This article addresses the role of chemical ideas in the formation of sociological discourse, focusing on the works of Rousseau and Durkheim. The opposition between physics and chemistry, as envisaged by Rousseau and the encyclopaedists, was transposed to social philosophy. This procedure is at the origin of contrasting sociological concepts. `Aggregation' and `association', in particular, are metaphors of the physical and the chemical object, respectively. It is shown that these Rousseauian constructions form the matrix of Durkheim's definition of the sui generis nature of collective representations. The interpretation is centred on the concept of synthesis as it relates to chemical notions of `affinity' and `combination'. I reassess, in this context, the continuity of Durkheim's thought.
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