Good and evil in the ethical psychology of personality. What is kindness - is there absolute goodness

Sukharev V.A.

The human soul is an unknown universe in which two eternal principles are fighting - good and evil. Is it possible to withstand stress and depression, defeat envy and schadenfreude, intrigue and slander, overcome fear and inferiority complexes that fetter the soul and body, without resorting to the help of healers and psychics?

You can - answers V.A. Sukharev. Look inside yourself, learn to look in yourself for the causes of your own sufferings and pains, believe in the power of thought, will - and you will become the master of your destiny.

In the book, readers will find answers to many questions: why women age earlier than men, and live longer, how to choose a life partner, to achieve harmony in sexual relations.

The range of human personality traits is extremely wide and multifaceted. TO better qualities the human soul belongs to nobility, pride, frankness, pride, justice, restraint, indulgence (tolerance), tact and delicacy, cheerful disposition, wit, enthusiasm, optimism, independence in decision-making, persistence in achieving goals, etc.

However, it is the same. as a shadow adjoins light, noble qualities are balanced by their antipodes. Among the personal qualities that violate the duty of respect for other people, one should name envy and hatred, schadenfreude and backbiting, a passion for intrigue, slander and gossip, arrogance and arrogance, stinginess and stinginess, a tendency to quick temper and anger.

In accordance with the above personal qualities, the actions and behavior of people naturally evoke the respect or antipathy of others. Some are extremely proud, others are overly sentimental, and still others are lazy. Some are reputed to be arrogant or too flattering. Some are overly licentious, others hate the opposite sex.

All human actions and deeds should be based on the principles of morality, that is, the principles created by people in order to live together in the happiest way.

The foundations of morality are immutable truths, like the axioms of geometry. Nevertheless, due to the fact that they contradict passions or interests, people with surprising ease oppose them and violate them, often contrary to common sense. A clear confirmation of this can be the attitude of people to one of the main laws of human morality, known as the law of psychological self-improvement: control yourself enough to respect others as yourself, and act with others as you want to be treated with you.

He who is straight in heart, who has the same feelings towards others as towards himself, should not deviate from this law, which is essentially prescribed to man by rational nature.

It is interesting how this law is realized in life. Statistics show that in the question of positive qualities most people lean towards confidence, decisiveness, endurance, willpower, poise. To the question of what qualities of those around them they would welcome, the answer most often follows: kindness, decency, human participation, tolerance, altruism, generosity.

Thus, the rule of psychological self-improvement: "Wish yourself firmness in your behavior, and others around you softness" - sounds quite paradoxical, if not insidious: we expect kindness and decency from others, but we want the opposite for ourselves.

It is clear that neither the decisiveness we have earned, nor the purposefulness we have acquired will help to wait for the desired softness from others. Love and understanding cannot be pulled out by force. Sometimes they can be received as a gift - from people who are kind by nature. But since nature is not always generous, it is better to follow one of the rules of psychological culture: wish for yourself what you wish for others. If you feel a lack of kindness in others, then you need to be kinder yourself. If you are poorly understood, try to understand others better yourself. If you feel a lack of honesty around - become more honest yourself.

The moral principle in man is much less perfect than the physical. Complete purity is just as inaccessible to weak human nature as unconditional cruelty without any glimpses of kindness.

Man is a contradictory being. He is rather weak than angry; vain than ignorant; likes to argue a lot, but in actions he is rarely reasonable; almost always uses the ideas of others, but stubbornly considers them to be his own. Always mistaken, he thinks that he alone knows the truth. Hero in the morning, he is the personification of shyness in the evening. Eternally tormented by some vague anxiety, he does not admit this out of pride, but reveals his melancholy at every step. Life seems to a person too short, but meanwhile he spends all of it in finding ways to kill time.

Fearing death most of all, he is nevertheless ready to rush to meet her every minute for the most insignificant reason, for the satisfaction of pride, out of greed or revenge.

A young man thinks childhood is funny, and a mature man is just as funny about youth, an old man finds years of maturity, but meanwhile, at any age, a person spends time exclusively on trifles, not caring enough about what is really important. Always dissatisfied with the present, he is more likely to expect something from the future and is constantly hovering in the clouds of unrealizable hopes. Personal interest is the only stimulus for human activity.

But if a person's intentions are always pure, actions are direct; if others judge him superficially and he has enough courage to neglect it: if contempt makes him proud and praise makes him humble; if the request touches, the threat outrages, and the suffering of others torments; if failures strengthen, danger elevates, and happiness temper desires, then he is a truly worthy and magnanimous person. He loves good for his own sake, not for his own glory.

Part one

Soul labyrinths

Chapter one

The origins of morality

NOBILITY

Nobility is so closely associated with selflessness that these two personality traits are often difficult to distinguish from each other. Sometimes nobility is manifested in secret self-sacrifice, which does not loudly declare its feat and does not require reciprocal gratitude. In another case, nobility takes the form of special attention to the unfortunate and outcast. It also encourages to forgive the wrongs inflicted, to respond with good to evil and to refuse in favor of others from their rights.

Nobility consists of good nature and an excess of trust. People who are supposedly noble hide their shortcomings both from others and from themselves. People who are truly noble are well aware of them and openly declare them. A truly noble person easily forgives people's delusions.

What we take for nobility often turns out to be ambition, which. despising small benefits, it goes straight to large ones. The nobility of the soul is not always accompanied by the nobility of manners.

A decent person will not slander those who are absent and speak about people behind their backs that which cannot be said directly to their faces. A noble person will never allow himself to be rude to persons with whom he had to disperse due to ideological convictions. He delicately guards the pride of his enemies, refrains from causing them harm and trouble; sometimes trusts unworthy people; finally, the same feeling of nobility keeps him within the boundaries of moderation of pleasures and pleasures.

A generous person should be recognized as one who, despite good reasons to be dissatisfied with his neighbors, remains disposed to them and even sacrifices himself for their good.

Nobility can sometimes manifest itself in the form of pride, although this is not always accepted by others. History knows many examples of this. So, Scipio, being unsubstantiatedly accused by the Roman Senate of covetousness, tore up his acquittal as a sign that he considered it beneath his dignity to be suspected of such an act.

Nobility is an essential quality of many great people. This is how the Dutch writer Thein de Vries describes the nobility of the artist Rembrandt in relation to his colleague:

“Rembrandt turned to the artist and saw that he was sitting with his elbows on the table and his head lowered sadly. Suddenly the guest sobbed and burst into tears. The gray head fell into his hands; in these tears poured out all the despair of a downtrodden man, brought to the point of the mighty of this world. Rembrandt was shocked. It was as if something had broken in him. Where did his confidence and calmness go! Compassion screamed in him. Blood rushed to his head, and in a fit of rage, he slammed his fist on the table. Then he looked back at the artist, grabbed his hands and shouted shrilly: Bloodsuckers! We will stand up for ourselves!

The master shifted his gaze from one valuable object to another, stopped in front of candelabra, vases, fabrics embroidered with silk. Suddenly he tore off a small Persian carpet from the wall, spread it on the floor and began to throw everything at it. what came to hand and was of some value. Opening the cupboard, he took out wine jugs and goblets of the finest minting and threw them at the feet of the frightened artist. Then he ran into the next room, suddenly remembering that he had hidden a thousand more ducats in cash there. It is necessary to take revenge, to take revenge in the name of the honor of the persecuted brother, in the name of all the persecuted and persecuted ... And he threw and threw valuable things on the carpet. Hard...

L. M. Popov, O. Yu. Golubeva, P. N. Ustin

Good and evil in ethical personality psychology

© Institute of Psychology Russian Academy Sciences, 2008

Introduction

"Ethical psychology of personality" is an independent branch of knowledge, which over time may become on a par with pedagogical, social, clinical and other areas of psychological science.

We begin our conversation about this new branch of psychology with the elaboration of one of the central questions of human behavior - the question of understanding good and evil.

On the basis of dictionary sources, about 80 words were identified that characterize the personality traits of a person from two extreme sides: from the side of virtuous and vicious behavior. The task of assessing personality traits was set before the students of one of the Kazan universities.

As a result, a fairly definite picture was built, the students identified, for example, groups of traits that, from an ethical point of view, characterize the qualities, the mental state of the individual, interpersonal relationships, which could definitely be attributed to positively perceived (virtuous) and negatively perceived (vicious) personality characteristics.

So, positively perceived personality traits included: tenderness, mercy, kindness, justice, disinterestedness, honesty, wisdom, benevolence, nobility, politeness, loyalty, spirituality, modesty, conscience, honor. Negatively perceived (vicious) qualities include: cruelty, greed, rudeness, arrogance, self-interest, meanness, stinginess, harm, stupidity, sycophancy, indifference, selfishness, backbiting, insidiousness, intolerance, tyranny, sarcasm, stubbornness, callousness.

Positively perceived states with the status of "good" were: joy, laughter, freedom, hope, well-being, pity, calmness, confidence, luck, energy; negatively perceived (status "evil") - fear, anger, grief, loneliness, inaction, hostility, misunderstanding, disgust, devastation, damnation, sadness, boredom.

Among the virtuous concepts that characterize interpersonal relationships are: love, peace, friendship, affection, care, respect, sympathy, trust, forgiveness. The number of vicious concepts included: hatred, envy, betrayal, violence, murder, lies, treason, aggression, lawlessness, terrorism, abuse, enmity.

The results of this survey demonstrate that the usual well-known personality traits and interpersonal relationships are perceived in the student environment of a large Russian city unequivocally: some as positive, virtuous (mercy, spirituality, love, care), and others as vicious (cruelty, arrogance, lies, treason) ...

Interesting, in our opinion, is the problem of a set of concepts that convey what is created by civilization and which, according to the authors of the study, should also be categorized into two columns (good - evil):

1) what causes a positive reaction: music, church, garden, theater, knowledge, democracy, book, religion, etc .;

2) what causes a negative reaction: drugs, weapons, prison, fascism, money, vodka, power, explosion, cigarettes, army, official, crisis, TV, school, etc.

There is already something to think about when such concepts as power, army, TV, school, and an official entered the minds of young people with a negative attitude.

Finally, the real moral problem was revealed where the students faced the need to classify the most famous Russian politicians as those with whom “good” is associated and with whom “evil” is associated. It is difficult to categorize a number of politicians from the general set of columns: Peter the First, Nicholas II, V. I. Lenin, V. V. Zhirinovsky, V. S. Chernomyrdin vividly imprinted in the minds of young people as politicians transition period, who actively showed themselves at the stage of the next historical turning point in the social life of Russia and in relation to which there was no unambiguous assessment.

The distribution of politicians into two groups revealed a deep moral problem of Russian society: young people who unexpectedly found themselves in a position of moral choice had to decide for themselves: which of the politicians was really guided by good intentions and did good deeds, and who was guided by vicious intentions and did so, which in the minds of the people is assessed as unpleasant, vicious, negative.

We must agree that this survey shows: in our society there is a crisis of values, “when morality loses evidence, cannot be supported by the power of tradition, and people, torn apart by conflicting motives, cease to understand what is good and what is evil. This usually happens when different cultures collide and cultural eras when, for example, new generations break sharply with traditional foundations. "

From a psychological point of view, we can state that there is a steady formation of people with a low level of tolerance for violence, death - for evil. This is manifested in a lowering of the threshold of sensitivity to vicious behavior. If, according to the teaching of the Apostle Paul, a person is body, soul and spirit, then vicious behavior is, first of all, behavior aimed at satisfying bodily needs. The more interest in the bodily, the further away from the spiritual.

It is necessary to turn to the understanding of man as a spiritual being, a carrier of moral consciousness, as a being responsible for everything that is done on our planet. Need to find mutual language with each other, to understand where we are coming from and where we are going in our evolutionary development. It is necessary to understand that people who used to live on Russian soil have gone a long way of development, in which, along with intellectual and economic achievements, certain customs, traditions, a system of stable values ​​have developed, which are long-term guidelines from the past to the future.

Since the period of the first manuscripts, a person has been interested in what is considered good and what is evil. In religions, ethical works of Aristotle, Seneca, Spinoza, I. Kant, G.V.F. Hegel, Z. Freud, E. Fromm, S.L. It is impossible to explain a single act of a person without understanding his true motives, which are formed in society. Each person is forced to take into account what will cause approval and support from other people (family, community, work collective, country, state), and what will cause condemnation and rejection.

Ethics more than other sciences gives an idea of ​​the moral development of a person, of his moral consciousness. However, the problem is that personality psychology as a branch of scientific psychology has not yet adequately mastered a huge layer of data accumulated in connection with the study of religion, spiritual sources, ethical works of classics, philosophical and religious sources. And here, in domestic psychology, a large detachment of domestic psychologists (B.S.Bratus, V.P. Zinchenko, V.V. Znakov, V.A.Ponomarenko, V.I.Slobodchikov, V.D.Shadrikov, etc.) moved in that direction. But once again I would like to say that the efforts of scientists will be more productive if we define ethical psychology as an independent branch of psychology as a vector of this research and applied activity.

For all the controversy of this issue, as the main argument, it should be recognized that the term "ethical" comes from ethics - the science of morality (morality), in the center of which is the study of customs, habits, morals, developed over a long time acceptable ways of communication between people inside communities of various levels: from the family to the unification of nations. As soon as we take a step in psychology on the way to its new branch, the tasks of defining the subject, categorical apparatus, research methods, that is, the entire attributes of an independent branch of psychology, will immediately arise.

This book is the first attempt in this direction. Some theoretical substantiation of the ethical psychology of personality is presented here, research methods are presented, including the positively proven test of good and evil, which has passed the assessment procedure for representativeness, test reliability and validity.

Since, in our understanding, ethics is a practical philosophy, we believe that ethical is a practice-oriented psychology of a person, which not only explains the presence of moral guidelines, but also helps to form them, realize them practically, and subsequently move in life, having them. as motives and value orientations.

The authors of this work are Doctor of Psychology, Professor L.M. Popov (author and scientific editor of the project, introduction, conclusion, chapters 1 and 2), PhD in Psychology P.N. Ustin (Chapter 3) and PhD in Psychology O. Yu. Golubeva (chapter 4).

You cannot even imagine, dear friends, how much your understanding of good and evil affects your life. We are taught to distinguish between good and evil from early childhood, when we are diligently convinced of the correctness of some actions and the incorrectness of others. And we ourselves, to the best of our ability, are trying to figure out what is good for us in this life, and what is bad. And not always, not always, we manage to find out the truth about good and evil, about right and wrong, about good and bad. As a result, we face various problems in our life due to our inadequate perception of reality. We make mistakes that are unnecessary for us, the consequences of which can be very, very dire for us.

Many problems of a psychological nature are reduced to the definition of good and evil by a person and the development of an adequate, from his point of view, reaction to both. Many of you are probably unhappy with your position in life, and this is a very common occurrence. Anyone there, philosophical and religious beliefs about the attitude towards money, towards our neighbor, towards the way of life, towards moderation and the like, try to convince us of what we feel with our whole body. Well, it seems like money is evil, the desire to possess some woman you like is a sin, the desire to live in a palace is an optional luxury. It turns out that things that are completely natural for our life are something wrong and bad, and we should not want what we really want. Forgive me, but what about those people who have all this, who live a full life and are not going to give it up? Why on earth should we limit ourselves in something and give in to someone?

What is good for us and what is bad for us, we can probably understand ourselves, if no one will impose their point of view on certain things and instill in us their ideas about good and evil. A person has a basic set of instincts that give rise to natural desires in him, and by listening to his instincts, but giving them an intelligent form, we can easily understand what exactly and why we need, what is good for us and what is evil. You will follow your true desires, learn to meet your basic needs, and you will have significantly fewer problems with your mental and psychological health.

I know what I'm talking about, thousands of people with various problems have passed through me. And very often these problems rested on their wrong, or rather, deliberately distorted worldview. But one has only to show a person the right path and he gradually comes to an understanding that he himself has driven himself into a dead end, following other people's beliefs about good and evil. Well, for example, people write to me that their family life is like hell and that they can no longer tolerate a swinish attitude towards themselves, but do not know what to do, how best to act. But just to break off relations with the wrong person, they do not have enough spirit, because it is not good somehow, to leave a person who may love you in the depths of his soul. Well, yes, of course he loves, loves so that he beats, offends, humiliates, mercilessly exploits, and even threatens to kill. Very such, sincere love, which sometimes ends in very deplorable results. Yes, sometimes you should not rush to divorce, because the problem may lurk in yourself, but when everything goes too far, when family life turns into a game of survival, the decision should be made immediately. True, sometimes it is not easy to make the right decision, because a person is overcome by doubts about the correctness of this decision, and besides, there is also such a thing as a habit that forces a person to get used to everything, including a very bad, and even very dangerous life ...

Well, in this case, given that we live in modern world, you should seek the help of a psychologist who will help you make the right decision and explain you its correctness. You can go to a psychologist for an appointment, or even better, contact him on the Internet, for example, write him a letter and ask him to help you figure out a difficult situation for you, ask him to help you decide on right step... Believe me, good specialists are not poisoned by any inadequate nonsense, they look at life with sober eyes, and advice is guaranteed to be correct, following which you will get more than you lose. The expert's wise answer to your question does not necessarily have to be a revelation for you, he can simply help you decide on the act, the correctness of which you yourself perfectly understand.

So the meaning of the advice of a psychologist, as well as in general, any wise advice, comes down to the urge of a person to make the only right decision for him in life. What sometimes seems to a person to be evil, and because of which he is very worried, in fact, can be good for him and for other people. Conversely, what we perceive as good can turn out to be evil. If our mental decoder of the external world is configured incorrectly, we also make the wrong decisions in this case, moreover, we also suffer from our wrong attitude to this or that situation in life, or from our attitude to one or another of our actions. Sometimes a person thinks that he acted wrong, that he acted badly, if his act is at odds with his beliefs, while in fact, he feels very good and the result of his actions convincingly proves that they were correct. And the question is, what should we believe, what someone suggested to us, or our own feelings?

Why should we even believe what other people tell us about good and bad deeds, good and evil, right and wrong? What are our reasons for that? Look at all these virtues that bring pure and light to the masses, and many of them have drowned in vices and lies, many of them, such as priests in the Vatican, commit sexual crimes against children, and we are taught to follow God's commandments. A mother who protects her son, who mercilessly killed several people, including small children, sees evil not in her son, but in a society that is supposedly to blame for the way he grew up with her. And what, we must believe all this, we must follow the rules that such people impose on us? To be able to distinguish good from evil, you just need to learn to anticipate the consequences of certain actions and take into account their impact on your life and the lives of other people in the long term. I think you understand that you cannot live on your own, therefore, you need to somehow take into account the interests of the people around you, and not do everything just for your own sake. Unhealthy selfishness is fraught with unhealthy consequences. On the other hand, doing wrong and thoughtless good to other people is also unreasonable, no one will appreciate your efforts, rather, people will try to get more from you, using your kindness. So do things that are useful for yourself and for other people, as needed, taking into account all the possible consequences of these matters. Having calculated the consequences of your actions and adequately assessing these consequences, you will not encounter unpleasant surprises for you.

Sometimes it is not easy to do, it is not easy to understand what this or that action you have done can lead to, and therefore, it is impossible to give it a correct assessment, defining it as a good or bad deed, as right or wrong. That is why we seek advice from other people who, thanks to their experience and knowledge, can warn us about the likely consequences of our actions, about which we ourselves do not know anything. Whether your acquaintance, your relative or a psychologist will be such an advisor for you, it does not matter, the main thing is that he is a wise person who understands life. And this can only be the person who is faced with various life problems directly, who knows what they are, and knows how to solve them. Do not listen to various advisers who, having made a lot of mistakes in their lives, undertake to teach other people how they should live. They certainly won't tell you anything worthwhile about what is good and what is bad.

Remember how many times in your life you did everything, as it seemed to you, right, and in the end, you didn’t get the best result? As we in this case say: wanted the best, but it turned out as always? And where did you get the idea that you wanted the best, did you know at all about how best to act in a given situation, or did you just think you knew? It often turns out that people did not know and did not understand, so they got the same unexpected and completely unacceptable result for them. This is the whole problem, not knowing how best to act in a given situation, and you cannot come to what you planned to come to. Sometimes you don't need to do anything at all, in general, in other people's affairs and even in the situation in your own life, you should not interfere, and then the end result of other people's efforts will benefit you. Inaction, to a certain extent, is also an action, and often very effective, capable of significantly influencing the outcome of certain events.

It happens that people turn to me for help, describe their situation, considering it unfavorable for them, and forgive me to give them good advice on how they should act in order to influence this situation. However, with a deep analysis of the situation described by these people, I sometimes come to the conclusion that they should not interfere with anything at all and they should not change anything in their lives. I see that sometimes it is more profitable for a person to remain indifferent in certain matters, and then they will end in his favor. To understand this, you must, of course, be able to calculate the probable outcome of certain events that occur in our life, you need to think several steps ahead, then in some cases you can do nothing at all and still get the results you need. Well, this is when you know, a fool is doing something, and we simply do not interfere with him, do not interfere in his activities, and as a result, the result of this activity turns out to be quite acceptable for us.

Sometimes it only seems to us that a person is doing a good, or, on the contrary, an evil deed, and we resent, worry, interfere and try to change something, not realizing that without us everything is going exactly as it should, including as it should US. And all because of our misconception about good and evil, which awakens in us emotions that are adequate to our convictions and thereby forces us to react in a certain way to a particular situation. Only now, if you think carefully, if everything is carefully weighed and properly evaluated, then you will surely find positive sides in everything that happens in your life and will be able to take advantage of this or that situation to your advantage.

How many mistakes in life could be avoided if people knew how to accurately distinguish good from evil, good from bad, right from wrong. Otherwise, as usually happens, if we see, hear, or learn about something, we immediately give this information our explanation, which may not correspond to reality at all. Thus, we can get upset in situations where we really need to rejoice, or vice versa, we can rejoice when we should be concerned about what is happening, taking into account all the possible consequences of certain events and preparing for these consequences. In other words, the erroneousness of our beliefs is a very, very serious thing, and if everything in a person's life is not going in the best way for him, he should reconsider his views on life, independently or with the help of a specialist.

Remember that beyond good and evil lies the truth, the truth that reveals to us all the secrets of our being. We live according to strict and indestructible laws of the universe or God's laws, as they are also called, which in fact, no matter how we call them, determine our whole life from beginning to end. Knowing these laws, you can always adjust to them, you can always use them for your own good. Partly these laws are known to religion, partly to science, partly to each of us, depending on our education. Using these laws, we can protect ourselves from various threats, both from nature and from other people, we can make our life better, developing science and technology, we can predict our future. And any good deed in this case will mean that we are doing something that improves our life, which makes it safer, more well-fed, more interesting and promising.

Good is order, and the measure that this order provides. When everything is in moderation, when there is order in everything, a competent sequence, when everything is coordinated and there is discipline in everything, then everything goes well for us. Evil, on the contrary, destroys everything, deprives us of benefits and opportunities to develop, makes our life chaotic, unpredictable, meaningless. We can feel all this on our own skin, our sensations will never deceive us, unlike other people, all phenomena should be explained from the standpoint of their final result. Maybe we are not all, so educated as to correctly assess all the events taking place in our life, maybe we do not all and do not always understand our feelings, but in spite of this, it is better to remain in search of the correct answer to our questions than be content with ready-made but incorrect answers.

And for those of you, dear readers, who want to get rid of the problems that poison your life, I strongly recommend putting things in order in your head, reconsidering all your beliefs, all your desires and actions, and come to a full understanding of the course you are on at this moment you move. If you need help for this, please contact. The main thing is that you see a way out of any situation, or at least understand that it exists at all. And it really exists, believe me, it cannot but exist, there are no deadlock situations in life, there are only people in life who cannot find a way out of the deadlock, and who need help to do it. Do not rush to make fateful decisions in your life without consulting smart people, do not act on emotions, they often force people to make very serious mistakes, which are not easy to correct later.

Good and evil have always been perceived and perceived by us, mainly from the standpoint of other people's beliefs, which we adhere to, considering them our own. Well, let's say you think that giving alms to beggars is a good deed, and you do not think about what, in fact, you are doing evil, because by your act you are condoning poverty. Moreover, in our world of good and evil, begging is often associated with crime, in which infants, pumped up with vodka, suffer, which puts them to sleep, and at the same time kills them. This is done for the sake of creating the image of a poor mother asking for money for her child, that is, there is pressure on pity. Such is the bestial savagery, because children often die from alcohol, it is supported by those who give money to such mothers. And people do this with a firm conviction that they are doing the right thing, that is, doing a good deed.

In this way, driven by good intentions, we can do evil, and then be surprised that the end result is directly opposite to our expectations. Friends, you don't know how to do it right, ask wise people for advice, let them tell you what really is a good deed and what is an evil deed. Just ask them to explain to you why they consider something good and something evil. I understand that you will not find wise people today with fire, and yet they are, and you can always find them, and consult with them.

Your life will become much easier if you look at it with a sober look, if you understand what is really happening to you and your life, where it can lead you and what you should or should not do in order to influence her. Knowing the truth and knowing how to use it, you can always make the most correct decisions for you, in any situation.

© Institute of Psychology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 2008

Introduction

"Ethical psychology of personality" is an independent branch of knowledge, which over time may become on a par with pedagogical, social, clinical and other areas of psychological science.

We begin our conversation about this new branch of psychology with the elaboration of one of the central questions of human behavior - the question of understanding good and evil.

On the basis of dictionary sources, about 80 words were identified that characterize the personality traits of a person from two extreme sides: from the side of virtuous and vicious behavior. The task of assessing personality traits was set before the students of one of the Kazan universities.

As a result, a fairly definite picture was built, the students identified, for example, groups of traits that, from an ethical point of view, characterize the qualities, the mental state of the individual, interpersonal relationships, which could definitely be attributed to positively perceived (virtuous) and negatively perceived (vicious) personality characteristics.

So, positively perceived personality traits included: tenderness, mercy, kindness, justice, disinterestedness, honesty, wisdom, benevolence, nobility, politeness, loyalty, spirituality, modesty, conscience, honor. Negatively perceived (vicious) qualities include: cruelty, greed, rudeness, arrogance, self-interest, meanness, stinginess, harm, stupidity, sycophancy, indifference, selfishness, backbiting, insidiousness, intolerance, tyranny, sarcasm, stubbornness, callousness.

Positively perceived states with the status of "good" were: joy, laughter, freedom, hope, well-being, pity, calmness, confidence, luck, energy; negatively perceived (status "evil") - fear, anger, grief, loneliness, inaction, hostility, misunderstanding, disgust, devastation, damnation, sadness, boredom.

Among the virtuous concepts that characterize interpersonal relationships are: love, peace, friendship, affection, care, respect, sympathy, trust, forgiveness. The number of vicious concepts included: hatred, envy, betrayal, violence, murder, lies, treason, aggression, lawlessness, terrorism, abuse, enmity.

The results of this survey demonstrate that the usual well-known personality traits and interpersonal relationships are perceived in the student environment of a large Russian city unequivocally: some as positive, virtuous (mercy, spirituality, love, care), and others as vicious (cruelty, arrogance, lies, treason) ...

Interesting, in our opinion, is the problem of a set of concepts that convey what is created by civilization and which, according to the authors of the study, should also be categorized into two columns (good - evil):

1) what causes a positive reaction: music, church, garden, theater, knowledge, democracy, book, religion, etc .;

2) what causes a negative reaction: drugs, weapons, prison, fascism, money, vodka, power, explosion, cigarettes, army, official, crisis, TV, school, etc.

There is already something to think about when such concepts as power, army, TV, school, and an official entered the minds of young people with a negative attitude.

Finally, the real moral problem was revealed where the students faced the need to classify the most famous Russian politicians as those with whom “good” is associated and with whom “evil” is associated.

It is difficult to categorize a number of politicians from the general set by columns: Peter the First, Nicholas II, V.I. Lenin, V.V. Zhirinovsky, V.S. another historical turning point in the social life of Russia and in relation to which there was no unambiguous assessment.

The distribution of politicians into two groups revealed a deep moral problem of Russian society: young people who unexpectedly found themselves in a position of moral choice had to decide for themselves: which of the politicians was really guided by good intentions and did good deeds, and who was guided by vicious intentions and did so, which in the minds of the people is assessed as unpleasant, vicious, negative.

We must agree that this survey shows: in our society there is a crisis of values, “when morality loses evidence, cannot be supported by the power of tradition, and people, torn apart by conflicting motives, cease to understand what is good and what is evil. This usually happens when different cultures and cultural eras collide, when, for example, new generations abruptly break with traditional foundations. "

From a psychological point of view, we can state that there is a steady formation of people with a low level of tolerance for violence, death - for evil. This is manifested in a lowering of the threshold of sensitivity to vicious behavior. If, according to the teaching of the Apostle Paul, a person is body, soul and spirit, then vicious behavior is, first of all, behavior aimed at satisfying bodily needs. The more interest in the bodily, the further away from the spiritual.

It is necessary to turn to the understanding of man as a spiritual being, a carrier of moral consciousness, as a being responsible for everything that is done on our planet. It is necessary to find a common language with each other, to understand where we are coming from and where we are moving in our evolutionary development. It is necessary to understand that people who used to live on Russian soil have gone a long way of development, in which, along with intellectual and economic achievements, certain customs, traditions, a system of stable values ​​have developed, which are long-term guidelines from the past to the future.

Since the period of the first manuscripts, a person has been interested in what is considered good and what is evil. In religions, ethical works of Aristotle, Seneca, Spinoza, I. Kant, G.V.F. Hegel, Z. Freud, E. Fromm, S.L. It is impossible to explain a single act of a person without understanding his true motives, which are formed in society. Each person is forced to take into account what will cause approval and support from other people (family, community, work collective, country, state), and what will cause condemnation and rejection.

Ethics more than other sciences gives an idea of ​​the moral development of a person, of his moral consciousness. However, the problem is that personality psychology as a branch of scientific psychology has not yet adequately mastered a huge layer of data accumulated in connection with the study of religion, spiritual sources, ethical works of classics, philosophical and religious sources. And here, in domestic psychology, a large detachment of domestic psychologists (B.S.Bratus, V.P. Zinchenko, V.V. Znakov, V.A.Ponomarenko, V.I.Slobodchikov, V.D.Shadrikov, etc.) moved in that direction. But once again I would like to say that the efforts of scientists will be more productive if we define ethical psychology as an independent branch of psychology as a vector of this research and applied activity.

For all the controversy of this issue, as the main argument, it should be recognized that the term "ethical" comes from ethics - the science of morality (morality), in the center of which is the study of customs, habits, morals, developed over a long time acceptable ways of communication between people inside communities of various levels: from the family to the unification of nations. As soon as we take a step in psychology on the way to its new branch, the tasks of defining the subject, categorical apparatus, research methods, that is, the entire attributes of an independent branch of psychology, will immediately arise.

This book is the first attempt in this direction. Some theoretical substantiation of the ethical psychology of personality is presented here, research methods are presented, including the positively proven test of good and evil, which has passed the assessment procedure for representativeness, test reliability and validity.

Since, in our understanding, ethics is a practical philosophy, we believe that ethical is a practice-oriented psychology of a person, which not only explains the presence of moral guidelines, but also helps to form them, realize them practically, and subsequently move in life, having them. as motives and value orientations.

The authors of this work are Doctor of Psychology, Professor L.M. Popov (author and scientific editor of the project, introduction, conclusion, chapters 1 and 2), PhD in Psychology P.N. Ustin (Chapter 3) and PhD in Psychology O. Yu. Golubeva (chapter 4).

The authors are deeply grateful to the staff of the Faculty of Psychology of Kazan state university them. VI Ulyanov-Lenin, who took part in the discussion of the materials of this book and in preparing them for publication.

Chapter 1
Ethical psychology of personality and its phenomena

1.1. The reasons for the emergence of ethical psychology

During the period of social and moral upheavals, the Russian psychological community shows interest in psychology with a human face, in humanistic, existential, anthropological psychology, androgogy and acmeology. Traditional abstract-analytical, "objective" psychology cannot adequately help practice-oriented psychologists to cope with the life problems of clients, teach a leader the art of communicating with subordinates, overcome shyness, etc. Now there is a growing demand for non-traditional psychology, which opposes abstractly -analytical and based on the requests of practice, common sense, intuition. Typically, such phenomena are accompanied by critical periods in the life of countries, nations, cultures.

The time at the turn of the millennium is a time of social innovation, a change in political, personal, and scientific orientations. This is the time for a heightened assessment of moral and ethical paradigms. Scientific psychology, with its in-depth attention to individual abilities, qualities, elements of personal, activity behavior, is often unable to answer the emerging questions of existential sound: what is the meaning of life? how to relate to the struggle of the deputies in the Duma? to military action on the territory of Russia? to drug addiction, prostitution, violence, aggression, cruelty? Another psychology helps to answer these and many other questions: humanistic, existential, ethical, spiritual ...

This situation has already been noted during the period of the social crisis in America in the 50-60s, when interest in objective psychology, psychoanalysis fell, and a desire arose to view a person as a whole in which organic and psychological, conscious and unconscious, feeling and thought are inseparably linked. Human integrity has become the prerogative of research conducted under the banner of humanistic and existential psychology.

In accordance with the idea of ​​rhythmic fluctuations, which can be extended to the psychology of personality, it was natural to expect a turn in movement from scientific differentiated approach to a person - to the "unscientific", holistic. Only by understanding a person as a whole was it possible, through psychology, to find answers to the questions that tormented the Americans of the period " cold war", The Vietnam War, race riots. Existential Approach helped to focus the main problems of the social crisis in America in the 50s and 60s. They boiled down to the following:

1. The crisis of values ​​associated with the loss of confidence in the government, the state, social institutions... Instead, love and psychological closeness come to the fore.

2. The problem of identity correlates with asking oneself questions: who am I? what am I striving for? In the changed world, a person has lost his bearings on the usual authorities, personal ideals, which has created a state of uncertainty and pessimism.

4. Loss of the meaning of life, which, as is evident, appears only when life proceeds meaningfully and every day brings one closer to the achievement of priority values. The loss of the meaning of life prompts the withdrawal from life, to passivity, insecurity, depression.

The parallels between the spiritual crisis of America in the 1950s and 1960s and the spiritual crisis of Russia in the 1980s and 1990s are obvious. We find them on all four counts. Hence, a demand arose in the psychological community of Russia for an understanding of man as an integrity and the desire of a number of domestic psychologists to borrow the ideas of humanistic psychology of the United States, to introduce them into Russian spiritual culture (B.S.Bratus, V.P. Zinchenko, D.A. .).

It is necessary to agree that the strategy of a holistic approach to a person is now more preferable. During the crisis of values, denial of authority, loss of the meaning of life, most people faced the need to find external and internal guidelines for life. Within the framework of a holistic approach, humanistic psychology encourages us to consider ourselves the most important guideline (I am the greatest value). Hence the focus on the client, self-knowledge and self-construction (self-activity, self-development). Existential psychology helps those who view a person as something that is formed in continuous interaction with the world, in a constant choice of objects and values. An integral person “is only what he makes of himself,” that is, a self-creating, self-developing subject.

In fairness, it should be noted that in Russian psychology itself, just as during the crisis in the United States, there was an understanding of the main existential issue - the meaning of life. S. L. Rubinshtein believed that “the meaning of life is the value-emotional education of a person, which manifests itself: 1) in the acceptance (or denial) and implementation of certain values; 2) in strengthening (or decreasing) their importance; 3) in the retention (or loss) of these values ​​in the time and circumstances of life. The meaning of life meets the highest personal need for self-expression. "

The meaning of human life is “to be a source of light and warmth for other people, to be the consciousness of the Universe and the conscience of mankind, to transform life and to continuously improve it”.

The movement towards existential psychology has prompted many psychologists to raise the central questions of a person's ethical relationship to another person and to oneself. The ethical branch of personality psychology has become increasingly transformed into ethical psychology. In the period of a new understanding of the personality as a product of the development of culture, society, philosophical, psychological and religious understanding of the I, questions of the moral order began to come out on top, that is, what measure of decency a person is endowed with. Hence, a substantive interest in such phenomena as the relationship of a person to another, to people; type of character and the predominance of authoritarian or humanistic components in it; conscience, faith, spirituality, beneficence, virtue, depravity, sin, good and evil.

S. L. Rubinshtein is one of the few Russian psychologists who, in the 1950s and 1960s, turned to ethics as the science of practical, morally assessed human behavior in its entirety. It was the desire of a psychologist and philosopher to pick up and make meaningful that thread of universal human knowledge stretched from the depths of centuries (Confucius, Lao Tzu, Socrates, Aristotle, Descartes, Spinoza, L. Tolstoy, F. Dostoevsky, S. Frank), the desire to understand a person as a psychological and ethical education.

Explaining the variety of connections and interactions between man and the world, S. L. Rubinshtein uses the category "attitude". The world can be represented by the greatest variety of objects, but everywhere the most important relations of man are the contemplation (cognition) of the world and the transformation carried out in activity.

But if the world is represented by such a type of objects as the Other (a person) or people (a group of people), then a proper psychological, ethical type of relationship comes into play, a person learns to enter into relationships with Other people, and this constitutes “the spiritual strength of a person, which is necessary the prerequisite, basis, internal condition of the ethical relationship of Man to Man ”.

Ethics, thus, included in the ontology of man as a subject of life (cognition and transformation) is an expression of the inclusion of morality in life. This means that good (in general, morality) should be considered as the content of a person's personal life. Personal life includes not only a social, cognitive, aesthetic attitude towards being, but also an attitude towards the Other not as a means of achieving one's goals, but towards the Other as a value. “The content of genuine ethics is militant goodness and the struggle to build a new man. The meaning of ethics is not to close one's eyes to all the difficulties, hardships, troubles and scrapes of life, but to open a person's eyes to the richness of his spiritual content, to everything that he can mobilize in order to resist, to cope internally with those difficulties that have not yet been eliminated in the struggle for a decent life. "

Introducing the concept of "moral psychology" into the Russian psychological culture of the 90s, B. S. Bratus continues the line of S. L. Rubinstein and believes that the common space, the point of intersection of ethics and psychology is the attitude to the other as an intrinsic value. Ethics in this case is a discipline that indicates the vectors of normal psychological development of a person. It is in the attitude of a person to another that the vectors of the two sciences coincide, it is here that the lines of psychology and ethics are correlated, psychology has the opportunity to "consciously serve the tasks of moral development."

Ethical personality psychology can be formed as a combination of ethics and personality psychology. Ethics is a practical philosophy or science of morality (morality). For the first time, the concept "ethical", used by Aristotle, is derived from the Greek "ethos" (originally - a place of habitation, and later - habits, disposition, character, custom).

Subsequently, to convey the same content, in addition to "ethics", the terms "morality" and "morality" began to be used in different cultures and countries. The word "moral" was introduced into humanitarian culture by Cicero with a direct reference to Aristotle for translating the Greek word "ethical" into Latin language... Morality, according to ethical reference books, is a term used, as a rule, synonymously with the term "morality", less often "ethics". This is the Russian analogue of the ethical, since it goes back to the word "temper" (character).

With all the attempts of philosophers, ethicists, educators (R. Descartes, B. Spinoza, G. Hegel, F. Nietzsche, etc.) to separate these three concepts and give them a special lexical meaning, all the arguments of the thinkers should be recognized as insufficiently convincing, since three terms (ethical, moral, moral) in origin and etymological content mean the same thing that is recorded in dictionaries and in the mass press.

However, in the vocabulary of specialists in ethical, moral and ethical behavior, the use of three terms is reflected in semantic differences. So, "ethics" began to be viewed as a science, a field of human knowledge, practical philosophy as its normative-practical part, and morality (morality) as its subject.

In the history of ethical teachings, a significant number of positions have arisen regarding the content of the subject of research. This is not knowledge about morals, deeds, customs, but the deeds themselves (Aristotle), “life in accordance with the laws and customs of our country” (R. Descartes), human freedom, understood as liberation from the power of affects, passive-passive states (B Spinoza), moral will in the form of “existing freedom for oneself” (G. Hegel), human activity in its world-transforming version (K. Marx and F. Engels), the creation of values ​​(F. Nietzsche), which can be hedonistic, vital , spiritual and religious, which gives them a timeless character (M. Scheler), finally, this is a program and procedure for the formation of a virtuous personality due to the constant focus of consciousness on itself, that is, reflection.

The constant focus of consciousness on itself consists in the formation of a measure of man's domination over himself, in the formation of the most important goal of his life, which is highest good.

This is the orientation of a person towards what he considers the highest good in his life, which helps everyone to have a certain absolute point of support, finally, this is what is recognized by all people, which, from the point of view of the ethical psychology of a person, can be considered as its moral dimension.

In the history of human culture, the degree of virtue individual is determined by such indicators as:

1) the level of domination of the mind over affects;

2) the presence of good will, that is, a pure heart and lack of benefit for oneself;

3) the ability to live in a human community, accepting this way of existence as an unconditional value;

4) humanity, i.e. orientation in actions in to a greater extent for good (mercy, freedom, conscience, happiness, etc.) than for evil (aggression, vanity, violence, rudeness, etc.);

5) the reciprocity of relations, expressed in the universal human golden rule of morality: act towards others as you would like others to act towards you.