul) by the fact that the Druids allegedly burned Roman prisoners alive in willow cages as a sacrifice. Other very different and sophisticated ways of justifying their own violence in geopolitics, not avoiding lies and bias, have been and are being used. In principle, violence has no justification. Extremes can do without violence. Interaction, material and spiritual, is more viable and fruitful than any violence that breeds madness.
A peculiar manifestation of violence that stimulates insanity is sadism as a manic-depressive psychosis, often becoming relatively mass, as a special pleasure and even enjoyment that one person gets from violence, often the most brutal towards another person. Military conditions exacerbate and intensify this process.
So far, unfortunately, the world has been dominated by violence, which reinforces insanity, and insanity reinforces violence.
Violence has long been cultivated in the cinema and is the leitmotif of many films produced by Hollywood and beyond. At the same time, violence has already begun to be shamed and even mocked. Even K. Marx noted that “mankind is parting with its past by laughing”. In the movie “The Palace” (2023), which its director Roman Polanski himself called “hooligan”, various characters appear in exotic and unsightly guises, as long as no one reproaches them or suspects them of violence against anyone. This is clearly a positive symptom. History shows what people laugh at and even mock does not exist for very long.
Violence as a state policy, foreign and domestic, endless and massive bloodshed, constant and merciless wars, legalized cruelty really makes it suicidal and insane for a state to pursue such geopolitics, depleting, without restoration, material and spiritual, its real capabilities and resources. This inevitably led and leads to the death and decay of the state with boundless violence and madness. This has already happened in history and led to the actual disappearance of states and even civilizations. Let us recall in this regard the most different states: Assyrians, Sumerians, Aryans, Olmecs, Mayans, Aztecs, Incas, Ancient Rome, Ancient Egypt, Huns, “Golden Horde”, Chinggis, Jacobins, Nazis, “Khmer Rouge”, etc.
There is reason to say that the essential reason for the collapse of the USSR was the boundless growth of the Military-Industrial Complex (MIC) in it. The USSR economy could not withstand such an exorbitant load on it, and violence, including various bans, often took the form of real madness.
At first, the MIC noticeably stimulated development, and then, having become hypertrophied, significantly slowed down and even destroyed development. The historical experience is very instructive.
History shows and proves that philosophy plays a significant role in the different interpretations of the problem of violence and madness.
It is known that the Russian thinker P.Y. Chaadaev in his “Philosophical Letters” (1829-1830), i.e. for a special, exactly philosophical approach to Russian history, in which, as Chaadaev believed, there was consistent and truly unlimited violence as the main principle of government, Russian Tsar Nicholas I was officially declared “insane”. Apparently, the Tsar’s particularly sharp rejection could have been caused by such a perceptive statement of Chaadaev, related to his “Philosophical Letters”: “Speaking of Russia, constantly imagined as if they are talking about the same state as others; in fact, it is not so at all. Russia – a whole special world, obedient to the will, arbitrariness, fantasy of one man – whether he is called Peter or Ivan, it does not matter: in all cases equally it – the personification of arbitrariness. Contrary to all the laws of human society, Russia is marching only in the direction of its own enslavement and enslavement of all neighboring peoples. And therefore it would be useful, not only in the interests of other nations, but in her own interests, to force her into new paths.”
Obviously, by “Peter” Chaadaev meant Peter the Great, and by “Ivan” he meant Ivan the Terrible. Their activities were indeed largely in the nature of “arbitrariness” as universal violence in the state. Both of them acted “in opposition to all the laws of human intercourse,” essentially the interaction between people, material and spiritual, vital, material and spiritual. All other “Peter” and “Ivan” as autocrats were and are based on this.
In A.K. Tolstoy’s novel “Prince Silver” (1863), Ivan the Terrible appears as a truly insane autocrat in his pathological violence. In A.N. Tolstoy’s novel “Peter the First” (1929-1949) the emperor in his unrestrained violence shows himself as a truly madman.
By the way, in AS Griboyedov in the comedy “Woe from Wit” (1833) its hero Chatsky before (a version of the comedy) carried the surname Chadsky is an obvious allusion to Chaadayev. For Chatsky’s sharp criticism of violence as a principle of state management of official secular society, he was declared “insane”. He – “jumped out of his mind”. In turn, Chatsky himself, denouncing such a society, called it “insane”. Indeed, violence in principle is inseparable from madness, and madness is inseparable from violence. “Mad” are those who, in one way or another, support and implement violence, not those who do not recognize and condemn it.
History is prone to a certain repetition, although, as G.F. Hegel believed, “history teaches nations and government nothing”.
Russian classical writers developed a special “Aesop language” (hidden historical analogies), allowed by the tsarist censorship. “Aesop’s language” is preserved to this day. He lives and serves at present to affirm world peace, a world without violence.
In the allegorical satire of M.E. Saltykov-Shcheded. Saltykov-Shchedrin’s “The History of One City” (1870), Russian autocrats with clear signs of insanity were presented under the guise of governors. All coups d’état in the town of Glupov ended in violence: the next “Ivashka and Nikishka were thrown off the raskat” (roof). Violence looks like madness in this case, and madness realizes itself through violence.
Various apologists of war nowadays demagogically and sophisticatedly describe psychological and other “beauties of war” as violence, its enduring value for mankind, material and spiritual. The so-called “art of killing” by people of their enemies is glorified in every possible way. This looks like real madness. It is time to stop such exercises in any way, naturally, legally, and to exclude violence as a norm of existence from the life of mankind, everyone and everything, at least for the foreseeable future.
Especially negative and life-threatening for mankind, everyone and everybody, is the fact that many people gradually get used to violence as a norm of their own existence and insanity, which is realized in life practice.
Even F.M. Dostoevsky asserted “that man gets used to everything”. Such a habit is especially dangerous for a human being and it is high time to overcome it, materially and spiritually.
Violence does not strengthen human security at all; on the contrary, it actually weakens it and makes it vulnerable to any violence bordering on madness.
In history, violence has often become madness, and madness has caused violence. This phenomenon, which is truly world historical, has been faithfully reproduced by the world literature of different nations.
Already in Homer’s “Iliad” it was convincingly shown how unrestrained violence turned into real madness, which gets its real expression in violence.
Purposeful and universal violence in ancient Egypt, which led to insane geopolitics, impressively portrayed B. Prus in the novel “Pharaoh” (1885).
Limitlessly cruel and at the same time legalized violence becomes a general madness in ancient Carthage, as G. Flaubert shows in his novel “Salammbo” (1862).
In G. Sienkiewicz’s novel “Kamo Gredeshi” (1894-1896), the Roman Emperor Nero, who realizes his sophisticated violence, enjoys insane pleasure.
In M. Twain’s story “The Prince and the Beggar” (1882) English King Henry VIII, a convinced supporter of all violence, at the same time looks insane.
В. Hugo in the novel “93rd year” (1884) Jacobin terror appears as a truly insane violence.
L.N. Tolstoy’s epic novel “War and Peace” (1863-1869) shows that war as violence, and the most diverse and brutal, is in principle unnatural to human nature. Even war, geopolitically forced and temporary, violates and deforms the inner world of man thought-psychologically, materially and spiritually, actually signifying a special kind of madness. It is world peace, peace without violence, which corresponds to the nature of man, of everyone and everything, that constitutes the philosophical meaning of life. Tolstoy himself was inwardly opposed to evil, not by violence, which he considered the main evil, material and spiritual.
The Norwegian playwright G. Ibsen’s play “Per Gyunt” (1867) shows how violence becomes a real expressed madness, trying to stop the hero’s desire for freedom, make him obedient to violence and therefore in his own way mad, passive-quiet.
In F.M. Dostoevsky’s novel “The Devils of Violence” (1871-1872), materially and spiritually possessing people, makes them truly insane.
Nazism as insane violence is expressively depicted in the novel “The Trial” (1935) by W. Bredel and the novel “The Seventh Cross” (1935) by A. Zegers. Zegers “The Seventh Cross” (1942).
В. Kataev in his novel “Already Written Werther” (1980) showed that mass and indiscriminate violence is committed by people truly insane. The title of the novel is not accidental. In J.W. Goethe’s The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774), Werther himself suffers from his inner doubts and hesitations. In Kataev, other people suffer from the insane violence perpetrated on them.
Even N.A. Nekrasov urged writers: “Sow the reasonable, the good, the eternal.”. This, in essence, is the assertion of world peace as a world without violence and geopolitical madness, for which the writers will “say” thank you, heartfelt not only “Russian people”.
The process of transformation of violence into madness and madness into violence manifests itself negatively in life.
All its ideological and artistic structure of world literature convinced the reader of the inhumanity and inadmissibility of turning violence into madness and madness into violence. Modernity expects from writers a truthful and impressive reproduction of this process.
It is indicative that both in the past and at present, people’s speech against violence against them was and is called by the authorities “rebellion” against themselves and demanded and demanded its state prohibition. FV believes that it would be better to prohibit all violence that leads to insanity.
It should also be said that reconciliation is not identical to interaction. It is of a relatively private and temporary nature, and one of the parties to the reconciliation, at least in some respects, wants to surpass the other party to the conflict.
The energy naturally accumulating in man should be directed to peaceful rather than military purposes. This is a kind of law of nature that ensures man his normal-natural life, material and spiritual.
After the First World War, in which his son died, Ear Kipling wrote “Epitaph of War”, in which he explicitly stated: “If anyone asks why we died, we answer them – because our fathers lied to us.” Lying in war is not for salvation. It is ruinous both for the liar himself and for the people deceived by him. We should always remember this, especially in the difficult modern geopolitical conditions.
Even Pushkin said that if you undertake to lie, it must be done skillfully and with talent. This is relatively rare nowadays. One should lie with inspiration and enthusiasm, with inner pressure and demonstrative conviction of one’s rightness, with inspiration and enthusiasm, with bold and new arguments, and not with boring and meaningful facial expressions, slurring and barely moving one’s lips, and with ritual kisses. Then maybe someone will believe it. Lying is a kind of art and it is not given to everyone and not immediately. The most diverse audience feels and understands it well.
Nowadays we remember Colonel Skalozub from Griboyedov’s “Woe from Wit” with his famous words: “I will give you a field officer in Voltaire”, who will build you “in three rows and calm you down in no time”. There are a lot of field officers now, but it is unlikely that they will “calm down” everyone. Voltaire is not comparable to any fieldfebel, nor to any “scalozuby” (this word means contemptuous mockery). As is well known, it did not work out in the past. And nowadays there are a lot of “fieldfebels” in life, but we do not see Voltaire. It is known Voltaire’s negative attitude to clericalism.
In his time, Count A.K. Tolstoy warned: “it can be slimy to walk on other stones, we would rather keep silent about what was close. Count L.N. Tolstoy loudly declared: “I cannot keep silent”. Now is such a time that it is really impossible to keep silent and, above all, we must talk about world peace, a world without violence.
For FV, violence and madness represent mutual stimulation, material and spiritual, in the most different measure and in the most different expression, negatively-materially and negatively-spiritually significant. It is really life-threatening for mankind, everyone and everybody, and it can and must be overcome by various ways and means, completely excluding from the material and spiritual life of mankind, everyone and everybody, its material and spiritual vital interests.
It is interaction that really eliminates material and spiritual negativity from people’s lives, promotes the creation and establishment of a world without violence, material and spiritual.
© 28.12.2023 St. Petersburg
