On John Stuart Mill: (Core Knowledge)

John Stuart Mill expressed many of the central tenets of liberalism with unsurpassed clarity and enduring influence. Yet Mill's apparent victory in the marketplace of ideas has numbed us to the power of his arguments. To many readers today, his views can seem utterly familiar, even banal. Sharing insights from teaching Mill for many years, the eminent philosopher Philip Kitcher makes a cogent case for why we should read this nineteenth-century thinker now. He portrays Mill as a conflicted humanist who wrestled with problems that are equally urgent in our own time. Kitcher reflects on Mill's ideas in the context of contemporary ethical, social, and political issues such as COVID mandates, gun control, income inequality, gay rights, and climate change. More broadly, he shows, Mill's writings help us cultivate our own capacities for critical thought and ethical decision making. Inviting readers into a conversation with Mill, this book shows that he supplies tools for thinking that are as valuable today as they were in the nineteenth century.

Table of Contents:
Preface 1. The Making of a Conflicted Humanist 2. Freedom for All? 3. Democracy in Danger? 4. Inevitable Inequality? 5. When Do the Numbers Count? Coda: Progressive Mill Suggestions for Further Reading Index

About the Author :
Philip Kitcher is the John Dewey Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Columbia University. He is the author of numerous books and the recipient of awards including the Rescher Medal for systematic philosophy and the Hempel Award for lifetime achievement in the philosophy of science.

Review :
The astute examination of Mill’s attempts to balance conflicts between universal equality and individual agency offer much to ponder. Kitcher eloquently presents a flexible, pragmatic Mill, a Mill whose main concerns are each person's self-cultivation, both intellectual and emotional, and the bonds of public deliberation that link people to one another. Using down-to-earth examples, he then shows how this Mill can confront many of the key problems of our era. A deeply impressive achievement and a marvelous addition to the Core Knowledge series. In this provocative book, Philip Kitcher challenges the conventional views of Mill as a straightforward utilitarian or libertarian. His Mill is a conflicted humanist and progressive. He thereby exposes the tensions in Mill's thought and turns him from someone whose lessons we have already learned into someone who speaks to our current problems. Written in a topical and lively style, this book relates Mill to the present through four central questions in ethical and political theory. Kitcher’s account gives Mill’s thought a new sense of urgency and relevance to today’s issues. Kitcher is one of the most interesting philosophers writing today. This remarkable book shows why. In lucid, jargon-free prose, it makes the case for reading Mill as a progressive, a humanist, and a philosophical pragmatist. It promises to delight philosophers and non-philosophers alike An excellent starting point for the eager and the intrepid who wish to plunge into the purpose driven yet ambivalent world of utilitarianism. Making Mill clear, relevant, and vibrant for new readers and doing so in a way that connects with an enormous and controversial secondary literature. Philip Kitcher does a marvelous job of both.