Abstract
DR. WOODGER'S book is an attempt to do for a part of biology what Whitehead and Russell, in “Principia Mathematica”, did for mathematics. Starting from as small a number as possible of axioms and undefined terms, he proposes to deduce known biological generalizations, and to discover new ones by pure deduction. For this purpose he uses a special set of symbols, including many taken from Whitehead and Russell, and 125 new ones. Some of these, for example, cell, are undefined, whilst others, for example, Ps, meaning the relation of sexual parenthood, are defined in terms of cell lineages.
The Axiomatic Method in Biology
Dr. J. H. Woodger. With Appendices by Alfred Tarski and W. F. Floyd. Pp. x + 174. (Cambridge: At the University Press, 1937.) 12s. 6d. net.
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HALDANE, J. The Axiomatic Method in Biology. Nature 141, 265–266 (1938). https://doi.org/10.1038/141265a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/141265a0
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