The concept of memory in the works of ancient philosophers (socio-philosophical perspective)

Relevance. Social memory plays an important role in the life of a society. Selecting information about past events and transforming for the purpose of preserving accumulated social experience and passing it down through generations, social memory doesn’t only influence the state of a modern society but, also acting as a link between the past, present and future, it is an important factor in the process of social development and it consolidates society, serves as the foundation for its social identity formation. To understand the phenomenon of social memory and its powerful influence on the formation of social consciousness and the maintenance of social identity, it is necessary to go back to the origins to Antiquity, when the philosophical foundations for its study were laid.

The purpose is to identify various approaches to understanding the nature of social memory in the works of philosophers of Ancient Greece.

Objectives: to reveal the features of social memory concepts of the greatest Greek thinkers Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, to highlight methods and mechanisms of preserving social memory in Ancient Greek society.

Methodology. The study was conducted using methods such as hermeneutics, phenomenology, comparative analysis, and system analysis.

Results. Within the scope of this article the works of three prominent ancient philosophers Plato, Aristotle and Plotinus have been examined, in which the thinkers explored the phenomenon of memory that allowed to form the understanding of the development trends of ideas about memory in Ancient Greek society. The peculiarities of understanding the nature of memory, factors influencing its functioning have been identified, mechanisms of its fixation in public consciousness have been determined. Going back to the origins of the research of understanding and preserving social memory problem has emphasised the importance of documenting major events in people’s collective consciousness as the future is impossible without understanding the past, including its positive and negative aspects.

Conclusions. The philosophical basis for studying social memory was laid in ancient times. In this period the phenomenon of memory was considered at the level of human consciousness in the context of the problem of the cognition of the world and memory itself was just a condition of the process of cognition. Memory was seen as a container for information, the content of memory was linked to the past and memory itself is an acquired trait that develops over time.

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