Abstract: The object of this research is the humanitarian education in Russia on the example of the higher school. The subject is the trends in development of education as a social institute in the context of information era and epoch of globalization. The author analyzes the role, place, meaning, and major issues of development of the Russian humanitarian education as a major rebroadcaster of culture. Special attention is given to the problem of humanitarian education within the framework of market relations and informatization of society as a whole, and the educational process in the higher school in particular. The author comes to the conclusion that the integral humanitarian knowledge suggests presence of an extensive scientific scope and a worldview component, without which a person cannot develop such principal humanitarian quality as confidence, necessary to establish a civil position. Humanitarian education in this regard has to become an instrument of self-cognition, self-upbringing, and self-actualization in the process of formation of identity. Scientific novelty consists in the comprehensive approach towards the role of humanitarian education and humanitarian knowledge within the life of human and society.

Abstract: The subject of this article is the research on the role of “megamachine” in the establishment of the modern technogenic civilization, as well as the analysis if the interrelation between the modern society and “megamachine”. The article also conducts analysis of the causes that substantiate the ecological crisis on the planet, which can be qualified as a manifestation of the cultural crisis, and the correlation between the “megamachine” and the emerged in the XX century based in its functioning “consumer society”, the main concept of which became a so-called “mass culture” – foundation the modern Western civilization. An expressive phenomenon here is the complicated dialectics of the contradictory process of the correlation between culture and socio-technical component of the modern civilization, which is often referred as “megamachine”. A special attention is given to the negative trends and their causes, associated with the existing contradiction between the fundamental grounds, which comprise the base for culture and civilization. The author’s main conclusion consists in the fact that the modern global society has come to a certain quality milestone, the meaning of which is yet not clear for many. The current socio-economic, political, and cultural challenges of the modern era require its theoretical reasoning and methodological reflection in order to deeper and better understand the essence of the modern era, as well as devise strategies for the future civilized development. Nevertheless, certain crises phenomena in the development of the society, allow us speaking of the factors that led to this milestone today. Among the major factors are the deep contradictions that emerged in the process of development of the technogenic civilization, within the framework of which the Western socio-cultural project is being realized.