Gacheva A.G. Fight against hunger in the philosophy of Russian cosmism: From Vasily Chekrygin to Vladimir Vernadsky // The Russian Peasant Studies. 2025. V.10. №2. P. 37-62.

EDN: AFTTUR

Annotation

The article continues the discussion about the ways to fight against hunger suggested in the philosophy of Russian cosmism. Thus, the idea of overcoming hunger through the common cause is presented in the works of V. N. Chekrygin and his treatise On the Council of the Resurrection Museum. The author considers practical proposals of N. F. Fedorov and his followers — A. K. Gorsky, N. A. Setnitsky, V. N. Muravyov — related to the ideas of artificial rainmaking and of turning the army into a natural-science force, focusing on their place in the “economy of regulation” developed by Russian cosmism. The article presents the approaches of Gorsky, Setnitsky and Muravyov to the issues of labor and their visions of the culture of the future, emphasizing that, unlike A. M. Gorky’s and biocosmists’ Prometheistic interpretation of regulation, Gorsky, Setnitsky and Muravyov followed Fedorov in defining regulation as a personal religious duty to fulfill the commandment of “possessing land” and cultivating world to transform it into the Kingdom of God. The author considers the ideas of the natural-science branch of cosmism presented by N. A. Umov, K. E. Tsiolkovsky, V. I. Vernadsky and A. L. Chizhevsky, who defined the human mind as a key agent in world development and the creator of the noosphere, thus, interpreting hunger as a noospheric task.

Keywords

Philosophy of cosmism, problem of hunger, exploitation, regulation, science, economy, legacy of N. F. Fedorov, cosmists’ projects of the 1920s–1930s, A. K. Gorsky, N. A. Setnitsky, V.N. Muravyov, biocosmism, V.N. Chekrygin, treatise On the Council of the Resurrection Museum.

About the author

Anastasia G. Gacheva, DSc (Philology), Leading Researcher, A. M. Gorky Institute of World Literature of the Russian Academy of Sciences; Head of the Center for Cosmism Studies, Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences; Chief Librarian, N. F. Fedorov Moscow Library No. 180. Povarskaya St., 25A, bld. 1, Moscow, 121069.
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