3.4 The Law of the Classification of Sciences

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Classical Sociological Theory

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University of Amsterdam

Classical Sociological Theory

1018 ratings

This Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) will offer the participants an introduction into the most important classical sociological readings between the 18th and 20th century. Highly influential social science scholars, such as Karl Marx, Max Weber and Emile Durkheim, will be discussed during 8 sessions. Combined with small tests, based on the video’s and recommended readings, the participants will be encouraged to dive deeply into the complex texts and get familiar with classical sociological concepts that are still very relevant today.

From the lesson

Session 3: Auguste Comte (1798-1857)

This session will cover the author of the word “sociology”, August Comte. He often engaged in theorizing the social world in order to attempt to discover invariant laws. Terms like “positivism”, “the law of the three stages” and “Functionalism” are prominent topics in this session. Comte believed that positivism could both advance science (theory) and change the ways people live their lives (practice).

3.1 Religious and Scientific Knowledge5:51

3.2 The Law of the Three Stages of the Human Mind7:02

3.3 Sociology as a Means to Establish Social Harmony5:50

3.4 The Law of the Classification of Sciences6:09

3.5 Religious Thought as Starting Point5:23

3.6 Comte’s Religion of Humanity6:39

3.7 Early Functionalism5:54

3.8 The Importance of Auguste Comte5:19

Meet the Instructors

Bart van Heerikhuizen
Dr.
Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences

In his Cours de Philosophie Positive, The Course in Positive Philosophy,

Comte presented a well-ordered list of all the sciences.

Starting with the most fundamental and independent science and

ending with the most encompassing science,

the one that was entirely dependent on all the other sciences.

The foundation of science, the uncontested basis of everything else was mathematics.

The science crowning the list,

the science that depended most on all the other sciences was sociology.

And in between from the bottom to the top,

Comte discerned astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology.

The sciences that are located lower on that ladder are less complex than

the sciences that you find high on the ladder and

that is why he calls it a hierarchical classification.

This is his law of the classification of the sciences from simple to complex,

from general to specific, from independent to dependent.

And the science on top of his construction, sociology is therefore,

the most dependent science.

It needs all the other sciences.

It lacks the generality of, for example, mathematics.

But because it is the science that we find at the highest floor

of his building, he calls it the queen of the sciences.

And of course, later sociologists have been very grateful with that expression.

In this way, Comte tried to bring intellectual order,

in what seemed to many to be a hodgepodge of scientific branches and subbranches.

For the first time, a scientist drew a map on which you could

locate the main sciences and indicate who influences who and in what ways?

There was according to Comte another important difference between the sciences

and there is this speed with which they passed through the different stages.

Starting from the theological way of thinking and eventually,

all arriving at last in the positivists phase.

According to Comte, the lower level sciences, such as mathematics and

physics arrive earlier in the positivists stage than the more complex sciences,

such as sociology.

In this way, Comte who started out his career as an engineer,

builds a kind of bridge between his law of the three stages and

his law of the classification of the sciences.

What he says here is very interesting.

He seems to imply that there is a kind of cultural lag between the sciences,

some of them moving fast while others are staying behind for a longer time.

When in physics, scientific research is well developed.

Sociology may still be in the metaphysical stage.

Comte believe that today, we live in a society where some fields of study,

such as physics and chemistry have become very scientific,

whereas sociology still has a very long way to go.

When I read those words for the first time, I was reminded

of National Socialism in Europe in the 30s and the 40s of the 20th century.

Because the scientists who worked for the Nazi regime were very advanced

when it came, for example, to developing missiles that could fly to London and

deliver their lethal load in the heart of the city.

But when it came to explaining why Germany was in a crisis

situation socially and economically, the Nazis fell back on

a kind of scapegoat theory that worked well in the Middle Ages.

Everything that goes wrong is the fault of the Jews.

So if only we could get rid of them,

then the health of the nation would be restored.

You could say that in Nazi Germany, the sociological interpretation of

what was going on in the country was filled with prescientific superstition,

whereas the natural scientists belonged to the best in the world.

So in a way, Comte helps us to better understand that

the coexistence of two realms of thought that differ so

strikingly in their scientific rigor is what made

National Socialism so dangerous, so deadly.

Comte believed that social harmony could only be achieved,

if there is intellectual harmony and that will only happen when all

the sciences have at last entered the phase of positivism.

The process is in fact, completed when the last one,

sociology has arrived in the final stage of the development and

has become a completely positivist enterprise.

And then the new scientific knowledge has to be distributed.

Everybody should be taught what modern science can learn mankind.

In the end, everybody has to accept the encompassing

new scientific vision of the world.

By giving his lectures and by writing his books and his articles,

Comte himself wanted to contribute personally to that development.

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