Richard Arthur
Professor Emeritus, Philosophy

Richard T. W. Arthur is a philosopher specializing in early modern natural philosophy and mathematics. His main interests are time and the infinite, which he studies in both historical and contemporary contexts. He explores the views of some of the great founders of natural philosophy, such as Descartes, Newton, Einstein and Leibniz, as well as those of subsidiary figures such as Beeckman and Robb, all the time with an eye to implications for time and the infinite in modern physics and mathematics.
Based in Toronto, he is currently co-writing three books: Leibniz on the Foundations of the Differential Calculus, with David Rabouin from the Université de Paris, Russell on Leibniz, with Nick Griffin from McMaster, and Leibniz on the Metaphysics of the Infinite, with Osvaldo Ottaviani from Raboud. Published last year with Oxford University Press was Leibniz: Journal Articles on Natural Philosophy, for which I did about half the translations, edited, and wrote an introduction.
He is also active in various online forums, as well as giving talks and presentations (last year in Paris and Milan in March, and Hanover in August). I was invited as Visiting Distinguished Professor at the University of Bristol for September and October, where he gave a series of seminars and two lectures.