The meetings minutes of the Philosophical society at St. Petersburg University as a source on history of Russian science

The main goal of the article is a complex analysis of the meetings minutes of the Philosophical Society at St. Petersburg University. It should be stressed that it is the first such research, because the meetings minutes of the Philosophical Society have never been studied by other scholars before. The Philosophical Society was established in 1897. Among its founders were a number of famous scientists and scholars -A.I. Vvedensky, V.S. Soloviev, E.L. Radlov, V.M. Bekhterev, I.P. Borodin, A.S. Famintsyn, S.F. Platonov, A.S. Lappo-Danilevsky, S.A. Zhebelev, M.I. Tugan-Baranovsky, N.I. Kareyev, A.F. Koni, O.D. Khvolson, etc. The aim of the society was the development and dissemination of philosophical knowledge in Russia. According to its charter, the society had the right to organized closed meetings and public scientific meetings. The article is based on the meetings minutes of the Philosophical Society, which were published in two books of the Moscow journal "Voprosy filosofii i psikhologii" for 1899 and 1900. There are 22 meetings minutes of the society (a meeting was in 1897, 11 in 1898 and 10 in 1899). Besides, the archival documents from the St. Petersburg Branch of the Archives of Russian Academy of Sciences and the scientific articles of members of the Philosophical Society were used in the article. On the basis of the studied material the authors came to the conclusion that the meetings minutes of the Philosophical Society at St. Petersburg University are an important and interesting source on history of Russian science as the information contained in its bring a fairly complete picture of the everyday life of one of the most interesting scientific society at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, as well as its show the level of development of philosophy in Russia during the period under investigation. Moreover, they show the significance of the society in the socio-cultural space of the country and its relationships and links with different scientific institutions too. First of all, the minutes contain materials on the organizational, personnel and financial issues of the society. The most interesting materials of the meetings minutes were information on giving scientific reports, speeches and discussions. The famous scientists and scholars were the active participants of the society meetings that attracted a wide audience of scientists, scholars and students. The Philosophical Society was an important phenomenon in the history of Russian science, and the results of its activities are an important contribution to the development of Russian culture.

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