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Question #7: Auguste Comte (1798 – 1857) is commonly known as the Founder of Sociology.
Vanessa Shol (1026909) and Deniela Jamaicy (), Natasha Persaud (), Miriam Phillacey (),
INTRODUCTION
Auguste Comte was a product of Enlightenment Period carrying on the tradition of the
philosophers of progress of the late eighteenth century (Francis Abraham, 1982). Auguste
Comte (1798-1857) is widely known as the founder of “Positivism”, a political and philosophical
that enjoyed a wide spread the second half of the 19th century. However, it was completely
forgotten during the 20th century, when it was overshadowed by neopositivism-new positivism
His experienced as a child was heavily influenced by the French Revolution. The French
Revolution was a horribly violent affair which took place in France between 1789 and 1799 and
the results were political and social change. One of the most noticeable establishments was the
First French Republic and the execution of King Louis XVI. It costed the lives of people and
As a result of his experiences, Auguste rejected religion and royalty which led to the birth
to “SOCIOLOGY”. He once stated that “Sociology is the QUEEN of all sciences”. He divided
the scientific study of sociology into two components; social statics social dynamics (Henslin ,
J.M, 2010). He further went on to develop and study the Law of Three Stage. The theory is
formed on the principle that prove the evolution of human knowledge, thinking and
understanding can be categorized into three stages (Mustapha Nasser, 2013). Auguste Comte
proposed that Sociology is a Positivistic Science in which he contended that in order for the
study of society to be a science the invariant laws of nature must be applied to the social world.
These invariant laws/ the scientific method are: observation, experimentation, comparison and
historical research. Comte propositions and contributions to Sociology will be discussed further
in this paper.
AUGUSTE COMTE (1798 – 1857) IS COMMONLY KNOWN AS THE FOUNDER OF SOCIOLOGY.
EXAMINE HIS MAIN PROPOSITIONS AND CONTRIBUTION TO THE DISCIPLINE.
Comte's main works include: The Course on Positive Philosophy (1830-1842), this book
consisted of 6 volumes that were translated and summarized by Harriet Martineau as The
Positive Philosophy of Auguste Comte. Secondly, Comte wrote the “The System of Positive
Polity, or Treatise on Sociology, Instituting the Religion of Humanity”, (1851-1854), this book
consisted of four volumes. Thirdly, he wrote The Early Writings (1820-1829), where it can be
seen how much influence Saint-Simon had on Comte. Comte served as secretary for St. Simon
Aguste Comte first called the new discipline “social physics”. He later altered this to
“sociology”. The words derives from the Greek (“soci” which means “society” and Latin
Comte developed the Law of Three Stage to show the evolution of human knowledge,
thinking and understanding can be categorized into three stages (Mustapha Nasser, 2013). The
important to note that in each of these stages, religion plays a lesser role as they progresses as
In the Theological Stage (the dawn of man/1300), early men beliefs were founded on
supernatural powers, religious figures and that both social and physical world was produced by
god himself. This stage consists of three other substages which are: Fetishism, Polytheism and
In Fetishism substage, people believed that spirits embodied in nature and attributed the
powers and causes of phenomena to special objects, often non-living. For example, people would
attribute occurrences to a rocks, trees, sun, moon, water. In Polytheism sub stage, people
believed in multiple God as well as natural and human forces. In the Monotheism sub stage, the
people believed that there is one God who is all powerful and supreme. This stage can be thought
the periods of 1300 and 1800 (Middle Ages) and is characterized by beliefs in abstract forces like
nature rather than personalized gods. Finally, the Positivism Stage emerged in the
Industrialization Period, 1800- onwards, where people started to give up the absolute causes to
gods and nature and instead focused on the search of laws governing the social and physical
world through more reliable knowledge and objective meaning. (Ritzer, 2002).
In this final stage, religion plays no role and science plays a greater role.
Stages- Simplified
EMPIRICAL
century that stated that the only valid knowledge gained is through the positive affirmation using
AUGUSTE COMTE (1798 – 1857) IS COMMONLY KNOWN AS THE FOUNDER OF SOCIOLOGY.
EXAMINE HIS MAIN PROPOSITIONS AND CONTRIBUTION TO THE DISCIPLINE.
the scientific method. (Mustapha Nazzer, 2013). Aguste Comte believed that this new science
would provide the knowledge that would help to reform society. It would establish the natural
laws that govern human affairs, establish institutions that would help to maintain order and guide
to social change. The methodology of sociology is the same as for the natural sciences.
Comte identified four methods for discovering these invariant laws such as: 1.
people and listening to them in order to collect naturally occurring data about what they do and
experimentation takes place whenever the regular course of the phenomena is disturbed. Formal
experimentation is not applicable in the study of many social phenomena. For example, we
cannot study the effects of mother’s love by taking infants away from their mothers and
comparing this to infants that were held and comforted by the mother. Experimentation assesses
the impact of the change made to the situation. (Coser. L., Volume II, p.245)
between animals and other parts of the world to the society being looked at.
The fourth stage is the historical research. "The historical comparison of the consecutive
states of humanity is not only the chief scientific devices of the new political philosophy. It
constitutes the substratum of the sciences, in whatever is essential to it." Historical comparisons
throughout the time in which humanity has evolved are at the very core of sociological inquiry.
Coser. L (1997) once said that Sociology is nothing if it is not informed by a sense of historical
To reiterate, the only valid knowledge gained is through positive affirmation/ using the
Comte lived in the aftermath of the French Revolution. He was distressed by the disorder
of his time and by the material and cultural poverty of the people. Comte was concerned with
stability in the history of human civilizations. Hence, his study on social static and social
dynamics.
Social Static focuses on how order is maintained in the society and social dynamic
focuses on how society changes over time. Comte therefore focused his social statics on the
individual, as well as such collective phenomena as the family, religion, language, and the
division of labor (Schaefer, 2013). Comte placed greater emphasis on the study of social
dynamics (social change, his theory of social dynamics is founded on the law of the three stages,
that is, the evolution of society is based on the evolution of mind through the theological,
progressive evolution in which people become cumulatively more intelligent and in which
HIERARCHY OF SCIENCES
Comte maintained that the development of numerous recognized sciences showed that
not only human thought passed through the law three stages, but that subjects had developed in
the very same way. However, it was possible to arrange the sciences in order with: “1. The order
of their historical emergence and development, 2. The order of their dependence upon each
other. 3. Their decreasing degree of generality and the increasing degree of complexity of their
AUGUSTE COMTE (1798 – 1857) IS COMMONLY KNOWN AS THE FOUNDER OF SOCIOLOGY.
EXAMINE HIS MAIN PROPOSITIONS AND CONTRIBUTION TO THE DISCIPLINE.
subject matter” (Francis, Abraham, 1982). Comte’s arranged the sciences as: Mathematics,
Astronomy, Chemistry, Physics, Biology, and Sociology. Mathematics was the first science as it
was the broadest of all sciences, while he viewed sociology as the most multifaceted of all
sciences. Sociology was the novel science of society with a distinctive subject matter called the
“social system”. Comte, in his own words, once said that “SOCIOLOGY IS THE QUEEN OF
ALL SCIENCES”.
Sciences
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, Auguste Comte set the stage for the development and emergence of the
Science of Sociology. We see that Comte’s contribution was to mainly construct a positive
science of society. Comte’s science was geared towards resolving the crisis of the contemporary
world and to provide a system of scientific ideas which would assist to reorganize society and
bring about other thinkers to help solve the problems. Comte’s contribution to Sociology is long
REFERENCES
Bourdeau, Michel, "Auguste Comte", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (winter 2015
<https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2015/entries/comte/>.
August Comte 1798 - 1857. (2018). [ebook], Diobu area of Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria:
http://www.faculty.rsu.edu/users/f/felwell/www/Theorists/Comte/Presentation/Comte.pdf
Henslin , J.M(2010). Sociology a down to Earth Approach (10 edition). United States of
America.
Ritzer George, 1988, Sociological Theory (2nd ed.), New York, McGraw Hill Publication.