Researching David Lewis

Lewis's politics were heavily influenced by the Jewish Labour Bund, which contributed to his support of parliamentary democracy. He was an avowed anti-communist, and while a Rhodes Scholar prevented communist domination of the Oxford University Labour Club. In Canada, he played a major role in removing communist influence from the labour movement.

In the CCF, he took the role of disciplinarian and dealt with internal organizational problems. He helped draft the Winnipeg Declaration, which moderated the CCF's economic policies to include acceptance of capitalism, albeit subject to stringent government regulation. As the United Steelworkers of America (USW)'s legal counsel in Canada, he helped them take over the International Union of Mine, Mill, and Smelter Workers (Mine-Mill). His involvement with the USW also led to a central role in the creation of the Canadian Labour Congress in 1956.

The Lewis family has been active in socialist politics since the turn of the twentieth century, starting with David Lewis's father's involvement in the Bund in Russia, continuing with David, and followed by his eldest son, Stephen Lewis, who led the Ontario NDP from 1970 until 1978. When David was elected the NDP's national leader in 1971, he and Stephen became one of the first father-and-son-teams to simultaneously head Canadian political parties.

Lewis made significant contributions in philosophy of mind, philosophy of probability, epistemology, philosophical logic, aesthetics, philosophy of mathematics, philosophy of time and philosophy of science. In most of these fields he is considered among the most important figures of recent decades. But Lewis is most famous for his work in metaphysics, philosophy of language and semantics, in which his books On the Plurality of Worlds (1986) and Counterfactuals (1973) are considered classics. His works on the logic and semantics of counterfactual conditionals are broadly used by philosophers and linguists along with a competing account from Robert Stalnaker; together the Stalnaker-Lewis theory of counterfactuals has become perhaps the most pervasive and influential account of its type in the philosophical and linguistic literature. His metaphysics incorporated seminal contributions to quantified modal logic, the development of counterpart theory, counterfactual causation, and the position called "Humean supervenience". Most comprehensively in On the Plurality of Worlds, Lewis defended modal realism: the view that possible worlds exist as concrete entities in logical space, and that our world is one among many equally real possible ones.

The author of eight books and editor of two more, Lewis concentrates on comparative history with special focus on twentieth-century United States social history and civil rights. His interests include nineteenth-century Africa, twentieth-century France, and Islamic Spain.

He has a first-class honours degree in psychology and biology from the University of Westminster and a doctorate from the Department of Experimental Psychology at the University of Sussex, where he lectured in clinical psychology and psychopathology before setting up his own research organisation.

He is the author of books covering a range of psychological topics, a lecturer and Sony award-winning broadcaster for a BBC Radio 5 Live series on the psychological relationships between sports stars and their mentors and trainers.

In the early 1990s his work was featured on BBC TV's Tomorrow's World.

He was also the longtime romantic partner of director James Whale from 1930 to 1952. Although they were separated at the time of Whale's death in 1957, Lewis later released the contents of Whale's suicide note. Whale was cremated per his request and his ashes were interred in the Columbarium of Memory at Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale. When David Lewis died in 1987, his executor and Whale biographer James Curtis had his ashes interred in a niche across from Whale's.

Lewis was portrayed in the 1998 film Gods and Monsters by David Dukes.

Lewis was born in Hong Kong, the grandson of a sheep-farmer from Carmarthenshire, Wales and regards himself as half Welsh and half Manx. He was brought up and educated in Singapore and then at the Dragon School and St Edward's School, Oxford before reading Jurisprudence at Jesus College, Oxford. At Oxford he represented OUAC and Achilles without gaining a blue.

He joined Norton Rose in 1969 and qualified as a solicitor with honours in 1972, and in 1977 in Hong Kong. He becoming a Partner in 1977, serving as managing partner of the Hong Kong office in 1979-1982; head of corporate finance; head of professional resources, education, training and quality control; and then as Chairman and Senior Partner between 1997 and 2003. He then served as a part time consultant retiring in 2013 after 44 years with the firm. In 1986 he was named as one of BusinessAge magazine's Top 40 young businessmen of the year aged under 40. Lewis specialised in takeovers and mergers and public company share issues. In 1999 Norton Rose was the first UK law firm to win a Queen's Award for Exports. Lewis has served as a NED of Standard Life, and as a member of the Isle of Man Financial Supervision Commission.

He was elected as a City Alderman of Broad Street Ward in 2001 and then as Sheriff of London in 2006-7.He became the 680th Lord Mayor in 2007-8, being only the eighth Welsh Lord Mayor in the City of London's history, and the first to have a Welsh heraldic motto (Aim as high as the sun). Upon the completion of his year of office Lewis was knighted in the 2009 New Year Honours List. He retired as an Alderman in 2013.

His public and charitable service includes: Governor of the Dragon School Oxford (1987-2017)(chairman 2003-8); churchwarden of St Margaret's Church Lothbury (2001-13); Almoner/Governor of Christ's Hospital (2004-10)(school chairman 2010); chairman Oxford Univ Law Development Council (2003-6); trustee Oxford Univ Law Foundation (1997-2007); member Oxford Univ Chancellor's court of benefactors (1997-2010) and of VC's circle of benefactors since 2010; member of Council of Oxford Brookes Univ (1995-2003), of Lampeter Univ, and of Swansea Univ (2014-16); Chancellor of City Univ (2007-8); Chairman of HM Commissiomers of City of London (Lord Lieutenant) 2007-8; president Lord Mayor's Appeal 2007-8 for Wellbeing of Women and ORBIS, and trustee of both charities; president of St Edward's School Society (1995); co-founded the annual Sheriffs' Award for Bravery at the Old Bailey 2007; co-founded the annual Lord Mayor's Big Curry Lunch 2008 for Army Benevolent Fund; magistrate in City of London and in Carmarthenshire 2001-11; liveryman of City of London Solicitors Company (Master 2009-10), of Fletchers Company, of Welsh Livery Guild, and Hon Liveryman of Security Professionals Company; president of City of London Law Society (2009-10); City of London Law Soc company law committee (1982-97); Law Soc Legal Practice Course committee (2009-12); Governor/ Chairman of The Hon The Irish Society (2009-12). Lewis endowed in perpetuity at Jesus College Oxford (a) a Law Fellowship in 2010, (b) the Sir Peter North Fund for bursaries, and (c) the Francis Jones annual prize for the best book or article on any era of Welsh history in 2017.

His honours and awards include: Knight Bachelor for services to the legal profession and to the City of London in New Years Honours 2009; St David's Award on 1 March 2008 from First Minister for Wales; Hon Fellow Jesus College Oxford (1998) and Queen Elizabeth 1 Fellow (2012); Knight of Justice of Order of St John (KStJ) (2007); Companion of League of Mercy (2008); Hon DCL City Univ (2007); Hon DCL Univ of Wales (2008); Hon Fellow of Cardiff Univ (2008), of Trinity Univ Coll Carmarthen (2009), and of Guildhall School of Music and Drama (2008); Hon Professor of Hunan Univ (2008), of Xiaman Univ (2008) and of Cardiff Business School (2009); Dep-Lieutenant Carms (2009-19).

His published works include: Cynwyl Gaeo-Land of My Fathers (2009); Family Histories and Community Life in North Carmarthenshire (2012); Dolaucothi and Brunant-A Tale of Two Families in Wales (2016); A History of the Edwinsford and Clovelly Communities (2017); The Vaughan (Earls of Carbery) and Campbell (Earls and Thanes of Cawdor) Families of Golden Grove Carmarthenshire (2018); The Families of Gogerddan in Cardiganshire and Aberglasney in Carmarthenshire (2020); Aim as High as the Sun-Family History and Memoirs (2020).

Lewis was born in Llanrhystud near Aberystwyth, Cardiganshire, Wales, the son of David Lewis, a farmer, and his wife Catherine, née Mason.

Lewis migrated to Melbourne, Australia, in 1890; opening a drapery shop in 1902 which became a successful business. In 1928 he donated £2000 to the engineering school of the University of Melbourne for laboratory extensions.

After his death, his will established the Dafydd Lewis Trust, with a £700,000 endowment. This provided scholarships for full-time degree courses (other than in theology, arts, music or education) at the University of Melbourne for boys from Victorian state schools whose parents could not afford to pay for a university education.

Born in Indianapolis, Lewis received an undergraduate degree from DePauw University and a law degree from the University of Chicago Law School, gaining admission to the bar in Indiana in 1932. From 1938 to 1940, he served as county prosecutor for Marion County, Indiana. He was also active in Democratic Party politics, serving two terms as the chairman for the party in Marion County. In 1967, Governor Roger D. Branigin appointed Lewis to a seat on the Indiana Supreme Court vacated by the death of Justice Walter Myers Jr., but Lewis declined to run for reelection at the expiration of the term in 1969, returning to private practice until his retirement in 1972.

After his retirement, Lewis moved to Asheville, North Carolina, where he died in a hospital at the age of 76.

He was born in 1887 at Machynlleth which was where he attended school. He started his career in journalism by researching and writing for Montgomeryshire County Times but soon moved to Port Talbot in 1916 where he became a representative of Cambrian Daily Leader. He later joined the staff of the Western Mail but was also a part of several other newspapers in South Wales. He won the crown at Neath National Eisteddfod in 1918. In his lifetime, he married a woman named Margaret who was also from Machynlleth. They had two sons.

Lewis died due to a grave illness at Gendros, Swansea, on 12 March 1954, at age 67.