HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Sir Alfred Jules "Freddie" Ayer (; 29 October 1910 – 27 June 1989), usually cited as A. J. Ayer, was an English philosopher known for his promotion of logical positivism, particularly in his books ''
Language, Truth, and Logic ''Language, Truth and Logic'' is a 1936 book about meaning by the philosopher Alfred Jules Ayer, in which the author defines, explains, and argues for the verification principle of logical positivism, sometimes referred to as the ''criterion of ...
'' (1936) and ''The Problem of Knowledge'' (1956). He was educated at Eton College and the University of Oxford, after which he studied the philosophy of logical positivism at the University of Vienna. From 1933 to 1940 he lectured on philosophy at
Christ Church, Oxford Christ Church ( la, Ædes Christi, the temple or house, '' ædēs'', of Christ, and thus sometimes known as "The House") is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, the college is uniqu ...
. During the Second World War Ayer was a
Special Operations Executive The Special Operations Executive (SOE) was a secret British World War II organisation. It was officially formed on 22 July 1940 under Minister of Economic Warfare Hugh Dalton, from the amalgamation of three existing secret organisations. Its p ...
and
MI6 The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), commonly known as MI6 ( Military Intelligence, Section 6), is the foreign intelligence service of the United Kingdom, tasked mainly with the covert overseas collection and analysis of human intelligenc ...
agent. He was Grote Professor of the Philosophy of Mind and Logic at
University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = � ...
from 1946 until 1959, after which he returned to Oxford to become
Wykeham Professor The University of Oxford has three statutory professorships named after William of Wykeham, who founded New College. Logic The Wykeham Professorship in Logic was established in 1859, although it was not known as the Wykeham chair until later. ...
of Logic at New College. He was president of the
Aristotelian Society The Aristotelian Society for the Systematic Study of Philosophy, more generally known as the Aristotelian Society, is a philosophical society in London. History Aristotelian Society was founded at a meeting on 19 April 1880, at 17 Bloomsbury Squar ...
from 1951 to 1952 and knighted in 1970. He was known for his advocacy of humanism, and was the second president of the
British Humanist Association Humanists UK, known from 1967 until May 2017 as the British Humanist Association (BHA), is a charitable organisation which promotes secular humanism and aims to represent "people who seek to live good lives without religious or superstitious be ...
(now known as Humanists UK). Professor A. J. Ayer was president of the
Homosexual Law Reform Society The Homosexual Law Reform Society was an organisation that campaigned in the United Kingdom for changes to the set of laws which criminalised homosexuality at the time. History In 1954 the Conservative government set up a Departmental Committee ...
for a time; he remarked that "as a notorious heterosexual I could never be accused of feathering my own nest."


Life

Ayer was born in St John's Wood, in north west London, to Jules Louis Cyprien Ayer and Reine (née Citroen), wealthy parents from
continental Europe Continental Europe or mainland Europe is the contiguous continent of Europe, excluding its surrounding islands. It can also be referred to ambiguously as the European continent, – which can conversely mean the whole of Europe – and, b ...
. His mother was from the Dutch-Jewish family who founded the
Citroën Citroën () is a French automobile brand. The "Automobiles Citroën" manufacturing company was founded in March 1919 by André Citroën. Citroën is owned by Stellantis since 2021 and previously was part of the PSA Group after Peugeot acquired ...
car company in France; his father was a Swiss
Calvinist Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Cal ...
financier who worked for the Rothschild family, including for their bank and as secretary to Alfred Rothschild. Ayer was educated at
Ascham St Vincent's School Ascham St Vincent's School was an English preparatory school for boys at Eastbourne, East Sussex. Like other preparatory schools, its purpose was to train pupils to do well enough in the examinations (usually taken around the age of 13) to gai ...
, a former boarding preparatory school for boys in the seaside town of Eastbourne in Sussex, in which he started boarding at the comparatively early age of seven for reasons to do with the First World War, and Eton College, where he was a
King's Scholar A King's Scholar is a foundation scholar (elected on the basis of good academic performance and usually qualifying for reduced fees) of one of certain public schools. These include Eton College; The King's School, Canterbury; The King's Schoo ...
. It was at Eton that Ayer first became known for his characteristic bravado and precocity. Although primarily interested in furthering his intellectual pursuits, he was very keen on sports, particularly rugby, and reputedly played the
Eton Wall Game The Eton wall game is a game that originated at and is still played at Eton College. It is played on a strip of ground 5 metres wide and 110 metres long ("The Furrow") next to a slightly curved brick wall ("The Wall") erected in 1717. It is one ...
very well. In the final examinations at Eton, Ayer came second in his year, and first in classics. In his final year, as a member of Eton's senior council, he unsuccessfully campaigned for the abolition of corporal punishment at the school. He won a classics scholarship to
Christ Church, Oxford Christ Church ( la, Ædes Christi, the temple or house, '' ædēs'', of Christ, and thus sometimes known as "The House") is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, the college is uniqu ...
. He graduated with a BA with first-class honours. After graduation from Oxford, Ayer spent a year in Vienna, returned to England and published his first book, '' Language, Truth and Logic'' in 1936. The first exposition in English of logical positivism as newly developed by the Vienna Circle, this made Ayer at age 26 the 'enfant terrible' of British philosophy. As a newly famous intellectual, Ayer played a prominent role in the Oxford by-election campaign of 1938. Ayer campaigned first for the Labour candidate
Patrick Gordon Walker Patrick Chrestien Gordon Walker, Baron Gordon-Walker, (7 April 1907 – 2 December 1980) was a British Labour Party politician. He was a Member of Parliament for nearly thirty years, and served twice as a Cabinet Minister. He lost his Smethwi ...
, and then for the joint Labour-Liberal "Independent Progressive" candidate Sandie Lindsay who ran on an anti-appeasement platform against the Conservative candidate, Quintin Hogg who ran as the appeasement candidate. The by-election when it was held on 27 October 1938 was quite close with Hogg winning a narrow victory over Lindsay. In the Second World War he served as an officer in the Welsh Guards, chiefly in intelligence (Special Operations Executive (SOE) and
MI6 The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), commonly known as MI6 ( Military Intelligence, Section 6), is the foreign intelligence service of the United Kingdom, tasked mainly with the covert overseas collection and analysis of human intelligenc ...
). Ayer was commissioned second lieutenant into the Welsh Guards from Officer Cadet Training Unit on 21 September 1940. After the war, he briefly returned to the University of Oxford where he became a fellow and
Dean of Wadham College This is a list of Wadham College, Oxford people, including alumni, Fellows, Deans and Wardens of the College. An alphabetical list of alumni of Wadham college can be found here. Alumni Academics * Martin Aitken, archaeometrist * Amir Attara ...
. He thereafter taught philosophy at
London University The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...
from 1946 until 1959, when he also started to appear on radio and television. He was an extrovert and social mixer who liked dancing and attending the clubs in London and New York. He was also obsessed with sport: he had played rugby for Eton, and was a noted cricketer and a keen supporter of Tottenham Hotspur football team, where he was for many years a season ticket holder. For an academic, Ayer was an unusually well-connected figure in his time, with close links to 'high society' and the establishment. Presiding over Oxford high-tables, he is often described as charming, but at times he could also be intimidating. Ayer was married four times to three women. His first marriage was from 1932–1941 to (Grace Isabel) Renée (d. 1980), with whom he had a son - alleged to be in fact the son of Ayer's friend and colleague, philosopher Stuart Hampshire - and a daughter. Renée subsequently married Stuart Hampshire. In 1960 he married Alberta Constance (Dee) Wells, with whom he had one son. Ayer's marriage to Wells was dissolved in 1983 and that same year he married Vanessa Salmon, former wife of politician
Nigel Lawson Nigel Lawson, Baron Lawson of Blaby, (born 11 March 1932) is a British Conservative Party politician and journalist. He was a Member of Parliament representing the constituency of Blaby from 1974 to 1992, and served in the cabinet of Margar ...
. She died in 1985 and in 1989 he remarried Dee Wells, who survived him. Ayer also had a daughter with Hollywood columnist Sheilah Graham Westbrook. In 1950, Ayer attended the founding meeting of the
Congress for Cultural Freedom The Congress for Cultural Freedom (CCF) was an anti-communist advocacy group founded in 1950. At its height, the CCF was active in thirty-five countries. In 1966 it was revealed that the CIA was instrumental in the establishment and funding of the ...
in West Berlin, though he later stated that he only went because of the offer of a "free trip". Ayer gave a speech on why he felt that John Stuart Mill's classic liberal conceptions of liberty and freedom were still valid for the 20th century. Together with the historian
Hugh Trevor-Roper Hugh Redwald Trevor-Roper, Baron Dacre of Glanton (15 January 1914 – 26 January 2003) was an English historian. He was Regius Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford. Trevor-Roper was a polemicist and essayist on a range of ...
, Ayer fought against
Arthur Koestler Arthur Koestler, (, ; ; hu, Kösztler Artúr; 5 September 1905 – 1 March 1983) was a Hungarian-born author and journalist. Koestler was born in Budapest and, apart from his early school years, was educated in Austria. In 1931, Koestler join ...
and
Franz Borkenau Franz Borkenau (December 15, 1900 – May 22, 1957) was an Austrian writer. Borkenau was born in Vienna, Austria, the son of a civil servant. As a university student in Leipzig, his main interests were Marxism and psychoanalysis. Borkenau is kno ...
, arguing that the latter two were far too dogmatic and extreme in their anti-communism, and were in fact proposing illiberal measures in the defense of liberty. Adding to the tension was the location in West Berlin, together with the fact that the Korean War began on 25 June 1950, the fourth day of the congress, giving a feeling that the world was on the brink of war. From 1959 to his retirement in 1978, Sir Alfred held the Wykeham Chair, Professor of Logic at Oxford. He was knighted in 1970. After his retirement, Ayer taught or lectured several times in the United States, including serving as a visiting professor at
Bard College Bard College is a private liberal arts college in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. The campus overlooks the Hudson River and Catskill Mountains, and is within the Hudson River Historic District—a National Historic Landmark. Founded in 1860, ...
in the fall of 1987. At a party that same year held by fashion designer Fernando Sanchez, Ayer, then 77, confronted Mike Tyson who was forcing himself upon the (then) little-known model
Naomi Campbell Naomi Elaine Campbell (born 22 May 1970) is an English model, actress, singer, and businesswoman. She began her career at the age of 15, and established herself amongst the most recognisable and in-demand models of the past four decades. Cam ...
. When Ayer demanded that Tyson stop, the boxer reportedly asked, "Do you know who the fuck I am? I'm the heavyweight champion of the world," to which Ayer replied, "And I am the former
Wykeham Professor of Logic The University of Oxford has three statutory professorships named after William of Wykeham, who founded New College. Logic The Wykeham Professorship in Logic was established in 1859, although it was not known as the Wykeham chair until later. ...
. We are both pre-eminent in our field. I suggest that we talk about this like rational men". Ayer and Tyson then began to talk, allowing Campbell to slip out. Ayer was also involved in politics being involved in anti-Vietnam War activism, supporting the Labour Party (and then later the
Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties For ...
), Chairman of the Campaign Against Racial Discrimination in Sport, and president of the
Homosexual Law Reform Society The Homosexual Law Reform Society was an organisation that campaigned in the United Kingdom for changes to the set of laws which criminalised homosexuality at the time. History In 1954 the Conservative government set up a Departmental Committee ...
. In 1988, a year before his death, Ayer wrote an article entitled, "What I saw when I was dead", describing an unusual
near-death experience A near-death experience (NDE) is a profound personal experience associated with death or impending death which researchers claim share similar characteristics. When positive, such experiences may encompass a variety of sensations including detac ...
. Of the experience, Ayer first said that it "slightly weakened my conviction that my genuine death ... will be the end of me, though I continue to hope that it will be." However, a few weeks later he revised this, saying "what I should have said is that my experiences have weakened, not my belief that there is no life after death, but my inflexible attitude towards that belief". Ayer died on 27 June 1989. From 1980 to 1989 Ayer lived at 51 York Street, Marylebone, where a memorial plaque was unveiled on 19 November 1995.


Philosophical ideas

In ''Language, Truth and Logic'' (1936), Ayer presents the
verification principle Verificationism, also known as the verification principle or the verifiability criterion of meaning, is the philosophical doctrine which maintains that only statements that are empirically verifiable (i.e. verifiable through the senses) are cogniti ...
as the only valid basis for philosophy. Unless logical or empirical verification is possible, statements like "God exists" or "charity is good" are not true or untrue but meaningless, and may thus be excluded or ignored. Religious language in particular was unverifiable and as such literally nonsense. He also criticises C. A. Mace's opinion that metaphysics is a form of intellectual poetry. The stance that a belief in "God" denotes no verifiable hypothesis is sometimes referred to as igtheism (for example, by
Paul Kurtz Paul Kurtz (December 21, 1925 – October 20, 2012) was an American scientific skeptic and secular humanist. He has been called "the father of secular humanism". He was Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buff ...
). In later years Ayer reiterated that he did not believe in God and began to refer to himself as an atheist. He followed in the footsteps of
Bertrand Russell Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British mathematician, philosopher, logician, and public intellectual. He had a considerable influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, linguistics, ar ...
by debating with the Jesuit scholar
Frederick Copleston Frederick Charles Copleston (10 April 1907 – 3 February 1994) was an English Roman Catholic Jesuit priest, philosopher, and historian of philosophy, best known for his influential multi-volume '' A History of Philosophy'' (1946–75). ...
on the topic of religion. Ayer's version of
emotivism Emotivism is a meta-ethics, meta-ethical view that claims that ethical Sentence (linguistics), sentences do not express propositions but emotional attitudes. Hence, it is colloquially known as the hurrah/boo theory. Influenced by the growth of anal ...
divides "the ordinary system of ethics" into four classes: #"Propositions that express definitions of ethical terms, or judgements about the legitimacy or possibility of certain definitions" #"Propositions describing the phenomena of moral experience, and their causes" #"Exhortations to moral virtue" #"Actual ethical judgments" He focuses on propositions of the first class—moral judgments—saying that those of the second class belong to science, those of the third are mere commands, and those of the fourth (which are considered in normative ethics as opposed to
meta-ethics In metaphilosophy and ethics, meta-ethics is the study of the nature, scope, and meaning of moral judgment. It is one of the three branches of ethics generally studied by philosophers, the others being normative ethics (questions of how one o ...
) are too concrete for ethical philosophy. Ayer argues that moral judgments cannot be translated into non-ethical, empirical terms and thus cannot be verified; in this he agrees with ethical intuitionists. But he differs from intuitionists by discarding appeals to intuition of non-empirical moral truths as "worthless" since the intuition of one person often contradicts that of another. Instead, Ayer concludes that ethical concepts are "mere pseudo-concepts": Between 1945 and 1947, together with Russell and George Orwell, he contributed a series of articles to '' Polemic'', a short-lived British "Magazine of Philosophy, Psychology, and Aesthetics" edited by the ex-Communist Humphrey Slater. Ayer was closely associated with the British humanist movement. He was an Honorary Associate of the Rationalist Press Association from 1947 until his death. He was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...
in 1963. In 1965, he became the first president of the Agnostics' Adoption Society and in the same year succeeded
Julian Huxley Sir Julian Sorell Huxley (22 June 1887 – 14 February 1975) was an English evolutionary biologist, eugenicist, and internationalist. He was a proponent of natural selection, and a leading figure in the mid-twentieth century modern synthesis. ...
as president of the
British Humanist Association Humanists UK, known from 1967 until May 2017 as the British Humanist Association (BHA), is a charitable organisation which promotes secular humanism and aims to represent "people who seek to live good lives without religious or superstitious be ...
, a post he held until 1970. In 1968 he edited ''The Humanist Outlook'', a collection of essays on the meaning of humanism. In addition he was one of the signers of the Humanist Manifesto.


Works

Ayer is best known for popularising the
verification principle Verificationism, also known as the verification principle or the verifiability criterion of meaning, is the philosophical doctrine which maintains that only statements that are empirically verifiable (i.e. verifiable through the senses) are cogniti ...
, in particular through his presentation of it in ''
Language, Truth, and Logic ''Language, Truth and Logic'' is a 1936 book about meaning by the philosopher Alfred Jules Ayer, in which the author defines, explains, and argues for the verification principle of logical positivism, sometimes referred to as the ''criterion of ...
'' (1936). The principle was at the time at the heart of the debates of the so-called Vienna Circle which Ayer visited as a young guest. Others, including the leading light of the circle, Moritz Schlick, were already offering their own papers on the issue. Ayer's own formulation was that a sentence can be meaningful only if it has verifiable
empirical Empirical evidence for a proposition is evidence, i.e. what supports or counters this proposition, that is constituted by or accessible to sense experience or experimental procedure. Empirical evidence is of central importance to the sciences and ...
import; otherwise, it is either " analytical" if tautologous or "metaphysical" (i.e. meaningless, or "literally senseless"). He started to work on the book at the age of 23 and it was published when he was 26. Ayer's philosophical ideas were deeply influenced by those of the Vienna Circle and David Hume. His clear, vibrant and polemical exposition of them makes ''Language, Truth and Logic'' essential reading on the tenets of logical empiricism; the book is regarded as a classic of 20th century
analytic philosophy Analytic philosophy is a branch and tradition of philosophy using analysis, popular in the Western world and particularly the Anglosphere, which began around the turn of the 20th century in the contemporary era in the United Kingdom, United Sta ...
, and is widely read in philosophy courses around the world. In it, Ayer also proposed that the distinction between a conscious man and an unconscious machine resolves itself into a distinction between "different types of perceptible behaviour", an argument that anticipates the Turing test published in 1950 to test a machine's capability to demonstrate intelligence. Ayer wrote two books on the philosopher
Bertrand Russell Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British mathematician, philosopher, logician, and public intellectual. He had a considerable influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, linguistics, ar ...
, ''Russell and Moore: The Analytic Heritage'' (1971) and ''Russell'' (1972). He also wrote an introductory book on the philosophy of David Hume and a short biography of Voltaire. Ayer was a strong critic of the German philosopher Martin Heidegger. As a logical positivist Ayer was in conflict with Heidegger's proposed vast, overarching theories regarding existence. These he felt were completely unverifiable through empirical demonstration and logical analysis, and this sort of philosophy an unfortunate strain in modern thought. He considered Heidegger to be the worst example of such philosophy, which Ayer believed to be entirely useless. In ''Philosophy in the Twentieth Century'' (1982) Ayer accuses Heidegger of "surprising ignorance" or "unscrupulous distortion" and "what can fairly be described as charlatanism." In 1972–1973 Ayer gave the
Gifford Lectures The Gifford Lectures () are an annual series of lectures which were established in 1887 by the will of Adam Gifford, Lord Gifford. Their purpose is to "promote and diffuse the study of natural theology in the widest sense of the term – in ...
at the
University of St Andrews (Aien aristeuein) , motto_lang = grc , mottoeng = Ever to ExcelorEver to be the Best , established = , type = Public research university Ancient university , endowment ...
, later published as ''The Central Questions of Philosophy''. In the preface to the book, he defends his selection to hold the lectureship on the basis that Lord Gifford wished to promote " natural theology", in the widest sense of that term", and that non-believers are allowed to give the lectures if they are "able reverent men, true thinkers, sincere lovers of and earnest inquirers after truth". He still believed in the viewpoint he shared with the logical positivists: that large parts of what was traditionally called "philosophy"including the whole of metaphysics, theology and
aesthetics Aesthetics, or esthetics, is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of beauty and taste, as well as the philosophy of art (its own area of philosophy that comes out of aesthetics). It examines aesthetic values, often expressed thr ...
were not matters that could be judged as being true or false and that it was thus meaningless to discuss them. In ''The Concept of a Person and Other Essays'' (1963), Ayer heavily criticized
Wittgenstein Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein ( ; ; 26 April 1889 – 29 April 1951) was an Austrian-British philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. He is consider ...
's
private language argument The private language argument argues that a language understandable by only a single individual is incoherent, and was introduced by Ludwig Wittgenstein in his later work, especially in the ''Philosophical Investigations''. The argument was cent ...
. Ayer's sense-data theory in ''Foundations of Empirical Knowledge'' was famously criticised by fellow Oxonian J. L. Austin in '' Sense and Sensibilia'', a landmark 1950s' work of common language philosophy. Ayer responded to this in the essay "Has Austin Refuted the Sense-datum Theory?", which can be found in his ''Metaphysics and Common Sense'' (1969).


Awards

He was awarded a Knighthood as Knight Bachelor in the London Gazette on 1 January 1970.


Selected publications

* 1936, ''
Language, Truth, and Logic ''Language, Truth and Logic'' is a 1936 book about meaning by the philosopher Alfred Jules Ayer, in which the author defines, explains, and argues for the verification principle of logical positivism, sometimes referred to as the ''criterion of ...
'', London: Gollancz., 2nd ed., with new introduction (1946) * 1936, "Causation and free will," ''
The Aryan Path ''The Aryan Path'' was an Anglo-Indian theosophical journal published in Bombay, India, between 1930 and 1960. Its purpose was to form "a nucleus of universal brotherhood of humanity, without distinction of race, creed, sex, caste or color; to st ...
''. * 1940, '' The Foundations of Empirical Knowledge'', London: Macmillan. * 1954, '' Philosophical Essays'', London: Macmillan. (Essays on freedom, phenomenalism, basic propositions, utilitarianism, other minds, the past, ontology.) * 1957, "The conception of probability as a logical relation", in S. Korner, ed., ''Observation and Interpretation in the Philosophy of Physics'', New York, N.Y.: Dover Publications. * 1956, '' The Problem of Knowledge'', London: Macmillan. *1957, "Logical Positivism - A Debate" (with F. C. Copleston) in: Edwards, Paul, Pap, Arthur (eds.), ''A Modern Introduction to Philosophy; readings from classical and contemporary sources'' * 1963, '' The Concept of a Person and Other Essays'', London: Macmillan. (Essays on truth, privacy and private languages, laws of nature, the concept of a person, probability.) * 1967
"Has Austin Refuted the Sense-Datum Theory?"
ref name=":3">listed (and reprinted) as "Has Austin Refuted Sense-data?" in Fann. K.T. (ed.), '' Symposium on J.L. Austin'' (1969)
''Synthese'' vol. XVIII, pp. 117–140. (Reprinted in Ayer 1969). * 1968, '' The Origins of Pragmatism'', London: Macmillan. * 1969, '' Metaphysics and Common Sense'', London: Macmillan. (Essays on knowledge, man as a subject for science, chance, philosophy and politics, existentialism, metaphysics, and a reply to Austin on sense-data theory yer 1967) * 1971, '' Russell and Moore: The Analytical Heritage'', London: Macmillan. * 1972, '' Probability and Evidence'', London: Macmillan. * 1972, ''
Russell Russell may refer to: People * Russell (given name) * Russell (surname) * Lady Russell (disambiguation) * Lord Russell (disambiguation) Places Australia * Russell, Australian Capital Territory * Russell Island, Queensland (disambiguation) ...
'', London: Fontana Modern Masters. * 1973, '' The Central Questions of Philosophy'', London: Weidenfeld. * 1977, '' Part of My Life'', London: Collins. * 1979, "Replies", in G. F. Macdonald, ed., ''Perception and Identity: Essays Presented to A. J. Ayer, With His Replies'', London: Macmillan; Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press. * 1980, ''
Hume Hume most commonly refers to: * David Hume (1711–1776), Scottish philosopher Hume may also refer to: People * Hume (surname) * Hume (given name) * James Hume Nisbet (1849–1923), Scottish-born novelist and artist In fiction * Hume, ...
'', Oxford: Oxford University Press * 1982, '' Philosophy in the Twentieth Century'', London: Weidenfeld. * 1984, '' Freedom and Morality and Other Essays'', Oxford: Clarendon Press. * 1984, '' More of My Life'', London: Collins. * 1986, '' Ludwig Wittgenstein'', London: Penguin. * 1986, '' Voltaire'', New York: Random House. * 1988, '' Thomas Paine'', London: Secker & Warburg. * 1990, '' The Meaning of Life and Other Essays'', Weidenfeld & Nicolson. *1991, "A Defense of Empiricism" in: Griffiths, A. Phillips (ed.), '' A. J. Ayer: Memorial Essays'' (Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplements). Cambridge University Press. * 1992, "Intellectual Autobiography" and Repiies in: Lewis Edwin Hahn (ed.), '' The Philosophy of A.J. Ayer (The Library of Living Philosophers Volume XXI)'', Open Court Publishing Co.Hahn (1992) also includes a comprehensive 27-page bibliography of Ayer's writings compiled by Guida Crowley. *For more complete publication details se
"The Philosophical Works of A. J. Ayer"
(1979) and "Bibliography of the writings of A.J. Ayer" (1992).


See also

* ''A priori'' knowledge * List of British philosophers


References


Footnotes


Works cited

* Ayer, A.J. (1989)
"That undiscovered country"
''New Humanist'', Vol. 104 (1), May, pp. 10–13. * Rogers, Ben (1999).
A.J. Ayer: A Life
'. New York: Grove Press. .

''The New York Times'', 24 December 2000.) *


Further reading

* Jim Holt
"Positive Thinking"
(review of
Karl Sigmund Karl Sigmund (born July 26, 1945) is a Professor of Mathematics at the University of Vienna and one of the pioneers of evolutionary game theory. Career Sigmund was schooled in the Lycée Francais de Vienne. From 1963 to 1968 he studied at the In ...
, ''Exact Thinking in Demented Times: The Vienna Circle and the Epic Quest for the Foundations of Science'', Basic Books, 449 pp.), ''
The New York Review of Books ''The New York Review of Books'' (or ''NYREV'' or ''NYRB'') is a semi-monthly magazine with articles on literature, culture, economics, science and current affairs. Published in New York City, it is inspired by the idea that the discussion of i ...
'', vol. LXIV, no. 20 (21 December 2017), pp. 74–76. *
Ted Honderich Ted Honderich (born 30 January 1933) is a Canadian-born British professor of philosophy, who was Grote Professor Emeritus of the Philosophy of Mind and Logic, University College London. Biography Honderich was born Edgar Dawn Ross Honderich o ...

Ayer's Philosophy and its Greatness
*
Anthony Quinton Anthony Meredith Quinton, Baron Quinton, FBA (25 March 192519 June 2010) was a British political and moral philosopher, metaphysician, and materialist philosopher of mind. He served as President of Trinity College, Oxford from 1978 to 1987; an ...

Alfred Jules Ayer
''Proceedings of the British Academy'', 94 (1996), pp. 255–282. * Graham Macdonald, Alfred Jules Ayer, '' Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', 7 May 2005. *


External links


"Logical Positivism"
(video) '' Men of Ideas'' interview with
Bryan Magee Bryan Edgar Magee (; 12 April 1930 – 26 July 2019) was a British philosopher, broadcaster, politician and author, best known for bringing philosophy to a popular audience. Early life Born of working-class parents in Hoxton, London, in 1930, w ...
(1978)
"Frege, Russell, and Modern Logic"
(video) '' The Great Philosophers'' interview with Bryan Magee (1987)
Ayer's Elizabeth Rathbone Lecture on Philosophy & Politics

Ayer entry in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy


by
Alex Callinicos Alexander Theodore Callinicos (born 24 July 1950) is a Rhodesian-born British political theorist and activist. An adherent of Trotskyism, he is a member of the Central Committee of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) and serves as its Internatio ...
* *
Appearance on Desert Island Discs - 3 August 1984
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ayer, Alfred 1910 births 1989 deaths 20th-century atheists 20th-century British non-fiction writers 20th-century British philosophers Academics of University College London Alumni of Christ Church, Oxford Analytic philosophers Aristotelian philosophers Atheism in the United Kingdom Atheist philosophers Bard College faculty British Army personnel of World War II British atheists British people of Dutch-Jewish descent British people of Swiss descent British secularists British Special Operations Executive personnel Critics of religions Cultural critics Empiricists English atheists English humanists English logicians English people of Dutch-Jewish descent English people of Swiss descent English philosophers Epistemologists Fellows of Christ Church, Oxford Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Fellows of the British Academy Jewish atheists Jewish humanists Jewish philosophers Knights Bachelor Linguistic turn Logical positivism Logicians Metaphysicians Moral philosophers Ontologists People educated at Eton College People from St John's Wood Philosophers of culture Philosophers of education Philosophers of ethics and morality Philosophers of history Philosophers of language Philosophers of logic Philosophers of mind Philosophers of religion Philosophers of science Philosophers of technology Philosophy writers Political philosophers Presidents of the Aristotelian Society English social commentators Social critics Social philosophers Vienna Circle Welsh Guards officers Wykeham Professors of Logic