1. Robert Wonser SOC 368 – Classical Sociological Theory Spring 2014
Lesson 2 Auguste Comte
Much of these resources are credited to Dr. David Boyns.
Robert Wonser
SOC 368 – Classical Sociological Theory
Spring 2014

2. Classical Sociological Theory
August Comte’s Life
(Isidore) Auguste Marie Marie Francois-Xavier Comte
( )
Brilliant but mischievous student.
Was expelled for leading a rebellion against a teacher.
1817: Comte began his association with Claude-Henri de Saint-Simon.
1825: Comte married Caroline Massin, a registered prostitute in Paris (they separate in 1841).
Classical Sociological Theory

3. Classical Sociological Theory
Comte’s Life
1826: Comte has a nervous breakdown and attempted suicide twice.
Wrote the six volumes of the Course of Positive Philosophy (1830, 1835, 1838, 1839, 1841, 1842).
1838: Began practicing “cerebral hygiene”
1844: Comte married again to Clotilde de Vaux (she dies in 1846)
Classical Sociological Theory

4. Classical Sociological Theory
Comte’s Life
Wrote the System of Positive Polity ( ).
Created a religious cult based on his ideas. He called himself the “high priest of humanity.”
1857: Comte dies after looking at some shriveled flowers given to him years earlier by Clothilde.
Classical Sociological Theory

5. Comte’s Key Intellectual Influences
Charles Montesquieu ( )
The Spirit of Laws – society is a “thing.”
Social Laws
Hierarchies of Laws – less to more deterministic
Development of Sequence of Socio-Political Structures (republic – monarchy – despotism)
Classical Sociological Theory

6. Comte’s Key Intellectual Influences
Jacques Turgot ( )
“The Advantages which the Establishment of Christianity Has Procured for the Human Race.”
(each stage of human history creates the conditions for the next stage)
“Philosophical Review of the Successive Advances of the Human Mind.”
(movement towards a perfect individual and society)
Development through three universal stages (hunters, shepherds, and husbandmen) occurs because of economic transformations.
Classical Sociological Theory

7. Comte’s Key Intellectual Influences
Jean Condorcet ( )
Emphasized the importance of science in the perfection of the human race.
Societies develop through ten stages.
The history of human progress can be mapped through science.
Classical Sociological Theory

8. Comte’s Key Intellectual Influences
Claude-Henri de Saint-Simon ( )
During the years his ideas overlapped with Comte’s to a great extent.
Focus on a “positive” science.
Observations to Laws to Improved Social Organization.
Hierarchy of sciences:
Astronomy
Physics
Chemistry
Biology
“Terrestrial Morality”
Work eventually became overly moralistic and was rejected by Comte.
Classical Sociological Theory

9. The Sociological Theory of Auguste Comte
1822: “Plan of the Scientific Operations Necessary for Reorganizing Society.”
Positive science – positivism.
the search for invariant laws of the universe in both the natural and social world.
In his version, laws can be derived from doing research on the social world and/or from theorizing about that world.
Also meant it as 'the opposite of negativism'.
Classical Sociological Theory

10. Comte’s Take on Science
Comte was a realist, there is a real world out there and that the task of the scientist is to discover it and report on it (it’s ‘natural laws’)
Discovered sociology in 1839.
Two ways to do this: doing research and theorizing
Which was he more a fan of?
Classical Sociological Theory

11. Comte’s Take on Science
Explicitly identified three basics methods for sociology:
Observation – should be directed to some theory
Experiment – better suited to other sciences than sociology
Comparison – 3 subtypes:
Us to other animals,
compare societies in different parts of the world,
compare different stages of different societies at different points in time (Comte’s favorite), historical research
Classical Sociological Theory

12. Classical Sociological Theory
1822: “Plan of the Scientific Operations Necessary for Reorganizing Society.”
Social Physics – sociology was a science on par with, physics.
Law of Three Stages – 3 basic stages that the human mind, people through maturation process, all branches of knowledge and the history of the world, his own mental illness all pass successively through these stages. In all, humans search for explanations of the world around us.
Classical Sociological Theory

13. Classical Sociological Theory
Law of Three Stages
The Theological Stage – first and necessary stage for the rest. Mind is searching for essential nature of things (origin and purpose), concludes supernatural forces (gods) are at work.
Fetishism – worship of an object, like a tree
Polytheism – many gods
Monotheism – one god to explain everything
Classical Sociological Theory

14. Classical Sociological Theory
Law of Three stages
The Metaphysical Stage – least important stage as it serves as a transitional stage.
Basically, we look to nature to explain everything, as in ‘it was an act of nature’
Classical Sociological Theory

15. Classical Sociological Theory
The Law of Three Stages
The Positivistic Stage – final and most important stage for Comte. All we can know are phenomena and relations among them, not their essential nature and purpose. We drop nonscientific explanations and instead look for invariable laws that govern everything.
Concrete laws come inductively from empirical research, abstract laws derived deductively from theory.
Classical Sociological Theory

16. Classical Sociological Theory
Positivism
Comte meant this in a couple of ways:
Positivism as a science committed to the search for invariant laws (through sense perceptions, empiricism) and …
The opposite of negativism, the chaos and disorder that characterized much of Europe at the time (French Revolution, intellectual anarchy, political corruption, etc.). Why did intellectual anarchy exist then?
Coexistence of “incompatible” philosophies—theological, metaphysical and positivistic.
Classical Sociological Theory

17. Who Will Support Positivism?
Despite not believing humans have much control over the outcome of progress, he planned much for the emergence of positivism.
Upper classes were too self involved
The working class – work frees them up to think during the day
Women – best representation of key positivistic idea, “victory over selfish affections.”
Classical Sociological Theory

18. The Sociological Theory of Auguste Comte
The Course of Positive Philosophy
Theory should be more axiomatic (rules accepted as true) than causal (x causes y).
Search for a small number of fundamental properties of the social world.
Empirical observations should be guided by theory and not the other way around.
Comte’s Sociological Methodology:
Observations
Experimentations
Comparisons
Historical Analysis
Classical Sociological Theory

19. The Sociological Theory of Auguste Comte
The study of society as an organic whole, as a social organism.
Social Statics (social structure and social pathology)
1) Interdependence of parts.
2) Centralization of authority.
3) Development of a common morality (culture).
Classical Sociological Theory

20. The Sociological Theory of Auguste Comte
Social Dynamics (social change) – study of how societies change and evolve.
“theory of the natural progress of human society”
Little humans can do here since natural laws govern the process.
Law of Three Stages:
Theological
Metaphysical
Positivistic
Classical Sociological Theory

21. The Sociological Theory of Auguste Comte
Sociology was to be the “queen science” in a hierarchy of sciences.
It would be the most complex science to reach the positivistic stage.
Comte felt Western European societies were on the verge of getting here but weren’t in his lifetime.
Classical Sociological Theory

22. The Sociological Theory of Auguste Comte
Comte’s Hierarchy of Sciences:
Mathematics
Astronomy
Physics
Biology (physiology)
Chemistry
And the pinnacle…
Sociology
Classical Sociological Theory

23. Role of the Individual in Comte’s Theory
Individuals as imperfect, dominated by the “lower” forms of egoism rather than “higher” more social forms of altruism.
Like Durkheim after him, he believed society was needed to restrain our selfish impulses and orient us to the social group.
Classical Sociological Theory

24. Family according to Comte
Family is the “fundamental institution”
The family, not the individual is the building block of Comte’s sociology.
Families are “nothing but our smallest society”
Acts as the school of society.
Classical Sociological Theory

25. Religion According to Comte
Family is most pivotal but religion is the most important according to Comte.
“the universal basis of all society”
Two major functions it serves:
1) regulate individual life by subduing egoism and elevating altruism
2) fostering social relationships among people, providing for the emergence of other large scale social structures.
Classical Sociological Theory

26. Major Contributions and What he is remembered for today:
August Comte:
coined the term “sociology”
Defined sociology as a positivistic science
helped to establish sociology as an intellectual tradition in France
Articulated methods for sociological study
“law of three stages” – theological, metaphysical, positivistic
sociology as a “social physics”
Classical Sociological Theory

27. Major Contributions and What he is remembered for today:
Differentiated between social statics and social dynamics, or social structure and social change
Focus on macrosociology and the study of collective phenomena.
Clearly stated his beliefs about unchecked human nature (egoistic).
Dialectical view of macro structures
Interested in integrating theory and practice.
Classical Sociological Theory

28. Classical Sociological Theory
Comte’s weaknesses
Theory was overly influenced by his own life.
Comte fell increasingly pout of touch with the real world.
Fell out of touch with the intellectual world.
Failed as a positivist, both in empirical and theoretical work.
Very little actual sociology in his work.
Made no original contributions.
Classical Sociological Theory

29. Classical Sociological Theory
Comte’s Weaknesses
Whatever sociology he contributed was distorted by a primitive organicism in which he saw strong similarities between the workings of the human and social body.
positivism was the cure for the social diseases
Developed theoretical tools then imposed them onto whatever he was studying.
Like his own mental illness…
Classical Sociological Theory

30. Last of Comte’s Weaknesses
His “outrageous” and “colossal” self-conceit led him to make ridiculous blunders.
His romanticized view of the working class and women as agents of a positivist revolution, cerebral hygiene.
Sacrificed what he stood for with his turn to a positivist religion.
Classical Sociological Theory