Contents
The Principles of Mathematics consists of 59 chapters divided into seven parts: indefinables in mathematics, number, quantity, order, infinity and continuity, space, matter and motion.
In chapter one, "Definition of Pure Mathematics," Russell asserts that:
The fact that all Mathematics is Symbolic Logic is one of the greatest discoveries of our age; and when this fact has been established, the remainder of the principles of mathematics consists in the analysis of Symbolic Logic itself.
There is an anticipation of relativity physics in the final part as the last three chapters consider Newton's laws of motion, absolute and relative motion, and Hertz's dynamics. However, Russell rejects what he calls "the relational theory", and says on page 489
- For us, since absolute space and time have been admitted, there is no need to avoid absolute motion, and indeed no possibility of doing so.
In his review, Hardy (1903) says "Mr. Russell is a firm believer in absolute position in space and time, a view as much out of fashion nowadays that Chapter will be read with peculiar interest."
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