Weaknesses of Comte's study to sociology
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Auguste Comte
First published Wed Oct 1, 2008; substantive revision Tue May 8, 2018
Auguste Comte (1798–1857) is the founder of positivism, a philosophical and political movement which enjoyed a very wide diffusion in the second half of the nineteenth century. It sank into an almost complete oblivion during the twentieth, when it was eclipsed by neopositivism. However, Comte’s decision to develop successively a philosophy of mathematics, a philosophy of physics, a philosophy of chemistry and a philosophy of biology, makes him the first philosopher of science in the modern sense, and his constant attention to the social dimension of science resonates in many respects with current points of view. His political philosophy, on the other hand, is even less known, because it differs substantially from the classical political philosophy we have inherited.
Comte’s most important works are (1) the Course on Positive Philosophy (1830–1842, six volumes, translated and condensed by Harriet Martineau as The Positive Philosophy of Auguste Comte); (2) the System of Positive Polity, or Treatise on Sociology, Instituting the Religion of Humanity, (1851–1854, four volumes); and (3) the Early Writings (1820–1829), where one can see the influence of Saint-Simon, for whom Comte served as secretary from 1817 to 1824. The Early Writings are still the best introduction to Comte’s thought. In the Course, Comte said, science was transformed into philosophy; in the System, philosophy was transformed into religion. The second transformation met with strong opposition; as a result, it has become customary to distinguish, with Mill, between a “good Comte” (the author of the Course) and a “bad Comte” (the author of the System). Today’s common conception of positivism corresponds mainly to what can be found in the Course.
The ‘complete positivism’ of what Comte himself called his ‘second career’ has on the whole been judged severely. Very quickly, the most famous admirers of the early Course of Positive Philosophy (1830–1842), such as Mill and Littré, disavowed the author of the later System of Positive Polity (1851–1854), thereby giving substance to the idea that there is a good and a bad Comte. Nevertheless, if his early writings call for a revision of the standard interpretation of positivism, this is even more the case for the works of his ‘second career’.
From these introductory remarks, some of the main threads of what follows can already be seen. First, whatever the exact worth of the two groups of writings that surround it may be, the Course of Positive Philosophy (hereafter Course) remains Comte’s major contribution. Second, an interpretation of the whole of Comte’s work is confronted with two problems. The first problem concerns the unity of Comte’s thought: do the first and the second career form a continuum, or is there a break? The second problem concerns Comte’s relationship to Saint-Simon (see below 3.2.): is the founder of positivism merely one Saint-Simonian among others, as Durkheim maintained, or should one, as Gouhier (1933) proposed, follow Comte himself, who on this matter spoke of a ‘disastrous contact’ that had, at best, merely hindered his ‘spontaneous development’ (1830 (56), v. 2, 466)?[1].
Disappointed by the unenthusiastic response his work got from the workers, Comte launched an Appeal to Conservatives in 1855. The next year, he published the first volume of a work on the philosophy of mathematics announced in 1842, under the new title of Subjective Synthesis, or Universal System of the Conceptions Adapted to the Normal State of Humanity. Increasingly occupied by his function as High Priest of Humanity, he sent an emissary to the Jesuits in Rome proposing an alliance with the ‘Ignacians’.