Abstract: This paper holds that logical thinking is innovative and functional thinking, and it is a thinking tool to incite scientific development. Only by cultivating students with innovative thinking ability can we continuously deliver fresh troops for scientific development and promote the prosperity and sustainable development of scientific research. The basic way to improve students' logical thinking level and innovative thinking ability is high-level logic teaching. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen the discipline and teaching construction of logic and effectively ensure and improve the teaching quality of logic.
[Keywords:] the innovative function of logical thinking and illogical thinking
In some colleges and universities, the construction and teaching of logic discipline are ignored because they think that the logical thinking of logic research has no innovative significance. This view is quite influential and has a great market, such as the famous scientist Poincare. This view has two theoretical bases: one is that "scientific creative thinking is an abnormal way of thinking characterized by non-experience, hyperlogic and the inversion of thinking procedures and conventional thinking". [1] Therefore, logical thinking has no innovative significance in scientific research. Second, it is considered that pure logic is tautology and cannot create any new scientific viewpoint, so logical thinking has no innovative significance for scientific discovery. That was not the case. Logical thinking is not only innovative in itself, but also leads to the prosperity and progress of scientific research. Therefore, if colleges and universities want to cultivate innovative talents and send fresh troops for China's scientific development, they must strengthen the construction and development of logic discipline and improve the teaching level and quality of logic.
Logical thinking is a thinking tool that leads to scientific innovation and development.
Throughout the history of scientific development, people will find that the scientific revolutionary movement in history is often guided by the development of logical thinking. For example, the deductive logic of Aristotle in ancient Greece brought unprecedented prosperity to the humanities and natural sciences in ancient Greece; Bacon's inductive logic set off a whirlwind of modern scientific revolution; Modern logic promotes the all-round development of modern science and philosophy.
Based on the historical fact of scientific development, Marxist classical writers and world-famous scientists fully affirmed the important position and positive role of logical thinking in the development of scientific innovation. Lenin said: "Any science is applied logic." [2] Einstein believes that the development of western science is based on two major achievements: "formal logic invented by Greek philosophers (in Euclidean geometry) and possible causality discovered through systematic experiments (discovered in the Renaissance)." [2] Therefore, scientists must be "strict logical reasoners". The purpose of scientists is to obtain a logically consistent description of nature. Logic is to it what the law of proportion and the law of perspective are to painters. [3] They are very positive about the position and role of logical thinking in the development of scientific innovation. There is a simple reason. The establishment of any scientific theory is a denial of the old theory. In this sense, any science is innovative; Logical thinking is the only way to transform knowledge technology into scientific theory. Accordingly, it can be said that logical thinking is a thinking tool that triggers scientific innovation and development.
The fact that the modern scientific revolution did not take place in China also illustrates this point. Needham, a famous British historian of science, saw that China people had made many outstanding scientific and technological achievements in ancient times and had a historical foundation of scientific revolution, but the modern scientific revolution did not take place in China, which puzzled him and attracted the attention and thinking of many scholars. In Einstein's view, this is "not surprising". [4] China and Tessa did not create the logical foundation needed for scientific innovation and development. Wu Dayou, a famous physicist, said: "In ancient China, it was mostly technology, not science, that won the West. Without science-based technology, development will be limited. " [5] Technological advantage is not an important condition for transforming into scientific advantage, and China lacks a logical thinking tool for transforming knowledge and technology into scientific theory.
As we all know, technology lies in solving practical problems in human life by using known scientific knowledge, which is obtained by chance in real life and labor. Science is to explore the unknown world and reveal the objective laws of nature, but only through arduous and complicated logical analysis and reasoning can we finally form a scientific knowledge system about a certain problem. China has always attached importance to the overall intuitive insight, but lacked the tradition of logical thinking, paid attention to practical application and ignored basic scientific research, which made China have many great technological inventions, but did not produce a complete natural science system; It has trained countless champions, juren and scholars, but it has not trained a Newton-style scientist; There is a famous practice of inventing gunpowder, but the composition and structure of gunpowder have not been found, and the explosive nature of gunpowder in the scientific sense has not been clarified. All this shows that knowledge and technology are one-sided and discrete without logical thinking, and only with the intervention of logical thinking can they finally be integrated into scientific theory.
Logical thinking itself has innovative function.
The development of logical thinking can lead to the innovation of scientific research and become a logical thinking tool to transform knowledge and technology into a scientific theoretical system, because logical thinking itself has innovative functions. The innovative matrix of logical thinking lies in its rational innovative thinking. The thinking subject abstracts the information materials obtained from perceptual knowledge into concepts, then uses the concepts to judge and form propositions, and then uses the propositions to reason according to certain logical relations, so new ideological knowledge will be deduced.
Concept is a form of thinking that reflects the unique essential attributes of things. People know that when the concept of things has not been formed, people's perceptual knowledge can't grasp the essence of things. Through conceptual thinking, many specific things are analyzed, compared and identified, and the unique essential attributes of things are abstracted. It can be seen that conceptual thinking is not a mechanical imitation, but a rational innovation. Without conceptual thinking, people's understanding of things can only stay at the phenomenon level, and it is impossible to have a comprehensive new understanding of the nature of things.
Judgment is a form of thinking to judge the situation of things, not a simple repetition of the situation reflected by the senses. An agronomist went to a place to inspect the development of animal husbandry, and the local people asked him if he could develop sheep farming. He said, "If you want to raise sheep, you should raise cats first." This judgment embodies the unique vision of agronomists. When people were puzzled, he said, "If you want to raise sheep, you need to plant a lot of clover, but clover depends on bee pollination. There are too many local voles, and the hive is seriously damaged, which affects the development of clover. You should raise a cat to kill rats first. " It can be seen that judgment is a new conclusion after logical analysis. It is also an innovative thinking with its own innovative characteristics.
Reasoning is a logical thinking form that deduces unknown knowledge from known knowledge, including deductive reasoning, inductive reasoning and analogical reasoning, all of which are innovative.
Deductive reasoning has established its important position in logic because of its rigor and inevitability. It also occupies an important position in the history of science because of its innovative function. The innovative significance of deductive reasoning lies in that it can help people analyze the present situation, find problems, and also help people put forward and demonstrate new ideas. The well-known new understanding of the relationship between the weight of an object and its falling speed is closely related to deductive reasoning. As we all know, Aristotle's view that the weight of an object is directly proportional to its falling speed, that is, the greater the weight of an object, the faster the falling speed, has been recognized as an indisputable truth for more than 1000 years. But in the16th century, Italian scientist Galileo questioned this view through an experiment of deductive reasoning. He imagined that if two objects with different weights were tied together, in which A was a heavy object and B was a light object, A and B were tied together and left behind. According to Aristotle's point of view, the additional weight of A and B increases, and its falling speed is faster than that of A alone, but the weight of the two objects is very different. When falling, the slow B holds off the fast A, so A and B are tied together, and its falling speed is slower than that of A alone. Through deductive reasoning, the logical contradiction in Aristotle's viewpoint is exposed, and the viewpoint containing logical contradiction is unscientific, so it is finally replaced by a new viewpoint.
Inductive reasoning is the reasoning that directly deduces general knowledge from individual experience knowledge. This kind of reasoning itself is innovative, because "general knowledge" as the conclusion of reasoning is brand-new knowledge compared with "individual knowledge" as the premise. For example, people found that willow can carry out photosynthesis, so can grass, soybean, cotton and rice. Willow, grass, soybean, cotton, rice, etc. They are all part of green plants, so people say that all green plants can carry out photosynthesis. Innovative examples of inductive reasoning can be seen everywhere, which proves that inductive reasoning is an innovative thinking.
Analogical reasoning is also a kind of thinking with innovative function. It is the inference that two or two objects are the same or different in a series of attributes, and these two (or two) objects are the same or different in other attributes. In the thinking process of analogical reasoning, the attribute used for comparison is the original known knowledge, while it is brand-new knowledge to conclude that its other attributes are the same. In the history of medicine, Harvey put forward the theory of human blood circulation based on the anatomical observation of a snake. It was found that when the snake's artery was clamped, the snake's heart became bigger and purple due to congestion, but it was normal to loosen the artery to clamp the vein, and the snake's heart became flat and white due to ischemia, so Harvey put forward the view of "human blood circulation", which denied the popular view that human blood was produced and supplied by the heart for more than two thousand years. All these thinking facts prove that analogical reasoning is also an innovative thinking.
Logical thinking is the premise and foundation of innovating illogical thinking.
Non-logical thinking is usually called innovative thinking, which mainly includes divergent intuition, inspiration, association and so on. Non-logical thinking plays an important role in scientific discovery, but they are still based on logical thinking.
Intuition, inspiration and association play a great role in the process of human invention and creation, but the content of intuition, inspiration and association is not groundless, it is produced in the hard logical thinking process before. Archimedes realized the law of buoyancy in the bathtub; Newton was hit in the head by a falling apple and realized the law of gravity; The moment Mendeleev stepped on the train, he realized the periodic table of elements; Kekule dreamed that a snake bit his tail and realized the molecular structure of benzene. In all these cases, scientists seem to realize scientific truth through illogical thinking. Actually, it's not. No matter how strange and diverse their epiphany is, there is one thing in common: before their epiphany, they all thought hard and used logical tools for analysis, reasoning and argumentation countless times. Mendeleev didn't sleep for three days and nights, thinking and calculating constantly; Newton forgot whether he had eaten in the laboratory; When attending the dance, Kekule was still thinking about his benzene molecular structure. It can be said that without the help of logical thinking, illogical thinking is impossible to "suddenly realize" scientific truth. As the French biologist Pasteur said, opportunities only favor those who are prepared. Bonger said it more directly. Without long and patient deductive reasoning, it is impossible to have rich intuition. Obviously, intuition, inspiration, association and other illogical thinking are really based on logical thinking.
Logical thinking is not only the premise of illogical thinking, but also determines the goal and direction for intuition, inspiration and association. Because, "in the intense creative thinking activities, without logic, thinking will lose its direction and goal;" There is no way without logic. Any intuition, imagination, association, etc. If it has a goal, it can only be done under the guidance and command of logical thinking. If you leave logical thinking, it is tantamount to insanity, or the contradictory and chaotic thinking of the brain-disabled. " [6] Intuition, inspiration and association in scientific innovation always point to certain goals and directions, and it is logical thinking that sets the goals and directions for intuition, inspiration and association.
Logical thinking not only sets goals and directions for illogical thinking, but also logically analyzes and demonstrates the conclusions produced by intuition, inspiration and association. The characteristic of illogical thinking is to "directly grasp" the essence and law of things. Without clear logical thinking, it is impossible to logically explain and demonstrate the new ideas produced by illogical thinking. This kind of thinking can't have logical certainty and self-sufficiency, which is an unfounded guess. Kekule said humorously, "If we learn to dream, we may find out the truth, but we must be careful not to reveal our dreams until they are confirmed by a clear mind." Because people can't accept imaginary things. It can be seen that after the result of illogical thinking appears, it should be an integrated demonstration of logical thinking. Only in this way can the conclusion of illogical thinking become a scientific view with strict logic.
In a word, logical thinking has innovative function and is innovative thinking. Colleges and universities shoulder the heavy responsibility of cultivating innovative talents, which means cultivating innovative thinking ability to a great extent. There are many ways to cultivate students' innovative thinking ability, but the most basic way is to strengthen the discipline construction of logic and improve the teaching level of logic, so as to cultivate students' logical thinking ability. This is the basic conclusion of this paper.
References:
[1] Lenin. Philosophical notes [M]. Beijing: People's Publishing House, 1974:2 16.
[2] Xu and Fan Dainian. Complete works of Einstein (vol. 1) [M]. Beijing: Commercial Press, 1976: 574.
[3] Xu. Translated by Fan Dainian. Complete works of Einstein (vol. 1) [M]. Beijing: Commercial Press, 1976: 299.
[4] Xu, translated by Fan Dainian. Complete works of Einstein (vol. 1) [M]. Beijing: Commercial Press, 1976: 574.
[5] Zhan Keming, Needham. Problems and Wu Dayou's doubts [N]. The essay newspaper,1996-11-19.
[6] Ge Lin Run. On the logical structure of hypothesis and its position in the system of thinking form [J]. NPC copied the material Logic, 1997, 7:23.
;