Staff profile

Research

I’m a historian of philosophy, focusing on seventeenth to early twentieth century metaphysics. Much of my work concerns time and space, but I’m also interested in substance, change, idealism, process, emergentism, personal identity, and philosophical questions about travel. I like digging out the work of rich but under-studied figures, including women philosophers who have traditionally been neglected.

Three of my monographs are scholarly. Real Time: A Reinvention in British Metaphysics 1883-1928 (forthcoming, Oxford University Press) argues that many of the questions we ask about time today were invented back during this particular slice of history. Victoria Welby (2023, Cambridge University Press) offers the first study of Welby’s science-fuelled metaphysics. Absolute Time: Rifts in Early Modern British Metaphysics (2018, Oxford University Press) considers the seventeenth century theory that time is a kind of thing. 

My fourth monograph is trade: The Meaning of Travel: Philosophers Abroad (2020, Oxford University Press), explores philosophical issues around travel, from the “Age of Discovery” to the present day, including maps, climate change, and wilderness. It’s been widely reviewed - see for example The Wall Street Journal - and translated into five languages.

I have edited two collections: Early Modern Women on Metaphysics (2018, Cambridge University Press); and the special issue Time at the Turn of the Twentieth Century in American-British Philosophy (2023, British Journal for the History of Philosophy).

In 2020, I won a Philip Leverhulme Prize for excellence in research. My earlier work has been supported by a Netherlands Research Council “Veni”, a John Templeton Foundation stipend, a British Academy “Rising Star” grant, and an AHRC "Leaders" Fellowship.

I am committed to getting philosophy out beyond the academy. You can listen to me talking about Bergson and time on BBC Radio 4's In Our Time; and about travel on BBC Radio 4’s Start the Week and Moral Maze. My writing has appeared in magazines such as Aeon, History Today, and The Conversation. I tweet regularly about philosophy @emilytwrites

Previously, I studied for my PhD at the University of Cambridge, and held a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Groningen. I sit on editorial or advisory boards for the British Journal for the History of Philosophy, the journal Analysis, Cambridge Elements, the International Association for the Philosophy of Time, and the Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Philosophers. At Durham, I have held many administrative and management roles, including Head of Durham’s Philosophy Department. 

For further information about my research, popular writing, and media work, please see my personal website www.emilythomaswrites.co.uk

• American-British metaphysics (17th to early 20th century)
• Space and time (in the history of metaphysics)
• Women in the history of philosophy
• Philosophy of travel
• Pictures in the history of philosophy

Authored book

• Victoria Welby
  
  Thomas, E. (2023). Victoria Welby. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009345897
• The Meaning of Travel: Philosophers Abroad.
  
  Thomas, E. (2020). The Meaning of Travel: Philosophers Abroad. Oxford University Press.
• Absolute Time: Rifts in Early Modern British Metaphysics
  
  Thomas, E. (2018). Absolute Time: Rifts in Early Modern British Metaphysics. Oxford University Press.

Book review

• The Unknowable: A Study in Nineteenth-Century British Metaphysics, by W. J. Mander
  
  Thomas, E. (2022). The Unknowable: A Study in Nineteenth-Century British Metaphysics, by W. J. Mander. Mind, 131(521), 357-361. https://doi.org/10.1093/mind/fzaa050
• Book Review of 'Space: A History', edited by Andrew Janiak (Oxford University Press, 2020)
  
  Thomas, E. (2021). Book Review of ’Space: A History’, edited by Andrew Janiak (Oxford University Press, 2020). Philosophy, 96(2), 319-322. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0031819121000036

Chapter in book

• Travel Writing and Early Modern Experimental Philosophy
  
  Thomas, E. (in press). Travel Writing and Early Modern Experimental Philosophy. In Encyclopedia of Early Modern Philosophy and the Sciences.
• Metaphysical Idealists in Britain: Constance Naden, Victoria Welby, and Arabella Buckley
  
  Thomas, E. (2023). Metaphysical Idealists in Britain: Constance Naden, Victoria Welby, and Arabella Buckley. In A. Stone & L. Moland (Eds.), Oxford Handbook of American and British Women Philosophers in the Nineteenth Century (pp. C34S1–C34N22). Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780197558898.013.34
• Space and its Relationship to God
  
  Janiak, A., & Thomas, E. (2022). Space and its Relationship to God. In D. Miller & D. Jalobeanu (Eds.), The Cambridge History of Philosophy of the Scientific Revolution (pp. 424-438). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108333108.025
• Travelling for Exploration: Science, Space Travel, and Personal Discovery
  
  Thomas, E. (2021). Travelling for Exploration: Science, Space Travel, and Personal Discovery. In M. Niblett & K. Beuret (Eds.), Why Travel? Understanding our Need to Move and How it Shapes our Lives. Bristol University Press.
• Samuel Alexander’s Place in British Philosophy: Realism and Naturalism from the 1880s Onwards
  
  Thomas, E. (2021). Samuel Alexander’s Place in British Philosophy: Realism and Naturalism from the 1880s Onwards. In A. Fisher (Ed.), Marking the Centenary of Samuel Alexander’s Space, Time and Deity (pp. 113-127). Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-65121-3_7
• Locke, Newton, and Edmund Law
  
  Thomas, E. (2021). Locke, Newton, and Edmund Law. In J. Gordon-Roth & S. Weinberg (Eds.), The Lockean Mind. Routledge.
• Travel as Exploration: Science, the Unknown and Personal Discovery
  
  Thomas, E. (2021). Travel as Exploration: Science, the Unknown and Personal Discovery. In M. Niblett & K. Beuret (Eds.), Why Travel? (pp. 205-228). Bristol University Press. https://doi.org/10.51952/9781529216394.ch011
• The History of Philosophy and its Disappeared Women
  
  Thomas, E. (2020). The History of Philosophy and its Disappeared Women. In E. Vintiadis (Ed.), Philosophy by Women: 23 Philosophers Reflect on Philosophy and Its Values. Routledge.
• Anne Conway on the Identity of Creatures over Time
  
  Thomas, E. (2018). Anne Conway on the Identity of Creatures over Time. In E. Thomas (Ed.), Early Modern Women on Metaphysics. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316827192.008
• Creation, Divine Freedom, and Catharine Cockburn: An Intellectualist on Possible Worlds and Contingent Laws
  
  Thomas, E. (2017). Creation, Divine Freedom, and Catharine Cockburn: An Intellectualist on Possible Worlds and Contingent Laws. In Women and Liberty, 1600-1800. Oxford University Press.
• Samuel Alexander’s Spacetime God: A Naturalist Rival to Current Emergentist Theologies
  
  Thomas, E. (2016). Samuel Alexander’s Spacetime God: A Naturalist Rival to Current Emergentist Theologies. In A. A. Buckareff & Y. Nagasawa (Eds.), Alternative Concepts of God (pp. 255-273). Oxford University Press.
• Cavendish, Conway, and Cockburn on Matter
  
  Thomas, E. (n.d.). Cavendish, Conway, and Cockburn on Matter. In K. Detlefsen & L. Shapiro (Eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Women and Early Modern European Philosophy [Contracted by publisher]. Routledge.

Edited book

• Early Modern Women on Metaphysics
  
  Thomas, E. (Ed.). (2018). Early Modern Women on Metaphysics. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316827192

Journal Article

• Constance Naden’s Metaphysics: Hylo-Idealism’s Ideal Known World and Unknown Matter
  
  Thomas, E. (2024). Constance Naden’s Metaphysics: Hylo-Idealism’s Ideal Known World and Unknown Matter. Journal of the History of Philosophy, 62(3), 475-499.
• The Specious Present in English Philosophy 1749-1785: On David Hartley, Joseph Priestley, Abraham Tucker, and William Watson
  
  Thomas, E. (2023). The Specious Present in English Philosophy 1749-1785: On David Hartley, Joseph Priestley, Abraham Tucker, and William Watson. Philosophers’ Imprint, 23(1). https://doi.org/10.3998/phimp.1281
• G E Moore’s Time Realism: Presentism, A-Theory, and the Ghost of Henry Sidgwick
  
  Thomas, E. (2023). G E Moore’s Time Realism: Presentism, A-Theory, and the Ghost of Henry Sidgwick. Gavin David Young: Lectures in Philosophy, 14, 1-33. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.13772495
• The Philosophy of Joseph Priestley’s 1765 Timeline: Abstract Ideas, Time, and Human Progress
  
  Thomas, E. (2023). The Philosophy of Joseph Priestley’s 1765 Timeline: Abstract Ideas, Time, and Human Progress. History of Philosophy Quarterly, 40(1), 25-58. https://doi.org/10.5406/21521026.40.1.03
• Mary Calkins, Victoria Welby, and the spatialization of time
  
  Thomas, E. (2023). Mary Calkins, Victoria Welby, and the spatialization of time. British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 31(2), 205-230. https://doi.org/10.1080/09608788.2022.2123780
• The Obsession with Time in 1880s-1930s American-British Philosophy
  
  Thomas, E. (2023). The Obsession with Time in 1880s-1930s American-British Philosophy. British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 31(2), 149-160. https://doi.org/10.1080/09608788.2022.2093157
• Travel, Philosophy, and Locke’s Openness to the Unknown
  
  Thomas, E. (2022). Travel, Philosophy, and Locke’s Openness to the Unknown. Studi Lockiani. Advance online publication.
• Time through time: its evolution through western philosophy in seven ideas
  
  Thomas, E. (2021). Time through time: its evolution through western philosophy in seven ideas. Think, 20(58), 23-38. https://doi.org/10.1017/s1477175621000038
• Time and Subtle Pictures in the History of Philosophy
  
  Thomas, E. (2020). Time and Subtle Pictures in the History of Philosophy. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 120(2), 97-121. https://doi.org/10.1093/arisoc/aoaa007
• Anne Conway as a Priority Monist: A Reply to Gordon-Roth
  
  Thomas, E. (2020). Anne Conway as a Priority Monist: A Reply to Gordon-Roth. Journal of the American Philosophical Association, 6(3), 275-284. https://doi.org/10.1017/apa.2019.1
• The Roots of C. D. Broad’s Growing Block Theory of Time
  
  Thomas, E. (2019). The Roots of C. D. Broad’s Growing Block Theory of Time. Mind, 128(510), 527-549. https://doi.org/10.1093/mind/fzx020
• The Idealism and Pantheism of May Sinclair
  
  Thomas, E. (2019). The Idealism and Pantheism of May Sinclair. Journal of the American Philosophical Association, 5(2), 137-157. https://doi.org/10.1017/apa.2018.45
• Time, Space, and Process in Anne Conway
  
  Thomas, E. (2017). Time, Space, and Process in Anne Conway. British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 25(5), 990-1010. https://doi.org/10.1080/09608788.2017.1302408
• On the “Evolution” of Locke’s Space and Time Metaphysics
  
  Thomas, E. (2016). On the “Evolution” of Locke’s Space and Time Metaphysics. History of Philosophy Quarterly, 33(4), 305-325.
• Henry More and the development of absolute time
  
  Thomas, E. (2015). Henry More and the development of absolute time. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A, 54, 11-19. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.shpsa.2015.06.003
• British Idealist Monadologies and the Reality of Time: Hilda Oakeley Against McTaggart, Leibniz, and Others
  
  Thomas, E. (2015). British Idealist Monadologies and the Reality of Time: Hilda Oakeley Against McTaggart, Leibniz, and Others. British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 23(6), 1150-1168. https://doi.org/10.1080/09608788.2015.1059314
• In Defense of Real Cartesian Motion
  
  Thomas, E. (2015). In Defense of Real Cartesian Motion. Journal of the History of Philosophy, 53(4), 747-762. https://doi.org/10.1353/hph.2015.0067
• Hilda Oakeley on Idealism, History and the Real Past
  
  Thomas, E. (2015). Hilda Oakeley on Idealism, History and the Real Past. British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 23(5), 933-953. https://doi.org/10.1080/09608788.2015.1055232
• Catharine Cockburn on Unthinking Immaterial Substance: Souls, Space, and Related Matters
  
  Thomas, E. (2015). Catharine Cockburn on Unthinking Immaterial Substance: Souls, Space, and Related Matters. Philosophy Compass, 10(4), 255-263. https://doi.org/10.1111/phc3.12210
• Catharine Cockburn on Substantival Space
  
  Thomas, E. (2013). Catharine Cockburn on Substantival Space. History of Philosophy Quarterly, 30(3), 195-214.
• Space, Time, and Samuel Alexander
  
  Thomas, E. (2013). Space, Time, and Samuel Alexander. British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 21(3), 549-569. https://doi.org/10.1080/09608788.2012.734776
• Baking with Kant and Bradley
  
  Thomas, E., & Leech, J. (2013). Baking with Kant and Bradley. Collingwood and British Idealism Studies, 19(1), 75-94.