![]() Language, Truth, and Logic was published in 1936, and Ayer "went off to war" in 1940, to speak loosely. ![]() ![]() Logical positivism in Britain lasted for only about a decade (1935-46). Unfortunately, its founding principle, the principle of verifiability, was irremediably flawed, notwithstanding Ayer's best efforts, notably in the Preface to the second edition of 1946. For twentieth-century British philosophy, Language, Truth, and Logic was both a philosophical Declaration of Independence (from metaphysics) and the Constitution for a new philosophy. Ben Rogers nicely intertwines the facts of Ayer's day-to-day life-which is not to say "quotidian," given Ayer's ego and libido-with his philosophical peregrinations.Īlthough Ayer picked up logical positivism in Vienna when attending sessions of the Vienna Circle, he had accepted the main lines of an empiricism and positivism earlier and on his own. ![]() ![]() Almost everyone now knows the story of how he saved Naomi Campbell by going a round with Mike Tyson. Ayer (1910-89) had the misfortune, for a philosopher, to write his most influential book, Language, Truth, and Logic, when he was in his twenties, even though he continued to publish into his seventies, and to have his nonphilosophical life overwhelm his philosophical one. ![]()
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