p Philosophy forms man’s world outlook and enables him to develop an integral idea of world phenomena, thus helping him to pattern his everyday behaviour and practical activity. But this is not the only role philosophy plays in society. It also performs methodological functions by developing a general method of cognition which is the totality of interrelated principles or demands advanced on the basis of general laws discovered in the surrounding world and in knowledge, and constituting a conclusion drawn on the basis of the historical development of social knowledge.

p The history of philosophy knows two opposing philosophical methods of cognition-the metaphysj£aland the dialectical.

p Tne metaphysical method took shape in the natural sciences in the 16th-17th centuries. At that time natural scientists, in view of the requirements of developing production, set themselves the task 25 of studying specific aspects and properties of the surrounding world, the concrete forms of being. They broke down the objects of their studies into separate parts, snatched them out of their natural or historical context, and studied “each one separately, its nature, special causes, effects, etc.".  [25•1  This resulted in a tendency to consider the objects and phenomena of the external world in isolation from their relationship and interdependence, in isolation from their motion and development, which in turn resulted in a general metaphysical method of cognition. According to this method, the objects and phenomena of the external world are isolated, independent of each other, devoid of contradictions and the capacity to develop, with always the same qualitative features, i.e. unchanged.

p Characteristically, modern metaphysicists absolutise separate aspects and forms of the motion of matter and reduce the higher to the lower.

p The principles of the dialectical method of cognition began to emerge as natural science started to investigate the processes inherent in objects rather than the objects and their properties themselves. This method postulates that, in reality, all objects and phenomena are intrinsically interconnected and interdependent, that all of them are inherently contradictory and that due to the struggle of opposites they undergo constant changes and pass to a higher qualitative state.

The dialectical method is drawn from the general 26 laws of reality and knowledge. It is, therefore, the only consistent scientific (philosophical) method helping scientists in their cognitive activity.