A.J. Ayer: An Overview

Ted Honderich:

Alfred Jules Ayer was born in London on 29 October 1910 into a well-connected family with a continental past, went to the great private school Eton and then to Oxford, wrote the book Language,Truth and Logic when he was 24, and won celebrity for it and some notoriety. After serving in the war as an intelligence officer, he became the Grote Professor of the Philosophy of Mind and Logic at University College London, and then the Wykeham Professor of Logic at Oxford. He was a dutiful teacher, and in philosophical discussions he invigorated and indeed inspired students and younger colleagues. As a result of broadcasting on the BBC, he became the best-known of British philosophers, and was knighted. He was England's Logical Positivist...

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