FRANK RAMSEY

Frank Ramsey (1903-1930) was a rising star in the Cambridge intellectual firmament during the 1920s, but his early death meant that his career was literally meteoric in its brilliance and brevity. Appropriately subtitled 'a sheer excess of powers', this scintillating and highly readable biography is the first of a man who, despite his short career, made fundamental contributions in up to seven disciplines: philosophy, economics, pure mathematics, mathematical logic, the foundations of mathematics, probability and decision theory. He has an incredible 19 innovations named after him. Ramsey started reading almost as soon as he could talk, and took the top scholarship to Winchester College at the age of 12, then the top scholarship to Trinity College Cambridge at 16, becoming a fellow of King's College at 21. He was already an atheist by 13, and it is somewhat ironic that his brother Michael subsequently became Archbishop of Canterbury. At Cambridge, he was a member of the famous Apostles and read papers to the Moral Sciences Club in the presence of the likes of GE Moore, Keynes, Russell and Wittgenstein, all of whom were also personal friends. He was also part of the London Bloomsbury group with its advanced views on society and free love (it is quite an eye-opener to read about the early stages of his relationship with Lettice in view of the then prevalent social restrictions on extramarital sex).

Writing a biography of a man with such an amazing capacity and range of interests is itself extraordinarily demanding, but the author succeeds admirably, also drawing on other thinkers to explain more specialised developments in his work in boxes throughout the book. I enjoyed this comment about him from GE Moore: 'he had an exceptional power drawing conclusions from a complicated set of facts… But sometimes I feel that he fails to explain things as clearly as he could have done, simply because he does not see that any explanation is needed' (a similar complaint was made about Alan Turing). On another occasion, at a meeting of the Heretics, Ramsey ostensibly read the minutes of the previous week, giving a very learned and complete summary of a philosophical lecture, but when he passed the book for signature to the chairman, the pages were completely blank! Ramsey was the intellectual equal of Keynes, Russell and even of Wittgenstein, whose Tractatus he translated by dictation from German into English at the age of 19. Max Black wrote that 'the Tractatus was a book of tremendous mystery and only Wittgenstein himself could have known what he meant by it, but he'd forgotten.'

All this might give the impression of a purely cerebral existence, but nothing could be further from the truth, as his life was equally full of interest. Ramsey went to Vienna to be psychoanalysed, where he was treated by one of Freud's students. There are vivid accounts of his interactions with his peers and of the contributions he made in the various disciplines already mentioned. Sir Roy Harrod writes that he discussed philosophy in an extraordinary easy style: 'subtle thoughts were distilled into simple straightforward sentences. In an entirely effortless and almost gossipy way he set out the quintessentials of a problem…' His personal life culminated in his marriage and two children, although both he and his wife continued to have affairs during this period, somewhat turbulent emotionally even if they were both intellectually committed to free love. Keynes compared Ramsey to David Hume in their parallel scepticism and in making major contributions to philosophy before the age of 27 and extending their intellectual reach into economics. Another parallel that sprang to mind is the Admirable James Crichton (1560-1582), who lived an even shorter life. He completed his degree at St Andrews at the age of 14. At the age of 20, he could discourse in poetry and prose in 12 languages as well as being an accomplished horseman, fencer, musician and orator. In Paris, he challenged professors to ask him any question on science or the arts in any one of 11 languages, including Slavonic and Syriac – and at the end of the day, no one had caught him out. Tragically, he was assassinated by a rival lover in Mantua at the age of 22. So in both cases, one can ask the question what if, yet life is as it is and Ramsey's legacy is still extraordinary by any standard. I can't recommend this biography highly enough - hugely informative as well as entertaining and a vivid picture of the contemporary Cambridge intellectual landscape.