The document as a cognitive object

The problem of scholarly knowledge strata is one of the key subjects in modern philosophy of science and epistemology (theory of knowledge). The three-level model is the most popular in the document sphere as a sociocultural domain; it comprises empirical, theoretical and philosophical scientific knowledge. The author describes collision and contradictions between theoretical documentology and the empirical disciplines of document studies and book studies. He appraises achievements of empirical knowledge in the documentosphere and compares theoretical and methodological ways of three types: informational, conventional and mediatogicat ones. The author is skeptical about the following statement: the concept of document is relative, conventional and conditional in its essence. The author examines "The Strategy for Librarianship in the Russian Federation for the Period up to the Year 2030". He insists that the Strategy has to be supported by the scientific strategy aimed to promote each level of empirical, theoretical and philosophical knowledge. He is also concerned about tacking philosophical level in document studies. The wisdom of philosophy ties in its comprising both rational and irrational sides of objects being studied. With document rational and irrational attributes in view, he offers the philosophical definition of document: document is the statement of humanness within social environment and historical time. This definition comprises anthropological and national variations of homo sapiens and philosophical concept of humanness as the unity of the opposite universal principles - the material and ideal.