Vermont avenue, N.W. washington, D.C. 20571

811 vermont avenue, N.W. washington, D.C. 20571

аспирантура (канд. экз.)

Экзаменационный билет (на 2 листах) по дисциплине

английский язык

(специальность: онтология и теория познания)

Task I. Translate from English into Russian in writing using a dictionary. Your time is 45 minutes

Ideal-types are conceptual abstractions that we employ in trying to get to grips with the complexities of the social world. Weber properly points out that we cannot grasp social phenomena in their totality. Patterns of behaviour and institutional forms like capitalism, or Protestantism, or bureaucracy, are each composed of a large number of interconnected elements, both normative and struc­tural. In order to comprehend any such institution or social formation it is necessary to reduce it to its core components. We do this by singling out and accentuating the central or basic features of the insti­tution in question and suppressing or downgrading those features that could be considered marginal to it. This means that our ideal-type of capitalism, or the bourgeois revolution, or whatever, is unlikely to be an accurate representation of the real thing. It is almost bound to be a somewhat slanted or exaggerated version rather in the way that a cartoonist's caricature is an exaggerated version of a still recognizable face. Thus, an ideal-type of the bourgeois revolution will not conform exactly to the features of any one particular bourgeois revolution; rather, it will be a kind of distillation of the principal features that are characteristic of these revolution in general: in other words, ideal-types only approximate to social reality, they do not and cannot mirror it faithfully.

Situations change

Sometimes, the experience of other people can furnish us with facts we need, but we must remember that situation is not situation, and what works or does not work in one place may turn out differently somewhere else - or at another time. We must learn to observe what particular kinds of mistakes in thinking we make most often. Is it from not seeking the advice of others? Or is it from not using adequately our own experi­ences and our own ideas? Is it from not testing our ideas in a small way before relying upon them in a large way? Each one of us must act as his own judge in finding out his own particular weakness in thinking.

Task II. Translate the letter from English into Russian without a dictionary. Your time is 5-7 minutes

To: Ms Rodoula Ath. ZICCI

Deputy Minister

of National Economy

28 January 2000

Dear Ms Zicci

Herewith I am glad to write in accordance with my forthcoming visit to Greece as a participant to ASIA FORUM 2000 which is to be held in Thesalloniki on 7-8 February.

I was a great pleasure to meet you during my visit to Athens in July.

Taking the chance of going to Greece I would greatly appreciate if you could find a few minutes in your business schedule and meet me and discuss the issues of mutual interest.

Thank you in advance for your kind cooperation and assistance. Looking forward to meeting you, I remain

Sincerely yours

Gennady Bogachev

Deputy Director

аспирантура (канд. экз.)

Экзаменационный билет (на 2 листах) по дисциплине

английский язык

(специальность: онтология и теория познания)

Task I. Translate from English into Russian in writing using a dictionary. Your time is 45 minutes

The point that Weber is touching upon here is that it is illusory to imagine that we can somehow capture the 'real essence' of social reality. Social reality does not possess a real essence because it is always capable of being constructed or represented in various different ways. What counts as social reality depends pretty much upon the conceptual apparatus through which we view it in the first place. Weber's stance on this is, again, noticeably different from that of Marx and Durkheim. Marx was inclined to distinguish between the mere appearances of reality and the essence of reality. Surface reality was never quite the same as the deeper, underlying reality. Hence his celebrated dictum that "…all science would be superfluous if the outward appearance and the essence of tilings directly coincided." As far as Marx is con­cerned there is some ultimate and irreducible level of reality that is not a mere artefact of our own conceptual making. Although there might be different ways of depicting capitalism, the state, and so forth, these different constructs were certainly not to be granted equal validity. There were false constructions and true constructions, bourgeois or ideological conceptions and scientific conceptions.

Some thoughts on creativity

Any individual can acquire the tools of a trade. As he learns to use these tools he becomes technically competent. It is, however, only when he contributes of himself that the individ­ual becomes more than a technician. This giving of oneself is essentially what we mean by creativity.

The ability to create exists in every individual in varying degree and according to inclination. The domains where one may exert his effort are sufficiently varied to offer each individ­ual an opportunity to exhibit originality. The growth of mental potentialities through experimentation with the creative proc­ess broadens the individual's capacity of original contribution.

Task II. Translate the letter from English into Russian without a dictionary. Your time is 5-7 minutes

Sadovaya'Kudrinskaya str.

Russian Federation

Dear Minister

Thank you for your interest to meet representatives of the Brandenburg State Government, especially Prime Minister Dr. Manfred Stoipe, during your stay in the Federal Republic of Germany from April 25"' to April 26"' 2000.

It is my pleasure to invite you to the state of Brandenburg. A copy of your request has been.mailed to the office of the Prime Minister for coordinating purposes.

Sincerely yours

Dr. Wolfgang FьrniЯ

аспирантура (канд. экз.)

Экзаменационный билет (на 2 листах) по дисциплине

английский язык

(специальность: онтология и теория познания)

Task I. Translate from English into Russian in writing using a dictionary. Your time is 45 minutes

Durkheim's view is broadly similar. In his analysis of collective behaviour he is not proposing one possible interpretation among others; he is claiming to reveal the very stuff of social life. In reducing religion to its 'elementary forms' he is seeking to lay bare the substance of supernatural belief, the substance that is found in all religions from the simplest to the most complex. Durkheim's standard working assumption is that the quintessential nature of any social phenomenon can be identified by showing what is common to its various manifes­tations. The task is to uncover what is universal to all religions, to all systems of morality, to all legal institutions, and so on. What is it that apparently disparate things actually share in common? For Durkheim the point of the exercise is not to set up ideal-type constructs that are only weak approximations of social reality, but to penetrate to the fundamental core of reality.

Seen from Weber's angle, even if it were possible to pinpoint some quintessential substance of religion or morality or law, this would still leave all the interesting questions unanswered. In the case of religion, for example, it would still be necessary to show how the doctrinal expressions of the sacred varied from one religion to another. For Durkheim, "The details of dogmas and rites are secondary".

Miracles Do Happen

G. K. Chesterton

The most incredible thing about miracles is that they hap­pen. A few clouds in heaven do come together into the staring shape of one human eye. A tree does stand up in the landscape of a doubtful journey in the exact and elaborate shape of a note of interrogation. I have seen both these things myself within the last few days. Nelson does die in the instant of victory; and a man named Williams does quite accidentally murder a man named Williamson; it sounds like a sort of infanticide. In short, there is in life an element of elfin coincidence which people reckoning on the prosaic way perpetually miss. As it has been well expressed in the paradox of Рое, wisdom should reckon on the unforeseen.

Task II. Translate the letter from English into Russian without a dictionary. Your time is 5-7 minutes

To: Mr Kim-nee LEE

Minister of Trade

Ministry of Trade and Industry