On the circular link between sociology and science in Comte

Abstract

It is a topic of sociology to discuss the intellectual paternity of the sociological discipline. Although sociology is generically associated with Modernity, topically it is recognized that Comte coined the term in 1824 to replace the concept of social physics that he himself, however, continued to use until Lecture XLVII on the Cours, published in 1839. But it has been another Frenchman, Emile Durkheim, who, by vindicating Saint-Simon's socialism, ends up making him responsible for «the idea of extending to the social sciences the method of the positive sciences, from which sociology arose, and the historical method, an indispensable auxiliary of sociology».

For our part, we rightly attribute to Comte the establishment of the pertinent circular links between sociology and science, so that his theory of science can be considered without scruple as the first formulation of a true sociology of science ―as Pierre has seen. Ducassé with sagacity. I will show the two basic arguments that make Comte's sociology a first attempt to do sociology of science, before going on to discuss ―as a reinforcing argument― the differences between Comte's sociology and Saint-Simon's, and their links with the ideology of Desttut de Tracy.