Logical method of investigation: step-by-step instruction

Based on the forms and laws of thinking, the logical method includes ways and means of study and explanation. Can be applied and applied to the study of various disciplines. The logical method in dialectics coincides with the materialistic in the theory of knowledge, and the formal method, for example, is a special method in mastering the legal reality and many other fields of knowledge.

Right

Due to its special features and capabilities, legal ground is the most favorable for the application and use of logic. Since there is a formally defined, consistent and strictly fixed system that includes a lot of definitions of the legislative plan that correspond to the rules for establishing concepts (through the nearest genus, species difference, genetic definition, through description of instructions, etc.), the logical method in the field of law fully manifests itself. Every law of logic - contradictions and identities, sufficient grounds, excluded third - reflects the main features of this method. The main processes and procedures (primarily law enforcement and law-making processes) are built strictly according to the forms of thinking - rules of operating inferences, judgments, concepts.

The logical method is applied already at the stage of the main definitions: the legal norm is a judgment that meets all the requirements of judgment in general, and the application of law to the situation or to a specific person is a syllogism, that is, a deductive reasoning, where the legal norm is the main premise, the case given for consideration is a smaller premise , And the decision on this case is a conclusion. From the earliest times are in the arsenal of jurisprudence analogies, methods of proof and logical operations. To use the logical method of research when studying and explaining the law is simply necessary. Only in this way can we avoid contradictions in the legislative arrangement of an effective system of law, where the positive (existing) right is harmonized with all the requirements of the natural, and also the opportunity to competently apply legal norms.

General logical methods: analysis

Among the logical methods of cognition of processes, phenomena, objects of the objective world, there is synthesis, analysis, idealization, abstraction, deduction, generalization, analogy, induction, modeling, extrapolation and hypothesis.

The logical method of investigation (cognition) begins with analysis, that is, from the schedule, analysis, dismemberment of the object under study. This method is concluded in the mental or practical analysis of the composition of elements - attributes, properties, structural parts, after which each element is to be examined separately as a part of the whole. Analysis has a variety of types, depending on the specifics of the object, which is subjected to research. Modern science adopts a system analysis - an approach to the studied object as an organized system, where the elements are inextricably and organically interrelated and affect one another.

Methods of logical analysis include a methodological approach to the fruits of cognitive activity, that is, the study of knowledge of people, all of its forms and types, and knowledge is expressed in natural and artificial means of language, based on the laws of logic. For example, when studying society as an integral system, system analysis divides into political, economic, moral, legal and other aspects, where each aspect of social being and consciousness is examined separately. The logical method of cognition by means of analysis reveals structural elements - types, types, levels of knowledge, designed with a certain text. Further, their ratio, falsity or truth of statements is established, the conceptual apparatus that realizes knowledge is specified, the validity, consistency and proof of this knowledge are established.

Synthesis

Synthesis is an integral part of the research, without which a structurally-logical method is impossible. Through synthesis, all available knowledge is combined into a whole. Lawyers have laws and laws formulated on the basis of personal research, all the postulates of the general theory of the state and law, as well as special interdisciplinary and branch theories of law.

A really thinking person always uses logical methods, and analysis and synthesis are always interconnected. Here one can note the analytical and at the same time synthetic character of the thinking of a good lawyer - a prosecutor, a lawyer, a judge, an investigator. Professional activity, for example, the judge, by all means provides for an analysis of all materials that are submitted to the court, and then on the basis of studies of what is read and heard, he makes up a mental holistic picture of the case. Thus, the interdependence of analysis and synthesis helps to ensure accurate and impartial conduct of litigation.

Abstraction

General scientific logical methods can be supplemented with abstraction (abstraction), which is a process of mental abstraction from certain common or separate properties, relationships, attributes of the studied subject, since at the moment particulars are of no interest. Aristotle, the founder of this concept, cited abstraction as the process of separating all the accidental and the secondary from the general and the main. Now this term is used much broader. This is a scientific and logical method, both in everyday and in scientific knowledge, which is both an algorithm and an order for the procedure of abstraction according to the rules of abstraction, this is the construction of abstract objects in scientific cognition. The essence of this method is not as simple as it seems. First of all, it is necessary, again, a detailed study of the real object, phenomenon or process, the isolation in it of various qualities, attributes, properties, after which everything that is secondary is discarded.

This process of cognition is also the result. That is, the research process - in the study of phenomena and objects, and the goal is to identify specific characteristics. The result is knowledge obtained in categories, concepts, ideas, judgments, theories, laws. For example, logic can abstract from less important individual characteristics, if it studies the way of thinking of a particular person, and the general, inherent in all subjects, takes into account. For a lawyer, for example, thinking is regulated by legal norms, therefore, it is abstracted from all kinds of manifestations of relations on the part of society, and studies primarily legal relations, ie, only that which is sanctioned and regulated by law.

Idealization

This kind of abstraction helps to create ideal objects. The concept of an idealized object differs from other concepts in that along with the real features of an object, those that are far from real properties are reflected here, and in the pure form in the objects under study are not present at all. The method of idealization in modern sciences creates theoretical objects that help to build reasoning and draw conclusions related to real objects. The term is used in two meanings - as a process and as a result, which is also very similar to the method of analysis. The first meaning of idealization is understood as a mentally created idealized object in the formation of idealized assumptions, that is, conditions under which a really existing object can be described and explained.

As a result of this process, idealized concepts and laws appear, which are called logical constructs. As an example of an idealized object, the concept of a law-governed state can be cited. The concept is, but the legal state in the form in which it is commonly understood, does not exist yet. However, lawyers can use this concept to construct reasoning and draw conclusions about the activities of various existing entities, for example, states, on the basis of features that are inherent in the rule of law: basic human rights are constitutionally and legislatively fixed, laws prevail in state and public life, Legally protected and so on.

Generalization, induction and deduction

It is in the process of generalization that appropriate hypotheses, theories and concepts are formed. This method in legal cognition can exist in the form of generalization on the basis of the analysis of professional experience of concrete cases, in the form of the theory of law by theoretical generalization of practical construction and the implementation of legal activity, in the form of generalization of branch empirical theories of law.

Induction and deduction are logical methods of cognition, used in the search for conclusions from the original data. Both methods are naturally interrelated: deduction helps to draw conclusions from theoretical ideas, laws, principles, since it is connected with building an idealized object, and induction generalizes empirical regularities. Knowledge, which is obtained by induction, is just a prerequisite for the emergence of new knowledge - demonstrative, which already becomes a basis for partial theoretical truths.

Analogy, extrapolation

Analogy is one of the most effective methods of the cognitive process. With his help, great discoveries were made in science. Its essence lies in the fact that certain properties and characteristics are transferred from one subject of research to another, in the same way relations and connections between one and the other set of objects are transferred.

Extrapolation - a kind of induction, generalization and analogy, this method is very widely used in almost all sciences. Qualitative characteristics extend from one area of the subject to another, from the past to the future, from the present to the future, the quantitative characteristics are transferred in the same way, some areas of knowledge are equalized with others, as a method of mathematical induction, for example. Most often, the extrapolation method is used for forecasting purposes, justifying the transfer of knowledge to other subject areas. Lawyers have this analogy of law and the analogy of law.

Modeling, hypothesis

Modeling in modern science is used very actively to find ways to obtain the latest scientific results. The essence of this method in the construction of a particular model that studies social or natural objects. Under the model it is customary to understand a lot, it can be: analog, method, type, system, theory, world picture, interpretation, algorithm and much more. If it is impossible to directly study an object, the model acts instead of it as an imitation of the original. For example, an investigative experiment.

And the hypothesis (assumption) as a method is used in the sense of a problematic knowledge or idea that allows to combine a body of knowledge into their system. Legal activity uses the hypothesis in all its meanings: an assumption is made about the actual data of a particular object, phenomenon or process, about the causes of problems and the forecasting of the future. The same data can become material for several hypotheses, so-called versions. This method is also used for forensic investigation.

Formally-logical method

Knowledge of the laws of inference from verified truths helps to get formal logic. The previously established truths, which are the basis of the conclusion, do not require recourse to experience in each particular case, since knowledge is obtained by applying the rules and laws of thought. Logical methods of scientific research include traditional and mathematical logic.

The first to derive new conclusions uses analysis, synthesis, induction, deduction, abstraction, concretization, analogy and comparison. A mathematical, also called symbolic, logic applies to the problems of formal logic the more rigorous methods used in mathematics. The special language of formulas can logically and adequately describe the structure of evidence and build a rigorous and precise theory, applying the description of judgments in their extension - the description of conclusions.

Historical method

Very different methods of research are used to construct theoretical knowledge about developing and complex objects that can not be reproduced through experience. For example, the universe. How to see its formation, the origin of species and the emergence of man? Historical and logical methods of cognition will help. The historical is able to penetrate the real history with the variety of its specifics, reveal historical facts and mentally recreate the historical process, revealing the logical pattern of development.

Logical also reveals regularities in a different way. He does not need to directly consider the course of real history, he reveals the objective reality by studying the historical process at the highest stages of development, where he in a condensed form reproduces the structure and functioning of historical evolution in the most basic features. This method is good in biology, where phylogeny is repeated in ontogeny. Both historical and logical methods exist as methods of constructing purely theoretical knowledge.