John Stuart Mill - The Arguments of the Philosophers

First Published in 1999. John Skorupski's book is a comprehensive revaluation of Mill as a philosopher. The opening chapters outline Mill's main doctrines and attitudes and provide an up-to-date account of his views on language, logic and the mind. Skorupski carefully examines Mill's analysis of connotation and denotation and brings out the affinities between Mill's naturalistic view of logic, mathematics and science and important themes in current philosophy. Mill's standing as a political philosopher rests on his insights into the bases of liberalism, and on the power and eloquence with which he grounds them in an appeal to general human good. His views on social science, on utilitarianism and on liberty are examined in the final three chapters. This book aims to re-establish Mill as a major philosopher whose ideas on issues as different as the nature of mathematics and the foundations of liberal democracy are strikingly relevant to today's philosophical debates and inquiries. This book should be of interest to students and lecturers in political/social philosophy.