Dr. V.K.Maheshwari, M.A. (Socio, Phil) B.Sc. M. Ed, Ph.D.
Former Principal, K.L.D.A.V.(P.G) College, Roorkee, India
In 1854, French philosopher Auguste Comte, in his System of Positive Polity: or System of Sociology, gave the following so called “hierarchy of the sciences”, according to which they all are, at bottom, dependent on astronomy.
The second pillar of positive philosophy, the law of the classification of the sciences, has withstood the test of time much better than the law of the three stages. Of the various classifications that have been proposed, it is still the most popular today. This classification, too, structures the Course, which examines each of the six fundamental sciences—mathematics, astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, sociology—in turn. It provides a way to do justice to the diversity of the sciences without thereby losing sight of their unity. This classification also makes Comte the founder of the philosophy of science in the modern sense. Comte’s classification is meant not to restore a chimerical unity, but to avoid the fragmentation of knowledge.
Existence of “Classification of Sciences” – Prior to Comte:
The law of classification of the sciences also has a historical aspect . From Plato to Kant, reflection on science had always occupied a central place in philosophy, but the sciences had to be sufficiently developed for their diversity to manifest itself it gives us the order in which the sciences develop. For example, astronomy requires mathematics, and chemistry requires physics. Each science thus rests upon the one that precedes it. As Comte puts it, the higher depends on the lower.
The idea of the “classification of sciences” did not originate with Comte. It did exist prior to Comte. From times immemorial thinkers have been trying to classify knowledge on some basis. The early Greek thinkers undertook to classify all knowledge under three headings: (1) physics, (2) ethics, and (3) politics. Later on, Bacon made the classification on the basis of the faculties of man namely, (i) memory, (ii) imagination, and (iii) reason. The science based upon memory is history, the science based upon imagination is poetry, and the knowledge based upon reason is physics, chemistry, etc. Comtean classification of sciences has its own specialties among which the following may be noted.
Comte’s theory of the hierarchy of the sciences
Comte’s second best-known theory, that of the hierarchy of the sciences, is intimately connected with the Law of Three Stages. Just as mankind progresses only through determinant stages, each successive stage building on the accomplishments of its predecessors, so scientific knowledge passes through similar stages of development. But different sciences progressat different rates. “Any kind of knowledge reaches the positive stage early in proportion to its generality, simplicity, and independence of other departments.” Hence astronomy, the most general and simple of all natural sciences, develops first. In time, it is followed by physics,chemistry, biology, and finally, sociology. Each science in this series depends for its emergence on the prior developments of its predecessors in a hierarchy marked by the law of increasing complexity and decreasing generality.
The social sciences, the most complex and the most dependent for their emergence on the development of all the others, are the “highest” in the hierarchy. “Social science offers the attributes of a completion of the positive method. All the others . . . are preparatory to it. Here alone can the general sense of natural law be decisively developed, by eliminating forever arbitrary wills and chimerical entities, in the most difficult case of all.
Although sociology has special methodological characteristics that distinguish it from its predecessors in the hierarchy, it is also dependent upon them. It is especially dependent on biology, the science that stands nearest to it in the hierarchy. What distinguishes biology from all the other natural sciences is its holistic character. Unlike physics and chemistry, which proceed by isolating elements, biology proceeds from the study of organic wholes. And it is this emphasis on organic or organismic unity that sociology has in common with biology. “There can be no scientific study of society either in its conditions or its movements, if it is separated into portions, and its divisions in its conditions or its movements, if it is separated into portions, and its divisions are studied apart.” The only proper approach in sociology consists in”viewing each element in the light of the whole system. . . . In the inorganic sciences, the elements are much better known to us than the whole which they constitute: so that in that case we must proceed from the simple to the compound. But the reverse method is necessary in the study of Man and Society; Man and Society as a whole being better known to us, and more accessible subjects of study, than the parts which constitute them.”
The conception of the hierarchy of the sciences from this point of view implies, at the outset, the admission, that the systematic study of man is logically and scientifically subordinate to that of Humanity, the latter alone unveiling to us the real laws of the intelligence and activity. Paramount as the theory of our emotionalnature, studied in itself, must ultimately be, without this preliminary step it would have no consistence. Morals thus objectively made dependent on Sociology, the next step is easy and similar; objectively Sociology becomes dependent on Biology, as our cerebral existence evidently rests on our purely bodily life. These two steps carry us on to the conception of Chemistry as the normal basis of Biology, since we allow that vitality depends on the general laws of the combination of matter. Chemistry again in its turn is objectively subordinate to Physics, by virtue of the influence which the universal properties of matter must always exercise on the specific qualities of the different substances. Similarly Physics become subordinate to Astronomy when we recognise the fact that the existence of our terrestrial environment is carried on in perpetual subjection to the conditions of our planet as one of the heavenly bodies. Lastly, Astronomy is subordinated to Mathematics by virtue of the evident dependence of the geometrical and mechanical phenomena of the heavens on the universal laws of number, extension, and motion.” Astronomy and biology are, by their nature, the two principal branches of natural philosophy. They, the complement of each other, include the general system of our fundamental conceptions in their rational harmony.
Comte maintained that the growth of several established sciences showed that not only human thought in general had passed through the three stages, but also that particular subjects had developed in the same way. Therefore, it was possible to arrange the sciences systematically 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 subject matter.
Comte‟s arrangement of sciences on this basis was : Mathematics, Astronomy, Chemistry, Physics, Biology, Sociology.
Mathematics was the first science as it was the most general of all sciences, while he regarded sociology as the most complex of all sciences.
Comte’s Advocacy of Sociology
Sociology was the new science of society with a distinctive subject matter. The subject matter of sociology was the social system‟. A society was a system of interconnected parts. Individuals could be understood only within the context of societies of which they were members, „Sociology‟, wrote Comte “consists in the investigation of the action and reaction of the different parts of the social system. Sociology, was then, the scientific study of the nature and the different forms of societies, of social system.
Comte’s Positive Philosophy can be viewed as a long and elaborate advocacy for a science of society. Comte was laying a philosophical foundation and justification for all science and then using this foundation as a means for supporting sociology as a true science. His advocacy took two related forms:
(1) to view sociology as the inevitable product of the law of the three stages and
(2) to view sociology as the “queen science,” standing at the top of a hierarchy of sciences.
These two interrelated forms of advocacy helped legitimate sociology in the intellectual world and should, therefore, be examined briefly. Comte saw all idea systems as passing through the theological and metaphysical stages and then moving into the final, positivistic, stage.
In Comte’s view, then, astronomy was the first science to reach the positivistic stage, then came physics, next came chemistry, and after these three had reached the positivistic (scientific) stage, thought about organic phenomena could become more positivistic. The first organic science to move from the metaphysical to the positivistic stage was biology, or physiology. Once biology became a positivistic doctrine, sociology could move away from the metaphysical speculations of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries toward a positivistic mode of thought.
Sociology has been the last to emerge, Comte argued, because it is the most complex and because it has had to wait for the other basic sciences to reach the positivistic stage. For the time, this argument represented a brilliant advocacy for a separate science of society, while it justified the lack of scientific rigor in social thought when compared with the other sciences. Moreover, though dependent on, and derivative of, evolutionary advances in the other sciences, sociology will study phenomena that distinguish it from the lower inorganic phenomena as well as from the higher organic science of biology. Although it is an organic science, sociology will be independent and study phenomena that “exhibit, in even a higher degree, the complexity, specialization, and personality which distinguish the higher phenomena of the individual life.”
The hierarchy, in descending order, is sociology, biology, chemistry, physics, and astronomy. Comte added mathematics at the bottom because all sciences are ultimately built from mathematical reasoning. as the other highly respected sciences, and it placed sociology in a highly favorable spot (at the top of a hierarchy) in relation to the other “positive sciences.” If sociology could be viewed as the culmination of a long evolutionary process and as the culmination of the positive sciences, its legitimacy could not be questioned.
Sociology has a double status. It is not just one science among the others, as though there is the science of society just as there is a science of living beings. Rather, sociology is the science that comes after all the others; and as the final science, it must assume the task of coordinating the development of the whole of knowledge. With sociology, positivity takes possession of the last domain that had heretofore escaped it and had been considered forever inaccessible to it. Many people thought that social phenomena are so complex that there can be no science of them. On the contrary, according to Comte, this distinction, introduced by the Greeks, is abolished by the existence of sociology, and the unity that was lost with the birth of metaphysics restored .
It goes without saying that Comte’s idea of sociology was very different from the current one. To ensure the positivity of their discipline, sociologists have been quick to renounce its coordinating function, also known as encyclopedic or architectonic function, which characterizes philosophy. As a consequence, no one can become a sociologist without having had a solid encyclopedic education, one that has no place for economics or social mathematics, but, on the contrary, emphasizes biology, the first science that deals with organized beings.
Special Features of Comtean Classification of Sciences
The main aim of the classification of knowledge by Comte was to prepare the background and the basis for the study of “sociology”, a new science founded by him.On the basis of this principle he also determined the methodology of sociology. It also helped him in establishing the relation between sociology and other sciences. It tried to establish the fact that by discovering some general principles, it is possible to establish relationship among various sciences.
Linkage with the “Law of Three Stages”:
Comtean classification of sciences, as it is already stated, is linked with his famous contribution to the social thought namely, the law of three stages. The logic of the link is that – as with individuals and societies, so with the sciences themselves – they all pass through the same stages.
Classification Based on the Principle of Increasing Dependence:
Comte chose “the order of increasing dependence” as his principle of classifying knowledge. Comte “arranged the sciences so that each category may be grounded on the principal laws of the preceding category, serve as a basis for the next ensuing category. The order, hence, is one of increasing complexity and decreasing generality.
This principle could be stated in simple words in this way: The facts pertaining to different sciences differ in complexity. Some facts are simple while others are complex. The complex facts being dependent on simple facts are, general and are present everywhere.
The sciences based upon complex sciences are, in turn, dependent upon simple sciences. Thus, each science is, in some measure, dependent upon some other science and by itself forms a basis of some other science. On this basis Comte presented a serial order of sciences.
Comte was of the opinion that the more complex sciences in the course of their development will ultimately attain the positive stage. He thus stated: “Any kind of knowledge reaches the positive stage early in proportion to its generality, simplicity and independence of other departments.” “Hence astronomy, the most general and simple of all natural sciences, develops first. In time, it is followed by physics, chemistry, biology, and finally sociology.
Each science in this series depends for its emergence on the prior developments of its predecessors in a hierarchy marked by the law of increasing complexity and decreasing generality.
Classification of Sciences Begins With Mathematics:
Comte considers mathematics the basic tool of the mind. “With mathematics as its chief tool, the mind of man can go anywhere in its thinking. Mathematics is the most powerful instrument which the mind may use in the investigation of natural laws: “Education that is based on any other method is faulty, inexact, and unreliable. It is only through mathematics that we can understand sciences.”
According to Comte, mathematics occupies the first place in the hierarchy of the sciences. Mathematics, in the Comtean scheme, is not a constituent member of the group of sciences. It is the basis of them all. It is the oldest and most perfect of all the sciences. He says that mathematics is “the science.” It is the science that measures precisely the relations between objects and ideas.
The Design of the Classification of Sciences:
In the Comtean design of the hierarchy of sciences mathematics occupies the lowest rung and the topmost, rung is occupied by sociology. The hierarchy of this classification is as follows: (1) Mathematics, (2) Astronomy, (3) Physics, (4) Chemistry, (5) Biology, and (6) Sociology or Social Physics. This classification makes it clear that the simplest and the least dependent science are at the bottom and the most complex and dependent of the sciences is at the top of the hierarchy.
Basis of Hierarchy of the Sciences Hierarchy of Sciences:
According to this view of the sciences, first proposed by Comte, the sciences can be arranged in ascending order of complexity, with sciences higher in the hierarchy dependent, but not only dependent, on those below. Thus, sociology makes assumptions about the physical and biological world, but at the same time also involves an “emergent” level of analysis different from and not reducible to those below.
Classification of Sciences as Inorganic and Organic:
Comte stated that the classification of knowledge could be done in another manner by making use of mathematics as the tool. Thus all natural phenomena could be categorised into two grand divisions: inorganic and organic.
Comparatively speaking, inorganic sciences [for example, astronomy, physics, chemistry] are simpler and clearer. Organic sciences such as biology are more complex. “It involves the study of all life and the general laws pertaining to the individual units of life.
Sociology at the Top of the Hierarchy:
In the Comtean scheme, social sciences are at the apex of the hierarchy for they enjoy “all the resources of the anterior sciences.” Social sciences are the most complex and the most dependent for their emergence on the development of all the other sciences. Social sciences offer “the attributes of a completion of the positive method: All others are preparatory to it.
Hence, they occupy the highest place in the hierarchy.” Social physics or sociology according to Comte is the last and the greatest of the sciences. Although sociology has special methodological characteristics that distinguish it from its predecessors in the hierarchy, it is dependent on them too.
The Emphasis on Holistic Approach:
The holistic approach is the natural direction of the progress of sciences. All sciences progress towards the positive method. Sociology is the crowning glory of all sciences. The holistic approach starts with biology and culminates with sociology. Biological approach is virtually the holistic approach and it proceeds from the study of the organic wholes.
According to Comte, inorganic sciences proceed from simple to compound and the organic sciences move the reverse way from compound to simple. Hence, the inorganic sciences pursue what is known as individualistic approach whereas organic sciences [including sociology] stress upon the importance of the “holistic approach.”
Emphasis on the Organic Unity:
Comte stressed on the organic unity of society. Comte has thus stated: “In the organic sciences, the elements are much better known to us than the whole which they constitute; so that in that case we must proceed from the simple to the compound. But the reverse method is necessary in the study of man and society….. Just as biology cannot explain an organ or a function apart from the organism as a whole, sociology cannot explain social phenomena without reference to the total social context.
Critical Evaluation
Comte successfully established through his classification of sciences that sociology is also a positive science. Comte found an appropriate place for sociology and gave that discipline its name He also stressed that sociology must be a theoretical discipline. “The conversion of sociology into a positive science completed the system of positive philosophy thus marking the onset of the positive stage of development of the human mind and human society. It meant, in Comte’s view, the real “positive revolution, the victory of science over the scholasticism of past epochs.
Comte’s “idea of organic unity or the primacy of the system over element, has important theoretical implications. Comte has repeatedly asserted that one element of social entity could be understood only in terms of the entity as a whole. Comte’s assertion of the principle of increasing dependence in the classification of sciences has today culminated in what is being called “interdisciplinary approach.” This approach is quite popular at the academic level.
In this regard Bogardus writes: “Comte urged that no science could be effectually studied without competent knowledge concerning the sciences of which it depends. It is necessary not only to have a general knowledge of all the sciences but to study each of them in order this is Comte’s dictum to the student of sociology. Comte insisted that one general science could not develop beyond a given point until the preceding has passed a given stage.