Sociology is the systematic study of society and social interaction. In order to carry out their studies, sociologists identify cultural patterns and social forces and determine how they affect individuals and groups. They also develop ways to apply their findings to the real world.
same scientific methods utilized in the natural sciences. Comte also believed in the
potential of social scientists to work toward the betterment of society and coined the
slogan “order and progress” to reconcile the opposing progressive and conservative
factions that had divided the crisis-ridden, post-revolutionary French society. Comte
proposed a renewed, organic spiritual order in which the authority of science would
be the means to reconcile the people in each social strata with their place in the order.
It is a testament to his influence that the phrase “order and progress” adorns the
Brazilian coat of arms (Collins and Makowsky 1989).
Comte named the scientific study of social patterns positivism. He described his
philosophy in a well-attended and popular series of lectures, which he published as
The Course in Positive Philosophy (1830–1842) and A General View of Positivism
(1848). He believed that using scientific methods to reveal the laws by which
societies and individuals interact would usher in a new “positivist” age of history.
His main sociological theory was the law of three stages, which held that all human
societies and all forms of human knowledge evolve through three distinct stages
from primitive to advanced: the theological, the metaphysical, and the positive.The
key variable in defining these stages was the way a people understand the concept
of causation or think about their place in the world.
In the theological stage, humans explain causes in terms of the will of
anthropocentric gods (the gods cause things to happen). In the metaphysical stage,
humans explain causes in terms of abstract, “speculative” ideas like nature, natural
rights, or “self-evident” truths. This was the basis of his critique of the
Enlightenment philosophers whose ideas about natural rights and freedoms had led
to the French Revolution but also to the chaos of its aftermath. In his view, the
“negative” or metaphysical knowledge of the philosophers was based on dogmatic
ideas that could not be reconciled when they were in contraction. This led to
irreconcilable conflict and moral anarchy. Finally, in the positive stage, humans
explain causes in terms of scientific procedures and laws (i.e., “positive” knowledge
based on propositions limited to what can be empirically observed). Comte believed
that this would be the final stage of human social evolution because science would
reconcile the division between political factions of order and progress by eliminating
the basis for moral and intellectual anarchy. The application of positive philosophy
would lead to the unification of society and of the sciences (Comte 1830).
Although Comte’s positivism is a little odd by today’s standards, it inaugurated the
development of the positivist tradition within sociology. In principle, positivism is
the sociological perspective that attempts to approach the study of society in the
same way that the natural sciences approach the natural world. In fact, Comte’s
preferred term for this approach was “social physics”—the “sciences of observation”
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