“Being”, “reality”, “meaning” in the process of evolution of philosophical and theoretical thinking

The article analyzes the similarities and differences in three historical types of theoretical thinking - classical, new and modern, each of which differs both ontologically and methodologically. In the classical type of philosophizing, the central category of the theoretical representation of the world is the concept of being, in the new one - reality, and in the newest this role is played by the concept of meaning. The peculiarity of the classical type of theoretical comprehension of the concept of being is speculation. The speculative method characteristic of ancient and medieval philosophy is also based on it, which, in addition to analysis and systematization, abstraction and generalization, universal for theoretical thinking, includes speculation itself. Reflection becomes a special method of the new philosophy, and the central category of a new type of theoretical thinking - reality - is constructed. In the philosophy of the newest period of theoretical thinking, thought is directed to reconstruct the relationship between sign and meaning, as well as between meaning and meaning. This transition makes it possible to abandon the desire to comprehend being theoretically - it is analytically determined through its presence in human existence. At the same time, reality is not constructed, but reconstructed. Both the first and the second lose their primacy, turning into categories defined through the category of meaning.