The Methodology of Natural Philosophy: From Leibniz to Modern Philosophy of Physics
4 September - 13 October 2023
Biography
Richard Arthur is an Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at McMaster University in Ontario. His research interests are in early modern natural philosophy and mathematics, and the foundations of physics, with special attention to the theory of time and the infinite. With a BA in physics from the University of Oxford, and an MA and PhD from McGill University and the University of Western Ontario, he has taught philosophy in Canada, Nigeria, the United States, and Italy, and has also taught applied mathematics in Canada, and has s published scores of articles and seven books on Leibniz, Newton, Descartes and their contemporaries. A particular research interest has been the natural philosophy and mathematics of the polymath Gottfried Leibniz, on whom he has written a general overview of his thought, Leibniz (Polity Press, 2014), Monads Composition and Force (Oxford UP, 2018), and most recently Leibniz on Time, Space, and Relativity (OUP 2021).
He has also written extensively on the philosophy of time, including The Reality of Time Flow (Springer 2019), in which he gives a thorough exposition and evisceration of views denying the reality of becoming, treating arguments given by philosophers and physicists alike from antiquity through to the context of quantum gravity. He is currently in the process of finishing four co-authored books, one a thorough treatment of the foundations Leibniz provided for his calculus (with David Rabouin), another translating from Latin previously unknown writings by him on the infinite (with Osvaldo Ottaviani), the third an edition and translation of a selection of Leibniz’s scientific journal articles, and the fourth a study of the impact of Leibniz’s thought on Bertrand Russell (with Nicholas Griffin).
Research Summary
The overarching research theme of this project is the methodology of natural philosophy as found in the work of Leibniz and in modern philosophy of physics. Gottfried Leibniz was Newton’s contemporary, and main rival. He made monumental contributions to both to what was then called natural philosophy, and what is now broadly speaking understood to be physics, and to metaphysics. These contributions are deeply linked and his methodology with regard to how they are connected is of particular interest. One part of this project will involve research and scholarship relating to Leibniz’s methodology as regards in particular to the relation between his natural philosophy and his metaphysics. Relationalism about time, temporal relationism, has been defended in the context of modern physics by various important contemporary figures, including Carlo Rovelli and Julian Barbour. It is the very idea that time is in some sense nothing more than the succession of changes of things. It is not something else independent of such changes. A further part of this project will involve work on time in classical and quantum theories of gravity towards comprehensive analysis of the different aspects of temporal relationism, with a particular emphasis on the interdisciplinary methodology relevant to the intersection of such metaphysical views of time and modern fully mathematicised physical theories. The third and final part of this project will focus on more general methodological lessons that can be drawn from the comparative study of early modern and modern periods. In particular, how best should we understand the relationships between natural philosophy, metaphysics, and mathematics in the early modern period, and between philosophy of physics, metaphysics, mathematics, and physics, in the modern period.
Professor Arthur is hosted by Dr Karim Thébault, Philosophy Department.
Proposed activities include:
It is often said that the main stumbling block preventing the creation of a successful theory of Quantum Gravity —the physical theory that attempts to combine Einstein’s General relativity and Quantum Theory —is the incompatibility between the treatments of time in the two theories. Moreover, many proponents of QG have contended that the implication of the mathematics is that time is not part of fundamental physical reality, and that the flow of time is an illusion. In this lecture Professor Arthur will examine many of the arguments supporting this view, exposing their roots in older philosophical prejudices, and their shortcomings as viable interpretations of the theories concerned. He will explain how an understanding of time flow as a local phenomenon relieves much of the difficulty, and then comment on the wider implications of his critique for the interpretation of modern physics.
This free talk is part of the 'Centre for Science and Philosophy' and the 'Thinking Science' Projects series. It is generously supported by a Bristol Benjamin Meaker Distinguished Visiting Professorship. Tickets on Eventbrite.
Enquiries to be directed to thinking-science@bristol.ac.uk
Professor Arthur will introduce each seminar with an introductory lecture to stimulate discussion, on (1) Leibniz’s relational theory of time, (2) Leibniz’s treatment of continuity, (3) time in relativity theory,and (4) time in quantum theory.
Opposing common claims that Zeno’s Paradoxes had to await the work of Cauchy, Russell or Nonstandard Analysis for their successful resolution, Professor Arthur explains how Leibniz had already provided resolutions that either anticipated the modern ones or bettered them.
