System of Logic Ratiocinative and Inductive Being a Connected View of the Principles of Evidence and the Methods of Scientific Investigation

by John Stuart Mill

""System of Logic Ratiocinative and Inductive"" is a comprehensive book written by John Stuart Mill. The book provides a detailed overview of the principles of evidence and the methods of scientific investigation. Mill's work is divided into two the first part focuses on the principles of deductive reasoning, while the second part focuses on the principles of inductive reasoning. The book covers a wide range of topics, including the nature of evidence, the principles of causation, the methods of scientific investigation, and the role of probability in reasoning. Mill's work is considered a classic in the field of logic and has had a significant influence on the development of modern scientific methodology. The book is written in a clear and accessible style, making it suitable for both students and scholars of logic and philosophy.1886. John Stuart Mill is one of the foremost representatives of utilitarian thought as well as one of the most influential of nineteenth century liberals. Influenced by his wife, Harriet Taylor, Mill developed a very humane version of utilitarianism that was sympathetic to women's rights, labor unions, proportional representation, and other liberal themes. This edition contains both Part I and II of A System of Logic. This is the first major installment of Mill's comprehensive restatement of his empiricist and utilitarian position and makes plain his belief that social planning and political action should rely primarily on scientific knowledge, not on authority, custom, revelation, or prescription. See the many other works by this author available from Kessinger Publishing.This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the old original and may contain some imperfections such as library marks and notations. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions, that are true to their original work.

Genres: Philosophy, Science, Logic, Classics, Nonfiction, Economics, Sociology

644 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1843

About the author

John Stuart Mill, English philosopher, political economist, civil servant and Member of Parliament, was an influential liberal thinker of the 19th century. He was an exponent of utilitarianism, an ethical theory developed by Jeremy Bentham, although his conception of it was very different from Bentham's.

Reviews

[Irene · Rating 4 out of 5]

be prepared...this stuff is dense as concrete

[Elia Mantovani · Rating 3 out of 5]

Provare a scrivere una breve recensione di opere monumentali come il Sistema di Mill è senza dubbio impegnativo e probabilmente impossibile. In questo ardimentoso trattato, che negli anni '40 del XIX secolo fece per la prima volta circolare il nome del grande teoreta Inglese, Mill indaga la logica così come intesa in tempi moderni, ossia come la scienza delle scienze, la ragione delle principali strutture del pensiero scientifico. La giustificazione dell'induzione in apologia di Bacone e accusa di Hume si risolve, sostanzialmente, in un accennato probabilismo (tesi, tra l'altro, alla quale perverrà anche Russell, del quale Mill fu padrino battesimale), come suggerito dalle ampie considerazioni sopra l'opera di Laplace. Interessanti le riflessioni in merito al necessitarismo, questo sì di matrice humeana, che l'Autore cerca di combinare con l'idea di un libero arbitrio compatibile con la legge di causazione che introduce l'uomo in un sistema logicamente determinato. Certo, alla luce della filosofia della scienza del secolo scorso il teorema di uniformità della natura lascia insoddisfatti, ma è indubbio che questo sia stata una delle posizioni maggiormente diffuse in difesa del ragionamento induttivo (che per Mill è il vero motore del progresso teorico, essendo il sillogismo nient'altro se non una particolare guisa di petitio principi). Come osservava Feyerabend, tuttavia, l'eredità di Mill presso gli epistemologi del Novecento è incredibile: il "metodo della differenza" non è niente se non una formulazione più tradizionale di quel "modus tollens" sul quale Popper avrebbe eretto un intero criterio logico per demarcare scienza e pseudo-scienza. Un po' troppo dal sapore positivista, secondo me, l'indagine conclusiva sui metodi delle scienze sociali che, se mai godranno dello statuto autonomo delle scienze dure, secondo il filosofo possono essere oggetto di inferenze conclusive se si osservano le tendenze ricorrenti durante la storia e la cosiddetta "etologia". Il testo, insomma, offre una doviziosissima panoramica della storia della logica da Aristotele a Kant passando per gli Scolastici, Leibniz e gli Empiristi e, per quanto la lettura non possa certo dirsi alla portata di ognuno, è sicuramente una pietra miliare nella storia della logica e dell'epistemologia che può arricchire la visione della teoria del ragionamento nei suoi sviluppi e nei suoi dipanamenti concettuali.

[⋆ ˚｡⋆౨ৎ˚Malena · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mostly cohesive and surprisingly modern at times.

[Andrew Noselli · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first half was about analytical logic, which I found more compelling than the second half, which dealt with the logic of language, perhaps.

[Tyler · Rating 4 out of 5]

This, while not an overly complex work, will remain one of my favorites in the field of philosophy, science, and logic. The general idea is basically that it is a compendium of different ideas. A pot pourri of certain stances, philosophies, and overall questions, many of which, even within science, have remain unanswered to this present day. The idea of Free Will and determinism, the validity of the scientific method, the foundation of language, syllogisms and how they were derived from Aristotle, the overall methodology of categorization, biological determinism, the foundations of astronomical observations, the different questions of sociologically correct methods in generating collective behavioral data, the overall questions of the validity of certain schools of thought, such as economics, and their application to the state, all of these questions are gone over in great detail. This is a great book, and is only valued because of its overall breadth, not necessarily the depth.

[Almustafa Couch · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good though rather technical philosophical book, useful to have a philosophical dictionary as a companion. It does set out a pattern requisite for rational thought and, does express its superiority to inconsistent emotional decisions, though it (the suggested method) does allow for emotional input.
His defence of Malthus,"An essay on the principal of population."may have been salient in the mid-1800s but is now demonstrably incorrect, as shown by freely available data. And using Mills methods Malthus's claims would have been refuted, but given that the data was not available Mill's assertion can be forgiven.