John Stuart Mill considered his A System of Logic, first published in 1843, the methodological foundation and intellectual groundwork of his later works in ethical, social, and political theory. Yet no book has attempted in the past to engage with the most important aspects of Mill's Logic. This volume brings together leading scholars to elucidate the key themes of this influential work, looking at such topics as his philosophy of language and mathematics, his view on logic, induction and deduction, free will, argumentation, ethology and psychology, as well as his account of normativity, kinds of pleasure, philosophical and political method and the "Art of Life."
Foreword, John Skorupski Preface Introduction Antis Loizides 1. Mill on Names Stephen P. Schwartz 2. The Sources of Mill’s View of Ratiocination and Induction Steffen Ducheyne and John P. McCaskey 3. Mill and the Philosophy of Mathematics: Physicalism and Fictionalism Mark Balaguer 4. Mill’s and Whewell’s Competing Visions of Logic Elijah Millgram 5. A Double Helix: Mill and Bain on Logic, Psychology and Ethology Frederick Rosen 6. In Defense of Mill’s Theory of Free Will Bernard Berofsky 7. Mill on the Epistemology of Reasons: A Comparison with Kant Christopher Macleod 8. Different Kinds of Pleasure Jonathan Riley 9. Mill, Informal Logic and Argumentation Hans V. Hansen 10. Mill on the Method of Politics Antis Loizides 11. A System of Logic and the "Art of Life" Alan Ryan
Biography
Antis Loizides teaches in the Department of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Cyprus
"A System of Logic was Mill’s most ambitious work and the one his contemporaries regarded as his most important. Regrettably, the Logic is comparatively neglected today. The essays in this volume, written by a strong slate of Mill scholars, promise to illuminate key aspects of this work and contribute to a renewed appreciation of its foundational place in Mill’s thought." -- Ben Eggleston, Department of Philosophy, University of Kansas, USA
"This book is extremely welcome and important, and it is very surprising that no book of its kind and scale focusing on Mill’s Logic existed before it. It will prove indispensible reading for any Mill scholar and student, but also students of philosophy and the history of philosophy and many sub-disciplines more generally." -- Georgios Varouxakis, School of History, Queen Mary, University of London, UK