Editing Étienne Bonnot de Condillac (section)

==Legacy==
As was fitting to a disciple of Locke, Condillac's ideas have had most importance in their effect 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 [[Alexander Bain (philosopher)|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.{{sfn|Sturt|1911|pp=850–851}}

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<ref>Hobbs, Catherine, ''Rhetoric on the Margin of Modernity, Vico, Condillac, [[Monboddo]]'', Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale, Illinois (2002)</ref> Condillac with [[Scottish Enlightenment]] [[philosopher]] and [[History of evolution|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]].{{sfn|Sturt|1911|p=851}}

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 ''{{lang|fr|Encyclopédie méthodique}}'' has a very long article on Condillac by [[Naigeon]]. Biographical details and criticism of the ''{{lang|fr|Traité des systèmes}}'' in [[J. P. Damiron]]'s ''{{lang|fr|Mémoires pour servir a l'histoire de to philosophie au dixhuitieme siècle}}'', tome iii.; a full criticism in V Cousin's ''{{lang|fr|Cours de l'histoire de la philosophie moderne}}'', ser. i. tome iii. Consult also F Rethoré, ''{{lang|fr|Condillac ou l'empirisme et le rationalisme}}'' (1864); L Dewaule, ''{{lang|fr|Condillac et la psychologie anglaise contemporaine}}'' (1891); histories of philosophy.{{sfn|Sturt|1911|p=851}}

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 [[Constructivism (psychological school)|constructivist]].<ref>{{cite book | last=Donald | first=Merlin | title=A mind so rare : the evolution of human consciousness | publisher=Norton | location=New York | year=2002 | isbn=978-0-393-32319-1 | oclc=53438156}}</ref>

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.