Herbert Spencer: Legacies Legacies

Herbert Spencer: Legacies explores and assesses the impact of the ideas and work of the great Victorian polymath Herbert Spencer across a wide range of disciplines. In the course of the essays a significant re-evaluation of his influence on Victorian and Edwardian thought is provided. Spencer's contribution to the fields of sociology, anthropology, psychology, biology and ecology are considered, alongside his influence on key figures in science and philosophy. The book brings together scholars from a wide range of disciplines to explore Spencer's nuanced and complex ideas and will be invaluable for historians of science and ideas, and all those interested in the intellectual culture of the late Victorian and Edwardian period. Contributors: Peter J. Bowler, James Elwick, Mark Francis, Bernard Lightman, Chris Renwick, Vanessa L. Ryan, John Skorupski, Michael W. Taylor, Stephen Tomlinson, and Jonathan H. Turner

1. Introduction Mark Francis 2. The method of nature: Herbert Spencer and the education of the adaptive mind Stephen Tomlinson 3. Herbert Spencer: nineteenth-century politics and twentieth-century individualism Michael W. Taylor 4. Herbert Spencer’s sociological legacy Jonathan H. Turner 5. Containing multitudes: Herbert Spencer, organisms social and orders of individuality James Elwick 6. Herbert Spencer, biology, and the social sciences in Britain Chris Renwick 7. Spencer and the moral philosophers: Mill, Sidgwick, Moore John Skorupski 8. The problem with star dust: Spencer’s psychology and William James Mark Francis 9. Spencer, cognition, fiction Vanessa L. Ryan 10. Herbert Spencer and Lamarckism Peter J. Bowler 11. Spencer’s British disciples Bernard Lightman. Index

Mark Francis is Professor of Political Science at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand. He is author of the critically acclaimed Herbert Spencer and the Invention of Modern Life (2007). Michael W. Taylor has written several well received bookson Herbert Spencer, includingMen Versus the State: Herbert Spencer and Late Victorian Individualism (1992) and The Philosophy of Herbert Spencer (2007).