Condillac, kon dee YAK, Etienne Bonnot de (1715-1780), a French philosopher and psychologist, stressed the importance of the senses. He tried to show that all knowledge and all operations of the mind, such as thinking and judging, can be traced to an original awareness of the senses. To make this idea clear, he used the example of a statue gradually coming to life, as one sense organ after another comes into operation. Condillac's chief work was Treatise on the Sensations (1754). He was born in Grenoble, France.