Assoc. Prof., Dr. Tran Dinh Tuan
INSTITUTE FOR EDUCATION COOPERATION AND DEVELOPMENT
Source; Vietnam Former Teachers journal – April 5, 2024
1. Introduction
In the history of scientific development, the science itself and the scientific research activities have become the objects of research of several other scientific disciplines such as Philosophy, History of development of sciences, Scientology, Scientific research methodology.
The research methodology in science is a scientific discipline that delves deeply into studying and constructing the theories about the path of cognition, exploring the objective world. The target of scientific research methodology are the laws of cognitive activities and scientific creativity. Based on the recognition of those laws, the scientific research methodology forms the viewpoints, principles, methods and techniques to approach the perceived object, identifying reasonable steps in the process of scientific research activities.
Developing and perfecting the scientific research methodology is requiring a constant development of modern science. Mastering and perfecting the scientific approach is the self-consciousness of sciences about their development path. The scientific research methodology helps the scientists' research activities become self-conscious and in the right direction. At the same time, it helps to systematize the acquired knowledge, creating the ability to grasp and apply them effectively in the practical activities.
The scientific research methodology is considered as the result of the generalization of theory and practice of scientific research, so it becomes a guide for the scientists to practice creatively the research activities, becoming a tool to organize and manage the scientific activities effectively. The scientific research practice has shown that, without the adequate theory on the cognitive methods, and without being equipped with scientific research skills, there can not be valuable scientific work and the development of scientific theory.
Mastering the methodology of scientific perception is mastering the direction and path to the scientific truth optimally, avoiding the failures and unnecessary detours. Just as V.I. Lenin pointed out, that anyone who started working on personal problems before solving common problems would, at every step, inevitably encountered those common problems unconsciously.
2. Science and the development of science
2.1. Definition of "Science"
At the most general level, the science is understood as a form of social consciousness. The social consciousness is reflected in many different forms, such as religion, ethics, art, politics, science ... Each form of social consciousness reflects one side, one aspect of the social existence. The science is a form of social consciousness that reflects the objective reality, creating a system of truth about the world.
The science exists through a system of concepts, categories, principles, generalizations, hypotheses, theories. An important feature of science is that all objective truths, all scientific arguments can be proved. As a form of social consciousness, the science takes practice as the source, standard, and driving force for development. The advanced scientific ideas are often ahead of their time, beyond the current level of development of practice. The science has no limit in the development because the human mind has no limit in perception.
The science is a form of social consciousness that is relatively independent from other forms of social consciousness but is dialectically related to other forms of social consciousness. All forms of social consciousness are the objects of scientific research. The science can outline the origin and nature of all other forms of social consciousness.
From a cognitive point of view, the science is the knowledge system of the objective world. These are the laws of nature, society, and mindset. This knowledge system was formed long ago, and it is constantly developing on the basis of social practice. The human cognitive process is carried out with many levels, by different methods and creates two systems of knowledge about the world: empirical knowledge and scientific knowledge.
The empirical knowledge, also known as conventional knowledge, is the knowledge accumulated through daily life activities in the relationship between people and people and between humans and nature. The empirical knowledge is constantly used and developed by the people in practical activities, exchanged with each other, becoming folk knowledge.
However, the empirical knowledge is created from simple induction, there is no theoretical model, it has not shown the nature and laws of the movement of things and phenomena, and it has not yet become a solid system. Therefore, the empirical knowledge only develops to a certain limited understanding, which is the basis for the formation of scientific knowledge.
The scientific knowledge is a general system about the nature and laws of movement of the objective world. The scientific knowledge is well-established, testable, and widely applicable. The scientific knowledge is the result of scientific research activities, in which the object of science is not only the objective world but also the method of perceiving that world. The scientific knowledge is organized within the framework of scientific disciplines and subjects.
The scientific knowledge and empirical knowledge are closely related. The scientific knowledge can come from the ordinary knowledge, but not the systematization of ordinary knowledge, nor the perfection of ordinary knowledge. The scientific knowledge results from a purposeful, planned, methodical process, facilitated by specialized methods and tools, carried out by highly qualified experts.
From an operational point of view, the science is a special type of social activity. It is an activity not only to perceive and explain the world but also to reform the world. Many great scientific ideas are ahead of their time, have the effect of directing and leading the development of practice. In that sense, understandably, the science is revolutionary. As a special type of social activity, the science is often associated with technology. As a general principle, technology is the process of applying scientific achievements into practice. Technology is a system of technical equipment and methods used to process the resources into products according to a certain process. Technology is the product of human creativity.
2.2. The development of science
The development of science is associated with the history of human social development. The science was born when the society had reached a certain level of development and associated with the appearance of special intellectual people. In ancient times, all scientific knowledge was concentrated in philosophy. Up to now, the science has been divided into more than two thousand different subjects, with the main scientific fields such as natural sciences and exact sciences, social sciences and humanities, technical sciences, agricultural sciences, health sciences... The past twentieth century was a period of brilliant development of science in human history. The science has become a direct productive force, impacting all aspects of social life. The science has promoted the development of the knowledge economy, making modern production, rich products with high intellectual content and good quality, and increasingly satisfying the needs of the people's lives.
Today, the modern science is developing in all fields, however it is the development of a dialectical inheritance in the scientific perception of a unified world. On the other hand, the modern science tends to both specialize into various branches and fields, delving deeply into researching different aspects of the objective world, and integrate between disciplines and subjects to collectively explore and address the common, complex issues posed by the reality. It is also the foundation of creating new scientific disciplines, new fields of research, making scientific knowledge more and more comprehensive and profound.
The history of scientific development shows that the pace of applying scientific achievements into practice is accelerating, which makes the quality of human physical and spiritual life improve rapidly, while also creating a driving force for continuous scientific advancement. The stormy development of science has led to a consequence: in turn, science itself needs to be studied scientifically.
3. Scientific research
3.1. Concept of scientific research
Scientific research is a particularly complex form of human activity, a creative intellectual activity of the scientists to perceive the world, generate valuable knowledge systems, and apply them to improve the objective world.
The subjects of scientific research activities are the individual and collective scientists. It is a team of the people with basic training, with creative research qualities and abilities. The success or failure of scientific research depends greatly on the quality, creative talent and coordination of the individual and collective scientists. In particular, the individuals are often a breakthrough starting point, proposing scientific creative ideas and attracting others to participate in research and invention. The collective scientists play an important role in providing comments, criticism, appraisal and collaborative research according to the individual proposed ideas.
The subjects and objects of the scientific research activities are the natural, social, complex, mysterious and thinking world, in which each science has its own field, angle, and research object.
The purpose of the scientific research is to explore and discover the nature and laws of the objective world, on that basis, generalize into a scientific knowledge system and map out a path to apply them in practice for human life.
The scientific research method is essentially a method of perceiving the world, including specific perspectives and operations affecting the research object that reveal the nature of the object. In the scientific research, the people must use special tools and technical means for experiments to measure and test the reliability of the research results.
The product and value of the scientific research are assessed by the novelty of the generalized knowledge and the proposed practical solutions. Such information must have objectivity, reliability, applicability, meeting the practical needs.
The scientific research process is a difficult, complex and contradictory intellectual process. In this process, there are always different and even contradictory hypotheses, trends, factions of theory and prediction, requiring the researchers to make their theories on the basis of the scientific arguments and evidences. The scientific research is the exploration and discovery of new things, so the researcher cannot follow the old, simple path to reach the destination, but they have to accept a difficult, challenging and risky path, not always leading to the success, and sometimes encountering the failures. However, the failure in the scientific research is also considered a result, because it also gives us an useful information to avoid similar mistakes
The scientific research is a process that develop according to the rising levels of awareness. In the history of scientific development, the scientific perception follows the following levels:
- Scientific description is the presentation of the research results about a particular object at the maximum level of originality by using a system of visual symbols and related concepts. The description can give a full picture of the research object, but it is not possible to establish the rule-based relationships that reflect the internal nature of the object, because this is usually the information collected through observation, investigation, stopping at the level of experiential awareness. However, the description is an important step towards scientific interpretation.
- Scientific explanation, is a clear presentation of the origin, development, basic relationships, conditions, causes, consequences of the research subjects and problems. The scientific explanations participate in exploring and discovering the nature and laws of the things, phenomena and processes being studied.
- Scientific discovery and invention, is the highest level of awareness of the research process in order to outline the nature and laws of the objective events and phenomena, create new truths, enrich the treasure of human knowledge. What is discovered and invented must be something that was previously unknown and undiscovered, thereby fundamentally changing human perception and mode of action. The discovery and invention are made using creative methods with the support of sophisticated technical means and equipment that affect the object, revealing its nature and laws of movement.
3.2. Types of scientific research
- Basic research, is a type of research with the goal of exploring and creating new knowledge and new values. These are the basic knowledge and foundational knowledge for the next research and application process. These knowledge are often expressed in the form of concepts, categories, laws, theorems, formulas reflecting the nature and laws of the movement of the research object.
The basic research is divided into two types: pure basic research is a type of basic research that has not yet been applied for any purpose; Oriented basic research is a basic research according to some application addresses.
- Applied research, is a type of research that applies basic knowledge to create new technological principles and processes in socio-economic management, in production and manufacture of new products. The knowledge is generalized in applied research to meet the needs of production and life demands. Therefore, such knowledge could and needs to be changed according to the transformation and development of practical life.
- Research and implementation, is a type of the research to find the solutions and models for mass application of the research results applied to the production practice and social life. The knowledge acquired in the implementation research includes the knowledge about operational procedures, technological processes, or technical solutions applied under specific conditions or circumstances. These knowledge must always be renewed to meet the new development of the environment, the situation and the new requirements of life.
- Forecasting research, is a type of research to discover new prospects, possibilities and development trends of science and practice. The results of the forecasting research is an important scientific basis for determining the socio-economic development strategies, scientific and technological development strategies. Therefore, in the forecasting research, the scientists often focus their attention on solving key topics and projects associated with the requirements of the socio-economic development, culture, education, national defense and security of the country in the coming time.
3.3. Creative mechanisms in scientific research
The results of modern scientific research have shown that the scientists' thinking logic is carried out according to the following types of creative mechanisms:
- Intuitive mechanism. The intuition is the emergence of scientific ideas and seeing research results suddenly, not according to conventional thinking logic. In the history of scientific invention, there have been many cases of miracles explored by intuition. Newton discovered the law of universal gravity by watching the apple falling. Archimedes discovered the rule of calculating the water repulsive force while lying in the bathtub.
The scientific basis of intuition is the "spark" in thinking, the sudden appearance of a scientific idea, a solution to a problem that the scientist is cherishing and concerning. The intuition is the result of intellectual and knowledge compression, an "explosion" based on many thought manipulations that have developed at many different levels.
The intuition is the product of talent, the result of practical experience, scientific research, passion, perseverance, creative labor. Without the accumulation of knowledge and concern and experience in scientific practice, no invention can be formed intuitively.
- Algorithm mechanism. In the scientific research, the scientists' thinking often follows the steps in an orderly manner, forming a logical chain of thinking operations. This orderly consciousness is called a creative algorithm. Algorithm are an accurate record of the order of the steps to solve a creative problem, so they are also called algorithms in scientific research.
The scientific inventions, in essence, are the discovery of creative algorithm. When you find out the logical steps of a type of work, it also means that you have successfully performed it. The basic idea of creative algorithm is to discover and use the rules in scientific creative research.
All things and phenomena are formed and developed according to a certain rule. To be aware of the rules and to use them consciously in scientific research is to have discovered a creative algorithm. . Solving creative problems using the algorithmic mechanism will avoid the disadvantages of steps based on the trial and error method.
The mechanism of creative algorithm not only helps the scientists be aware of the steps in subject research at the present time but also predict the steps to study the subjects in the future. Thus, the algorithm are meant as the technological processes and pathway in modern scientific research.
- Heuristics mechanism. The creativity according to the Heuristics mechanism is the process of scientific research conducted by proposing and proving a scientific hypothesis about a new event or phenomenon. The central problem of the Heuristics creative mechanism is to formulate and prove scientific hypotheses. The conflicts, theoretical shortcomings and practical difficulties are always the problems that motivate the scientists to find the solutions. One of the ways to resolve these contradictions is to formulate scientific hypotheses. The scientific hypothesis is meant as a directional conjecture about the measures to resolve the emerging conflicts. The researcher needs to find a way to prove and confirm such conjecture measures. If that conjecture is correct then it becomes a new theory. That is a theory formed through the mechanism of Heuristics creative mechanism.
The Heuristics mechanism is a common scientific mechanism in all types of modern scientific research. To be creative, according to the Heuristics mechanism, it requires the researchers not only to have extensive professional knowledge but also to have scientific judgment, to rely on those judgments to propose hypotheses and prove hypotheses.
In short, the scientific research is the creative activity of the scientists for the purpose of perceiving and improving the world, serving the human life. The process of scientific research always takes place in a difficult, complex and elaborate way, following the rules of creative inquiry. These laws need to be discovered and synthesized into the theories about the path of exploring the world – the theories about scientific research methods.
4. Objects and tasks of scientific research methodology
4.1. Objects of the scientific research methodology
The target of the scientific research methodology is the laws of cognitive activities and scientific creativity. The methodology of the scientific research is a scientific discipline delving into the investigation to elucidate the essence of science and scientific research activities. It clarifies the mechanism of creative thinking in the scientists' cognition and their research practice skills, thereby synthesizing a knowledge system about the path, methods of perception, and exploration of the world. This knowledge system is expressed at two levels:
Firstly, is the theory of scientific approaches, the principles, and starting points of the scientific perception. They are associated with a certain philosophical doctrine.
Secondly, is the theory of methods, approaches and processes of conducting a scientific research?
The two levels, which are also the two basic theoretical parts of the scientific research methodology, are closely related to each other, in which the views and principles play a role in directing the selection and application of the specific research methods and processes.
4. Tasks of scientific research methodology
As the science of the cognition path and world exploration, the methodology of scientific research must address the following fundamental tasks:
- Studying to clarify the characteristics of the nature and development rules of science and scientific research activities. This task requires a correct understanding of the nature of science as a special social activity, clarifying the development of science associated with the history of human social development and generalizing the laws of that development. On the other hand, it is necessary to clarify the characteristics of the subject, object, and target, purpose, method, and products of the scientific research process. On that basis, it is necessary to clarify the law of development, the characteristics of the scientific and technological activities in the military field.
- Researching to identify the general views and basic principles as the methodological basis of the scientific research activities. From their perspective, the scientific research methodology must address an important task: researching to identify basic scientific approaches in order to properly orient the thinking of the scientists in the process of affecting the research subjects and objects. These views and principles are determined on the basis of the Marxist-Leninist Doctrine and Ho Chi Minh's ideology, becoming the crucial starting points for each researcher in the scientific exploration and creation, generalizing the knowledge and applying them to serve the practical life.
- Researching to identify the paths, ways and processes of the scientific research activities. The scientific research methodology must identify the mechanism and skills of scientific creation, indicate the theoretical research methods and practical research methods, the methods of collecting, screening, processing, measuring and retaining the scientific data information. At the same time, it is necessary to identify the stages and steps carried out in a reasonable sequence to optimally solve the research tasks of a work, a scientific topic.
- Researching to identify the forms of presentation of the results evaluation and the publication of the scientific research works. Presenting, publishing and evaluating the scientific research results is an important work of the scientific research activities. Therefore, the methodology of scientific research has the task of clearly defining the requirements for the format and presentation of a research work, methods, and evaluation standards for a scientific product to help the researchers publicly disclose the research results, introduce the scientific achievements for the public verification and application in practice.
- Researching to identify the methods, forms of managing the scientific research activities. The scientific research is a complex and elaborate intellectual activity that requires strict organization and management. The task of the scientific research methodology is to clearly define the methods, forms of the organization, regulations on management of the research activities and scientific products in order to improve the potential and quality of the research, the dissemination and exchange of the scientific information, and technology transfer.
References
Vu Cao Dam (1999), Scientific research methodology, Science and Technology Publishing House, Hanoi.
Dobrov.G.M (1996), Science in Science, Science and Technology Publishing House, Hanoi.
Le Tu Thanh (1995), Logic and scientific research methodology, Youth Publishing House, Hanoi
Tran Dinh Tuan (2008), Scientific research methodology, People's Army Publishing House, Hanoi.
Pham Viet Vuong (2001), Scientific research methodology, Vietnam National University Publishing House, Hanoi.
Bui Cong Dat Translated
