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The Two Leaps

The first leap: from practice to cognition

  1. Perceptual cognition: People directly contact and perceive objective things through practical activities, thereby obtaining perceptual cognition. This is a direct reflection of the appearance of objective things, including phenomena that can be perceived by the senses, the external characteristics of things, etc.
  2. Rational cognition: Through thinking, analysis, comparison and induction, perceptual cognition gradually rises to rational cognition. Rational cognition is the understanding of the essence, internal connections and laws of things, and is a deeper level of cognition. This stage involves thinking activities such as concepts, judgments, and reasoning.

The second leap: from cognition to practice

  1. Guiding practice: People apply the rational cognition, theories and ideas they have obtained to practice to guide actual work and actions. This stage is to put theory into practice and transform cognition into specific action plans and plans.
  2. Testing cognition: Test the correctness and effectiveness of cognition through practice. In practice, theories and ideas are verified and corrected, and the feedback information can further deepen cognition

Two Leaps in Dialectical Movement

  1. The First Leap (from Practice to Cognition): In this process, people rise from perceptual cognition to rational cognition, and realize the initial understanding and abstract thinking of objective things. This leap is a qualitative change in the process of cognition, which is to extract general and universal rational cognition from specific and individual perceptual materials.
  2. The Second Leap (from Cognition to Practice): In this process, people apply the acquired rational cognition to practice, and test and correct cognition in practice. This leap is from theory back to practice, from abstract theory back to concrete reality, and is a key step in testing and improving theory.

The Dialectical Relationship between Practice and Cognition

  • Practice is the basis and source of cognition. People gain perceptual cognition through practice, and rise to rational cognition through further thinking.
  • Cognition in turn guides practice. Rational cognition applied to practice can guide people to carry out practical work more effectively, and further deepen and improve cognition in practice.
  • Practice and cognition interact and promote each other. Through repeated two leaps, we can achieve the deepening of cognition and the improvement of practice, and promote the continuous progress of human society and cognition.

Summary

The concept of two leaps emphasizes the close connection and interaction between practice and cognition, and embodies the core idea of ​​Marxist epistemology. Through the continuous cycle of practice-cognition-re-practice-re-cognition, cognition is continuously deepened and practice is continuously improved, thus promoting the development of society and science.