PURPOSE AND MEANS

Lit .: Hegel G. V. F. Philosophy of Law. M., 1990, p. 189-190; Aims and Means [selection of works by L. D. Trotsky, J. Dewey, J. P. Sartre, comments by A.A. Huseynova].- In: Ethical. Scientific and publicistic readings. M-, 1992, p. 212-285; HabermasJ. Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action. Cambr., 1990.

R. G. Apresyan

New Philosophical Encyclopedia: In 4 vols. M.: Thought. Edited by V. S. Stepin. 2001 .

See what "PURPOSE AND MEANS" is in other dictionaries:

- "The end justifies the means" catchphrase originally by Niccolò Machiavelli Il fine giustifica i mezzi. This expression is found in a number of authors: The English philosopher Thomas Hobbes (1588 1679) The German theologian Hermann ... Wikipedia

From Latin: Finis sanctificat media (finis sanctificat media). It is traditionally considered that these words belong to the famous Italian thinker, historian and statesman Niccolò Machiavelli (1469 1527), the author of the famous ... ... Dictionary of winged words and expressions

To whom the end is permitted, the means are also permitted. German Buzenbaum, Jesuit At least once to start with the fact that the means justify the ends! Karol Izhikovsky Does a person use a method or does a person use a method? Slavomir Mrozhek Having reached the goal, ... ... Consolidated encyclopedia of aphorisms

Final essay on literature 2018. Theme of the final essay on literature. "Aims and Means".

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FIPI comment:“The concepts of this direction are interrelated and allow us to think about a person’s life aspirations, the importance of meaningful goal setting, the ability to correctly correlate the goal and the means to achieve it, as well as the ethical assessment of human actions. Many literary works feature characters who deliberately or mistakenly chose unsuitable means to implement their plans. And it often turns out that a good goal serves only as a cover for true (lower) plans. Such characters are opposed by heroes for whom the means to achieve a lofty goal are inseparable from the requirements of morality.

Consider the concepts of "goal" and "means" from different angles.

1. Purpose as a fundamental part of human life. About the role and importance of having a goal in a person’s life, about its absence, about a person’s striving for heights, about achievements and about a goal as an engine of progress, about self-realization, great discoveries that are possible only thanks to a goal, about obstacles on the way to a goal, about a goal as a continuous process, as well as about what and who helps a person on the way to his goals.

2. Goals are different(true, false, great, vile, unattainable, selfish) One can speculate about the differences between goals and dreams, as well as how a person’s goals are connected with his personality. What leads to the pursuit of certain goals.

3. Does the end justify the means? Here one can speculate about whether great goals achieved by dishonest means can be justified, about the importance of human life, about the methods of achieving the goal, and about the ethical evaluation of methods and means to achieve the goal.

Target- this is an imaginary peak, individual for each person, to which he aspires, and tries to fulfill for this all the necessary conditions, requirements, duties that depend on him. From the point of view of philosophy, the goal is a necessary condition for life, both for humans and for other organisms.
Synonyms: intention, end, task, task, plan, plan, project, calculation, target; meta, types, end, dream, ideal, aspiration, object (of the sweetest dreams), so that; end in itself, intent, ultimate dream, highest goal, landmark, intention, telos, meaning, setting, purpose, goal setting, function, mission, fireball, dream-idea

Means- technique, method of action to achieve something. or something that serves a goal, necessary to achieve, carry out smth.
Synonyms: way, possibility, method; tool, device, weapon; panacea, tool, system, path, asset, resource, condition, method, recipe, drug,

Quotes for the final essay 2018 in the direction "Aims and means".

A person who certainly wants something forces fate to give up. (M.Yu. Lermontov)

Man must learn to obey himself and obey his decisions. (Cicero)

When the goal is reached, the path is forgotten. (Osho)

The meaning of life is those goals that make you appreciate it. (W. James)

Perfect means for obscure ends are a characteristic feature of our time. (A. Einstein)

High goals, even if unfulfilled, are dearer to us than low goals, even if they are achieved. (I. Goethe)

If you want to lead a happy life, you must be attached to a goal, not to people or things. (A. Einstein)

You cannot change the direction of the wind, but you can always raise the sails to reach your goal. (O. Wilde)

Find a goal, resources will be found. (M. Gandhi)

If you are heading towards the goal and stop along the way to throw stones at every dog ​​that barks at you, you will never reach the goal. (F.M. Dostoevsky)

The weaker and simpler people are best judged by their characters, the more intelligent and secretive by their goals. (F. Bacon)

It's never too late to step out of the crowd. Follow your dream, move towards your goal. (B. Shaw)

When it seems to you that the goal is unattainable, do not change the goal - change your plan of action. (Confucius)

No end is so lofty as to justify the unworthy means to achieve it. (A. Einstein)

We must set ourselves tasks above our strength: firstly, because you never know them anyway, and secondly, because forces appear as you complete an unattainable task. (B. L. Pasternak)

Ask yourself, do you crave this with all the strength of your soul? Will you live to see the evening if you don't get this thing? And if you are sure that you will not live, grab it and run. (R. Bradbury)

To reach the goal, you must first of all go. (O. de Balzac)

A person must have a goal, he cannot do it without a goal, for that reason is given to him. If he does not have a goal, he invents it... (A. and B. Strugatsky)

If you want to achieve the goal of your aspiration, ask more politely about the road you have lost. (W. Shakespeare)

I understand HOW; I do not understand why. (J. Orwell)

If you want to achieve a goal, don't try to be subtle or smart. Use rough tricks. Hit the target right away. Come back and hit again. Then hit again, with the strongest blow from the shoulder. (W. Churchill)

No transport will be passing if you do not know where to go. (E.A. Poe)

The one who aspires to the stars does not turn around. (L. da Vinci)

Life goes breathless without an aim. (F. M. Dostoevsky)

There are few unattainable things in the world: if we had more perseverance, we could find a way to almost any goal. (F. de La Rochefoucauld)

Some Jesuits say that every means is good, if only to achieve the goal. Not true! Not true! With feet defiled by the dirt of the road, it is unworthy to enter a clean temple. (I.S. Turgenev)

He walks faster who walks alone. (J. London)

Life reaches its peaks in those moments when all its forces are directed towards the implementation of the goals set for it. (J. London)

High goals, even if unfulfilled, are dearer to us than low goals, even if they are achieved. (Goethe)

At some second of the way, the target begins to fly at us. The only thought: do not evade. (M.I. Tsvetaeva)

The intention of a warrior is stronger than any obstacles. (K. Castaneda)

Only the one in whom the aspirations have died out is lost forever. (A. Rand)

It is much better to do great deeds, to celebrate great victories, even if mistakes happen along the way, than to join the ranks of ordinary people who know neither great joy nor great misfortune, living a gray life, where there are neither victories nor defeats. (T. Roosevelt)

Not a single person lives without some goal and striving for it. Having lost purpose and hope, a person often turns into a monster out of anguish... (F.M. Dostoevsky)

A person grows as his goals grow. (I. Schiller)

If there is no goal, you do nothing, and you do nothing great if the goal is insignificant. (D. Diderot)

Seek what is above what you can find. (D.I. Kharms)

Nothing calms the spirit so much as finding a solid goal - a point to which our inner gaze is directed. (M. Shelley)

Happiness lies in the joy of reaching a goal and the thrill of creative effort. (F. Roosevelt)

Concepts, the ratio of which constitutes a problem expressed in the well-known maxim “the end justifies the means” and is associated with the value aspect of the relationship between the end and the means and, accordingly, the choice and evaluation of means in expedient activity. Concerning the solution of this problem in the popular literature, the antithesis of the so-called. Jesuitism / Machiavellianism, etc. abstract humanism; it is generally accepted that the Jesuits, as well as Machiavelli, preached the principle that the end certainly justifies the means, and abstract humanists (which included L. N. Tolstoy, M. Gandhi, A. Schweitzer) argued the opposite, namely: the real value of the means as a whole determines the value of the results achieved.

The named maxim goes back to the statement of T. Hobbes, made by him in explaining the sugi of natural law (“On the Citizen”, ch. “Freedom”, I, 8); according to Hobbes, each person himself, on the basis of reason, that is, natural law, must judge what means are necessary to ensure his own security. This maxim does not correspond to the spirit of the Jesuit teaching, and although the formula “To whom the goal is allowed, the means are also allowed” was developed in Jesuit theology (by G. Buzenbaum), it only assumed that the means can be value-indifferent, and their value is determined by the worthiness of the goal. to which they are applied. Maxima was openly preached by a number of Jesuits, but principles of this kind were adhered to (openly or secretly) not only and not necessarily by the Jesuits, but in fact by all those thinkers and figures for whom ideal goals were the exclusive subject of moral evaluation.

From a formal point of view, the proposition that the end justifies the means is trivial: a good end does justify the means. From a pragmatic point of view, any practical, i.e., oriented to a directly achievable result, action, by the very meaning of its intention, determines the means necessary to achieve it; the achievement of the goal compensates (justifies) the inconvenience and costs necessary for this. In the framework of practical activity, efforts are recognized as a means only in their relation to a specific goal and acquire their legitimacy through the legitimacy of the goal. In praxeological terms, the problem of reconciling goals and means is: a) instrumental (means must be adequate, i.e. ensure the effectiveness of activities) and b) goal-oriented (means must be optimal, i.e. ensure the effectiveness of activities - achieving results at the lowest cost ). According to the logic of practical action (see Benefit), successful and effective activity is an essential factor in the transformation of value consciousness: the achieved goal establishes updated evaluation criteria. In modern social sciences, antithetical ideas have been formed, correlating with the praxeological approach to this problem, regarding functionally different types of activities: predetermine the planned results and scope of the project; b) technical means are developed within the framework of systems of purposeful rational action, one does not develop separately from the other (J. Habermas).

A demagogic-moralizing approach should be distinguished from the pragmatic one (see Moralizing), in which the maxim “the end justifies the means” is invoked to justify obviously unseemly or criminal actions. At the same time, what is mentioned as a “good goal” is either (in the long term) a declaration, or (retrospectively) an event that chronologically followed the actions taken, and the actions themselves, given the results obtained, do not really turn out to be a means, but are committed irresponsibly and arbitrarily or for their own sake.

The actual ethical problem arises in connection with the assumption that for the sake of a good goal it turns out to be morally permissible to perform any necessary actions (even if they are usually considered unseemly, morally unacceptable, and even downright criminal). Such a point of view is objectively relativistic (see Relativism): although not all actions are recognized as permissible, but only those that really lead to what is recognized as the highest goal, in the end, the choice of means turns out to be determined by the strategy and tactics of activity. Such an approach is fraught with a relativistic error. As Hegel showed, this error lies in the fact that actions considered as means are morally negative objectively, in themselves and in their concreteness, while the alleged end is good only according to a subjective opinion based on the concept of abstract good. In other words, from an ethical point of view, although actions as means are performed for the sake of a certain goal, their moral significance is determined not by expediency, but by correlation precisely with general principles. Therefore, the problem of ends and means is constituted as an ethical one in opposition to pragmatism and prudentialism.

Significant clarifications in the very formulation of the problem of goals and means were introduced by / Ms. Dewey in a polemic with L. D. Trotsky. 1. The concept of goal has a double meaning: a) goal as a plan and motive, oriented towards the ultimate, all-justifying goal, and b) goal as an achieved result, or a consequence of the use of certain means; the results achieved themselves act as means to the end. 2. Evaluation of funds should also be made in terms of the result that is achieved with their help; this is the principle of the interdependence of ends and means. The end as a result depends on the means used and is determined by them; but their evaluation depends on the goal as the result achieved. Since the ultimate goal is the idea of ​​final consequences, and this idea is formulated on the basis of those means that are evaluated as the most desirable for achieving the goal, the final goal is itself a means of directing action. Dewey's scheme contains a real dialectic of end and means, which is not exhausted by the universally recognized proposition that the goals achieved themselves become a means for subsequent goals (suffice it to say that this proposition was equally shared by both Trotsky and Jandi). Following the principle of interdependence requires a rigorous and critical examination of the means used in terms of how accurately the results to which they lead correspond to those planned. 3. A real unity of ends and means can be ensured on the condition that the means are actually determined in accordance with the ends, and not “derived”, as is often the case, from considerations external to the situation of choice (thus, Trotsky justified the methods of revolutionary struggle used "the laws of the development of society", in particular the "law of the class struggle"), otherwise it turns out that the goal is made dependent on the means, while the means are not derived from the goal. 4. The highest goals are moral goals, in the final analysis, they should be understood as an ideal, the achievement of which in the sense of practical realization, strictly speaking, is impossible; in activities oriented towards the ideal, it is all the more necessary to take into account the principle of the interdependence of means and ends as the practical consequences of the use of means. This provision was clarified by J. P. Sartre: the impossibility of realizing the goal, which is in the unattainable future and functions as an ideal, leads to a situation where the connection between the goal and the means is specific, while the goal as an ideal plays the role of an imperative. To develop this, an additional clarification is needed: morality is a value characteristic, but not the content of the goal. The attempt to accept "morality" as such as the goal of objectively defined activity, that is, to make the fulfillment of a principle or rule the content of actions, leads to rigorism. The assumption that "morality" may be the goal of activity turns out in practice that the goals actually pursued are not analyzed for their compliance with moral criteria; intoxication with the goal leads to the assumption of any goals. The ideal, the highest values ​​and principles should not be the actual goal pursued, but the basis of actions and the criterion for their evaluation. Morality is not the ultimate goal of life, but the path of life (N. A. Berdyaev).

The question of correlating actions with immediate results or general principles and, accordingly, the criteria for their evaluation was the subject of controversy (in a different ideological and methodological context) between representatives of utilitarianism-action and utilitarianism-rules (see Utilitarianism).

Lit .: Hegel G. V. F. Philosophy of Law. M., 1990, p. 189-190; Aims and Means [selection of works by L. D. Trotsky, J. Dewey, J. P. Sartre, comments by A.A. Huseynova].- In: Ethical Thought. Scientific and publicistic readings. M-, 1992, p. 212-285; HabermasJ. Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action. Cambr., 1990.

R. G. Apresyan