Comte's Philosophy Research Articles

George Henry Lewes, the Real Man of Science Behind George Eliot's Fictional Pedants

This paper demonstrates that George Eliot drew on George Henry Lewes's actual experience as an emerging scientist in her depiction of two fictional scholars, Edward Casaubon of Middlemarch and Proteus Merman, a lesser-known character from the chapter entitled “How We Encourage Research” in her final work, Impressions of Theophrastus Such. After Thomas Huxley published a devastating review of Lewes's first book of science, Comte's Philosophy of the Sciences, the evidence suggests that Lewes became highly focused on disproving his critics and earning lasting recognition as a scientist, a feat he expected to achieve with his five-volume series, Problems of Life and Mind. The paper concludes with a discussion of what purpose Eliot may have intended when she modeled these characters after George Henry Lewes, her consistently defended partner.

Un cuento satírico en medio del debate sobre el darwinismo en México

Charles Darwin's theory of biological evolution of species was accepted or rejected by Mexican scientists, including Gabino Barreda, representative of Comte's philosophy. It was also included by Justo Sierra in a history book for the Escuela Nacional Preparatoria, a decision which raised a lot of criticism from conservative groups. It is also discussed the implications of social Darwinism in the early Twentieth Century Mexico. The document we offer is a satire published in those years, which resembles the tone of Swift's Gulliver Travels.

The French Revolutionary Roots of Political Modernity in Hegel's Philosophy, or the Enlightenment at Dusk

Readers of Auguste Comte's Cours de Philosophie positive which began to appear just before Hegel's death might well have imagined, from the work's title, that they were about to confront an interpretation of Hegel's philosophical system. If Hegel himself had assembled his writings as systematically as his doctrines, that collective title would probably have embraced their meaning with greater accuracy than any other. The positivity of Comte's philosophy was of course strikingly different from Hegel's and was in a crucial sense meant to supplant it, replacing it with a genuinely scientific understanding of society, just as metaphysics had earlier overturned theology. Over the past hundred and fifty years or so, Comte's positive philosophy – which he also termed sociology – has in its various formulations by his disciples come to encapsulate the proper agenda of the human sciences for a post-metaphysical, post-Hegelian, age.

An introduction to the experimental versus the pragmatic paradigm in evaluation

This article provides a historical and conceptual framework for the six case studies that follow in this Special Feature section. About 100 years ago, psychology led the social sciences in a “Declaration of Independence” from philosophy. This declaration was supported by the development of Comte's philosophy of positivism, which argued for the superiority of knowledge derived from experimental science over that which came from scholarly interpretation and theory that was not empirically based. The theoretical and technological success of the physical sciences during the first half of the 20th century fueled psychology's commitment to the hypothesis-testing, laboratory-based experimental paradigm. However, for a variety of reasons (e.g., the lack of substantive accomplishments of the experimental paradigm in the social sciences and growing criticism of positivism in the philosophy community), over the past 30 years there has been a breakdown of consensus on the use of the experimental paradigm in psychology, and two alternative models have been developed: a pragmatic paradigm and a hermeneutic paradigm, both based on an epistemology of social constructionism. Although the field of program evaluation has attempted from its beginning to maintain a strong link to the experimental paradigm, in recent years it has been forced by its commitment to real-world program impact to adopt in a more systematic manner aspects of the pragmatic and hermeneutic paradigms. This Special Feature section examines the practical implications of adopting aspects of both the experimental and the pragmatic paradigms in a particular evaluation study. Specifically, the authors of the six case studies were asked to describe and analyze their experiences in terms of whether the two paradigms functioned in their study in a contrasting, conflicting, or complementary manner. The authors were asked to consider a variety of areas of impact, such as research design, data collection methodology, the response of peers, and communication of results.

A Comment on Positive Theory

The Association allows its members to identify themselves as theorists. I am a member who so identifies himself. Over several years, numerous political scientists (not themselves positive theorists) have asked me (sarcastically) whether positive theory is the opposite of negative theory. In each case, to avoid heaping sarcasm upon sarcasm, I answered that the word positive, in this case, referred to positivism, as in Comte's Philosophy and Polity. It referred to the assignment of a central role to observing phenomena and discovering the laws that relate them, and doing so gradually and laboriously, and, as Comte already understood and Weber makes crystal clear, without ever coming to final Truth. It did not refer to plus or minus signs. What I left out is that the word 'positive was in fact used early on in contradistinction to negative thought. But it may be useful to do so impersonally, for the information of those who seem unfamiliar with the ideas of our founders. The early positivists understood that human beings need to make sense of experience. They also understood the arduousness of doing so by theory based on and tested by observation, especially in the case of phenomena more complex than, say, astronomical motion. This, they argued, accounted for resorts to pseudoexplanations: to theological or metaphysical mumbo-jumbo. That sort of thought was negative thought ---negative, because not resting on solid bases and likely to do more harm than good. The early positivists were convinced that positive thought would gradually triumph over negative, fetishistic thinking, in all fields---spreading slowly from the simplest to the most complex phenomena. Surely, they have been substantially right, although they underestimated the continued appeals of high-flown obscurantism in the social sciences. Positive thought also had a secondary meaning early on, related to its primary meaning. It arose in the wake of the French Revolution, and involved a reaction against that revolution's guiding idea: that utopian transformation could be achieved by simple negative action: getting rid of feudal or similar constricting relations. One reaction to the revolution's failure to

The Problem of the Unity of Knowledge in Comte's Philosophy of Science*

Comte's philosophy of science is re‐examined from the point of view of the rationalist problematic of the unity of knowledge. It is argued that Comte's attempt to answer this metaphysical problem is the single most important factor determining the final form of his system of positive philosophy, his hierarchy of the sciences, his conception of sociology, and ultimately his positive religion of Humanity. After rejecting the main solutions offered by modern rationalism, Comte provides a subjective unity for the sciences by establishing Humanity as the principle of organization for all knowledge. The article describes the various components of the positive synthesis, their background in the history of ideas, and the contemporary relevance of the problem of unity for logical empiricism and Husserl.Some have said that need for unity expresses the identity of the self; others, that it stands for economy of thought. Possibly, but this is interpretation, psychologically or sociologically tinged. The need for unity is a historical fact and, as such, unresolved. It is also a symbol of science, and its myth. Science is a finely defined and articulated system of symbols; but the ultimate symbol, that of unity, can have no referent. Rather one might say it stands for the totality of the knowable and the unknowable. A confusing situation for the scientific mind, but one it cannot escape. For the conflict at the heart of rationalism is the source of its strength, as long as it lasts.Once the faith is lost, something else has to be found.Under the relentless pressure of social change, with the growing operationalism of physical theory and the metaphysical devastations attendant on Darwinism, the myth of unity could no longer hold. It had to be replaced by unification. But with that the status of science is changed and also that of the scientist. The mirror of nature that reason had endeavored to build up through the ages is shattered, and we look for the first time straight out into an unknown world.

Auguste Comte and "Development": A Note

Comte laid down as aim of historical analysis the rational coordination of fundamental series of human events according to a single design (C 11, 97).' But explanations, inferences, and metaphors presented in his two great works suggest at least three different designs, which in turn suggest different conceptions of meaning of development - a word which Comte relies upon extensively -in history and sociology. The best-known feature by far of Comte's philosophy of history is his of three states,' a law according to which history in general necessarily develops through three stages, described as theological, metaphysical, and scientific (or positive). Each stage, considered statically, forms an integral whole characterized in all its features by typical properties, which derive essentially from a certain cognitive mode. It does not follow that dynamics of change are essentially cognitive or

Towards a Reassessment of Comte's ‘Méthode Positive‘

In this study of Auguste Comte's philosophy of science, an attempt is made to explicate his views on such methodological issues as explanation, prediction, induction and hypothesis. Comte's efforts to resolve the dual problems of demarcation and meaning led to the enunciation of principles of verifiability and predictability. Comte's hypothetico-deductive method is seen to permit conjectures dealing with unobservable entities.

Auguste Comte: Four Lost Letters to America

Auguste Comte: Four Lost Letters to America NEAL C. GILLESPIE and GERALD H. DAVIS * AUGUSTE COMTE, THE FOUNDEROF POSITIVISM, has little influence today. Yet, in the told-nineteenth century his two major works, the Cours de philosophie positive (1830-1842) and the Syst~me de politique positive (1851-1854) seemed to offer a viable alternative to the traditional Christian world view which was then in the process of disintegration. In England and Russia, in his native France, and to a lesser extent in Germany and other countries of western Europe, disciples appeared and Positivist societies were formed to implement the new social order that Comte had outlined. Despite this interest, those who would go the whole way with Comte were few. For every follower who fully accepted Positivism there were others who found in Comte's philosophy nothing beyond a stimulation for their own thought and a systematic ordering of ideas that before had floated loosely in their minds. Devotees and skeptics alike, however, considered him one of the significant thinkers of the century: The reception of Comte's work in the United States was much the same as in Europe. A few enthusiasts went as far as Henry Edger who attempted to found a Positivist community at Modern Times, Long Island in 1854, but most American readers of the Cours and Syst~me declined to be converted although they were frequently sympathetic and even admiring. Among these was George Frederick Holmes. a young Englishman living in western Virginia who was by vocation variously a farmer, a reviewer, a college professor, and. by avocation, a student of social processes. Holmes was first led to the Cours in 1848 by his own quest for a science of history and soon became the most prominent of Comte's early critics in America. 2 * Neal C. Gillespie, Associate Professor, Gerald H. Davis, Professor, Deparunent of History, Georgia State University. x The best discussion of Positivism in Europe and one that effectively demolishes the notion that Comte's work was largely responsible for the spread of "scientism" in the latter part of the nineteenth century is W. M. Simon, European Positivism in the Nineteenth Century : An Essay in Intellectual History (New York: [ca. 1963]). For Positivism in Russia, see James H. Billington, "The Intelligentsia and the Religion of Humanity," American Historical Review, LXV (July, 1960), 807-821. 2 For Holmes's criticism see "Philosophy and Faith," Methodist Quarterly Review, 4th scr., III (April, 1851), 185-218; "Faith and Science---Comte's Positive Philosophy," ibid., IV (January and April, 1852), 9-37, 169-199; "Instauratio Nova--Auguste Comte," ibid., IV (July, 1852), 329-360; "The Bacon of the Nineteenth Century," ibid., V (July and Oct., [49] 50 H/STORY OF PHILOSOPHY Holmes's series of essays on Positivism, which appeared in the Methodist Quarterly Review between 1852 and 1854, were brought to Comte's attention by the editor, John McClintock. The result was an enlightening correspondence between the founder of Positivism and his American critic. Altogether they exchanged fourteen letters, ten of which were published in 1936 by Richard L. Hawkins in Auguste Comte and the United States, 1816-I853. The four previously lost letters from Comte are presented here to complete the series.3 The entire correspondence is an interesting example of the reversals that frequently attended Comte's attempts to spread his doctrine. Comte first wrote to McClintock praising Hohnes's well-disposed article "Faith and Science--C~mte's Positive Philosophy" as "une consciencieuse apprrciation de mon ouvrage fondamental." '* After learning of Comte's favorable opinion Holmes suggested that they correspond. In his initial letter he again praised Comte's work but, while pointing out their basic agreement on the serious moral and intellectual crisis facing contemporary civilization, he rejected Comte's philosophy as a whole because of its hostility to metaphysics and traditional Christianity. Regretting the world's neglect of Comte's genius and his consequent poverty Holmes sent a donation of fifty francs and also asked Comte to correct the errors in "Faith and Science" that he had mentioned to McClintock. While denying any desire to pry, he also wanted a sketch of Comte's life in order better to...

Tocqueville's Philpsophy of Freedom: A Trend Towards Concrete Sociology

HEGEL'S philosophy of freedom and Comte's philosophy of progress have one trait in common, in spite of the basic differences in their starting points. Although Hegel's panlogistic dialectics and Comte's sociological scientism present various levels and antagonistic tendencies of philosophical thought, they share the same indifference concerning the philosophical and structural problems of human existence. While Kant was aware that the basic questions of philosophy referred to the fundamental elements of human life, these new synthetical systems of the historicity of the race did not care about the character and the nature of the human being. They helped to bring to the fore that tendency in thought which was described as the autonomous movement of a universal principle of determination, spiritual or naturalistic, in the process and as the meaning of history. In these philosophical and sociological systems man is only the tool and the actor (the Roman persona in the literal sense) in the self-realization of a universal principle, inherent in the process of society. Thus, human action and attitudes are predetermined by the principles that represent die pseudo-religious meaning of the historical development. So far as this is true, human personality, as centered around the actuality of freedom, spontaneity, responsibility, no longer exists. The hybris of Hegel and Comte to make die dynamic institutions “concrete universals” and to suppress the concreteness of individuals is one symptom of the human situation in the modern world. Slowly developing since the sixteenth century, this situation is completely realized in these philosophical systems that proclaim the immanence of life, the reality of a universal principle of determination and the weakness and frailty of the human personality. This trend of thinking got supremacy in philosophical and scientific modes of investigation, in particular in the powerful stratification of positivist and of empiricist methods in the social sciences. The discovery of Historicism and of Sociologism is the logical result of this basic position. It expresses correctly the stage of consciousness in which man realizes the demonry of the world of institutions which, although his very own achievement, is becoming emancipated from man and developing autonomously like the forces of nature.

An Unpublished Letter of Auguste Comte

Previous articleNext article No AccessAn Unpublished Letter of Auguste ComteWilhelm PauckWilhelm Pauck Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The Journal of Modern History Volume 1, Number 2Jun., 1929 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/235454 Views: 2Total views on this site Copyright 1929 The University of Chicago PressPDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Auguste Comte: Sociology and the New Politics

Auguste Comte regarded political forces as of secondary importance. He sought to penetrate beneath forms of government and legislation to discover the deeper springs of social action, such as morality and spiritual power. Accordingly he was led to deny the validity of traditional political concepts. The notion of rights, of the separation of powers, and of the sovereignty of the people, he discarded as useless baggage inherited from a metaphysical and unscientific age. In particular he was eager to devitalize the concept of political authority, which he would replace with the concept of technical direction on the part of captains of industry. In Comte's philosophy, liberty is based on social function. Its guaranty is to be found in the subjection of social phenomena to natural laws, and in the subjection of politics to morality. New theories of the state reflect the positivism of Auguste Comte. The concept of sovereingnty is being challenged in certain quarters. The individualistic basis of rights is under re-examination. Expertness and technical direction are being prized more highly than formerly. Democracy is under fire.