However, since history is made by humans, we can understand it better than the natural world. He also advocated contextual interpretation, i.e. understanding an historical culture in its own terms, not in terms of our present conceptual framework. Economic and political organization is linked with art, literature, rhetoric, law, and philosophy. Condorcet Attempts to apply mathematical methods of the physical sciences to the study of history. He did pioneering research in the mathematical theory of probability in hopes of using it to evaluate aspects of collective decision making.
Individual development provides a microcosm of cultural development.
Knowledge is gained and used to alter external conditions. Progress occurs in stages defined by obstacles that must be overcome before it is possible to move on to the next stage. The movement is from dependence, ignorance, and superstition to power, knowledge, and enlightenment. He helped advance a notion of modernization , i.e. scientific and technological development leading to cultural transformation. The Response to Skeptical Empiricism Reason , Hume argued, did not provide an adequate foundation for knowledge or action .