The middle of the twentieth century has become a defining era for the scientific potential of mankind. There is a need to determine the functions of science in the social and cultural aspects, as well as the consequences that led to progress in science and technology. This led to a reorientation of the philosophy of science, and also to the fact that a phenomenon such as post-non-classical science began to take shape. The philosophical and worldview views and original ideas about the various types of epistemological and scientific activities characteristic of the post-war period had a huge impact on its occurrence. Both the subject matter and the conceptual apparatus of this special area took shape simultaneously with the development of the philosophy of science, and are the subject of philosophical interest and analysis.
At the end of the 19th century, the classical model of science developed the principles of bringing epistemological activity in accordance with the methodological ideal, which led to a certain standardization of scientific knowledge, as well as the appearance of mathematical logic models , which made it possible to clarify the structural features of scientific knowledge. At the same time, it turned out that the development of this knowledge was associated with crisis phenomena, and also that the claims of classical science to find absolute knowledge did not take into account the existence of so-called subjective knowledge, various types of rationality and dynamic processes. So began the stage, which began to bear the corresponding name: postclassical science.
Nevertheless, attempts to build a unified science continued on the basis of the language of physics and mathematics. Towards the end of the 1960s, these normative logical and mathematical programs of neopositivism caused such strong disappointment that there were doubts in society that any rationing of the epistemological process was possible at all. This was facilitated by post-non-classical philosophy, such as poststructuralism and postpositivism, which put forward the idea that the positivism methodology should be replaced by pluralism of methodological concepts that criticize each other and thus approach the truth. Among these theories are Karl Popper's theory of falsifications, Kuhn's concept of scientific revolutions, Lacatos' research programs methodology, Polanyi's idea of implicit knowledge, and many others.
Post-non-classical science has its own characteristics. First of all, it is characterized by the already mentioned idea of relativity of the norms of cognition in the field of science and related practice. In addition, in the framework of this model of science, criticism of the so-called scientific fundamentalism is heard, which is trying to fundamentally reduce all available knowledge to some basic types of it. In epistemology and methodology, it is assumed that at the same time different competing theories and "pictures of the world" can coexist, as well as the rivalry of various programs. At the same time, emphasis is placed on the diversity of relations between different theories and their groups, even those that are mutually exclusive, including competition, addition, criticism, and so on. At the same time, the leading theme is the need to get along with opponents and opponents and manage conflicts peacefully, by consensus - and not only in the scientific, but also in the social environment.
One of the key concepts that post-non-classical science operates with is the paradigm. It denotes the integrity of the beliefs, means and values adopted in the scientific community and ensuring the continuity of a particular tradition. We can say that the paradigm is a phenomenon that brings together those who are ranked among the scientific community. It also determines the range of problems that they deal with. When the paradigm changes, a scientific revolution takes place and a complete or partial transformation of the picture of the world that science draws, although it is dictated not only by logical, but by value considerations.
Post-non-classical science is also characterized by the presence of synergetics. This is an interdisciplinary complex of various studies that search for common principles for physical, chemical, biological, economic, social and other systems and their self-organization. Synergetics also assumes the concept of chaos as an extremely complex ordering, which is always potentially ready to manifest itself in a variety of ordered structures. This means giving up the picture of the world built, as if from bricks, from elementary particles, in favor of the world as a set of processes.