Feyerabend - Jacobs

The Social Science Journal 40 (2003) 201–212

Misunderstanding John Stuart Mill on science:Paul Feyerabend’s bad influence

Struan Jacobs∗

School of Social Inquiry, Deakin University, Geelong, Vic. 3217, Australia

Feyerabend (1975, 1981, 1987)takes J. S. Mill’sOn Liberty to support the proliferation of the-ories in science and to emphasize the fallibility of scientific knowledge.On Liberty, accordingto Feyerabend, contradicts and overthrows Mill’s major study of science,A System of Logic.Staley (1999)reads the 2 works of Mill as giving complementary accounts of science. Thepresent author rejects these interpretations of Mill, arguing thatA System of Logic andOn Lib-erty are mutually compatible sinceOn Liberty concerns the nature ofnon-scientific knowledgeand the methods that Mill believes are appropriate to expanding and assessing that knowledge.

Paul Feyerabend’sAgainst Method ranks withKarl Popper’sThe Logic of Scientific Discovery(1959), Michael Polanyi’sPersonal Knowledge (1958)andThomas Kuhn’sThe Structure ofScientific Revolutions (1962)as among the twentieth century’s most influential analyses ofscience. Supporting theoretical and methodological pluralism,Feyerabend (1975, pp. 47–48)suggests that “The separation between the history of a science, its philosophy and the scienceitself dissolves into thin air and so does the separation between science and non-science.” AndFeyerabend (1975, p. 48 n.2)considers that “An account and a truly humanitarian defence ofthis position can be found in J. S. Mill’sOn Liberty.”1 This is most ironical: Mill, who wascanonised “the saint of rationalism” in the nineteenth century, has his arguments invoked bythe irrationalist, Feyerabend, in the twentieth century. Exposing themisinterpretation of Mill’sthought by Feyerabend and his followers—notably K.Staley (1999)in a recent publication inthis journal—motivates the present essay.2

1. Logic of this discussion

In thefirst place it is necessary to show that there is a fundamentalepistemological differencebetween Mill’sA System of Logic, his major work on science, and his famous tract for the times,

∗ Tel.: +61-03-5227-2692.E-mail address: [email protected] (S. Jacobs).

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202 S. Jacobs / The Social Science Journal 40 (2003) 201–212

On Liberty, in terms of their respectiveaims for andmethods to knowledge. Accordingly, ifOn Liberty includes science, as Feyerabend and Staley assume, thenLiberty’s epistemologyis incompatible with that of A System of Logic. (Feyerabend recognises this incompatibility,unlike Staley, so this aspect of my argument is specifically against Feyerabend. InStaley’s(1999, p. 1)frank assessment, “those aspects of Mill’sOn Liberty that are suggestive of ananti-rationalist philosophy are entirely compatible with the theory of scientific method Milloffers inA System of Logic.” My discussion ofOn Liberty, in particular, will initially involvesome simplification (even oversimplification) which will be redressed along the way. I find itbetter to approach complex texts gingerly than to wade in.

In thesecond step of the argument I directly consider whetherOn Liberty includes science,as Feyerabend and Staley believe. A strong, but admittedly not conclusive (conclusiveness inthis context is quite simply out of the question) case is developed to show that Mill’s relevantdiscussion in the book—chapter two, “Of the Liberty of Thought and Discussion”—chieflyconcerns forms of knowledge other than science, science being a side issue for him there.(One corollary of this, too obvious to require elaboration in the paper, is that Feyerabend andStaley misconceiveOn Liberty in imagining it supports, in their terminology, methodologicalanarchism or dadaism in science. Another corollary is that our argument answers a questionin Millian exegesis which, despite or because of being fundamental, is seldom asked, whetherMill renounced the understanding of science laboriously developed inA System of Logic fora radically different understanding of science inOn Liberty.3 We answernegatively.) Reasonswe present forOn Liberty’s epistemology not being about science are (1) itseldom refersto physical science, usually to non-scientific doctrines, (2)when mentioned, physical scienceis apt to be excluded from key points being made, and (3) in composingOn Liberty, Mill’scontext and focus of interest had little if anything to do with scientists’ practice and knowledge.(Incidentally, (3) furnishes the rationale—which Staley complained my earlier writings onMill’s epistemology lacked (Jacobs, 1986, 1991)—for why Mill did not include science in histheory of knowledge in chapter two ofLiberty.)4

2. Aims of knowledge

2.1. Quality of the knowledge at which scientists aim, as represented in A System of Logic

The first point to note regarding Mill’sSystem of Logic—a salutary illustration of howintellectual history sharpens understanding of an author such as Mill (contrasting Feyerabendand Staley’s depictions of him which are synchronic and unhistorical, insufficiently sensitiveto nuance and unheeding of context)—is that he saw it through eight editions, the first in 1843,the final in 1872. Through all editions Mill envisages theaim of science asproven knowledge.(I concentrate on his image ofnatural science to the exclusion of social science so as to avoidextraneous material and to reflect Feyerabend and Staley’s interest.) He believes this aim isattainable, numerous causal laws of science having been proven true.

As matter of historical interest, all editions ofA System of Logic regard suchproof asgiving certain knowledge of the truth of laws. So, the law of universal causation is said byMill (1974, p. 570)to stand “at the head of all observed uniformities, in point of universality,

S. Jacobs / The Social Science Journal 40 (2003) 201–212 203

and therefore (if the preceding observations are correct [as he believes they are]) in point ofcertainty.“Again,”the law of cause and effect, being thus certain, is capable of imparting itscertainty to all other inductive propositions which can be deduced from it” as already manycan (Mill, 1974, p. 571; on certainty, see alsoMill, 1974, pp. 314, 324, 574).

Mill inserts some qualifications in later editions. For example,Mill (1974, p. 322 n. emphasisadded) had written in the consecutive 1843 and 1846 editions of uniformities that “may beconsidered asabsolutely certain and absolutely universal” which he toned down in the 1851edition (preserving the revision thereafter) to “quite certain and quite universal.” And in thefinal edition (1872)Mill (1974, p. 574)added, “We must hold even our strongest convictionswith an opening left in our minds for the reception of facts which contradict them; and onlywhen we have taken this precaution, have we earned the right to act upon our convictions withcomplete confidence when no such contradiction appears.”

One has, however, to guard against exaggerating the magnitude of such changes; it remainsthe recurrent theme ofA System of Logic thatproof givescertain scientific knowledge of truthof laws. For example, in the same passage (Mill, 1974, p. 322) from which our second lastquotation came, Mill reiterated through all editions:

If, then, a survey of the uniformities which have been ascertained to exist in nature, shouldpoint out some which, as far as any human purpose requires certainty, may be consideredquite certain and quite universal; then by means of these uniformities we may be able to raisemultitudes of other inductions to the same point in the scale. . . There are such certain anduniversal inductions; and it is because there are such, that a Logic of Induction is possible.

In the text immediately before the 1872 insertion noted in our last paragraph,Mill (1974,p. 574)preserved the words that had appeared in all seven earlier editions, that the universallaw of causation has “sufficient grounds” for being received “as a certainty,” describing this“certainty” (again in all editions) as imparted “to all other” statements of causal law (e.g.,Newton’s) that are able to “be deduced from it” (Mill, 1974, p. 571). Such, usually slight,qualifications in later editions are probably explicable in terms of Mill marking off his positionfrom the intuitionists (notably his great adversary William Whewell) who claimed there arescientific laws that we knowmust be true, their contraries being inconceivable. “Absolutecertainty” for Mill was unsupportable on his essentially (Lockean) empiricist principles. Torepeat, Mill’saim for science inA System of Logic remainedproven knowledge; truth of whichwe canjustifiably claim to becertain.

2.2. Type of knowledge appropriately aimed at—the account in On Liberty

Mill’s constructive aim in the essayOn Liberty is todefend freedom, his “theory” of knowl-edge being incorporated in his case for freedom of thought and discussion. In other wordstheepistemology of chapter two of this book is apremise andnot a conclusion (Mill, 1977b,p. 257)—the fact that goes some way towards explaining Mill’s presentation of it as fragmentsand bald assertions, Mill making no concerted effort to explain the epistemology’sgroundsnor to systematically articulate it.

How is Mill’s aim for knowledge inOn Liberty to be described? Truth is an important partof it; Mill wants people to upholdtrue doctrines, but the aim is complex, comprising at least


two other elements. Moreover Mill says many theories are not true or false as such but alloysof truthand falsity (hisfourth argument for intellectual freedom).Mill’s (1977b, pp. 242–243)ideal consists in a theory which, besides being true,exerts a practical (“moral”) effect on itsadherents’ character and conduct, and which also subjectively exists as a “living truth.” This lastcondition,rational belief in truth, requires that an adherent understandwhy her theory is true—its grounds—including the arguments that obviate objections to it. (Good reasons for believinga theory to be true are of course no guarantee that it is.) The opposite case (Mill, 1977b, p. 244)consists in a doctrine being held independently of argument, as a “prejudice” or “superstition.”Rational grounds and moral meaning appear as Mill’ssecond andthird arguments for freedomof thought in chapter two ofOn Liberty, with fallibility the first argument.

How, according to Mill inLiberty, are people to know whether theoriesare true? Here—andbecoming more conspicuous in the following subsection of our paper—is the rub. The answerto the question relates to the epistemology adumbrated by Mill in his famous first argument forfreedom of thought and discussion. (Consistent with my approach which I outlined earlier, Icommence in simplifying fashion, later adding complicating details.) Can thetruth of doctrinesor theories be proven? Not according to the piece of text in question.Mill (1977b, p. 231)sayswe are entitled toassume doctrines as true for “purposes of action”; but that, of course, is notthe same as saying they areproven true.

The point is significant:the aim for knowledge projected inOn Liberty is strikingly differentfrom its counterpart inA System of Logic. Proof of certainty Mill is suggesting in his firstargument in chapter two ofLiberty is not a feasible aim; our opinions arefallible and, besides,“ages are no moreinfallible than individuals; every age having held many opinions whichsubsequent ages have deemed not only false but absurd; and it is as certain that many opinions,now general, will be rejected by future ages, as it is that many, once general, are rejected bythe present” (Mill, 1977b, p. 230 emphasis added).

3. Methods to knowledge

3.1. Methods in A System of Logic

Suffice for present needs to discuss only some of the main methods Mill attributes to sciencein his massive tome.

Induction by simple enumeration is generalising to the truth of a universal proposition fromobserved particulars and from there being no reported experience of a counter-instance to it.The method offers a rigorous proof of select laws of highest generality—the sheer weightof confirming evidence together with there being known counter-evidence Mill counts asconclusive. Accordingly, “the most universal class of truths, the law of causation for instance,and the principles of number and of geometry, are duly and satisfactorily proved by that methodalone, nor are they susceptible of any other proof” (Mill, 1974, p. 569).

Induction by elimination comprises several separate methods, each assisting scientistsengaged in the experimental variation of circumstances to “eliminate” or filter out combi-nations that arenot causally connected, in the hope of discovering ones that are. Of these typesof elimination, the only one sufficiently strong to strictlyprove causation is themethod of


difference in which two sets of prior circumstances, symbolised as ABC and BC, and two setsof posterior circumstances,abc andbc, prove saysMill (1974, p. 393)that A is the cause orunconditional and invariable antecedent ofa.

Besides the foregoing, there is amethod of deduction which Mill (1974, p. 461) lookson as the most important development in scientific method since Bacon analysed the twobroad types of induction (enumerative and eliminative) in hisNovuum Organum, the deductivemethod having been crucially involved in Newton’s physics and contributing to its warrantedrecognition as the “true theory of the causes of the celestial motions” leading as it did “bydeduction to Kepler’s laws.” Newton himself had professed the use of complementary inductiveand deductive methods as Mill would have been well aware, with Newton’s physics a paradigmfor Mill (1974, pp. 218, 317)of proven, certain scientific knowledge, among “the greatesttriumph[s] of the investigation of nature.”

Recalling that Mill’saim for scientific knowledge inA System of Logic is certainty aboutthe truth of laws of nature, he regards themethods he presents there as conducing to that end,adapted toproving the truth of statements of causal laws, yielding certain knowledge.

3.2. Methods presented in On Liberty

WhatMill (1977b, pp. 229–230)writes inOn Liberty’s importantly relevant passages aboutmethod complements his understanding of the quality of knowledge to beaimed at, that allclaims to truth arefallible and opinions of which we “feel very certain” may very well beerroneous.

A notable strand inMill’s (1977b, p. 231)thinking aboutmethod in On Liberty is expressed inhis remark about our being entitled to presume “an opinion true” when “with every opportunityfor contesting it, it has not been refuted.” Then this: “Complete liberty of contradicting anddisproving our opinion, is the very condition which justifies us in assuming its truth for purposesof action; and on no other terms can a being with human faculties have any rational assuranceof being right” (Mill, 1977b, p. 231). Continuing thisnegative theme of criticism and discoveryof false knowledge,Mill (1977b, p. 231 emphasis added) attributes the “preponderance amongmankind of rational opinions” to a mental quality at the source of “everything” intellectuallyworthwhile, “namely, that. . . errors arecorrigible.”5 All of this contrastsA System of Logicwith its positive, probative emphasis onfinding truth.

4. Upshot of these considerations

Having indicated thatA System of Logic andOn Liberty affirm decidedly differentaimsfor andmethods to knowledge, it is plain thatif Liberty’s aims and methods are intendedforscience Mill will have produced an account of science in fundamentalcontradiction of the otherwork. In which case either he was badly confused in his own mind as to the nature of scientificmethods and achievementsor else he rejected one account for the other.If the latter, Millwould at least have been consistent, but then the interpreter would have the devilish problemof working out whether Mill preferredLiberty’s metascience to that of theLogic (Liberty waswritten later) orvice versa (he continued revising theLogic in editions after the appearance


of the other work and he never renounced theLogic’s account of the aims and methods ofscience).

So thecrucial issue for present purposes is whether Feyerabend and Staley are correct inviewing science as part ofOn Liberty’s epistemology.Were we to find thatLiberty does indeedinclude science we should say that Feyerabend’s point about its beingincompatible with themetascience ofA System of Logic is correct, Staley having misunderstood relations betweenthese works. In fact, our argument will be that while science and its knowledge arementionedby Mill in Liberty, they arenot part of his theory of knowledge there. There isno contradictionbetween Mill’s doctrines about aims and methods between the two books, those ofsciencebeing treated of inA System of Logic, butnot in On Liberty. Feyerabend and his follower Staleyis each mistaken in his own way.

4.1. Evidence to show that On Liberty is not presenting aims and methods for science

The evidence to be furnished in this section strongly suggests that chapter two ofOn Libertyprovides neither end nor method for science.

First, science is peripheral inLiberty; most references in the relevant chapter (two) are tonon-scientific subjects—religious beliefs and moral positions. In the opening argument of thechapter, for example, illustrations include espousal of the doctrine of tyrannicide, challengingthe “belief in a God and in a future state, or any of the commonly received doctrines of morality”(Mill, 1977b, p. 234), Socrates’ alleged impiety, crucifixion of Christ, Marcus Aurelius’ perse-cution of Christians, various persecutions of adherents of religious doctrines deemed immoral(seeMill, 1977b, p. 228–241and, for further cases,Mill, 1977b, pp. 243, 247–250, 252–257).

Second. while Mill’s references in chapter two ofLiberty are overwhelmingly to religiousand ethical subjects, I concede that there are some citations—four to be precise—of science.But these turn out on analysis to be weak support for the proposition thatLiberty’s accountof aims, methods and quality of knowledge is inclusive of science. The citations will be dealtwith one at a time.

(1) Early in the chapterMill (1977b, p. 225 emphasis added) defines the rightfuldomain of free thought and discussion as comprising “all subjects, practical or specula-tive, scientific, moral or theological.” Scientific knowledge and methods are obviously partof the domain of free discussion that Mill seeks to defend. But this isnot to say that thereasons-with-epistemology that Mill advances in support of this domainthemselves refer toscience. This is matter for scholarly inquiry and cannot be assumed.

(2) Mill’s next citation of science occurs in the context of his fallibility argument (firstargument, chapter two), the nub of which is that suppression of heterodoxy involves insupport-able assumptions of infallibility and certain knowledge of truth.Mill (1977b, p. 232 emphasisadded)adds the presently relevant thought:

If even the Newtonian philosophy were not permitted to be questioned, mankind couldnot feelas complete assurance of its truth as theynow do. The beliefs which we have most warrant for,haveno safeguard to rest on, but a standing invitation to the world to prove them unfounded.If the challenge is not accepted, or is accepted and the attempt fails, we are far enough fromcertainty still; but we have done the best that the existing state of human reason admits of; wehave neglected nothing that could give the truth a chance of reaching us.


There is anexegetical problem with this passage which contains twoconflicting sugges-tions. Its first sentence suggests, not the fallibility of Newton’s theory but, people’s full andjustified “assurance of its truth.” The first sentence insinuates that this “complete assurance”predominantly owes to anon-critical method(s), with criticism an adjunct enhancing that othermethod without which (non-critical method) our feeling of assurance would be nothing like“as complete” as it is.

Conflict exists between that opening sentence of Mill’s passage and the sentences followingit in the same passage. His second sentence is to the effect that our most warranted beliefs(in which class he obviously includes Newtonianism and other rigorously evidenced scientifictheories) haveno “safeguard” other thancriticism, a method, obviously, providingno certainty.(His metaphor “safeguard” is ill-chosen: an invitation tocriticise some theory increases,not thetheory’s security (security being what the term “safeguard” is normally understood to mean)but, the possibility of its being found false.)

Plainly, Mill’s passage is confused and confusing: initially suggesting there are theories thathave been certified or proven by a non-critical method, it shifts to the contradictory view thatopenness to criticism is theonly safeguard for theories, also suggesting we are never certainthat scientific theories are true. The first proposition chimes with Mill’s doctrines inA Systemof Logic, the second proposition runs counter to theSystem’s teaching and would seem toinclude science within the ambit of the opening—fallibility/criticism—argument ofLiberty’schapter two. As it stands this (internally inconsistent) passage inLiberty is withoutevidentialvalue in neither confirming nor disconfirming my interpretation thatLiberty basically exludesscience, nor the Feyerabend–Staley interpretation that it includes science.

(3) The way out of thatcul de sac, I suggest, is to understand sentences two and three in thelast quotation asrhetorical with regard to science. Developing this argument I move toMill’s(1977b, pp. 250–252)third mention of science where his comments serve as a corrective tothe second and third propositions in the passage that we have just considered and tally with hisclaim about science in the opening sentence of that passage.

Mill has anticipated an adversary rhetorically asking, “The highest aim. . . of improvedintelligence, it has hitherto been thought, is to unite mankind more and more in the acknowl-edgement of all important truths: and does the intelligence only last as long as it has notachieved its object?”Mill (1977b, pp. 250–251 emphasis added) answers:

As mankind improve, the number of doctrines which are no longer disputed or doubted willbe constantly on the increase: and the well-being of mankind may almost be measured bythe number and gravity of thetruths which have reached the point of beinguncontested. Thecessation, on one question after another, of serious controversy, is one of the necessary incidentsof the consolidation of opinion; a consolidation assalutary in the case of true opinions, as itis dangerous and noxious when the opinions are erroneous. But though this gradual narrowingof the bounds of diversity of opinion is necessary in both senses of the term, being at onceinevitable and indispensable, we are not therefore obliged to conclude that all its consequencesmust be beneficial.

Here Mill recognises and reservedly approves unanimity about true theories and suggests thereexist methods for establishing and recognising truth (without explaining what they are). Somereaders might object that Mill is not suggesting this at all; they might say he alludes to his


twofold thesis earlier in the chapter that the only method of appraisal iscriticism and thattheories accordingly are never more than fallible. I answer, were Mill here referring to thatthesis he would have been logically committed to saying in the passage just quoted, first, thattheories are exhaustively divisible as either fallible or else falsified and, second, our knowledgeof truth is at best uncertain. Andwere he assuming his earlier point that unfalsified theories arefallible, he would have no warrant now for talking about the “number and gravity of truths”that are uncontested as if this were an index of intellectual progress. Tacit in Mill’s presentpassage is a belief inpositive methods andproven truth—themes ofA System of Logic in otherwords.

We proceed to the bottom of page 251 ofLiberty where Mill writes:

It is the fashion of the present time to disparage negative logic—that which points outweak-nesses in theory or errors in practice, without establishing postive truths. Suchnegative criti-cism would indeed be poor enough as an ultimate result; but as a means to attaining any positiveknowledge or conviction worthy of the name, it cannot be valued too highly. . . (Mill, 1977b,pp. 251–252 emphasis added).

As they stand such sentiments appear to support the epistemology of fallibility-and-criticismof the opening argument ofOn Liberty chapter two, and to confirm the interpretation thatFeyerabend and Staley would no doubt want to give of the difficult passage at page 232(analysed in (2)). But—and this qualification seems crucial in revealing Mill’s deeper thoughtson the matter, helping us to interpret the problematic passage at page 232 as well as theepistemology of his first argument—Mill (1977b, p. 252 emphasis added) immediately addsthat the negative method “cannot be valued too highly; and until people are systematicallytrained to it, there will be few great thinkers. . . in any but the mathematical and physicaldepartments of speculation.” Mill (1977, p. 252) is implying here, as elsewhere in chapter twoof Liberty, that a method or set of methods is available to physical scientists over and abovethat of criticism, and he reinforces the point by adding that “on any other subject” thanphysical(and mathematical) science “no one’s opinions deserve the name of knowledge” that have notbeen subject to “negative logic.” Themethod which, in Mill’s eyes,distinguishes science fromnon-science is non-critical.6

(4) Mill (1977b, p. 244 emphasis added) also mentions science in the context of his secondargument for free thought and discussion, the argument that confrontation of ideas sharpensappreciation of thegrounds of one’s theory.

The peculiarity of the evidence of mathematical truths is, that all the argument is on one side.There are no objections, and no answers to objections. But on every subject on which differenceof opinion is possible, the truth depends on a balance to be struck between two sets of conflictingreasons. Even innatural philosophy [natural science], there is always some other explanationpossible of the same facts; some geocentric theory instead of heliocentric, some phlogistoninstead of oxygen; and it has to be shown why that other theory cannot be the true one: anduntil this is shown, we do not understand the grounds of our opinion.

After geometric truths (which, as a matter of interest, Mill inA System of Logic regardsas proven byinductive processes), those ofphysical science are the limiting case for Mill.There is nothing in the passage just quoted to suggest that he considers our knowledge ofthe heliocentric theory as unproven or fallible or as a theory of whose truth we must remain


uncertain (the epistemology of Mill’s argument one). Rather, what he is saying is that it isrationally desirable that protagonists know the grounds of their theory, otherwise adherenceis mindless. The primary concern of his argument becomes clear when, having mentionedscientific theories,Mill (1977b, pp. 244–245 emphasis added) writes:

But when we turn tosubjects infinitely more complicated, to morals, religion, politics, socialrelations, and the business of life, three-fourths of the arguments for every disputed opinionconsist in dispelling the appearances which favour some opinion different from it. . . So essentialis this discipline to a real understanding ofmoral and human subjects, that if opponents of allimportant truths do not exist, it is indispensable to imagine them, and supply them with thestrongest arguments which the most skilful devil’s advocate can conjure up.

The grounds ofscientific theories, by implication, are much clearer, less complicated, thanthose of non-scientific theories, and it is the latter that Mill principally addresses here.

There is a couple of further points worth mentioning. Mill excludes science, by implicationat least, from hisfourth argument in chapter two, the argument in terms of doctrines as alloys oftruth and falsity. The argument relates to “popular opinions, on subjects not palpable to sense”(Mill, 1977b, p. 252), therefore excluding technical/esoteric opinions on subjects “palpableto sense” such as theories of science. Predictably, then, none of his illustrative examples inthis argument (Rousseau vs. Enlightenment philosophers, opposite sides of the argument inpolitics, Christian morality (Mill, 1977b, pp. 253–257)) concerns science.

Also, it is exceedingly unlikely that Mill’sthird argument—freedom as needed for theoriesto mean something to, and affect the conduct of, adherents (1977, p. 247ff.)—has relevance toscience. Mill mentions no scientific theory in this context, and it is improbable that he imagineditems of physical scientific knowledge (e.g., gravitational theory, laws of motion and Kepler’slaw of elliptical orbits) as having moralmeaning. The point of Mill’s argument “is illustratedin the experience of almost all ethical doctrines and religious creeds” (1977, p. 247) and by“all traditional doctrines—those of prudence and knowledge of life, as well as of morals orreligion” (1977, p. 250).

If it be asked, What makes you, Jacobs, think, above and beyond these considerations, thatMill did not include science in his epistemology of knowledge in chapter two ofOn Liberty?I repeat my earlier point that Mill had already analysed science in massive detail inA Systemof Logic. Staley to the contrary notwithstanding, Mill’s understanding of science there wouldbe contradicted byOn Liberty were it also presenting an account of science. Mill continuedreaffirming the analysis ofA System of Logic through subsequent editions up to 1873, makingonly slight revisions. If Mill had fundamentally altered his view of science, presenting a newaccount of science inOn Liberty, he had ample opportunity to say so expressly, but he neverdid say it.

My third type of evidence against science being part of Mill’sOn Liberty concerns thecontextand motivation of his composition of it, suggesting that knowledgeother than that of physicalscience is what concerned him. The purpose, or more precisely thenegative purpose, ofLibertyis to combat the tyranny of the majority. This fear—never so much as mentioned by Staley,which is one of the reasons why I describe his analysis as ahistorical—is a spectre in manyof Mill’s writings from his first review (1836) of “De Tocqueville on Democracy in America”(Mill, 1977a). In Liberty Mill draws a basic social distinction between the “masses” who are


uniform and conformist, and “individuals” who decide for themselves what to believe and howto act. The mid-nineteenth century English masses, as I (Jacobs, 1993)have documented inanother work, were envisaged byMill (1977b, p. 286)in Liberty as consisting of labouringclasses and the middle class with the latter’s influence dominant. Among the masses “peculiarityof taste, [and] eccentricity of conduct, are shunned equally with crimes: until by dint of notfollowing their own nature, they have no nature to follow” (Mill, 1977b, p. 265). Religionrepresents the most considerable force operating on the “formation of moral feeling” (Mill,1977b, p. 226) and Calvinism’s teaching that “man needs no capacity, but that of surrenderinghimself to the will of God. . . is held, in a mitigated form, by many [in the masses] who do notconsider themselves Calvinists; the mitigation consisting in giving a less ascetic interpretationto the alleged will of God” (Mill, 1977b, p. 265). All this constitutes, for Mill, a grave dangerto Periclean individuality,Mill’s (1977b, p. 272)ideal of “great energies guided by vigorousreason, and strong feelings strongly controlled by a conscientious will.” “It is” saysMill (1977b,p. 273)“individuality that we war against: we should think we had done wonders if we hadmade ourselves all alike.”

Given that Mill wroteOn Liberty to defend individuals against mass culture and massconformity one asks how relevantscientists’ knowledge and methods would have been tohim when he composed the work. I suggest the relevance was minimal; Mill was addressingdoctrines close to the heart of members of thesocial mass—religion, morality and conduct oflife—and, obversely, doctrines disagreeing with their’s to which they were antipathetic. There isnothing to suggest Mill believed the social mass were interested in regulating scientific practiseand theories nor, accordingly, to suggest that Mill believed he needed to defend science againstthe masses inOn Liberty.7

5. Epilogue

If the foregoing sketch of Mill’s context and motivation is accurate, and if myexegesisof Mill’s books above is sound, we can conclude as follows. Feyerabend’s view of Mill as aproto-pluralist/anarchist on scientific theories and methods involves a strained interpretationof chapter two ofOn Liberty, and fails to explain why Mill never (as Feyerabend’s Mill shouldhave) openly disavowed theSystem of Logic, why he effectively continued reaffirming it in neweditions appearing after the publication of the other book. Staley, for his part, can be said tohave tortured Mill’s texts in claiming not only thatOn Liberty has a pluralist–anarchist accountof science but that it is compatible withA System of Logic. Whatever common elements thesetwo texts may have (my argument is not against all commonality whatsoever), their emphasesand views of knowledge are decidedly different, besides which theLogic is overwhelminglyconcerned with science whileLiberty hardly touches on it.

The vitiating weakness of Feyerabend’s interpretation ofOn Liberty is that he believesMill’s arguments apply to science, and he uncritically assumes Mill believed it too. Precedentestablished, Staley and other admirers of Feyerabend commit the same misinterpretation ofMill’s On Liberty. On the basis of this misinterpretation they anachronistically misreadLibertyas a defence of methodological and theoretical pluralism in science but, as shown in this paper,it is no such thing.


Notes

1. In Science in a Free Society, Feyerabend (1978, p. 86)affirms generally (not only withrespect to science) that

the only way of arriving at a useful judgement of what is supposed to be the truth, or thecorrect procedure is to become acquainted with the widest possible range of alternatives.The reasons were explained by Mill in his immortal essayOn Liberty. It is not possibleto improve upon his arguments.

(See alsoFeyerabend, 1981, p. 65, andFeyerabend, 1987, p. 33.)2. Reviewers forThe Social Science Journal commented on the penultimate version of this

paper that myapproach to reading Mill’s texts is historical and that as such it differsfrom the approach of Feyerabend and Staley, both approaches being valid according tothe Journal’s reviewers. They say that the approach of Feyerabend and Staley is “tointerpret a text and use it as a springboard for developing one’s own views. . . On thisapproach, Feyerabend and Staley are considering the implicit consequences of Mill’sChapter Two. . . of On Liberty. Of course, this cannot be done wantonly.” My responseto the reviewers is that the two approaches are overlapping rather than alternatives. Theapproach exemplified by Feyerabend and Staley involves, as the reviewers appreciate,interpretation of subject texts, and my argument is that, irrespective of the use they makeof Mill’s texts, Feyerabend and Staley havemisunderstood Mill’s intentions. My argumentis furnished with detailed support through the course of the present paper.

3. Skorupski’s (1989)recent major study (approximately 400 pages),John Stuart Mill,exemplifies the failure of Mill-scholars to recognise a possible contradiction betweenthe two famous works of Mill.

4. Staley makes the point that nowhere inOn Liberty does Mill explicitly exclude sciencefrom his epistemological analysis and prescriptions. I agree; but I do not believe it can beinferred from his lack of expressness about the exclusion that Mill includes science in hisanalysis. My detailedexegesis in this article is designed to show that science lies outsideMill’s epistemology inOn Liberty and that when Mill happens to mention science in thebook he does sonot in order to explicate science in terms ofLiberty’s epistemology butto throw features ofnon-scientific knowledge into relief.

5. Mill (1977b, p. 232)moves directly on to talk about studying all modes of opinion in orderto learn, but this is a distraction from the point of his argument under our consideration,for he confuses the topic of how knowledge claims are to beevaluated (the point ofhis argument) with the different issue of how to attaincomprehensive knowledge “of asubject”.

6. Should the reader consider my handling of mentions (1) and (2) in chapter two ofLibertyto be unpersuasive she/he might look on it more favourably if I point out how sure Millis of Newtonianism’s verity in other works, such as his study of Sir William Hamilton’sthought whereMill (1979, p. 487)writes of Newton having “partially unravelled a limitedportion of” the universe, and (Mill, 1979, p. 488) refers to “the system of which Newtondiscovered the laws”. See alsoMill (1989, pp. 95–96)and recall his glowing remarks onNewton’s theory inA System of Logic which I cited earlier.


7. For more on the context ofOn Liberty’s composition seeMill’s Autobiography (1981,pp. 245, 247, 259–260).

Acknowledgments

I am indebted to Neville Chapman for drawing to my attention, and enabling me to correct,infelicities of style and mistakes of substance in an earlier version of this paper. An amplificationrecommended by anonymous reviewers forThe Social Science Journal has also served toenhance the paper.

References

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1. Autobiography and literary essays (pp. 1–290). Toronto: University of Toronto Press.Mill, J. S. (1989). James Mill’s analysis of the phenomena of the human mind. In J. M. Robson (Ed.),Collected

works of John Stuart Mill: Vol. 31. Miscellaneous writings (pp. 93–253). Toronto: University of Toronto Press.Polanyi, M. (1958).Personal knowledge. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.Popper, K. (1959).The logic of scientific discovery. London: Hutchinson.Skorupski, J. (1989).John Stuart Mill. London: Routledge.Staley, K. (1999). Logic, liberty, and anarchy.The Social Science Journal, 36, 1–12 (pagination as in “Expanded

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