The legacy of P. Feyerabend: a look from the digital realities of the XXI century

Abstract

The article analyzes the ways of expressing the methodological message of P. Feyerabend, implemented by modern digital reality. The object of the study is the specifics of digital reality, and the subject is the forms of implementation of P. Feyerabend's methodological message in it. Using hypothetical-deductive and hermeneutic approaches, the author correlates the positions of P. Feyerabend's epistemological anarchism with the features of modern cyberphysical reality. The comparison of the first "counter-rule" – the principle of proliferation is carried out in relation to the understanding of hybrid society and the metaverse. The principle of incommensurability, understood by Feyerabend as a condition for the absence of criteria for assessing the truth of the theory, is compared with the heterogeneity of the digital environment. The main conclusions of the study are the highlighted parallels between the principle of proliferation and the constant transformation of the actors of the digital society, evaluated from the standpoint of expanding the possibilities of creativity. The principle of incommensurability is compared with the constant generation of new conventions by the digital environment, the presence of heterogeneous modalities. The modern way of thinking is positioned in the discourse of the given "counter-rules" as the implementation of complex network thinking. Feyerabend's premise for the perception of archaic man correlates with the idea of cybernetic animism. The scientific novelty of the work consists in fixing the parallels of Feyerabend's theoretical premises and the reality of the modern hybrid world with its ways of thinking, revealing the internal contradiction of Feyerabend's position and the ambiguity of the embodiment of his methodological guidelines in a modern hybrid society.