biography
| sex:
| male
|
| lived:
| (1806–73)
|
| biography:
| Empiricist philosopher and social reformer, born in London, UK. His father, the Scottish philosopher James Mill, imposed on him a precocious education: he was taught Greek at the age of 3, Latin and arithmetic at 8, logic at 12, and political economy at 13. In 1823 he began a career under his father at the India Office, where he advanced to become head of his department. One of the major intellectual figures of the 19th-c, he was leader of the Benthamite utilitarian movement, helped form the Utilitarian Society, was a major contributor to the Westminster Review, and became a regular participant in the London Debating Society. He published his major work, A System of Logic, in 1843. In 1851 he married Harriet Taylor, who helped him draft the brilliant essay On Liberty (1859), the most popular of all his works. His other main works include Utilitarianism (1863) and Three Essays on Religion (1874). He was elected to parliament in 1865, campaigning for women's suffrage and liberalism. A major figure in the British empiricist tradition, he greatly influenced such figures as Bertrand Russell (to whom he was godfather ‘in a secular sense’) and J M Keynes. |
|
|
