This book would be very important indeed if Mr. Spencer Brown had substantiated his claims “that the concept of probability used in statistical science is meaningless in its own terms” (p. 66), and that confirming this is the only significance of experiments in psychical research. The six short (and not very relevant) introductory chapters need not be discussed here. It is in Chapters VII to IX that the author develops his thesis that the concept of randomness is self–contradictory, and the statistician's concept of probability consequently meaningless. I shall examine what I take to be the central argument leading to this conclusion. This is developed from a distinction between “primary chance or randomness” and “secondary chance or randomness” (“chance” and “randomness” are used interchangeably). The former concept is to be applicable only to individual events and is to depend upon their “unexpectedness or unpredictability”; the latter concept, applicable only to a series as such, is denned as “possessing no discernible pattern” (p. 46). The definition of “primary randomness” is amplified, but not clarified, on page 49: “An event is primarily random in so far as... one cannot be sure of its occurrence... The only relevant criterion is that we are able to guess”. (My italics. Notice that the former sentence implies unpredictability in the strong sense, i.e. not predictable with certainty, whereas the latter suggests unpredictability in a weak sense, i.e. not predictable as more or less likely. Spencer Brown oscillates between these different interpretations.) We are then told that primary randomness “admits of analysis in subjective terms”, since the same event may be predictable by one person but unpredictable by another; whereas secondary randomness is “a more objective concept”. (Is the author claiming that people vary less in their ability to discern patterns in a series than in their ability to predict its unobserved members? Or is he, as I suspect, arbitrarily interpreting “primary randomness” in terms of the speaker's ability to predict, and “secondary randomness” in terms of anyone's ability to discern?)

In a recent broadcast talk it was said that philosophers commonly base arguments and theories on garbled versions of science. Professor Pass more's article in the April number of Philosophy seems to go some way to justifying this complaint. The article discusses the objectivity of history by a series of comparisons with science under various heads representing criteria of objectivity.

It need occasion no surprise that Recherche de la Liberté by Daniel Christoff (P.U.F.) 1957, 220 pp., is devoted to philosophy of value. Freedom, one wants to say in this sort of context, is the attribute or even the essence of, for example, Sartre's pour soi; but since such a description would be, in existentialist language, a contradiction in terms, freedom had better be identified with the means whereby the dynamic self escapes from its essence, as Sartre would say. Because of this dynamic role of freedom in Continental philosophy it is natural that M. Christoff should be happier talking of liberation than of liberty. The word liberation refers to the process of value-making, and perhaps it is chosen in order that such question-begging terms as “creation of values” may be avoided. Question-begging because, although M. Christoff is by no means an exponent of the “objectivist” theory of values, he does not play down the importance of the concept in the interest of what is strictly never done but always in process of being done. He denies that rational thinking is “an immobile system of concepts”, and sees an alternation (presumably “dialectical”) of conceptualization and valuation as the activity of mind. It is not only in his view of liberty as liberation that M. Christoff reminds one of Lavelle and Gabriel Marcel, but also in his particular brand of altruism. He seems to see Sartre's point of view about “others” without sharing it.

The reputation and influence of an author depends to a large extent on the predilections of a specific society. One and the same person may be esteemed for different aspects of his work in various countries. Edmund Burke is chiefly known for his aesthetics on the continent, and not for his political philosophy as in this country. Georg Simmel, on the other hand, is famous on the continent foremost as a philosopher, but is known in the Anglo–Saxon world only as a sociologist. The Americans even speak of “Simmelism” meaning thereby a sociology analysing the psychological forms of social interaction such as conflict and subordination. The disregard of his philosophical work is a pity, for Simmel (1858–1918) was a most stimulating thinker, almost French in his style, a truly European mind belonging with Bergson, Croce and Ortega to a group of philosophical essayists who are the salt of the earth whatever the “scientific” philosophers may say against them. A collection of his essays referring to history, religion, art and society, published under the title Brücke und Tür (Koehler, Stuttgart, DM. 9.80) may be recommended as an introduction. It contains papers, most of them unpublished, of uneven value, but all are characteristic of the most dynamic philosopher I ever met. His thought arose in immediate response to anything which aroused his interest, be it an object (bridge, door), a person (Kant, Goethe, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Rodin) or a sociological fact (meal, metropolis).

I agree with most of Mr. Kemp's paper, “Generalization in the Philosophy of Art” (Philosophy, XXXIII, 1958) but on his position at one point I should like briefly to comment.

In “Intrinsic value: some comments on the work of G. E. Moore” (Philosophy July 1958), I argued that Moore implies that intrinsic value is measurable, but has never suggested any method of measuring it. In this note I shall outline a method which is derived, but not exactly copied, from some of the analyses which economic theorists have given of “cardinal utility”. A survey of some of the economic discussions is given by S. A. Ozga in “Measurable utility and probability” (Econ. J. Sept. 1956).