Marquis de CondorcetIn existographies, Marquis de Condorcet (1743-1794) (IQ:180|#149) (Cattell 1000:288) [RGM:N/A|1,310+] (FA:79) (EPD:F1) (CR:18) was a French mathematician, philosopher, and political scientist noted for the 1770 introduction of the “curly d” symbol ∂ mathematical symbol for partial differential equations (see: history), as discussed in his “Memoir on Partial Differential Equations”, and for doing some of the first social mathematics (see: human mathematics) precursor to social physics.

Religion | Rationalism
In c.1793, Condorcet, in his posthumous Sketch of an Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Spirit, presented an inexorable historical progression from the barbarism of medieval Christianity to the rationalism of his day, arguing that humanity goes through ten epochs, the last resulting in revolution, each powered by public education. [4]

Social Mathematics | Social physics
Condorcet conceived the view that society was made up of homogeneous individuals all born equal under the law, whereby, according to such homogeneity, it should be possible to discern the mathematical laws, i.e. “social mathematics”, that govern the social mechanism, that government should be the realization of natural social laws, and that people should elect key experts to run government. [1]

In 2012, American sociologist, in discussion of Pitirim Sorokin's famous 1928 "The Mechanistic School" chapter, seems to comment that the social physics of Condorcet, Henri Saint-Simon, and Adolphe Quetelet are less “childish” was of dealing with the problem of human action, as compared to the “mechanical or molecular imagery” method of the extreme mechanism school of Henry Carey and Spiru Haret. [2]

Reaction end
Condorcet advocated women's suffrage, the separation of church and state, state-supported education, and the abolition of slavery. He was chief author of the “Address to the European Powers”, and the [dangerous] declaration calling for suspension of the King and summoning of the National Convention; to which he offered a constitution supported by the moderate Girondins. The aggressive Jacobins defeated that constitution and outlawed Condorcet for his forthright advocacy of political moderation. In 1794, he was arrested and in two days he was dead, perhaps from poison. (Ѻ)

Bust of Condorcet
A circa 1785 bust of Condorcet at the Louvre Museum, Paris.
Quotes | On
The following are related quotes:

“I am glad the bust of Condorcet has been saved and so well placed. His genius should be before us; while the lamentable, but singular act of ingratitude which tarnished his latter days, may be thrown behind us. I will place under this a syllabus of the doctrines of Epicurus [N2] somewhat in the lapidary style, which I wrote some twenty years ago [c.1799], a like one of the philosophy of Jesus, of nearly the same age is too long to be copied. Vale, et tibipersuade carissimum te esse mihi.
Thomas Jefferson (1819), “Letter to William Short”, Oct 31 (Ѻ)

“There has been a considerable number of those whom history calls ‘atheists’. Leucippus, Democritus, Xenophanes, and others of the Atomistic and Eleatic schools (Ѻ), are said to have been such. In his Intellectual System, Cudworth puts into this category Seneca and the younger Pliny among the Romans. Since the reformation, such men as: Rabelais, Machiavel, Bruno, Vanini, D'Alembert, Diderot, Buffon, Condorcet, Mirabeau, La Place, Frederic II, and even Pope Leo X, have been charged with atheism.”
— Willis Lord (1875), Christian Theology for the People (pg. 67)

“The term sociology was invented and adopted in its equivalent by Auguste Comte in his ‘hilosophie Positive.’ It makes its first appearance in the following sentence: "After Montesquieu, the next great addition to Sociology (which is the term I may be allowed to invent, to designate Social Physics) was made by Condorcet proceeding on the views suggested by his illustrious friend Turgot" (b. vi. chap. ii.). The term Social Physics, also used by Comte as its equivalent, is significant, suggesting as it does the materialistic theory of man which Comte takes no pains to conceal. For according to his teachings, the higher nature of man is simply the result of a more highly organized brain, and the psychical and social phenomena of humanity depend solely on the quality and conditions of cerebral activity.”
— Noah Porter (1880), “Herbert Spencer’s Theory of Sociology” [2]

References
1. Porter, Dorothy. (1998). Health, Civilization and the State: a History of Public Health from Ancient to Modern Times (§: The Social Physics of Human Aggregates, pgs. 64-). Routledge.
2. (a) Sica, Alan. (2012). “Classical Sociological Theory”, in: The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Sociology (editor: George Ritzer) (§5, pgs. 82-97; Sorokin + “mechanistic school”, pgs. 85-86; humanothermodynamics, pgs. 87-88). John Wiley & Sons.
(b) Sorokin, Pitirim. (1928). “The Mechanistic School” (pdf), in: Contemporary Sociological Theories (§1, pgs. 1-62). Harper & Brothers.
3. (a) Baker, Keith M. (1982). Condorcet: From Natural Philosophy to Social Mathematics. University of Chicago Press.
(b) Porter, Noah. (1880). “Herbert Spencer’s Theory of Sociology: A Critical Essay”, The Princeton Review, 6: 268-296.
4. (a) Condorcet, Marquis. (c.1793). Sketch of an Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Spirit (Ѻ). Publisher, 1955.
(b) Joshi, Sunand T. (2014). The Original Atheists: First Thoughts on Nonbelief (pg. 11). Prometheus Books.

External links
Marquis de Condorcet – Wikipedia.

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