Social Evolution as an Integral Part of Universal Evolution

The present article is devoted to the issue of unity of laws, patterns and mechanisms of evolution at all its stages and levels and also to the place of social evolution in the single and universal process of universal evolution or mega-evolution. Despite the enormous differences between cosmic, planetological, chemical, biological, and social evolutions, there are many similarities. Unfortunately, quite a few works are devoted to their identification. In the present article we will consider a number of such important similarities, which, in our opinion, clearly demonstrate the systemic-structural and functional-evolutionary unity of the world at its different levels and in different areas. The understanding of these similarities deepens our perception of social evolution and its regularities, and leads us away from the false idea that social evolution in all aspects is different from the evolution of previous levels. In the first section our key goal is to give our own definitions of evolution and social evolution which would cover as many variants of evolutionary changes as possible. In the second section we tried to give a rather voluminous and dialectical picture of the unfolding universal evolution instead of a primitive scheme: cosmic – biological – social. There introduce notions of main and transitional phases of universal evolution and show the importance of its planetological and chemical phases. In the third section we show that one can reveal a number of similarities at all levels and phases of mega-evolution, which can be generalized in uniGrinin and Grinin / Social Evolution as a Part of Universal Evolution 21 versal laws, rules, mechanisms, patterns and principles of evolution. One should note that in fact none of the important laws and principles as well as none of important rules of evolution have been ‘lost’ in the process of moving from lower to higher levels. They were only modified and became more complicated, and there also appeared some new principles and rules (in retrospect one can see their rudiments at the lowest levels of evolution). Some of these laws and rules are described in this section. In the fourth section we will try to present some evolutionary and philosophical ideas that explain the profound similarity in the laws and patterns of mega-evolution at all its levels and phases. In the Conclusion we discuss evolutionary and non-evolutionary matter.