Originally published: London: Hutchinson, 1971.

Gilbert Ryle was born in England in 1900, one of ten children. In 1924 he was appointed to a lectureship at Christ Church College, Oxford where he was to remain for his entire academic career until his retirement in 1968. In 1945 he was elected to the Waynflete Chair of Metaphysical Philosophy. He was editor of the journal Mind from 1947 to 1971. A confirmed bachelor, he lived after his retirement with his twin sister Mary in the Oxfordshire village of Islip. Gardening and walking gave him immense pleasure, as did his pipe. He died on 6 October 1976 at Whitby in Yorkshire after a day's walking on the moors.

Preface Julia Tanney Introduction 1.Negation 2. Are There Propositions? 3. Systematically Misleading Expressions 4. Imaginary Objects 5. 'About' 6. Internal Relations 7. Mr. Collingwood and the Ontological Argument 8. Back to the Ontological Argument 9. Unverifiability-By-Me 10. Induction and Hypothesis 11. Taking Sides in Philosophy 12. Categories 13. Conscience and Moral Convictions 14. Philosophical Arguments 15. Knowing How and Knowing That 16. Why are the Calculuses of Logic and Arithmetic Applicable to Reality? 17. 'If', 'So', and 'Because' 18. Heterologicality 19. Thinking and Language 20. Feelings 21. The Verification Principle 22. Thinking 23. Ordinary Language 24. Proofs in Philosophy 25. Pleasure 26. Sensation 27. The Theory of Meaning 28. Predicting and Inferring 29. On Forgetting the Difference Between Right and Wrong 30. A Puzzling Element in the Notion of Thinking 31. Use, Usage and Meaning 32. A Rational Animal 33. Abstractions 34. Thinking Thoughts and Having Concepts 35. Teaching and Training 36. Thinking and Reflecting 37. The Thinking of Thoughts - What is 'Le Penseur' Doing? Index