Abstract
Thomas Bradwardine (c. 1300–1349), Merton theologian and Archbishop of Canterbury, famous both for his innovative treatises on physics and mathematics and for his vigorous attack on what he perceived as a revival of Pelagianism in Ockham’s thought regarding divine foreknowledge and future contingents. Bradwardine was one of the “Calculators” of Merton College, philosophers who emphasized the need to incorporate mathematically precise reasoning into problems associated with Aristotelian physics. His treatment of the relation of variation in the velocities of moving objects to variation in the force and resistance affecting velocity led him to postulate the need for geometric, rather than arithmetic, ratios in understanding kinematics, which would eventually develop into logarithmic mathematics. Bradwardine became interested in formal theology when investigating Ockham’s account of how God knows created actions as contingencies. His De causa Dei is a compendious refutation of every imaginable species of reasoning that denies God certain, necessary knowledge of all created action, representing the high watermark of Augustinian determinism in pre-Reformation Western theology. Unless further manuscript discoveries are made, particularly of his commentary on the Sentences, it is unlikely that Bradwardine’s theological position can be connected to his earlier mathematically oriented thinking. Bradwardine was a member of the influential circle of thinkers associated with the Bishop Richard de Bury of Durham and was closely associated with Edward III; Black Death limited the duration of his occupation of the see of Canterbury to little more than a month.
Similar content being viewed by others
Bibliography
Primary Sources
Gillmeister, H. (Ed.). (1983). An intriguing fourteenth-century document: Thomas Bradwardine’s de arte memorativa. Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Literaturen, 220, 111–114.
Green-Pedersen, N.-J. (Ed.). (1982). Bradwardine (?) on Ockham’s doctrine of consequences: An edition. Cahiers de l’Institute de moyen age grec et latin, 42, 85–150.
Jean-François, G. (Ed.). (1979). Le de futuris contingentibus de Thomas Bradwardine. Recherches Augustiniennes, 14, 249–336.
John, M. (1957). Geometry and the continuum in the fourteenth century: a philosophical analysis of Thomas Bradwardine’s ‘Tractatus de Continuo’. PhD dissertation, University of Wisconsin.
Lamar Crosby, H. (Ed.). (1955). Thomas of Bradwardine: His Tractatus de Proportionibus: Its significance for the development of mathematical physics. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
Molland, A. G. (Ed.). (1989). Thomas Bradwardine, Geometria speculativa. Stuttgart: Steiner.
Nielsen, L. O. (Ed.). (1982). Thomas Bradwardine’s treatise on ‘incipit’ and ‘desinit’: Edition and introduction. Cahiers de l’Institute du Moyen Age Grec et Latin, 42, 1–83.
Read, S. (2010a). Thomas Bradwardine Insolubilia. Leuven: Peeters.
Thomas of Bradwardine. (1618). In Saville H (Ed.). De causa Dei contra Pelagium et de virtute causarum a suos Mertonenses libri tres. Ex officina Nortoniana, apud Ioannem Billivm, London.
Secondary Sources
Benetreau-Dupin, Y. (2015). Buridan’s solution to the liar paradox. History and Philosophy of Logic, 36(1), 18–28.
Busard, H. L. L. (1998). Zwei mittelalterliche Texte zur theoretischen Mathematik: die ‘Arithmetica speculativa’ von Thomas Bradwardine und die ‘Theorica numerorum’ von Wigandus Durnheimer. Archive for History of Exact Sciences, 53(2), 97–124.
Dolnikowski, E. W. (1995). Thomas Bradwardine: A view of time and a vision of eternity in fourteenth-century thought. Leiden: Brill.
Frost, G. R. (2013). Thomas Bradwardine on god and the foundations of modality. British Journal for the History of Philosophy, 21(2), 368–380.
Genest, J.-F. (1992). Prédétermination et Liberté Créée à Oxford au XIVe Siècle: Buckingham contre Bradwardine. Paris: Vrin.
Genest, J.-F. (2002). Les Premiers Écrits Théologiques de Bradwardine: Textes Inédits et Découvertes Récentes. In G. R. Evans (Ed.), Medieval commentaries on the sentences of Peter Lombard (pp. 395–421). Leiden: Brill.
Hanke, M. (2013). Implied meaning analysis of the Currian conditional. History and Philosophy of Logic, 34(4), 367–380. Leff, G. (1957). Bradwardine and the Pelagians. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lukacs, E. (2014). Bradwardine and Buckingham on the extramundane void. Bochumer Philosophisches Jahrbuch fur Antike und Mittelalter, 17(1), 123–144.
Lukacs, E. (2015). ‘Our stories’ and ‘your stories’: Narrating the passion and resurrection in Thomas Bradwardine’s de causa Dei. Essays in Medieval Studies, 31, 183–200.
Molland, A. G. (1978). An examination of Bradwardine’s ‘geometry’. Archive for History of Exact Sciences, 19(2), 113–175.
Molland, A. G. (1996). Addressing ancient authority: Thomas Bradwardine and Prisca Sapientia. Annals of Science, 53, 213–233.
Novaes, C. D. (2008). Insolubilia and the fallacy Secundum quid and simpliciter. Vivarium, 46(2), 175–191.
Novaes, C. D. (2009). Lessons on sentential meaning from mediaeval solutions to the liar paradox. The Philosophical Quarterly, 59(237), 682–704.
Novaes, C. D. (2011). Lessons on truth from mediaeval solutions to the liar paradox. The Philosophical Quarterly, 61(242), 58–78. Oberman, H. (1957). Archbishop Thomas Bradwardine: A fourteenth century Augustinian. Utrecht: Kemink & Zoon.
Read, S. (2002). The liar paradox from John Buridan back to Thomas Bradwardine. Vivarium, 40(2), 189–218.
Read, S. (2006). Symmetry and paradox. History and Philosophy of Logic, 27(4), 307–318.
Read, S. (2009). Plural signification and the liar paradox. Philosophical Studies, 145(3), 363–375.
Read, S. (2010b). Field’s paradox and its medieval solution. History and Philosophy of Logic, 31(2), 18–28.
Read, S. (2016). Paradoxes of signification. Vivarium, 54(4), 335–355.
Rommevaux, S. (2010). Magnetism and Bradwardine’s rule of motion in fourteenth and fifteenth century treatises. Early Science and Medicine, 15(6), 618–647.
Rommevaux, S. (2013). A treatise on proportion in the Traditio of Thomas Bradwardine: The de Proportionibus Libri duo (1528) of Jean Fernel. Historia Mathematica, 40(2), 164–182. Spade, P. V. (1988). Insolubilia and Bradwardine’s theory of signification in his lies, language and logic in the late middle ages (pp. 115–134). London: Variorum.
Sylla, E. D. (2007). The origin and fate of Thomas Bradwardine’s de proportionibus velocitatum in motibus in relation to the history of mathematics. In W. R. Laird & S. Roux (Eds.), Mechanics and natural philosophy before the scientific revolution (pp. 67–119). Dordrecht: Springer.
Tachau, K. (1988). Vision and certitude in the age of Ockham: Optics, epistemology and the foundation of semantics. Leiden: Brill.
Takahashi, K. (1984). The mathematical foundations of Bradwardine’s rule. Historia Scientiarum, 26, 19–38.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.
About this entry
Cite this entry
Lahey, S.E. (2018). Thomas Bradwardine. In: Lagerlund, H. (eds) Encyclopedia of Medieval Philosophy. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1151-5_492-2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1151-5_492-2
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-024-1151-5
Online ISBN: 978-94-024-1151-5
eBook Packages: Springer Reference Religion and PhilosophyReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Humanities