1903 – 1987
John Niemeyer Findlay (1903–1987) was a South African-born British philosopher who taught at the Universities of Natal, Otago, King's College London, Yale, and Boston University. He is best known for his 1948 argument that God's existence is logically impossible (later retracted), his influential studies of Hegel and Meinong, and contributions to axiology, phenomenology, and tense logic.
Proposed the 'ontological disproof' of God's existence in 'Can God's Existence Be Disproved?' (1948), later retracting it
Authored Hegel: A Re-examination (1958), a landmark revival of Hegelian scholarship in the Anglophone world
Wrote Meinong's Theory of Objects and Values (1933), a foundational study of Alexius Meinong
Contributed to tense logic and the semantics of future contingents, analyzing the logical status of tensed propositions
Developed a comprehensive axiology in Values and Intentions (1961) and Axiological Ethics (1970)