Graduate Students & Research Fellows
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Graduate Students
Brooke Abounader
Philosophy of Science, History of Condensed-Matter Physics
Tasleen Adatia
Sebastian Assenza
I am a historian of both Biology and Medicine, and I am interested in a wide range of topics, from organ transplantation, biological field work, and the use of dogs as model organisms in genetics research.
Esther Atkinson
Hakob Barseghyan
Epistemology:
· How do we compare competing scientific theories?
· Is there a fundamental difference between science and non-science (pseudoscience)?
Metaphysics:
· Are all future states of the universe strictly determined by the previous states?
· Do all levels of organization simply follow the fundamental laws or are there high-level laws?
Meta-epistemology:
· How do we compare competing epistemic theories?
· Is there progress in epistemology?
· How can epistemology and the history of science benefit from each other?
Riiko Bedford
I'm interested in the history and philosophy of medicine and biology.
Christopher Belanger
Chris is working on a thesis examining philosophical problems in the foundations of chaos theory. His primary focus is the philosophy of physics, but his interests include underdetermination, determinism, and laws of nature.
Chris's thesis topic is the foundations of chaos theory, and his interests include underdetermination, determinism, and laws of nature.
Supervisor: Joseph Berkovitz
Agnes Bolinska
My research focuses on how scientific models represent physical systems in the world. In virtue of what is a model a scientific representation of its target system? Is there some sort of essential relation that must obtain between the model and its target in every instance of representation, or is there rather some way in which models are used that accounts for their use as representations? My goal is to differentiate scientific representation from other kinds of representation. Why do scientists choose particular models, rather than others, for gaining knowledge about target systems of interest?
(Tentative) dissertation title: Epistemic representation: how scientific models facilitate knowledge gain
Supervisor: Anjan Chakravartty
Donald Borrett
Teresa Branch-Smith
My interests are currently in how the philosophy of biology has possible applications to the manner with which natural history exhibitions are presented in cultural institutions.
Shawn Bullock
history of science and science education
Alison Campbell
Melissa Charenko
I am interested in the history of biology.
Janet Chin Fatt
I am interested in general philosophy of science, especially philosophy of physics.
John Christopoulos
My dissertation explores early modern Italian conceptions of and attitudes towards 'abortion'.
Chris Conway
My research focuses on contemporary and historical developments in the evolution of large technical systems (LTS), such as power grids and communication systems, particularly within the Canadian context. I am interested in how technological systems change and how they interact with, shape, or are constructed by society. My particular interest is in studying the relatively recent tensions surrounding the migration to alternative energy technologies prompted by anthropogenic climate change (for example, power gird interconnection and electrical infrastructure renewal to accommodate a large scale adoption of innovations such as electric cars) and innovations in communications technology (for example, questions of privacy and trust in social media). My focus in technology studies allows me to explore the interconnected themes of technological complexity, emergence, innovation, and rejuvenation, and to continue mapping the growth and reaction to techno-scientific cultures.
Michael Cournoyea
I work to describe and uncover the epistemic virtues of medical explanations. In medical theory and practice, there is a crisis of cause: the linear causal reasoning upon which medicine relies cannot explain complex chronic diseases. This crisis overshadows every niche of clinical medicine but few physicians acknowledge it and few patients see its repercussions. It undermines allopathic medicine’s quest for certainty: a quest to act pragmatically despite the causal ambiguity of health. I discuss the role of certainty in medical explanations as they struggle to understand the causal etiologies of disease, develop interventionist treatments, and transform pathophysiologies into health.
Alex Djedovic
My interests concern the role of radical embodiment theses in the philosophy of cognitive science and their relation to biology. My work examines the extent to which received views on cognition and its relation to biological embodiment are tenable as explanatory frameworks. This work aims to ground the content-bearing, intentional and representational features of cognition in the purposive behaviour of living systems.
Eugene Earnshaw-Whyte
I am examining the concept of natural selection as it is embodied in scientific models. I am particularly interested in attempts to apply the concept of natural selection outside of biology.
Evolutionary Models and the concept of natural selection
Supervisor: Denis Walsh
Curtis Forbes
I wrote my MA thesis on the conflict between scientific realism and constructive empiricism, and attempted to resolve this conflict within the larger framework of the opposed epistemic stances that these two positions result from. It was called "A New Argument for Scientific Realism," which is a much more drool-inducing title than the argument turned out to be. Now I'm just waiting for something new to strike my fancy.
Fermin Fulda
I am interested in the Metaphysical and Epistemological foundations of the Special Sciences. In particular, I am interested in the Naturalistic status of Teleology in Evolutionary Biology and Intentionality in Psychology and whether and how a naturalistic account of the former can ground a naturalistic account of the latter.
Gwyndaf Garbutt
I study the use of evidence in the construction of natural knowledge in thirteenth and fourteenth century Europe. By examining the discussions of exotic and marvelous animals I try to unpack the knowledge claims and practices of evidence use associated with presenting natural information to different audiences. I try to get beyond the context of scholastic natural philosophy and also examine the ways natural information is presented to a wider reading public; the audience for works of wonder, travel literature and fiction.
Dissertation – "Assessing the Exotic: The construction of Natural knowledge in the middle ages," supervised by Bert Hall
Delia Gavrus
http://individual.utoronto.ca/deliagavrus/
I am interested in the ways in which medical specialists negotiate the boundaries of their professions, as well as in the cultural processes that lead to a shared identity within medical communities. My dissertation explores these themes in relation to the emergence of neurosurgery as a medical specialty in the first half of the 20th century.
Other interests: the cultural history of 19th and 20th century medicine, the history of neuroscience (especially the notion of mind/brain dualism), the history of psychiatry, scientific representations in popular culture.
Dissertation – "Men of Strong Opinions:' Identity, Self-Representation, and the Construction of Neurosurgery, 1919-1950," supervised by Professor Emeritus Pauline M.H. Mazumdar and Professor Lucia Dacome.
Teri Gee
My current research is centered on the defenses of astrology in Islam and the Latin West. I am specifically examining the works of Abu Ma'shar in 9th cent. Baghdad and Roger Bacon in 13th cent. Paris in order to find out how they defended the practice of a science which was officially banned by their respective religions (although practiced by many in spite of that), what arguments they used, how those arguments related to the Classical Graeco-Roman defenses found in such works as the Tetrabiblos by Ptolemy. Through this, I will be able to begin to define what place astrology had in the hierarchy of the sciences in both civilizations.
Dissertation – "Astrology as a Foreign Science: A Case Study," supervised by Alexander Jones.
Sebastian Gil-Rianó
Race and Science; History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences; Bio-politics; Identity Politics; Historical Ontology
Paul Greenham
I am interested the interplay of science (or to use actor categories, natural philosophy) and religion in Early Modern Europe. My current project looks at influences of Calvinism on Isaac Newton (especially his concepts of God's providence and sovereignty). I want to investigate the specific role of Calvinist theology and hermeneutics (theory of interpretation) in Newton’s early manuscripts, essentially answering two questions: How Calvinist was Newton’s early theology? And can we see echoes of English Calvinist concepts of nature in Newton’s physics?
Ari Gross
My present research is in the history and philosophy of visualization in scientific practice. Present research topics include understanding the use and function of diagrams (such as Feynman diagrams and structural chemical diagrams), focusing on the ways in scientific reasoning is enabled and affected by common styles and visual analogies. Other, related research includes examining the use of colour in scientific representations (such as in plastinates and astronomical images).
Supervisor: Chen-Pang Yeang, Thesis title: "Form and Function: Seeing, Knowing, and Reasoning with Diagrams in the Practice of Science"
I am involved with the University of Toronto Scientific Instrument Collection, a collaborative effort to catalogue, research, and display the material history of science at the University of Toronto.
Vivien Hamilton
individual.utoronto.ca/vhamilton
In my thesis, I examine moments of collaboration and conflict between physicists and doctors in the early history of radiology. From the moment of their discovery, X-rays were shared between multiple worlds, exhibited prominently in department stores, medical clinics and academic physics laboratories. A fascination with this new phenomenon brought together individuals with disparate backgrounds, in electrical engineering, photography, physics, and medicine. Focusing on the professional relationships between physicists and doctors in particular, I trace the ways in which these individuals from very different disciplinary cultures collaborated and established boundaries of expertise. I show how expectations concerning the proper place of physics changed over this period as physicists increasingly took on leadership roles in radiology, and as training in physics became a crucial part of the identity of radiologists.
Thesis: “Establishing Authority over X-Rays: The Role of Physics in Radiology in North America and Britain, 1896-1930."
Supervisor: Chen-Pang Yeang
Matt Hodgson
Michelle Hoffman
The broad question that my doctoral research seeks to answer is: What shaped the high school science curriculum in Quebec and Ontario over the course of late nineteenth & early twentieth centuries? The history of the science curriculum - and particularly the high school curriculum, which targets the general population - is a window onto changing views about the role of science in society. Political events, scientific breakthroughs and shifts in the public understanding of science have all contributed to important changes in the Canadian science curriculum. By examining how science content and pedagogical approaches have evolved, we can begin to understand how the curriculum reflects wider social attitudes about why and how science should be taught, who makes these decisions, and how Canadian science education can be situated within the context of international discussions and debates about the purpose and goals of school science.
Supervised by Chen-Pang Yeang and Yves Gingras
Jason Hornosty
Allan Jeffrey Hunt
I am interested in the broad area of the history of medicine from the very earliest of times to the present. I have a particular interest in the development of pathology and other areas of laboratory medicine, tropical medicine (including the West Indies), nautical and military medicine, the coroner’s system, infectious disease, the medical treatment of slaves in the British West Indies and social history of medicine in the British West Indies.
Elizabeth Koester
History of medicine
Alex Koo
I am interested in how the general metaphysical and epistemological issues in science are extended to answer fundamental questions in mathematics and physics. In particular, I intend to examine how philosophical positions within mathematics and physics relate and the implications they have upon each other.
Elana Koren
Sarah Kriger
I research technologies of illusion on the Victorian stage, including scientific demonstrations; theatrical special effects; and magicians' apparatus. My most recent project explores the significance of British magician J. N. Maskelyne's automaton, Psycho. Psycho, one of the most popular attractions of 19th-century London, was a mechanical man supposedly able to play cards, solve arithmetical problems, and present conjuring tricks. Incorporating the philosophy of dramatic theory along with the methods of history of technology, I analyze how Maskelyne convinced his Victorian audiences to accept Psycho as an intelligent machine while cultivating his own status as both a purveyor of mystery and a man of science.
Anthony Kulic
I completed a BA (Hons.) in philosophy at the University of Victoria, and an MA in philosophy at the University of Waterloo, where I wrote a thesis on linguistic reference in scientific theories. My interests coalesce around the central metaphysical and epistemological problems in the philosophy of science, especially those pertaining to causality, probability and realism. I'm also interested in the history of modern philosophy of science (particularly the work of Carnap) and the peculiar relationship between mathematics and the physical world. Recently I've been wondering whether we should conceive of the fields that feature in some of our best physical theories as real entities--i.e. as genuine components of the world--or whether the equations used to describe their behaviour are just useful devices for generating accurate predictions. When I have a conclusive answer I'll be sure to revise this blurb. I also enjoy playing, writing and listening to music, going to the movies, playing and watching soccer and basketball, and appreciating some art (especially my daughter's finger paintings).
Xavi Lanao
My main interests are in general philosophy of science, in particular, in metaphysics of science and the relation between metaphysics, philosophy of science and science.
Cory Lewis
I am interested in philosophy of science generally, and scientific explanation in particular. Issues around reduction and emergent explanations have the bulk of my attention currently. I would like to look at how these issues play out in the life sciences (biology, psychology, cognitive science, etc) and particularly to look at how ideas from cognitive psychology can help inform our understanding of scientific explanation. This tangled mess of issues has connections (that I hope to look at) with functional/teleological explanations, as well as the structure of explanations in evolutionary biology.
Patricia Liu
My doctoral research explores the interest surrounding the debate over the protein-only (prion) theory. In particular, I focus on the role of "non-experts” (e.g. science writers) in the controversy over prions, protein infectious agents hypothesized to cause transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs).
Supervisor: Dr. Pauline Mazumdar
Greg Lusk
Kira Lussier
I am interested in the social history of medicine, specifically of psychiatry and neuroscience, as well as the relationships between science and religion, politics, education. I am also intrigued by representations of science in popular culture.
Rebecca Moore
Andrew K Munro
http://individual.utoronto.ca/amunro/
My PhD dissertation research focuses on the how knowledge flows from basic scientific research to technological invention and innovation. Working from an innovation systems perspective, I am examining the biotechnology cluster in the Toronto Region, and in particular the role of MaRS as an incubator and locus of technology transfer. The biotechnology cluster in Toronto provides a particular case study of the broader issues in regional innovation systems, and necessarily includes a comparative analysis with other regions that have developed or will seek to develop biotechnology clusters.
My focus on biotech and use of the innovation systems approach is representative of a broader interest in how knowledge is embedded in technology and the transmission and diffusion of knowledge.
Dissertation supervisor – David Wolfe
Sylvia Nickerson
http://www.sylvianickerson.ca/
Sylvia Nickerson has undergraduate degrees in both Fine Arts and Mathematics. She is currently studying the history of mathematics, specifically the social history of the logicist and formalist movements in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. She also has an interest in the history of books and book printing technologies, which she has picked up from her previous work as a book designer and her current work at the Massey College press. Sylvia completed her Masters research project on the origins of Bertrand Russell's first book of mathematical philosophy, "An Essay on the Foundations of Geometry".
Dissertation – "On the Crumbling Edge of Reason: The Promise of Mathematical Logic, 1900-1939," supervised by Craig Fraser.
Robin Nunn
Sarah-Jane Patterson
I am presently interested in both the history and philosophy of maps – their commission, their measure, their construction, and their acceptance.
Maps are nexus points in history: They are political tools wielded by those in power, and those attempting to gain power. They can also be critical to specific elements of social consciousness, offering both spatial and cultural delineation. Further, how a map is presented, what it represents and how it was received can provide an insight into the prevailing philosophy of that map’s age. They are the direct product of training, technology and mathematics, but are not simply utilitarian scientific representations. Often, maps are beautiful. As I am just beginning my degree, I am directing my studies towards the areas of the history of the social sciences, technology, engineering, and mathematics, while also considering the philosophy behind scientific representation. It is my hope that I will be able to narrow my scope of investigation as I progress throughout the year.
I have two undergraduate degrees: a BFA from Ryerson University in Technical Theatre Production, and a Honours BSc from the University of Toronto which was a joint specialist degree in Mathematics and Philosophy.
I like to read, cook and travel. Everything else is gravy.
Bruce J. Petrie
individual.utoronto.ca/brucejpetrie/
The history of transcendental number theory is largely untreated, especially by professional historians. This project will fill a void in the current academic literature by offering a historically informed alternative to the common mathematical accounts of the origin and development of transcendental number theory and highlight paradigmatic differences between eighteenth and nineteenth century mathematics. My research will not only satisfy historical curiosities of a mathematical audience by detailing episodes relevant to modern mathematicians but also to historians wanting a comprehensive treatment of the birth of a fascinating branch of number theory during one of the most turbulent periods in the history of mathematics.
Dissertation – The Roots of Transcendental Numbers: A Historian’s Perspective on the Development of Transcendental Number Theory 1737 – 1844, supervised by Craig Fraser.
Isaac Record
My research interests begin with the central issues in the philosophy of science. My dissertation is an attempt to understand the role of scientific instruments in the process of knowledge production. I ask: how can we trust scientific instruments and what do we learn about when we use them? The dissertation has four parts.
(1) I give a novel account of “epistemic possibility,” the possibility of knowing, that captures the dependency of knowledge on action. Next, I introduce the notion of “technological possibility,” which depends on the availability of material and conceptual means to bring about a desired state of affairs. I argue that, under certain circumstances, technological possibility is a condition for epistemic possibility.
(2) I ask how instruments become reliable. I argue that when the material capacities and conceptual functions of a scientific instrument correspond, the instrument is a reliable component of the process of knowledge production. I then describe how the instrument design process can result in just such a correspondence. Instrument design produces not only the material device but also a functional concept revised in light of the designer's experience with the device, a measure of the closeness of fit between function and material, and practices of trust such as calibration routines.
(3) I ask how (and what) we learn from instruments whose function is to inform, such as those used for experimentation and simulation. I argue that in experiments, instruments function to inform us about the material capacities of the object of investigation, while in simulations, instruments function to inform us about the conceptual model of the object of investigation.
(4) I put these philosophical distinctions into historical context through a case study of Monte Carlo simulations run on digital electronic computers in the 1940s-70s. I argue that digital electronic computers made the practice of Monte Carlo simulation technologically possible, but that the new method did not meet existing scientific standards. Consequently, Monte Carlo design practices were revised to address the worries of potential practitioners.
Dissertation – "Knowing Instruments: How Instruments Change Scientific Practice," supervised by Anjan Chakravartty.
Toby Reid
Adam Richter
I am interested in the relationship between science and religion in Europe, particularly in the seventeenth century. I am also interested in priority disputes and related issues concerning credit for scientific discoveries and inventions.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Nicolas Sanchez-Guerrero
My dissertation research focuses on the history of school science education in Colombia in the second half of the 20th century. I am also interested in the history of physics and in the history of scientific instruments.
Kristen Schranz
I have a strong interest in chemistry in the late Enlightenment and early Romantic periods. By the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, chemistry was emerging as a science in its own right, particularly with the foundational work of Lavoisier in France. Political revolutions in France and America mirrored intellectual revolutions in the chemistry lab. I will begin my study of this period by researching the work of Beddoes, Davy and Faraday, but will plan to focus on the influence of itinerant chemistry lecturers in England during the late Enlightenment. I am also drawn to the great interplay between science, poetry, art and music during this time. This period in history was bursting with an attitude of hope as the secrets of nature were being unlocked using creative powers and theoretical chemistry was being actively applied to industry and the betterment of human life.
Eva Sham
Philosophy of Science (mainly Biotechnology and Medicine)
David Smillie
My area of interest is the history of science communication. I have two particular areas of interest in this field. The first is the changing role of visual representation in the effective communication of science (both between scientists and the public at large). I am interested in what role visual representations have played in communicating scientific facts and discoveries, and how changes in technology have affected this role over time.
The second area of interest is the role played by prominent scientists in communicating scientific discoveries directly to the public. I want to find out how important such public scientists are, and what (if any) price they have paid within their field of study for the time and effort they have devoted to popularization.
Anna Stoklosa
anna [dot] stoklosa [at] utoronto [dot] ca
I am interested in ethical and regulatory issues surrounding the governance of new biotechnologies.
Mike Stuart
individual.utoronto.ca/michaelstuart/
My interests include problems in the philosophy of biology, the philosophy of physics, the philosophy of language, epistemology, probability theory, and logic. I am currently working on the nature and function of thought experiments, a topic that happily draws many of my interests together. I hope to clean up some of the ambiguities in the literature and address the issue of how thought experiments generate knowledge about the physical world without the aid of "new" empirical input.
Dissertation – "Scientific Thought Experiments," supervised by Yiftach Fehige
Michael Thicke
I plan to research how philosophers of science employ methods and metaphors from economics to explain and justify the operation of science. Philosophers from C.S. Peirce, to Karl Popper, to Steve Fuller make judicious use of economic metaphors in their descriptions of, and arguments about, science. Most notably, Philip Kitcher and Alvin Goldman have promoted economic models as a way of countering SSK-inspired attacks on the authority of science. What work does economics do in countering this (perceived) attack, and how do critiques of economics affect its force?
Jonathan Turner
http://individual.utoronto.ca/jonathanturner/
Nearly everything Jonathan is interested in occurred in the twentieth century. His current research project is the development of technology and science in Canadian defence establishments, industries and universities during the Cold War. As such, Jonathan’s three main fields of study are the history of technology, the history of physics and Canadian history. As an historian of technology he is engaged primarily in studies of military technology, but he also has a keen interest in the philosophy of technology, which is just one example of his philosophical curiosity. As an historian of physics Jonathan is fascinated by the development of research institutions in the Cold War, as well as the emergence of both relativity and quantum mechanics in the early twentieth century. While the majority of his studies in Canadian history are political, he is keenly interested in both social and economic history as well, and he is familiar with the political, economic and social development of the United States in the same period.
Dissertation topic – The Defence Research Board of Canada, 1947-1974, supervised by Janis Langins, Chen-Pang Yeang and Robert Bothwell.
Felix Tyndel
History of medicine
Charissa S. Varma
History of biology: the history of biological classification, the impact of biological classification on medical and legal reform during the 18th and 19th century, and history of evolutionary biology.
Philosophy of biology: species concept, units of selection debate, problems of reference, definition, natural kinds, and identity in a biological context.
History of logic: logical reform during the 19th century in Britian, the history of philosophical logic, the history of logical positivism.
Philosophy of logic: problems of identity, mereology (the logic of parts and wholes), and set theory.
Dissertation – The relationship between logic and biological systematics in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, supervised by Prof. Mary P. Winsor
Jaipreet Virdi
individual.utoronto.ca/jaivirdi
My research broadly focuses on early nineteenth-century developments in English medicine and biology. In particular, I am interested in how medical communities defined and dealt with disease, and how these definitions had an impact on society. Currently, I am focused on an early nineteenth-century individual, John Harrison Curtis (1778-1860), who was among the first specialists on diseases of the ear. Curtis is a historically intriguing character: on one hand, his medical expertise and treatments contributed tremendously to his society and to the field of otology, and yet on the other hand, his medical and scientific contemporaries hastily labelled him as a “fraud.” I am researching Curtis’ contributions in order to devise a comprehensive understanding of why he was labelled a “fraud” despite his many achievements in the field.
Katherine Watson
Erich Weidenhammer
I am interested in the relationship of chemistry to medicine in the Enlightenment. In the past I have looked at the English chemist (or perhaps "aerial philosopher") Joseph Priestley's (1733-1804) experimental work as it related to existing medical ideas concerning putrefaction and antiseptic medicine. Now I'm looking at a similar subject: the Edinburgh born physician John Pringle (1707-1782) who was one of Priestley's powerful supporters. In the early 1750s, Pringle proposed a series of influential experiments on fermentation and putrefaction that he interpreted as analogies to bodily processes. I think that his work offers insight into Enlightenment views on hygiene and medical reform as well as into a longer tradition of chemically oriented medical experiment.
Aaron Sidney Wright
www.individual.utoronto.ca/wright
I am broadly interested in the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology, and Science and Technology Studies. In the past, I have worked on C19 American astronomy; race and science in the C18 French Atlantic; the arrow of time and thermodynamics; and the transfer of Canadian nuclear technology to India. I am currently focussing on modern physics.
I am interested in the way unobservable (in the physicist's sense) and unobserved theoretical entities get passed from theory to theory. Or: Why are we still theorizing about and looking for magnetic monopoles? In what way is Dirac's vacuum the same as Unruh's? And how is our understanding of these objects constituted by the physicist's methodologies and formalisms?
Research Fellows
Angela Byrne
www.widereurope.ie/people/angela_byrne.html
PhD, History, National University of Ireland (2009): 'The Irish in Russia, 1690-1815: travel, gender and self-fashioning'.
Current position: Visiting research fellow at IHPST and post-doctoral fellow at National University of Ireland (Maynooth).
I am primarily interested in Irish and British elite cultural practices in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, particularly in relation to travel, leisure, antiquarianism, knowledge/education, and popular culture.
My post-doctoral research project, 'Scientific and cultural researches in the sub-Arctic: a comparative study of exploratory travels in Scandinavia and Canada, 1800-1830', examines the sub-Arctic travel accounts of a number of British 'gentlemen of science' and antiquarians. Research for the project, to be conducted in Britain, Canada and Ireland, is funded by the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences and has the mentorship support of Suzanne Zeller, History, Wilfrid Laurier University and Jacinta Prunty, History, National University of Ireland (Maynooth). I also concurrently hold an Overseas Visiting Scholarship at St John's College, University of Cambridge (Michaelmas Term 2010).
Josipa Petrunic
Josipa’s research explores the many ways in which British mathematics in the nineteenth century served as a colonizing agent. By analyzing the historical development of scientific institutions in the colonies of India (later India and Pakistan), Canada, and Australia, Josipa is working to demonstrate how political agendas were often embedded within scientific cultures as they were disseminated, used and institutionalized in the colonies. Josipa’s research will shows that although mathematics is often thought of as a neutral field of activity, it can embody political ideologies. Her research is funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).
In August 2010, Josipa completed a research fellowship at the University College London, funded by Britain’s Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). While there, Josipa focused on the development of nineteenth century mathematical operators known as “quaternions”.
Josipa’s research at UCL constituted an extension of her doctoral research, which she completed as a Commonwealth Scholar at the University of Edinburgh. In her doctoral thesis, Josipa analyzed the ways in which three mathematicians (the Irish mathematician Sir William Rowan Hamilton, the Scottish mathematician and natural philosopher Peter Guthrie Tait, and the English mathematician William Kingdon Clifford) used vector concepts in idiosyncratic ways to advance divergent mathematical and philosophicalagendas.
Josipa’s research will be published as a book entitled Victorian Mathematics in the Making: A Social History of Quaternions, the manuscript of which will be submitted to the Science and Culture in the 19th-Century Series published by Pickering and Chatto in August 2011.