The Hegelian Roots of Russell's Critique of Leibniz

At the turn of the century (1899-1903) Bertrand Russell advocated an absolutist theory of space and time, and scornfully rejected Leibniz’s relational theory in his Critical Exposition of the Philosophy of Leibniz (1900). But by the time of the second edition (1937), he had proposed highly influential relational theories of space and time that had much in common with Leibniz’s own views. Ironically, he never acknowledges this. In trying to get …