Perry, Ralph Barton (1876-1957)

US philosopher. He was a key advocate of the ‘new realism’ and of philosophical clarity and precision. He outlined a naturalistic value theory in such works as The General Theory of Value (1926). His Puritanism and Democracy (1944) was a classic, and his 1935 biography of his teacher and colleague William James won a Pulitzer Prize.

Perry was born in Poultney, Vermont. Earning a Harvard doctorate (1899), he taught briefly at Williams and Smith Colleges, then returned to Harvard, where he taught from 1902 to 1946. He was a US Army major during World War I; later he supported the New Deal and campaigned for formation of the United Nations.