Epistemological Status of a Logical Procedure: Logical vs Cognitive?

The article contains the results of a study of logical procedures (LPs) as a variety of cognitive ones. The psychological and logical approaches to the analysis of LPs are differentiated. A logical and philosophical interpretation of LPs in the formal paradigm as a system of proof and proof-search (by Vladimir Bryushinkin) is discussed. The methodological and applied problems associated with this interpretation are formulated. In particular, a modeling relation between a formal LP and natural thinking procedures deprives the former of the status of a constructive element of cognitive processes. Moreover, natural reasoning loses the sign of logicality. The necessity of a system interpretation of LPs as a subject-object structure is substantiated. The LP concept is constructed through the restriction of the cognitive procedure concept. It is emphasized that: the LP object is logical forms of thought, the subject is their logical properties and relations; process and result are always expressed in some language; the result is a logical object. The LP is defined as a system of cognitive operations (carried out by a subject using a natural or artificial language) on logical signs of logical forms of thought, aimed at constructing a logical object with characteristics caused by these signs. The LP class is analyzed. Procedures for operating with logical objects and procedures for their generation are differentiated in it. The LP conceptual signs and the cognitive parameters of the thinking processes are correlated. The following procedures are eliminated from the LP set: metalogical procedures for interpreting a certain context as a logical task; intellectual operations on logical forms of thought with significant destructions of their macrostructures; pseudo-logical operations of human thinking based on the manipulations of language constructs. The article reflects the first part of a research on LPs. The second part will discuss the analysis of the structural characteristics of LPs, the problem of differentiation of normative and descriptive forms, the coverage of applied issues of the LP theory.

Keywords

Authors

References