Work

I have published research articles and book chapters on the reception of Isaac Newton’s natural philosophy in Scotland. I’m currently writing a book about how Scottish responses to Newton’s method and approach to causation shaped the branching off of natural philosophy from the wider discipline of philosophy in the creation of modern natural science.

Articles & book chapters

• ‘What Makes a Newtonian? David Hume’s Engagement with Isaac Newton in its Scottish Context’, Intellectual History Review, June (2026): 1–25. doi.org/10.1080/17496977.2026.2673487 (read a free eprint)

• ‘Two Pious Newtonians on the Concept of Gravity: Why Andrew Baxter and Colin Maclaurin Disagreed about Divine Causation and the Limits of the Mind’, Journal of Scottish Philosophy 24, 1 (2026): 1–20. doi.org/10.3366/jsp.2026.0433 (read the manuscript version)

• ‘David Gregory’s and John Keill’s Newtonian Pedagogy: Oxford and the Scottish Reception of Isaac Newton’s Natural Philosophy’, History of Universities 36, 2 (2023): 155–83. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198901730.003.0008

Book reviews

• ‘Bill Jenkins, David Brewster and the Culture of Science in Scotland…’, The Innes Review 76, 2 (2025). https://doi.org/10.3366/inr.2025.0388 (open access)

• ‘Physics in Minerva’s Academy… by Steffen Ducheyne…’, Intellectual History Review June, 35, 4 (2025): 853–6. doi:10.1080/17496977.2025.2512296. (read a free eprint)

• ‘Ray Perman, James Hutton: The Genius of Time...’, The Innes Review 75, 1 (2024): 65–72. https://doi.org/10.3366/inr.2024.0362 (open access)

• ‘Dmitri Levitin. The Kingdom of Darkness: Bayle, Newton, and the Emancipation of the European Mind from Philosophy...’, Isis 115, 2 (2024): 400–401. https://doi.org/10.1086/730252

View my ORCID and Academia