Time as Continuous Quantity in Radulphus Brito’s Philosophy

This study examines Radulphus Brito’s account of time in his (unedited) Questions on Aristotle’s Physics, comparing the two main manuscript versions and situating his position within medieval debates on time. Brito defends a realist, non-reductionist view: time exists extra animam as a quantitative accident distinct from motion, though inseparable from it, and grounded primarily in the first celestial motion as its “passio” and universal measure. He argues that time belongs to the category of continuous quantity, reinterpreting Aristotle’s definition of time as the “number” of motion through the notion of the numerus numeratus (the numbered, not the numbering). The paper also analyzes Brito’s treatment of the present instant (nunc)—indivisible yet “continuative” of time—and the resulting tensions between continuity, infinite divisibility, and the role of the now in measuring and sustaining temporal succession.