Rozum, wartości, polis w świecie nowożytnej nicości
Reason, Values, and the Polis in the World of Modern Nothingness

Summary/Abstract: RESEARCH OBJECTIVE: To present a fundamental problem in European culture and civilization. It is a matter of answering the question regarding the relationship between the polis and the world of values. THE RESEARCH PROBLEM AND METHODS: The modern world, or post modernity, gives the impression of total chaos. It is chaos within the sphere of principles governing human cooperation, within the sphere of values. It is there that two non identical and centuries old traditions of thought collide. The article presents dilemmas stemming from this situation. THE PROCESS OF ARGUMENTATION: It is necessary to frame the problem within the context of the history of ideas. Socrates laid the foundation for the “spirit” of Europe. His position was expressed in the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle. The world of values exists objectively. At the dawn of modernity, with Descartes’ thought, the starting point for thinking about the principles of collective life is the Self . This position is developed in the thought of Hobbes and Locke – liberal thought. This position is criticized by Rousseau and Kant. Their opposition will also create the premises for thinking in totalitarian categories (Marx). RESEARCH RESULTS: Modern reflection on the world of values within the sphere of the polis is a return to Locke’s thought; a commonsense apology of liberalism. CONCLUSIONS, INNOVATIONS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS: The position presented in this article indicates that in discussions on modern culture’s axiological chaos, it is necessary to frame the problem against the back drop of a broadly understood spectrum of ideas. The goal is to create awareness that though this “breakthrough” of modernity and “spirit” of Enlightenment played an essential role in scientific progress, their initialization of thought in the categories of the autonomous and sovereign individual simultaneously created premises leading to the individual being left alone; becoming stuck in a world of nothingness.

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