Earth’s Cryosphere, 2023, Vol. XXVII, No. 5, p. 47-51.

CRYOSOPHY

CRYOSOPHY: TOWARDS COGNITION OF THE UNITY AND DIVERSITY OF THE WORLD OF COLD

V.P. Melnikov1–3,*, A.V. Brouchkov4, R.Yu. Fedorov1,2

1 Earth Cryosphere Institute, Tyumen Scientific Center of Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences,
Malygina St. 86, Tyumen, 625026 Russia
2 Tyumen State University, International Center for Cryology and Cryosophy, Volodarskogo St. 6, Tyumen, 625003 Russia
3 Tyumen Industrial University, Volodarskogo St. 38, Tyumen, 625000 Russia
4 Lomonosov Moscow State University, Leninskie Gory 1, Moscow, 119991 Russia
*Corresponding author; e-mail: melnikov@ikz.ru

Cryosophy can be considered as conceptual meta-views of cryology. Its main goals are the interdisciplinary integration of ideas about cold and creation of conceptual models ensuring the holistic perception of the cryosphere. To achieve these goals, the scientific understanding of the cryosphere as a system, which would rely on modern general theoretical approaches that have overcome logical empiricism on the way to holism with its epistemological principle “the whole is always more than just the sum of its parts” is of major importance. One of the crucial factors that prevented the formation of a holistic scientific picture of the Earth’s cryosphere during the 20th century was that the cold shell of the planet, which consists of the glaciosphere, cryolithosphere, and atmosphere, was studied by different scientific disciplines. Only at present, the scientific community has made the first steps in considering the cryosphere as an almost one hundred-kilometer sphere around the Earth, the near-surface and subsurface parts of which occupy significant territories of continents and oceans. Given similar understanding, the Earth’s cryosphere can be interpreted as a global geosystem, which penetrates significant areas of commonly accepted geospheres–atmosphere, lithosphere, and hydrosphere, as well as soil horizons and largely determines the matter and energy exchange between them. The examples presented in this paper indicate that the key to understanding the unity and diversity of the world of cold is the philosophical comprehension of the cryosphere as a complex system. Such an understanding should make it possible to overcome logical empiricism and reductionism on the way to holism.

Keywords: cryosphere, cryosophy, phase transitions, classification of cryogenic objects, cryodiversity.

Recommended citation: Melnikov V.P., Brouchkov A.V., Fedorov R.Yu., 2023. Cryosophy: towards cognition of the unity and diversity of the world of cold. Earth’s Cryosphere XXVII (5), 47–51.