elementary functional unit" of thinking, with terms and relations as "the structural units of thought," and with deductive inference. In his discussion of the forms of propositions Dr. Reiser is content with the traditional fourfold schedule. He regards propositions such as "All men are mortal" as simple propositions of the same form as "Socrates is mortal." With regard to the latter he says, "You are here talking about the whole class, but the class has only one member" (p. 154). A page and a half is devoted to the statement of kinds of relations. He surprisingly regards "hates" as an intransitive relation. It is true that Dr. Reiser does not distinguish between intransitive and non-transitive relations, but even if this distinction is not necessary for his purposes, it is difficult to see why he should hold that "A hates C" is inconsistent with "A hates B and B hates C." Part IV, entitled "How New Knowledge is Obtained," is concerned with what is ordinarily called inductive logic. The discussion of this topic is extremely sketchy. No distinction is made between classing and classification; classification and explanation are said to be the same, yet classification is said to be "the intermediate link between induction and deduction" (p. 220). Mill's methods are briefly stated, with no attempt to improve upon Mill's own careless expression of the canons. The Joint Method is erroneously regarded as consisting of the combination of the method of agreement and the method of difference. This is a mistake which Mill himself did not make. The chapter on the "Foundations of Induction" is extremely inadequate. Dr. Reiser seems to think that the problem of induction, as raised by Hume, is a meaningless problem. He is content to assert that "The laws of logic and the principles of inference have been established by the social test working over a long period of time" (p. 266), and ends the chapter with the reflection: "An 'animal faith' in the uniformity of nature seems to be in accord with the not-too-sophisticated minds of humanity in general. Why then should philosophers suppose that they need to solve problems which in the last analysis turn out to be insoluble?" The book fittingly concludes with a chapter on "Human History and Intellectual Progress." L. S. STEBBING.
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