Documents / FOIA release
This Central Intelligence Agency JPRS report, dated 1 May 1989, is an English translation of an essay by academician Boris Raushenbakh from the Moscow journal Kommunist. The essay argues that people need both rational scientific knowledge and metaphorical, emotional knowledge, and that these connect to morality and religious feeling. It also criticizes crude atheist propaganda and calls for restoring moral principles. The only mention of UFOs is a passing remark that some people turn to belief in flying saucers.
Read from the scan by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word.
Document 3 of 3 43. The irrational component must be mandatorily taken into consideration in defining the objective toward which we must advance. The rational component calls for suggesting the most sensible ways of solving the problems. In other words, the objective must be moral and the way to achieve it, reliable. It is entirely obvious that not only the end objective but each step toward it must be consistent with the criteria of morality. 44. This problem has assumed new features in recent years. Until recently, rational science looked at anything "'irrational'" with a certain feeling of superiority, as though even as an obstruction to progress. However, this was progress conceived precisely from the viewpoint of rational knowledge. Let us consider the unrestrained aspiration of departments to build huge dams, canals and such similar "'construction projects of the century.'" When the humanitarian public was indignant by this, pointing out that this would destroy historical monuments, unique landscapes and the habitats of small nations or, in other words, the immorality of such projects, its arguments were considered secondary, far-fetched and unworthy of attention. The claim that "'the country needs metal, electric power, irrigation,'" and so on was always considered more substantive. The strictly "'rationally'" oriented "'thinkers'" undertook to define what precisely "'the country needs,'" with enviable conceit. In a somewhat different form, this process is also inherent in the West. It is the natural consequence of uncontrolled scientific and technical progress. We now see its results. The entire world is beginning to consider with concern its current condition, and forecasts leave no room for complacency. 45. Everywhere we note an exceptionally curious picture: the strictly rational knowledge, based on numerous computers, all of a sudden noticed with a feeling of horror, where this had taken mankind. It became clear that a radical restructuring is needed, if one may say so, in human behavior. Continuing the practice of recent decades would inevitably lead to ecological catastrophe. However, even before this had been realized the humanitarians, the creative intelligentsia and a high percentage of the people had already started, with an enhanced feeling of moral responsibility, to struggle against the arising catastrophe: for many long years 'red books'' for the protection of the natural world from destruction have been kept, ever new movements are appearing for the rescue of unique natural formations such as Lake Baykal, etc. 46. It would be useful to reemphasize that the feeling, a kind of ache for the fate of the earth and the country, preceded the computations which merely confirmed that which was said initially. Furthermore, the loss of moral criteria in the daily behavior of the
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FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. The text was read from the page images by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word. 13 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.