Explication of the Concept of Reality in the Digital Age: Issues of Theory and Methodology

Due to the explosive development of info-communication technologies and the equally explosive transformation of human and social life that followed, philosophers and publicists have started talking about digital reality. Apparently, the time has come to deal with that reality or even with the set of realities that have emerged during the pre-digital era. First, this is necessary for a better understanding of the nature and essence of digital reality itself, and, second, it is important for the most accurate assessment of the prospects of its interaction with pre-digital realities. Thus, in the 20th century, two main ways of constructing pre-digital reality were identified and described, or, more precisely, two models of reality identification were proposed. The first model was constructed using the means of neo-Kantian and phenomenological philosophy of science (Cogen, Cassirer, Husserl), while the second model was born at the junction of pragmatist psychology, phenomenological sociology and sociology of knowledge (Jаmes, Schutz, Berger, Lukman). What unites these models is that reality (unlike things) is not given to us in our direct experience and is not constituted in the direct sense of the word (unlike the world or being). The author proceeds from the assumption that in studying the formation of digital reality it is necessary to use the experience of predecessors and test the hypothesis that digital reality has the properties of both physical and everyday (social) reality. Just like the construction of physical reality and the social construction of everyday reality, the construction of digital reality should prove to be a spontaneous process in all its dimensions. It is also important to understand whether the construction of digital reality is a separate process running in parallel with the construction of theoretical realities and everyday realities, or whether it is the digitalisation of already existing realities.