For this session, we will answer the title’s question with the short and sweet: John P. Burgess’s Why I Am Not a Nominalist, a broad overview against various forms of nominalism.
Burgess responds to nominalist attempts to dispense with abstract objects in mathematical and scientific discourse, challenging both instrumentalist and reconstructionist forms of nominalism, among others. Burgess purports to shift the burden of proof onto the nominalist rather than the realist, by arguing that nominalistic reconstructions need (and in his view fail) to account for the role of mathematics in science. His critique addresses Goodman, Quine, and Field, among others.
Sonja Smets presents work on the use of logic to study social influence and herd behavior in epistemic social networks.
To celebrate the birthday of our emeritus professor, Peter van Emde Boas, the ILLC is organizing an event with his former colleagues and coworkers discussing his academic achievements of the last 40 years.
The Nordic Online Logic Seminar (NOL Seminar) is organised monthly over Zoom, with expository talks on topics of interest for the broader logic community. The seminar is open for professional or aspiring logicians and logic aficionados worldwide.
If you wish to receive the Zoom ID and password for it, as well as further announcements, please subscribe here: https://listserv.gu.se/sympa/subscribe/nordiclogic.
Programme:
15:00-15:15 Opening and the presentation of the book
15:15-16:00 Dick de Jongh: Notes on my scientific life
16:00-16:15 Break
16:15-17:00 Personal words by colleagues
17:00-18:30 Drinks
Attendance is free, but we kindly ask you to register, so that we know how many participants to expect. It will also be possible to follow the event online via Zoom. The online version of the book can be found at https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-47921-2.
The new research priority area (RPA) Shaping Interfaces Between Science and the Public will be launched, which aims to establish a Public Methodology Centre to strengthen the relationship between science, citizen science, social debate and various professional practices. The RPA is a collaboration between the faculties of Humanities, Law, Science, Social and Behavioural Sciences, and the Amsterdam UMC. Four ILLC faculty are PIs of this RPA: Huub Dijstelbloem (project leader), Rens Bod, Sebastian De Haro, and Sonja Smets.
In Austria, leading scientists in the field of AI have joined forces and created the Cluster of Excellence (CoE) “Bilateral Artificial Intelligence: Discovering the Next Dimension of AI”, funded by the Austrian Science Fund FWF. The vision is to educate a new generation of top-quality AI scientists with a holistic understanding of symbolic and sub-symbolic AI methods. The CoE “Bilateral AI” is currently looking for the brightest minds in this field, offering PhD and Postdoc positions, with several exciting opportunities still available.
The participating research centers are Johannes Kepler Universität Linz (JKU Linz), Technische Universität Wien (TU Wien), Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt (AAU), Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA), Technische Universität Graz (TU Graz), and Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien (WU Wien).
Applications are invited for a Junior Group Leader / PostDoc in CompLing / NLP / CogSci at the University of Tübingen (Germany) in the group led by Prof. Dr. Michael Franke.
Details:
- 4 years
- salary scale E14 (100%, starting at ~ € 5100 gross per month)
- co-supervision of PhD students
- no teaching obligations (but the opportunity to teach)
- dynamic interdisciplinary team in one of Germany's top research universities, with access to competitive compute
- required profile: PhD in a related field (CL, NLP, ML, CogSci, Ling …), practical and theoretical knowledge of current NLP (language modeling), and competitive research output
Additionally, there are open positions for a PhD and an Postdoc in CogSci/Pragmatics.
The Philosophical-Theological College Brixen (PTH) in Bressanone/Italy is searching for a Researcher (24 months, fulltime employment) within the project “Climate, Plastics and Sustainability: Ontology and Operationalisation” (ClimOO), funded by the Autonomous Province Bolzano/South Tyrol. The successful applicant should take up the position on 2. June 2025 or as soon as possible thereafter.
In the subproject hosted at the PTH Brixen, we will help to analyse how climate and environmental impacts are defined in existing standards and good practices, and how climate change and (micro)plastic pollution in agriculture are operationalised. We will use these results to develop a reference ontology to integrate the data collected by the various methods identified.
The Faculty of Science, through the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science (LIACS), invites applications for an assistant professor (0.8-1.0 FTE) position in Computer Science. We are seeking a candidate with expertise in Programming, Algorithms, and/or Software (Engineering), preferably with a research interest in how modern artificial intelligence methods can be leveraged for code generation, optimization, debugging, and/or testing. We are especially interested in candidates with the ability to teach an introductory bachelor-level course on programming in C++. As the candidate will be involved in education in the Dutch Informatica bachelor programme, proficiency in Dutch is highly desirable. Apart from doing research and teaching, the candidate is expected to secure funding and supervise bachelor and master students.
The successful candidate will be embedded in one of the research groups at LIACS, the Computer Science and AI department of Leiden University, depending on the precise area of the candidate's expertise, and will benefit from our open culture of cross-group collaboration.
We are looking for a postdoc interested in games on graphs, automata/logics, and generally game theory, to join the verification group at the University of Liverpool. The post is for two years and is to be filled as soon as possible (there is some flexibility). The application deadline is 2025-03-30.
A fully funded Ph.D. position in theoretical computer science is available at Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona. The successful candidate will be advised by Victor Dalmau. The topic of the Ph.D. is relatively flexible. Natural choices include Constraint Satisfaction Problems or Database Theory, but other mutually agreeable topics in theoretical computer science are also possible. The position includes some teaching duties. Specifically, candidates will be expected to serve as a teaching assistant for 45 hours/year.
A primary criterion for the position is a strong academic background in mathematics and/or theoretical computer science. Ideally, candidates should hold an undergraduate degree in mathematics. However, candidates with an undergraduate degree in computer science will also be considered, provided they can demonstrate a strong background in theoretical computer science—for example, through a bachelor's or master's thesis on the subject.
A postdoctoral research position in theoretical computer science is available at King's College London. The successful candidate will be hosted by Hubie Chen and will be expected to work on topics related to the themes of complexity, database theory, structural decomposition methods, and logic. Research interest and experience in the following areas will be valued: logic in computer science, database theory, finite model theory, structural decomposition methods, term rewriting, and parameterized complexity theory.
Key dates: the application deadline is April 17, 2025; it is hoped that the successful applicant will start by August 2025, but there is some flexibility concerning the start date. If the position is started by August 1, 2025, it can be held for at least 1 year. The exact starting date and duration can be set in a way that takes into account the successful candidate's needs and schedule.