John Stuart Mill, FRSE (20 May 1806 – 8 May 1873) was a British philosopher, political economist and civil servant. He was an influential contributor to social theory, political theory, and political economy. He has been called "the most influential English-speaking philosopher of the nineteenth century". Mill's conception of liberty justified the freedom of the individual in opposition to unlimited state control. He was a proponent of utilitarianism, an ethical theory developed by Jeremy Bentham. Hoping to remedy the problems found in an inductive approach to science, such as confirmation bias, he clearly set forth the premises of falsification as the key component in the scientific method. Mill was also a Member of Parliament and an important figure in liberal political philosophy.
Read more about John Stuart Mill: Biography, Major Publications
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“A party of order or stability, and a party of progress or reform, are both necessary elements of a healthy state of political life.”
—John Stuart Mill (1806–1873)
“Spig Wead: I’ve been thinking what a heel I’ve been about you and about my own kids. I don’t know, when I do something, I go all the way. Living. Gambling. Flying. I tap myself out. I guess that’s the way I want it to be. Maybe even the way I am.
Minne Wead: Star-spangled Spig. Damn the martinis, full speed ahead and don’t give up the ship.”
—Frank Fenton, William Wister Haines, co-scenarist, and John Ford. Spig Wead (John Wayne)
“The distractions, the exhaustions, the savage noises, the demands of town life, are, for me, mortal enemies to thought, to sleep, and to study; its extremes of squalor and of splendor do not stimulate, but sadden me; certain phases of its society I profoundly value, but would sacrifice them to the heaven of country quiet, if I had to choose between.”
—Elizabeth Stuart Phelps (1844–1911)
“Mathematics may be compared to a mill of exquisite workmanship, which grinds your stuff of any degree of fineness; but nevertheless, what you get out depends upon what you put in; and as the grandest mill in the world will not extract wheat- flour from peascods, so pages of formulae will not get a definite result out of loose data.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)