The Great Philosophers series is generally a mixed bag of accessible and inaccessible or dry material. Their treatment of Ayer is the most engaging and thought provoking of the series, most likely because his Logical Positivist philosophy is not nearly as obtuse as say Bertrand Russell's mathmatical conundrums. This book is highly recommended to both students and casual readers.

It's a shame that this book is out of print, as to my knowledge it is the best book of its kind. Ayer critically summarizes each of the major strains of 20th century thought, from logical positivism to pragmatism to existentialism. Russell, Moore, James and Collingwood are covered in some detail; other thinkers, such as Heidegger, Sartre, Quine and Goodman, are introduced more concisely (but not neglectfully -- for example, I found Ayer's few pages on "Being and Time" very helpful). A participant himself in some of the philosophical debates he chronicles, Ayer clearly understands what he is writing about, and he is both able and willing to translate complex ideas into non-technical language. The subject matter is not easy, but Ayer's style is always enjoyable. This book ought to be reissued, but for now it's worth tracking down a used copy.

I had higher expectations of this particular book. Somehow it feels too personal to me, and on that personal level I cannot connect with A.J. Ayer. This is supposed to be a grand account of the philosophy of logical positivism associated with some of the major figures of the Vienna Circle. Ayer is on a mission to save philosophy from the morass of metaphysics. He wants to make philosophy serve science by analyzing meaningful concepts and getting rid of the meaningless ones. But alas, he missed some scientific education. If Ayer were to be taken literally by scientists, much of science would stop dead in its tracks. He seems to think that clear definitions are key to good science. I disagree. Newton has only an operational definition of gravity (i.e., he says what it does), and even that seems to be implicit. Einstein's simultaneity, which is Ayer's own example is also not something marvelously defined, but simply the result of the core of the theory. And simultaneity is a figment of our imagination, since time is relative.

Another problem is that one logically has to conclude that literature cannot teach you anything meaningful because it is peppered with the kind of metaphysical concepts that are dismissed as meaningless by logical positivists. Is literature, painting, and music nothing more than a play on human passions? A mere portal to a state of emotional excitement. Please! I will take Shakespear, Gauguin, and Motzart over this kind of philosophy any day. I would rather listen to the raspy voice of Toto Cutugno any day and hear his foreign words, some of which I do not understand, than to read again young A.J. Ayer's "Critique of Ethics and Theology."

There is no better single source of doing philosophy via the logical positivism method than by reading this book. It's really two books in one. The Introduction is a rather thorough reply to his critics of the book's original lengthier substance, and if nothing else is read, the Introduction provides an excellent example of what logical positivism is, why it is regarded highly or poorly depending on the reader, and why some people think this kind of analysis defeats the whole purpose of philosophy. The book does try to end metaphysics as we know it, but in the course of establishing new principles (i.e., verifiability), it itself becomes indefensible against the accusation of itself relying on its own premises to prove its own conclusions (a charge Ayer coyly ignores), otherwise known as circularity.

The fact that many Anglo-American philosophers still do philosophy in this manner -- after Ayer's style -- is reason alone to study this book thoroughly. It is concisely written, clear and unambiguious (if not a tad bit too analytical), and exemplary of Anglo-American style of doing philosophy. I don't think too many philosophers subscribe to its own circular metaphysics, but many, if not most, current philosophers adopt its principles as a "method" -- something which Ayer later (in "The Meaning of Life") claims was his aim all along.

What is disappointing to me, at least in the body of Ayer's works read thus far, is his failure to address "verifiability" in light of Popper's "falsification" doctrine. What exactly constitutes "verifiability" or empirical truth? And, how does the verification of empirical truth differ from the "empirical falsification" of Popper? Perhaps Ayer addresses this problem somewhere, but I've not found it. It would be an interesting problem to see solved.

If you are tired of reading summaries and general introductions to philosophy and would like to start reading original works, "Language, Truth and Logic" is a great place to start. The book is clear and concise, and is the classic presentation of logical positivism in English.

The concept underlying Ayer's discussion is the "principle of verifiability," which defines a statement as being "literally meaningful" only if it either is logically necessary ("analytical") or can be empirically verified as being either true or false. Under this definition, metaphysical statements are not literally meaningful, and so are properly part of theology rather than philosophy.

Ayer believes that many philosophical debates (such as those about ethics or about the nature of the soul) stem from arguing about metaphysical statements as if they were literally meaningful. He believes that once metaphysics has been eliminated from philosophy, these debates will seem silly and the questions that underlie them will be recognized as theological rather than philosophical. So once he has established the principle of verifiability and explained how he identifies statements as either verifiable or analytical, Ayer spends the rest of the book applying this principle to various "philosophical" questions.

Of course, the place of metaphysics in philosophy is itself debatable. Ayer's conception of philosophy is relatively narrow, and many readers will prefer a wider definition of philosophy that includes some (or all) of the metaphysical statements that he banishes. Others will be thrilled to finally read a philosophical work that cuts through the mystical goo spread so liberally and destructively by other thinkers. Whether or not one agrees with Ayer's approach and conclusions, one has to appreciate his clear presentation of an important philosophical viewpoint.

"I warned you," Anthony Blanche said to Charles Ryder in Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited. "I took you out to dinner to warn you of charm. . . Charm is the great English blight. It does not exist outside these damp islands. It spots and kills anything it touches. It kills love; it kills art; I greatly fear, my dear Charles, it has killed you."

Anthony Blanche could have just as well been speaking of A.J. "Freddie" Ayer, for he was to philosophy what Waugh's Charles Ryder was to art: a celebrity more noted for being such rather than for his work, which is found to come up short. Overshadowed in philosophy by Wittgenstein and in both philosophy and celebrity by Russell (who had a unique talent of reinventing himself so as to appear new to each generation), Ayer is mainly known for one work, Language, Truth and Logic, a depressing tome that relegates anything that is not empirically verifiable or true in virtue of linguistic rules as meaningless. Questions of God and metaphysics are lumped in this category.

Despite being overshadowed by Russell and Wittgenstein, Ayer may have had the last laugh, for his influence on philosophy far surpassed theirs. As Rogers notes, Ayer wanted to put an end to philosophy. For Ayer, the only role for philosophy is the logical clarification of the concepts of science, rather than the quest for truth and ultimate reality.

With that stroke of the pen, Ayer succeeded to dealing philosophy a near mortal wound from only which she is now recovering. Ayer took philosophy from the general reader and rarefied it to the world of specialization and academia. Where once philosophers as Hegel, Schopenhauer, McTaggart, Bergson and Russell wrote for an educated public, today philosophers write for other philosophers. Instead of a search for ultimate truths, philosophy has become a series of problems made sterile in the world of academia.

But how could the iconoclastic Ayer accomplish this? The answer is simple: charm. Rogers astutely chronicles Ayer's smooth relationship and movement through the upper classes so often found in the environment of the English university. Ayer grasped quite quickly that if one can't out-think one's opponent, it is just as well to out-entertain him. And for that task Ayer was well suited. He became a sort of celebrity on the BBC, always playing the iconoclastic philosopher, whether debating Frederick Copleston on the existence of God for BBC radio or discussing the nature of knowledge for a televised lecture series. Learning from Russell's mistakes, Ayer eschewed the leftist radicalism that defined the later Russell in favor of a trendy leftist posture that guaranteed entree to the moneyed classes that dominated England and America.

Bur the real delight in Rogers's book comes when he describes not A.J. Ayer, thinker, but "Freddie" Ayer, hedonist, filling in what Freddie does not tell us in two volumes of autobiography. Unilke Alfred Jules, the Thinker, Freddie the Fop thought with a different organ, judging from his marriages and numerous affairs, sometimes seeing two or more women at the same time. There is a strange hilarity is seeing one of England's foremost practitioners of rationality being such a slave to his libido when not on duty. And Rogers does a first-rate job interlocking the two into a seamless whole, knowing when to switch gears and keep the reader's interest on the page.

The funniest passage in the book is the confrontation between Ayer and one Mike Tyson (yes, that Mike Tyson) who shanghaied a young Naomi Campbell into a spare bedroom during the course of a posh party with something other than debate on his mind. How does it turn out? I leave it to you to find out the power and limits of charm.

A.J. Ayer was a second rate thinker not worthy of serious consideration. Unfortunately, many do not agree with my assessment of Ayer's ideas and his ill earned fame and influence persists even in this century. One may prefer to ignore Ayer, but pragmatically this is not wise. Ben Roger's splendid book does much to assist us to learn more about Ayer and those who worship the ground he walked on. Ayer is a quintessential example of how a highly rewarding career can be built upon deliberate iconoclasm and trendiness. Pseudo intellectualism is often warmly received by the Left leaning members of Great Britain's university milieu. In such a dilettante environment, one's ability to shock and entertain is valued far more than true intellectual brilliance. The author spends significant time dealing with Ayer's relationships with members of England's upper crust. This class of people psychologically eviscerated by self doubts and low self esteem are perfect cannon fodder for Ayer's pernicious charm.

Ayer gravitated towards a personal philosophy that served to rationalize away his faults and mistreatment of other human beings. The central premise of Ayer's so called philosophy (which is actually an anti-philosophy) is that only phenomena that can be ascertained within the severely limited parameters of Logical Positivism merit our attention. Thus, nothing is worthy of valid interest that cannot be empirically verified. Questions concerning love, God, values, evil, the possibility of life after death, are to be relegated to the dust bin of history. The very underpinnings of a viable social order are inevitably threatened by the tacit conclusion of Ayer's thoughts. Ayer was a charlatan who seduced his adoring faithful into embracing a way of looking at matters that legitimately belong to the realm of the hard sciences. Unfortunately, this approach fails miserably when addressing the unavoidable existential issues of human life.

I suspect that I'm encouraging people to read Ben Roger's book for reasons that will not entirely thrill the author. Roger almost certainly doesn't share my caustic appraisal of Ayer. That, however, is Roger's problem and not mine. We should read Roger's book to learn from the past so not to fall prey to similar nonsense in the future. Karl Popper, an ardent foe of Ayer's central beliefs deserves your rapt devotion. Popper is truly a giant for all time, and scathingly took Ayer and his ilk to task. I also whole heartily encourage the reader to obtain a copy of the recently released --The Abolition of Britain--by Peter Hitchens. Another work , --The Intellectuals--by Paul Johnson, takes an insightful look at other high profile individuals who have also done much damage to civilization. Johnson whole thesis revolves around the absurdity of pretending that one's personal behavior does not influence their intellectual life.

Excellent! A very enjoyable read about a man I've heard disparaged more often than most in 20th century philosophy. While it's true Ayer's work seems to be fairly derivative, and still extremely influential, he was restating a vein of British philosophy that I for one feel pretty favorable about. On reading his life story, I find that Ayer did more than I knew to bring the anti-metaphysical views of his hero Hume to the public, the academy, and a large and interesting slice of cultural limelights. Sure, his flaws were many and glaring, and you'll find a clear cataloging of his vices in these reviews as well as the book itself. What was surprising to me was to read of his many less reported virtues, including an aversion to discipleship, an agile interest in philosophical developments throughout the world, courage in the face of wooly-headed public theism, and a valiant record of worthwhile public service (a rarity in the history of PHI giants). While Wittgenstein romantically isolated himself wringing his hands in the service of a semi-secular priesthood, Ayer made real gains in reforming British adoption, schooling, and discrimination against homosexuals.

And this points to what makes this book far more interesting to read than the lives of most British philosophers - He actually lived a life worth reading about! Hardly a famous cultural figure lived through post-war Britain without having dinner with Ayer. He even lectured the Kennedy family! For Ayer, philosophy and life were separate affairs for the most part (and of affairs you'll read plenty). He firmly believed that when one began to speak beyond the realms of empirical evidence, one risked speaking nothing but nonsense, and to his credit he seemed to mostly avoid the temptation. In my humble opinion, that is good for philosophy, bad for your fan club.

I for one gained from reading this book. While I don't see Ayer as a member of heroic pantheon to be emulated, I do have a new respect for this most "sensible" public intellectual.

Excellent discussion of Russell's philosophical logic. Discussion of epistemology is a bit less lucid. Highly recommend overall.