Epistemological specificity of art: from the «psychophysiology» of the primitive world to the «practical philosophizing» of the modern era.

Demenev Denis Nikolaevich PhD in Philosophy Associate professor, Department of Architecture and Fine Arts, Nosov Magnitogorsk State Technical University 455000, Russia, Chelyabinsk region, Magnitogorsk, Lenin str., 38, office building denis-demenev@mail.ru Other publications by this author

The specificity of art as a special kind of cognition can be first of all found both in comparison with other types of cognition, and in comparison of today's art with primitive (Paleolithic art). The latter is the subject of this study. The purpose of the article is a philosophical understanding of the epistemological specifics of art, which began with the "psychophysiology" of the primitive world and developed into forms of "practical philosophizing" of the modern era. The research methodology includes a review of literary sources, a dialectical approach to historical and art historical reconstruction, analysis of paleopsychological data, comparative analysis, elements of systems psychology and sociology. Despite the abundance of alternative information about the development of human civilization (often inseparable from "knowledge fakes"), the author in his article will adhere to the official point of view on the established scientific picture of the world ^[1]. This is especially true of historical science, which, according to a number of researchers, "is the most unscientific" because "it has the least... a reliable, recognized method of material selection" ^[2], often does not meet many criteria of scientific validity (objectivity, logical consistency, provability, verifiability, predictive component, etc.) and cannot be defined as a scientific activity ^[3], but is an "interpretation of interpretations" ^[4]. Historical science is largely "rescued" by the history of art, the artifacts of which generally contribute to building logical consistency of most historical processes ^[5]. The history of art itself (and the history of art of the Ancient World in particular) is supported by the data of archeology, however, it does not provide complete and objective information. Our ideas about the life and art of primitive man will also be distorted if we use only them. The observations of anthropologists of primitive societies that have survived to this day (indigenous Australians or Africans), who lingered at the stage of the primitive communal system up to the XIX–XX centuries and were pushed away from the main path of history, contribute to filling the lack of information in this field of knowledge. In addition to history and other sciences, alternative concepts periodically appear in natural science branches of knowledge, for example, in astrophysics. According to some of them, the age of the Universe can be at least twice the official version, or even a huge number of times ^[6]. Consequently, "time and history become the central dimensions of evolution" ^{[7, p. 6]} when history "unfolds within the framework set by biology", which "are extremely wide and allow sapiens to play a variety of games" ^{[8, p. 53]}. Thus, integrative processes in the main forms of human knowledge (art, philosophy, science) are the most important value bases in the formation of epistemology, epistemology and axiology ^{[9, p. 53]} and create prerequisites for an objective study of human formation, which occurs as "multidimensional morphogenesis from the interaction of ecological, genetic, cerebral, social and cultural factors" ^{[7, p. 6]}.

There are also various hypotheses of the origin of art, the main ones (according to L.B. Vishnyatsky ^[10]) are seven: "Game", "Magic" (in particular, it was shared by Z.A. Abramova ^[11]), "Mythological" (in fact, it was a continuation of the previous hypothesis), "Compensatory" hypothesis ^[12], hypothesis of "Trophy demonstration" ^[13], ecological and demographic ^[14], hypothesis of "Information explosion". According to P.A. Kutsenkov ^[15], the so-called "paleopsychological" hypotheses should be placed in a special row, the main contribution to the development of which was made by B.F. Porshnev ^[16] and N. Humphrey ^[17]. In general, a lot of works have been devoted to the genesis of visual activity and its role in the formation of human consciousness ^{[18, 19]}, in the bulk of which a kind of consensus has been reached: in ancient times of the Stone Age, at the time of its relative "beginning" (relative, because this beginning was the result of a long previous development) – art represented a syncretic conglomerate is the unity of religion, cognitive activity and, in fact, art ^{[20, 21]}. To date, the main subject of knowledge of art is a person in the diversity of his relationship to another person. It is the personal meaning of a person's relationship to the world, including the relationship of one person to another and to himself, "that makes up the special thing in which art acts as cognition ...", ^{[17, p. 98]}. Accumulating knowledge about the world in the forms of imaginative thinking, art is able to present a wealth of experience in concrete forms and has no equal as a means of human cognition. However, man has not always been at the epicenter of the knowledge of art.

First of all, this is modern art (here we mean not only and not so much the art of the XXI century, as art in general from the beginning of the historical period: archaic, classical, and postclassical) and differs from its primitive origins: the "ideal" and "subject of research" of the artist in the Paleolithic era was an animal – what his struggle for survival is connected with, and the main subject of the ancient artist's art, respectively, were the animals he hunted (or who hunted him). On the one hand, the beast was a source of nourishment and life, an object of round–the-clock attention, an enemy and a friend, a victim and a deity, on the other - an object of admiration and delight in him, reverence for him as the patron of the genus and the supreme being. The artist of that era depicted a person relatively little. Basically, these are sculptural female figurines (the so-called "Paleolithic Venus"), which are more animal than the animals themselves, because in them the artist emphasized only what was associated with fertility, procreation ^[21]. Man as the subject of the image appears much more often in the Neolithic era. At the same time, art moves away from realism into conventionality in connection with the transition from "communication of events" to "communication of relationships" ^[22]. The Cro-Magnon brain changed throughout the Upper Paleolithic and beyond, which was the basis for the formation of both modern man and his art.

Nevertheless, despite all the differences between us, we have many common qualities. And first of all, we are connected by the desire to master reality and the already purely artistic pictorial ability of mimetic fixation of what we have seen and emotionally experienced events of the world. Both of these abilities can be called one of the main, most profound elements of the complex specifics of art. The basis of the ability of mimetic fixation of what he saw "lies" parallelism in the work of nature and the artist. From the main trunk of the organism of artificial nature – art – grows its two main branches: artfulness (production, creation, "doing" something) and temptation (communication, the art of learning new things), determining reproductive, productive and creative processes. The visual ability of the artist of Paleolithic art is again not identical to the modern one: in the primitive era, it functioned on the basis of eidetic memory, a psychophysiological mechanism that is currently atavism, but predominant in the early phases of ontogenesis. The modern artist synthesizes and reflects the events of the world for the most part on the basis of imaginative memory, which "stores information in the form of a situational semantic field: it is enough to pull at any end of it to "unwind" the whole tangle of memories" ^{[15, p. 67]}. But in the psyche of a modern person there is also eidetism (an eidetic image is an unusually vivid subjective visual phenomenon that supposedly exists for all sense organs" ^{[18, p. 530]}) – a prehistoric kind of memory, which, according to L.S. Vygotsky ^{[19, p. 186]}, all modern children possess, and P.A. Kutsenko in his work "Psychology of Primitive and Traditional Society" [For more details, see: 15], he calls the modern child a "primitive man" and a "Cro-Magnon". The scientist logically and evidently extrapolates primitive psychophysiological mechanisms to modern people based on the analysis and synthesis of information from a variety of interdisciplinary studies on the topic: the physiological basis of eidetic images, which was quite convincingly revealed by Maryutina T.M. ^[20], Sechenov I.M., was one of the first to draw attention to the fact that memory is primarily generalizing activity ^{[21, p. 64]}, the idea of the possibility of reconstructing phylogeny using ontogenesis was first expressed by Z. According to Freud ^{[22, pp. 151-152]}, the issues of the psychology of memory and its correlation with thinking were deeply investigated by Vygotsky L.S. ^{[23, pp. 623, 624]}, and the difference between the thinking of a primitive artist and the thinking of his current "colleague" was shown by the English psychologist Niklas Humphrey ^{[10, p. 63]}. The analysis and synthesis of information from paleo and pathopsychology data, as well as many other studies, allowed P.A. Kutsenkov to draw an analogy between ontogenesis and phylogenesis and draw the appropriate conclusion: "the underdevelopment of the frontal lobes of the Cro-Magnon brain, combined with hypertrophied occipital lobes, made his visual memory and perception partially analogous to the memory and perception of a normal modern child 2-3-summer age. Consequently, it is eidetic memories (or close and/or similar to Eidetic ones) that can most likely claim to be the "matrix" of Paleolithic images [...] reinforced (or even directly provoked) by an incomplete action – an unsuccessful hunt" ^{[15, p. 67]}.

One of the first who drew attention to the phenomenon of eidetism was the Serbian scientist V. Urbancic. The German psychologist Jens continued his research at the experimental level. To date, there is still no common understanding among researchers of this phenomenon and the mechanism of its functioning, which emphasizes the importance of further research of its essence. The problems of eidetism continue to be developed within the framework of art criticism, psychophysiology, psychiatry, neuroscience, psychoanalysis, phenomenology, but there are still some contradictions in its description. There is clearly a lack of both experimental research (perhaps in the closed laboratories of "world imperialism" research has not stopped in a context that has a purely practical orientation (to create a "Superman"), since the eidetic image is one of the ways to have a very significant impact on the course of physiological processes in the body of its carrier), and in generalizations of a philosophical nature.

As the first contradiction , we can designate the coexistence of three types of interpretations of the nature of this phenomenon: 1) "physiological", 2) "pathological" and, let's call it conditionally – 3) "psychological and cultural". According to the first, edetism is a physiological type of human memory that is not acquired by man, but is predestined by nature. Edetism is interpreted here as an innate, involuntary mechanism for memorizing visual images with the highest accuracy. The second, "pathological" version of the existence of the eidetic phenomenon, generally confirms the first one. Fixing and describing it as a mechanism predestined by human nature, representatives of this version describe eidetism as a biological pathology given from birth and not being a healthy type of memory, and the development of eidetic images as a myth. According to the "psychological and cultural" interpretation, on the contrary, eidetism is the human ability to arbitrarily evoke and retain especially vivid images of representation for a long time. In this version of the description, eidetism in the process of human evolution "underwent" a kind of "civilizational superstructure", is a kind of acquisition of "new tools". The problem of eidetism is a source of broad scientific discussion, and in order not to be dogmatic in this matter, we will use the well-known thesis: "the truth is somewhere in the middle" and try to get closer to it.

Analyzing eidetism as a specific type of memory, it is necessary to point out the most important, in our opinion, contradiction associated with the interpretation of the nature of the eidetic image as the basis of this memory. Some researchers identify eidetic, sequential, images of perception, representations (A.R. Luria, L.S. Vygotsky), and even images of imagination (B.M. Teplov). Others are convinced that the eidetic image must be distinguished from others, including from the image of perception (S.L. Rubinstein). Giving an answer to the question where does eidetic memory go and what is transformed into in ontogenesis (studies of the age-related development of the child's psyche by M.E. Sandomirsky, L.S. Belogorodsky, D.A. Enikkev, V.V. Lebedinsky, A. Kossakovsky, etc.), modern psychology does not, at the same time, give a clear answer to the question, "based on what exactly does it originate and function for?" Therefore, in order to make some progress in understanding the essence of eidetic memory, it seems methodologically important to clarify the meaning of the concept of the image as a whole (to understand what exactly is being analyzed), as well as to try to determine the essence of its eidetic mode. Based on the analysis of the "meaningful constants" of the concept of "image" ^{[30, p. 7]} and highlighting a number of important differences between the eidetic image against the background of other images of the human sensory system (non-compliance with Emmert's law, which distinguishes it from both the representation image and the sequentially-simultaneous image; color-tone difference from the sequential image; figurative-color-background difference of the eidetic image from both) – it is possible to fix a single initial basis, with the extrapolation of which all scientists – representatives of various approaches to Eidetics agree on the eidetic modality of the image. Being a "substitute" for the original object, the image has a genetic visual connection with the perceiving subject, when the sensation of objective vision is isomorphic to real objects, being a fundamental bodily experience and ensuring the inclusion of the subject in reality. The concept of "image" here enters into the ultimate correlation (beyond which only complete identification is possible) with the concept of "reflection", where reflection is understood as "one of the types of interaction of material bodies (entities), "image" is understood as the result of this interaction – isomorphic display (sensation)" ^{[31, p. 231]}. In other words, visual sensations (scheme 1) as empirically-the initial phase of the formation of an eidetic image – no one doubts and are recognized as dominant (Aristotle, S.L. Rubinstein, B.G. Ananyev, etc.).

Scheme 1.

On the one hand, the eidetic image functions at the level of elementary visual sensation, reinforced by the effect of extrapsychic influence, and on the other – being neither an image of perception, nor representation, nor imagination – claims the status of uniqueness of its phenomenon, similar to the unique interpretation of the image of Husserl, according to which the image is "non–performing perception (setzungslose), it is perception is modified from the very beginning" ^{[32, S. 474]}, which is "neither a stage of cognition nor a specific mental formation, it is not the result of perception, but also not the result of mastering reality" ^{[30, p. 13]}. Of course, we can assume that Paleolithic images are not a stage of cognition at all (which does not fit both with the visual art of the Paleolithic and the symbolic and semantic art of the agrarian and industrial eras), because art, like the whole life of that era, is unlikely to ever be reconstructed in all details. But since the mechanism of eidetic memory, according to most researchers, is mediated by an extremely acute interest in the object, and visual images (sensations) are associated (in addition to biological and physiological factors) with a preference for the principle of "new", more interesting, desirable, it becomes unlikely that primitive art was not the result of mastering reality.

The problem here is something else: visual images of sensation can also be the basis of images of perception, representation, and imagination, which are also not alien to isomorphism to the original and extreme visibility, which again leads to the second contradiction mentioned above and does not make it possible to determine the exact nature of the eidetic image. And if the isomorphic component is removed from the above images, in which the memorization of the object is practically (but not completely) exhausted by the simple preservation of direct visual traces (according to the principle of correspondence, similarity), then the way opens to mixing the eidetic image with synesthetic images, which are also described as brighter and more persistent, in which the visual (but not necessarily isomorphic) the nature of memorization is also dominant when other sensory (analyzer) systems are irritated. However, according to research, synesthesia, being the ability to perceive any irritation in any modality of sensations, extends its sphere of influence to language (figurative perception of words, letters, phonemes), which makes it possible to use words in an indirect meaning. The phenomenon of eidetism, on the contrary, functions similarly to the "use of words" in the direct meaning (which will be discussed further). After all, in fact, these are two different ways of establishing a connection between phenomena (in real life, not excluding, but complementing each other): synesthesia is a kind of metaphor, with its inherent polysemy, whereas a group of Paleolithic images (or a chain of canines strung one after another) is, in a certain sense, an analogy of metonymic statements. In addition, according to A.R. Luria, "synesthesia [...] leaves an imprint" on "perception, understanding, thinking", and the symbolization and semantics of images play an important role in the development of "eidotechnics", that is, memorization is amenable to training (which simultaneously leads to the first and second contradictions indicated by us). The researcher in the famous "Little Book about Big Memory" ^[33] almost does not use the key terms for us "eidetic image" and "eidetic memory", which most likely indicates that the author either spoke specifically about the phenomenon of synesthesia, or did not want to directly "associate" his eidetic research with similar ones, but already discredited by the Nazi ideology of E. Jens. The same study says that the "omissions" (forgetfulness) [...] were not memory defects (neurodynamic features of the preservation of traces) in the studied Sherishevsky, but perception defects (clarity, contrast, highlighting the figure from the background, illumination, etc.)" [ibid.].

It is believed that for the formation of an isomorphic, but still "relatively generalized" visual image, the participation of elementary perception is necessary, at each stage of which the human brain processes information and makes the necessary adjustments to the resulting distortions, errors, failures, and also reflects the already combined properties of the object in the process of its impact on visual analyzers. And since we are not given an integral image of the object in sensation, but only its separate property or parameter is reflected (and with all the realism of Paleolithic images, there is also a considerable degree of generalization in them (and this requires a separate discussion!)), then a single visual sensation is clearly not enough for the image, even outside of the compositional connection, but holistically and impressively captured animals. In the images we study, we do not see the result of individual sensations (the color of the bison, its shape, tone, line – each separately), we see the whole object, as the ancient hunter probably saw it. This requires some minimal, systematizing activity of perception directed to the plane "for oneself", which implies the isolation of a sensory figure from a sensory background and that we just observe in Paleolithic art.

Back in her time, B.V. Zeigarnik showed that it is quite rational to act at the operational level, not being able to generalize and classify, when the creation of insignificant connections between objects does not necessarily occur at the level of representations, since it is quite feasible at the level of the sensory field – by creating an optical connection between them. And the representatives of the Marburg school, conditionally designating the eidetic image AV – Anschaunungsbilder (from German – "visual image") and calling it a "real sensation", understood by it a subjective visual image standing between the image of perception and the image of representation and which is much clearer and brighter than ordinary mental representations. Whatever it was, not one sensation, but the synthesis of visual sensations leads to the formation of a visual isomorphic image of perception. But even this visual image, even in combination with the Zeigarnik-Ovsyannikova effect (which P.A. Kutsenkov writes about), in our opinion, may not be enough for eidetic memorization of the object as the basis of Paleolithic art. It seems that to the phenomenon of reproducing incomplete actions, when access to memory traces is facilitated while maintaining tension, which is removed as a result of a certain activity (For more details, see: ^{[34, 35]}), it is necessary to add a vivid emotion provoked by the effect of the first impression, which are fixed in the form of emotional memory. The greater this emotion, the brighter, sharper the image, which is much easier to fix in memory. Emotional and eidetic memory are thus mutually conditioned (as well as the sensory-shaped sphere with eidetic memory): the first extrapsychically "captures" the object of the visual "impression", forming a primarily fused sensory, emotional and imaginative sphere (scheme 2).

                                                                                Scheme 2.

The presented scheme of functioning of eidetic memory shows the basic stage of mental development, when the emotional image of perception and the image of memory are not yet differentiated. This was also pointed out by E. Jensch in his ontogenetic theory: merged with perception in young children, eidetism is present in the absolutely overwhelming majority of cases. However, in the future, as a person grows up and develops his psyche, perception and representation develop into two relatively independent processes ^[36]. In general, since the experimental studies and discoveries of the Marburg and Soviet schools, "Eidetics" has not made much progress (due to well-known historical and political reasons) in the study of this phenomenon. But even the groundwork that the above-mentioned schools created was sufficient for further, almost a century-old discussion. Thus, the researchers of the Marburg School, as a result of their experiments, recorded two types of eidetic images – "B" and "T". The "T" type (mediated by physico-chemical factors), standing closer to the images of perception and showing little connection with the imagination and emotionality of the child, was described as more primitive in comparison with the second, and its production occurred spontaneously and unconsciously, regardless of arbitrary mental activity ^[37]. The "B" type of eidetic images (mediated by psychological factors) referred to images of representation and imagination, and their formation process revealed a direct dependence on emotionality and arbitrary thinking, correlating with mood and interest. In general, E. Yensh established the key distinctive features of the identified types: carriers of "B" images - representatives of a high intellectual level – could not only hold and reproduce in detail a previously seen image (perceptual image) for a long time, but also had the ability to creatively transform the original image (to produce an image of imagination). In contrast, the carriers of "T" images are representatives of a low intellectual level with relict reproductive ability of direct reflection of the objective world, not capable of producing high-order images ^{[38, 39]}.

Thus, the discovered dichotomy of the unconscious-conscious (the first contradiction) in various interpretations of the functioning of eidetic memory becomes clear, when initially the physiological production of "T"-type images (and later B-type) is based on a consistent correspondence between the world of objects and the neurons representing them: "The activity of such a mechanism does not transmit qualitative specificity (properties) of the input effect (because the corresponding specificity of the sensation is a priori – it, like the mechanism of correspondence, is formed in philo- and ontogenesis and during training). The role of this mechanism consists only in the implementation of the existing correspondence – "when one particular entity actualizes a certain other, put in accordance with it" (qui pro quo). Therefore, such a mechanism simultaneously acts both as a connecting and as a delimiting mechanism (as a kind of boundary) between the outside world and its neural model" ^{[31, p. 231]}. Also, the existing (and closely related to the concept) "concrete-abstract" nature of the eidetic image, which has evolved from its extremely concrete, visual-physiological state to its modern abstracting modality, looks quite logical and justified, when relict empiricism is enriched (and/or replaced) by symbolic-philosophical mastering of reality with the participation of the language of imagination. In this context, the second contradiction that we fixed regarding the figurative nature of eidetism can also be removed, and the "B"-images really become related (if not identical) to isomorphic-non-isomorphic synesthetic images, because both of them unfold in the sphere of the "pre-modal matrix of consciousness" [...] in which the mechanism "the unconscious transition from sign to meaning"[...] on the basis of "the identity of sensation, perception, thinking and signification" [...] represents "an inseparable layer of perception, sign-symbolic meanings and giving meaning" ^{[40, pp. 27, 30, 31]}. It can be assumed with great caution that the role of this pre-modal matrix may well be claimed by relict eidetic memory, which initially recorded (both simultaneously and separately) both "T"-visual images (the sight of the beast), and "T"-auditory (the roar of the beast), "T"-olfactory (smell (blood) of the beast), "T"-tactile (feeling the softness of fur), etc. Despite the fact that synesthetic and eidetic "B" images are related components of the primary perceptual "broth" (Scheme 3), the question of their distinction (or identity) remains relevant and requires rigor and accuracy both in further experimental and theoretical studies.

Scheme 3.

The higher-level mental system is an interdependent and interrelated mechanism of the work of sensations, perception and representation, on the basis of which, in the future, the "language of imagination" is born. If a Cro–Magnon "began to create" from the initial basis - sensations and perceptions, this does not mean that his abilities could not evolve, since it is known that his brain changed throughout the Upper Paleolithic and: "... by the time the first images of Homo sapiens were created, sapiens of the Upper Paleolithic had already passed the phase of holistic perception, characteristic of animals, and entered the period of dismemberment of the surrounding reality into its constituent elements, characteristic of primitive, but still human.

It follows from this not only that speech had already "invaded" thinking by that time, but "the first words, no matter how they looked, began to acquire the function of signs. But it also follows from this that the Cro-Magnon did not come out of this phase until the beginning of the Mesolithic" ^{[15, p. 123]}. Nevertheless, it is obvious not only the evolution of man in phylogeny and his development in ontogenesis, but also the evolution of his eidetic ability (this to some extent partially confirms modern scientific assumptions that the intellectual level of Homo sapiens sapiens steadily grew, starting from the Paleolithic and approximately to the New/Modern times). Indeed, man is a living being and his philo- and ontogenesis is a living process where, in addition to biological development, socio–cultural development takes place (scientists of the Marburg and Soviet schools experimentally studied the modern man, who, in addition to his ancient, purely physiological factors, was influenced by factors of modern civilization). Consequently, human eidetism as a relict stage of mental development (mediated by physico-chemical factors) could not remain "preserved" (a kind of "cocoon" it could remain throughout the early and part of the Middle Paleolithic, but not forever) on the scale of the entire history of human existence. Thus, the evolution of art from pure psychophysiology to practical philosophizing of the agrarian-industrial era seems quite natural. How exactly did this evolution happen? It can be assumed that it occurred by transforming the reproductive (mimetic) potential of visual-sensory images into a productive (more creative than the original) level - the synthesis of vision, thinking and speech through the emotional-affective sphere: "... human thinking is realized in two links: subject-visual (inner speech) and speech-motor (expressive speech) codes. In the first link, the thought is set, in the second it is transmitted and set again for the first link. Thus, in a person, the image enters into the very fabric of thought. In other words, images cannot be isolated from the thinking process at all" ^{[15, p. 128]}.

Thus, an eidetic image is a subject–pictorial code of the language of internal and external speech; a special way of storing information that is less redundant, but concrete than natural language. A code that is compactly and permanently recorded on a matrix – the eidetic memory of a person, and which is quite difficult to erase. As a person evolves and develops his sensory, emotional and imaginative apparatus, the spheres presented in diagram 2 were gradually "fragmented" into increasingly complicating modalities (diagram 4).

 Scheme 4.

To date, systemic psychology distinguishes eidetism "in childhood", eidetism of a "creatively gifted person" and eidetism "with altered states of consciousness" ^{[41, p. 9-15]}, studies of which confirm both the dual nature of eidetism (identified by the Marburg School) and several common factors predisposing to the production of eidetic images. Among the latter is a special state of the neurophysiological substrate of the psyche (a flash–like increase in the electrical activity of extensive areas of the cortex and subcortical structures of the brain, providing short-term generation of more nerve connections than occurs during normal brain operation), which allows you to keep the maximum visibility of the perceptual image in perception. The second, no less important factor is the greater than normal emotionality of the carrier of eidetism, which determines the increased sensitivity to a relatively weak stimulus in relation to the norm and, consequently, also contributes to the increased concretization of the visual image. Since the ancient hunters were direct participants in emotionally intense events, it was they (and not ordinary members of the tribe – old men, women, infants) they became carriers of eidetism. Both of these factors today, to one degree or another, directly affect both children's eidetism, and the eidetism of a modern artist, and a person with mental abnormalities (autistic, epileptic), with a "chronically" high emotional tension characteristic of all three in situations that are insignificant to other people and determine the production of unconscious "T"- images. Most likely, the one who left the Paleolithic images was both an artist, an epileptic, and a child in one person, for whom the most essential element of objective reality at that period of human development was the beast and operating on it at the level of the said image. Back in the second half of the XX century, V.N. Toporov noted this, in fact, metonymic property of rock carvings: "... the "connective" connection is the only way of organizing Paleolithic texts ..." ^{[42, p. 83]}.

All these masterfully executed images of bison – scattered, but deeply emotional "sketches", "sketches", "sketches", not connected in any way into a single composition – are "monuments of the era of the original signification" ^{[15, p. 203]}. In a certain sense, this is the result of the initial stage of the conceptual development of the world by the "child", who begins to master speech and learn the world, mimetic activity of the "imitator artist", depicting not just a source of nutrition and life, but also the object of his interest, admiration for his strength, reverence for him as the patron of the genus.  This is the removal of emotional tension by a person "with an altered consciousness" by depicting a psychologically unresolved dilemma: an enemy and a friend, prey, but a higher being. Portraying his "idol" – the beast, and introducing this information to the rest of the community for the purpose of future fruitful hunting (or for some other purpose), the ancient "artist", albeit unconsciously for himself, began to think and feel humanly. The formation of his spiritual world took place "through the knowledge and observation of external nature, the world of animals, which he then understood better, realized more clearly than himself" ^{[21, p.15]}. The proof that in physiological and eidetic images, through total biologism, instinctive and pre-conscious layers of impulse, feelings, drives, already at that time, the "reasonable" emotions of creatures shone through and broke through – is the image of an elephant blocking her baby elephant with her trunk from the attack of a lioness (Algeria). According to the beautiful expression of N.A. Dmitrieva, here "there is already sympathy, empathy, some kind of emotional enlightenment of the gaze" [ibid.]...

However, currently there is another factor contributing to the already conscious "photographing" of the subject of their interest – long–term professional training - training. In contrast to the physiological and eidetic ability of ancient artists, one of the parts of the global "mechanism" of mastering the reality of today's art is socio-eidetic contemplation – observation as a method of cognition, characterized primarily by meaningful contemplation of the object by the subject, with concomitant or subsequent reflection. The procedural approach to the problem of observation includes two initial points of view: on the one hand, observation is a purely sensory, perceptual (fundamental bodily experience) method based on sensory perception and memory (not related to goal–setting); on the other, it is an empirical method of purposeful perception, with concomitant or subsequent reflection. The epistemological specificity of today's art organically combines both: observation is a perceptual-empirical method of cognition of reality based on perception by the senses (as a general sensory method); but at the same time it includes both the primary stage of rational processing of information received by consciousness – that is, primary, concomitant reflection, and determines subsequent, a posteriori reflection based on the already general, integrated process of perceptual-empirical and rational-speculative cognition of the phenomena of the world. These processes are especially valuable in the art of plein air, sketch, and other "spontaneous" types of creativity. Whereas observation with subsequent reflection is an important component of the global "mechanism" of mastering reality when an artist works in the silence of his studio studio, "away" from the noise and worries of civilization.

Far from being devoid of eidetism, which is the link between the modern and primitive world, today's art, nevertheless, has more differences than similarities with similar primitive activity. It differs in both social functions, goals and objectives, and other mechanisms of functioning mediated by civilization. If the basis of Paleolithic art "lies", according to P.A. Kutsenkov, firstly: "compensatory function: satisfying the need for new impressions, images of the Paleolithic era contributed to the accelerated evolution of the species", and secondly, "for tens of millennia Paleolithic paintings and petroglyphs remained nothing more than animal markings, made in a human way" [...], then only in the Mesolithic and Neolithic "they will really begin to make sense, divorced from the physiological need to mark their place of residence" [ibid., p. 202]. The researcher here says that art has contributed (and there is no doubt about it) to the accelerated development of man. According to another version, Paleolithic "art" (the activity of primitive man, the forms of which, developing throughout human history, began to be perceived as art) itself was the result of a "cognitive revolution" caused, in turn, by "gene mutation" ^[8]. In principle, one does not contradict the other, and, consequently, both of these processes could well occur in parallel, stimulating and mutually enriching both each other and other processes: in particular, the development and improvement of the perceptual, sensory apparatus, thinking, imagination, etc.

  The depth of mastering the world by art, from the metal era to the present day, has steadily grown in the direction from the direct impact of psychophysiological factors to the prevalence of religious, social, ethnic, political and other functions in art ^{[43, 44]}. But, nevertheless, each of the arts discussed above are similar in one thing: the desire for knowledge of the new and the existence of the knower and the knowable. The first explores the sphere of the second to reflect its properties (phenomena of the world). In this case, we consider it quite logical to comprehend the unity of all types of art by G. Semper, who deduced the principles of architectonics of the laws of shaping common to all types of art from four initial types of "technical" activity: weaving (weaving), pottery (ceramics), tectonics (wood construction) and stereotomy (stone construction) ^[45]. This again sends us back to the prehistoric times of human life – not so much in nature as together with nature – for thousands of years watching how and for what the spider weaves its web, ants from individual twigs and sticks put their "pyramids" – dwellings, and swallows using their saliva sculpt nests out of clay. All this simply could not but become the basis in the future, first of purely utilitarian and practical activities (necessary for the survival of man as a biological species), and then aesthetic, at a certain stage separated from ordinary work and became purely human. Already in the lower, early layers of its evolution, the status of art "as one of the most ancient forms of human life activity" is enriched with the status of a "form of practical philosophizing" and art itself is isolated from other practices and transformed into professional aesthetic activity. The philosophy of pyramids and ziggurats (a symbol of the unity of the earthly and heavenly worlds, a solemn and gradual ascent), stupas (a symbol of the primordial foundation of the world) and the Torah, the wheels of law (a sign of a turning point in the consciousness of the Buddha and his enlightenment), yin and yang (a symbol of unity and, at the same time, the dialectical structure of the world) succinctly, but succinctly and fully (as a symbol should be) reflect a person's views on the world order as a whole and their position in it. This has become fixed in art as its specificity as a special kind of cognition.

Since the time of the Greek classics, "practical philosophizing of art" (art itself) as a specialized type of activity, it is gradually being separated from the utilitarian (sculpture and painting), and is supplemented and reinforced at the theoretical level specifically by philosophy itself. The art of the XX-XXI centuries, on the one hand, abandoned both mimesis and humanism, on the other – it continued the path of "practical philosophizing" begun in ancient times, based on the perceptual-empirical method of cognition of reality. With the difference that it has become more intellectually technological, rational, pragmatic, etc. But less sincerely emotional: "If you don't propose a new way of producing a work of art, no one will notice you or take you into account" ^{[46, p. 65]}. And since "Emotion is the main deficit in today's world" [ibid., p. 67], then truly emotional art is becoming a deficit in our time. The latter deserves a separate discussion and research, because the complete loss of feelings (not physiological), imagery and poetry in art will, from our point of view, be the greatest catastrophe for humanity. Without emotion, passion, tension, art will cease to be art. F. was still thinking about this . Schiller, rightly believing that art owes its origin not only to a person's desire for knowledge (new and unusual), but also to his need to "feel himself in a state of passion ..." ^{[47, p. 15]}. In fairness, it should be noted that, lagging behind the progressive development of the so-called elite-metropolitan, regional art still retains these emotional, figurative and semantic (essential for art) components.

The evolution of art from its primitive origins through archaic, classical to its modern state is, at the same time, the transformation of human consciousness, and the comprehension through artistic and creative activity of one's being and place in the universe, etc. - the development of its "depth" (the content of art). This is the development of art "in breadth" (the development of artistic form): the proliferation of its types and genres, the growth of stylistic and technological polyphony, etc. As a result, the epistemological specificity of art has thus gone a long way from the psychophysiological hypostasis of the Paleolithic era to practical philosophizing in the modern era, and artistic and creative activity continues to be the most important component of the global "mechanism" of mastering and cognizing reality.