Идея грехопадения в научном воображении Павла Флоренского

One of the most characteristic motifs of Pavel Florensky’s oeuvre is his famously harsh criticism of science in conjunction with a kind of scientific apologetics. Constantly attacking the so-called «scientific worldview», he directed all his learning — casually mixing scientific and esoteric sources — towards justifying the alternative, «Christian worldview». This work aims to put these attitudes into the context of intellectual history and history of ideas. The idea of the fall of man, which fuelled early modern discussions of scientific epistemology and seems to have acquired a new relevance in connection with the fin de siècle’s «revolt against positivism», proves to be particularly important. Through the analysis of a variety of little-studied materials, from the cover of the journal «Makovets» to Florensky’s obscure meditations on the history of science, it is shown that this particular idea regulated his scientific imagination to a considerable extent: it influenced Florensky’s views on the nature of scientific knowledge as well as some of his most renowned scholarly projects (e.g., the theory of «imaginary plane» and the concept of «reverse perspective»).