Problems of legitimation of knowledge in the context of the concept of critical rationalism of K. Popper and in post-modern discourse
The article analyzes the problem of knowledge legitimation in analytical and postmodern aspects; performs an attempt to review tautology as the principle of knowledge legitimation (R. Barthes, J.F. Lyotard). It is assumed that the ordering of elements is determined by the norm, but cannot be explained by the latter: the relevance of norms becomes so as a result of following certain rules. The question of the possibility / impossibility of falsifying the basis statements is considered in terms of metaphysical nature of the latter (K. Popper). The principle of knowledge legitimation, which is referred to by the representatives of neo-post-positivism, is a permanent attempt to rationalize the irrational. But this attempt may be successful only within the set (pre-specified) rules of the game, as in fact in every case there takes place the determination of the rational as rational and the irrational as irrational by its opposite. In this case, as an example, the article describes the so-called "theory of final explanation" of K. Popper in which he interprets Plato's theory of ideas in terms of the nature of definition. Taking into account L. Wittgenstein's statement that "Verity of tautology is reliable... The logical product of tautology and proposals says the same thing as the original proposals", it is necessary to take into account the possibility / impossibility of tautology as description in principle. If following K. Popper we recognize Plato's world of ideas as the "theory of final explanation", we find ourselves in a situation in which the theory of evolution, which is an obvious tautology, will also be assigned to the theory of final explanation. K. Popper's statements about the tautology of the evolutionary theory lead to a question why implicit tautology (unlike explicit tautology) can be regarded as an informative statement, and whether it is lawful in this case to share an opinion that tautology describes nothing? Thus, the problem of tautology of a definition is a problem of possibility / impossibility of a particular discourse, assertion of which is determined by its ontology, and "rationalization" of the latter, despite the paradoxicality of the situation, gets an apophatic status.