ДЕДУКТИВНЫЙ МЕТОД

Deductive Method

A method of scientific inference based exclusively on deductive techniques. Attempts have been made in philosophy to draw a line of distinction between the Deductive Method and other methods (such as the inductive) and to define deductive reasoning as excluding experience and laying excessive stress on deduction in science. However, deduction and induction are interconnected, and deductive reasoning is based on many centuries of man's practical and cognitive effort.

Deductive Method is one of the valid methods of scientific inference, used, as a rule, to systematize empirical data after they have been accumulated and theoretically interpreted, in order to infer all pertinent effects more strictly and consistently. This yields new knowledge, among other things, an aggregate of possible interpretations of a deductively formulated theory. The general scheme of the deductive systems (theories) includes: (1) basic premisses, that is, the aggregate of basic terms and propositions; (2) the devices of logic (rules of deduction and definition) used; (3) the theory obtained from (1) by applying (2).

Examination of such theories involves analysis of the interrelation of their specific components abstracted from the genesis and development of knowledge. It is, therefore, desirable to consider them as formalized languages, which can analyse either syntactically or semantically—syntactically when examining the relation between symbols and expressions entering the language in isolation from their extra-lingual meaning, and semantically when the relations between symbols and expressions of the system are examined from the standpoint of their meaning and validity.

Deductive systems are divided into axiomatic and constructive. When applied to knowledge based on experience and experiment, Deductive Method is more precisely termed as hypothetico-deductive. Analysis of the Deductive Method of inferring scientific knowledge began in antique philosophy, and was dealt with at length in more recent times by Descartes, Pascal, Spinoza, Leibniz, and others. However, the principles of the deductive organization of knowledge were not formulated conclusively and definitely until the turn of the century (with extensive use of mathematical logic).

Up to the end of the 19th century Deductive Method was applied almost exclusively in mathematics. It was not until the 20th century that attempts were made to apply Deductive Method (including the axiomatic method) to non-mathematical knowledge—physics, biology, linguistics, sociology, etc.