Étienne Bonnot de Condillac ( ; ; 30 September 1714 – 2 August or 3 August 1780) was a French philosopher and Catholic priest who focused on psychology and the philosophy of the mind.

Biography

He was born at Grenoble into a legal family, the youngest of three brothers. His two older brothers Jean and Gabriel took names associated with one of the family's properties at Mably, Loire, and were each known as "Bonnot de Mably". Étienne identified with another property at Condillac, Drôme, was known as "Bonnot de Condillac". Like his brother Gabriel, Condillac took holy orders (1733–1740) at Saint-Sulpice church in Paris. He was appointed as Abbot of Mureau.

thumb|250px|Birthplace of de Condillac in 13 Grande Rue à Grenoble

Condillac devoted his whole life, with the exception of an interval as a court-appointed tutor to the court of Parma, to speculative thought. His works are:

  • ' (1746);
  • ' (1749);
  • ' (1754);
  • ' (1755);
  • a comprehensive Cours d'études (1767–1773) in 13 vols., written for the young Duke Ferdinand of Parma, a grandson of Louis XV;
  • ' (1776); and two posthumous works,
  • ' (1781) and the unfinished ' (1798).

In Paris, Condillac was involved with the circle of Denis Diderot, the philosopher who was co-contributor to the Encyclopédie. He developed a friendship with Jean-Jacques Rousseau, which lasted in some measure to the end of his life. It likely started when Rousseau was a tutor to two of his brother Jean's sons in Lyon—Jean Bonnot de Mably was then provost of the police and known as Monsieur de Mably.

Condillac's relations with unorthodox philosophers did not injure his career. He had already published several works when the French court sent him to Parma to educate the orphan duke, then a child of seven years.

On his return from Italy, Condillac was elected to the Académie française in 1768. Contrary to the popular idea that he attended only one meeting, he was a frequent attendee until two years before his death. He spent his later years in retirement at Flux, a small property which he had purchased near Beaugency on the river Loire. He died there on 2

Economics

Condillac's Le Commerce et le Gouvernement (published in 1776, the same year as Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations) attempted to place economics in a coherent logical framework. He was a friend of François Quesnay – leader of the Physiocrats. Much of Condillac's work reflected mainstream Physiocrats, particularly his analysis of the structure of taxation and proposals for the revival of the economy, but he also proposed another line of argument, claiming that producers work to obtain utility. Most physiocrats rejected utility and the idea was ignored until his 'rediscovery' by Stanley Jevons and Carl Menger in 1871.

In his theory of "vrai prix" [true price], Condillac proposed a theory of human history divided into two phases: progress and decline. Progress is marked by a rational development and use of resources; decline is precipitated by bad behavior from the upper classes that then trickles down to the workers, encouraging excess, luxury, and false prices that harm the masses. Condillac saw the remedy to this as "vrai prix," a true price created by the unimpeded interaction of supply and demand, to be achieved by complete deregulation. People would be taught to work toward their best interest in an open market through a reshaping of their perceptions. By advocating of a free market economy in contrast to the prevailing contemporary policy of state control in France, Condillac influenced classical liberal economics.

Legacy

As was fitting to a disciple of Locke, Condillac's ideas had important effects upon English thought. In matters connected with the association of ideas, the supremacy of pleasure and pain, and the general explanation of all mental contents as sensations or transformed sensations, his influence can be traced upon the Mills and upon Bain and Herbert Spencer. And, apart from any definite propositions, Condillac did a notable work in the direction of making psychology a science; it is a great step from the desultory, genial observation of Locke to the rigorous analysis of Condillac, short-sighted and defective as that analysis may seem to us in the light of fuller knowledge.

His method, however, of imaginative reconstruction was by no means suited to English ways of thinking. In spite of his protests against abstraction, hypothesis and synthesis, his allegory of the statue is in the highest degree abstract, hypothetical and synthetic. James Mill, who stood more by the study of concrete realities, put Condillac into the hands of his youthful son with the warning that here was an example of what to avoid in the method of psychology. A modern historian has compared Condillac with Scottish Enlightenment philosopher and pre-evolutionary thinker Lord Monboddo, who had a similar fascination with abstraction and ideas. In France Condillac's doctrine, so congenial to the tone of 18th century philosophism, reigned in the schools for over fifty years, challenged only by a few who, like Maine de Biran, saw that it gave no sufficient account of volitional experience. Early in the 19th century, the romantic awakening of Germany had spread to France, and sensationism was displaced by the eclectic spiritualism of Victor Cousin.

Condillac's collected works were published in 1798 (23 vols.) and two or three times subsequently; the last edition (1822) has an introductory dissertation by A. F. Théry. The ' has a very long article on Condillac by Naigeon. Biographical details and criticism of the ' in J. P. Damiron's ', tome iii.; a full criticism in V Cousin's ', ser. i. tome iii. Consult also F Rethoré, ' (1864); L Dewaule, ' (1891); histories of philosophy.

In Condillac's statue, a chapter in A Mind So Rare: The evolution of human consciousness, psychologist and cognitive neuroscientist Merlin Donald argues that Condillac was the first constructivist.

In the short story "Condillac's Statue, or Wrens in his Head", science fiction writer R. A. Lafferty brings the allegory of Condillac's statue to life, having Condillac build the statue in a park in the French countryside, and then slowly turning the statue's senses on one at a time.

Works

Notes

References

Further reading

  • Orain, Arnaud. "Directing or Reforming Behaviors? A Discussion of Condillac's Theory of 'Vrai Prix'." History of Political Economy 2006 38(3): 497–530.
  • Étienne Bonnot de Condillac, An Essay on the Origin of Human Knowledge, Being a Supplement to Mr. Locke's Essay on the Human Understanding, Translated by Thomas Nugent (London: J. Nourse, 1756). Facsimile ed., introd. Robert G. Weyant, 1971, Scholars' Facsimiles & Reprints, .
  • Traité de l'art d'écrire correctement la langue française (Paris: Dufart, 1812)