A method in the broad sense of the word is a system of certain techniques or methods that can be applied in any area of a person’s life to implement his social activities.
For example, the methodology of science studies the development of scientific knowledge and its structure, as well as a variety of justifications for the results of these studies. In addition, the scope of the methodology of science includes the study of mechanisms and forms of implementing the knowledge gained in practice.
Any method includes a set of prescription systems, certain principles and requirements that determine the course of action of a particular subject to achieve a particular goal.
The classification of methods of scientific knowledge is reduced to a multi-level concept of methodological knowledge, which includes the following main groups.
- Philosophical methods. This variety of methods includes the dialectical method of scientific knowledge, and the metaphysical. These are the most famous, universal methods of scientific knowledge. In addition to the above, the philosophical methods include analytical (characteristic of modern analytical philosophy), phenomenological, intuitive and hermeneutical.
- General scientific approaches, as well as research methods.
- Special methods (private scientific) research.
- Disciplinary methods of scientific knowledge.
- Interdisciplinary research methods.
The classification of methods of scientific knowledge in the context of a philosophical approach to the study of its basic laws often uses precisely the dialectical approach to the problem.
Dialectics, in turn, is divided into three main forms. The first is the ancient dialectic, called "spontaneous and naive," since its arguments were exclusively worldly experiences. There is a well-known postulate of the founder of the ancient dialectic of Heraclitus, who claimed that "everything flows, everything changes." Another representative of this type of scientific knowledge was Plato: in his understanding, dialectics was the art of dialogue. Zenon tried to define real contradictions in the logic of concepts.
Also, the classification of methods of scientific knowledge is based on German classical dialectics as a philosophical method. This form of dialectics was developed by Hegel, Kant, Schelling, Fichte - German philosophers who made an invaluable contribution to the development of this science.
Materialist dialectics - the third kind of dialectics - is a system of views, categories, laws and principles, laid down by the classics of Marxism.
The dialectical method of scientific cognition of the world states that since the real world is constantly in motion, developing, moving from one life form to another, then all concepts and categories associated with this dynamic of the objective world should be flexible, flexible, reflect unity and struggle opposite categories of the world, to be interconnected in order to reflect reality as accurately as possible.
Given that the classification of methods of scientific knowledge applies to absolutely all spheres of human life, it is equally successfully applied in the social, economic, political spheres of human life.
Dialectic principles include, first of all, the historicism of the phenomenon - that is, the examination of the subject of study in its constant movement and development. The principle of comprehensive consideration is also fundamental in dialectics. In addition, principles such as concreteness, objectivity, the principle of contradiction, determinism also belong to the fundamental basic principles of the dialectical method of studying the world and are used to study phenomena, events, objects in their entirety.