Postdoctoral researcher in Logic

The Institute for Logic, Language and Computation (ILLC) is looking for an exceptional postdoctoral researcher in the area of Logic and Semantics within the project 'Cognitive Semantics and Quantities [CoSaQ]. Founding Logical Semantics on Cognitively Plausible Representations’. This is a 5-year project (2017-2021) funded by the European Research Council, and led by Principal Investigator (PI) Jakub Szymanik.

The Institute for Logic, Language and Computation is a renowned research institute at the University of Amsterdam in which researchers from the Faculty of Humanities and the Faculty of Science collaborate. The ILLC-research carried out at Humanities forms one of the six research schools within this faculty. ILLC’s central research area is the study of fundamental principles of encoding, transmission and comprehension of information. Research at ILLC is interdisciplinary, and aims at bringing together insights from various disciplines concerned with information and information processing, such as logic, philosophy, linguistics, musicology, mathematics, computer science, artificial intelligence and cognitive science.

Job description

The postdoctoral researcher will work within the subproject 'Founding Logical Semantics on Cognitively Plausible Representations', lasting for the first three years of the project (2017-2019), and will be employed full-time. This subproject will lay the logical, computational, and conceptual foundations for the cognitive models to be developed and tested within the other subprojects. The main task of the Postdoc will be to incorporate psychologically and cognitively plausible representations and verification mechanisms into a new logico-computational model of quantifier meaning. As no such model yet exist, its development will be an important contribution to formal semantics. To close the loop, back to cognitive science, the Postdoc will analyze the models to derive new predictions testable by experimental methods. These predictions will serve to spring parallel and follow-up lines of research.

The postdoc will be expected to:

• present intermediate research results at international workshops and conferences;
• deliver a number of excellent publications, also in cooperation with the PI and the other project members
• contribute to teaching activities at the Master of Logic, Master of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, and Cognition, Communication and Language programmes.

The postdoc is also expected to help with the organizational tasks connected to the project, including the:

• organization and attendance of a CoSaQ project seminars;
• organization of a CoSaQ kick-off workshop. 

Requirements

• PhD in the area of logic with demonstrable expertise in formal semantics and cognitive science;
• expertise in building logical models of language processing;
• research works testifying the capacity to publish regularly in top international peer-reviewed journals in the area of logic, formal semantics, and cognitive science;
• strong willingness to help with all the organizational duties connected to the project;
• strong cooperative attitude and willingness to engage in collaborative research;
• interest in teaching interdisciplinary topics at the intersection of logic and cognition.

Further Information

For more information on the CoSaQ research project, please contact:

• Jakub Szymanik, Principal Investigator

You may also want to check the:

• Amsterdam Institute for Humanities Research (AIHR)

Appointment

The selected postdoctoral researcher will be appointed full-time (38 hours per week) for a period of three years at the Department of Linguistics, Faculty of Humanities at the University of Amsterdam. The research will be carried out in the Institute for Logic Language and Computation. The appointment is initially for a period of 12 months; contingent on satisfactory performance it will be extended by 24 months. The gross monthly salary (on a full-time basis) will range from €3,193 during the first year to €3,671 during the third year, in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities.

Job application

Applications should include the following information in one single pdf file, named using your surname and 'postdoc' as file name, e.g.: Smith-phd.pdf:

• a 1-page statement of research motivating why you are applying and how you can contribute to the CoSaQ project in terms of (a) excellent collaborative research, (b) help with organization;
• a CV, including (a) details of research experience; (b) names and e-mail addresses of at least three referees to be contacted informally for references; (c) full list of publications. Also include URLs for downloading sample (best) publications and/or thesis manuscripts (do not send these as part of your application).

Please submit your application to solliciteren2016-FGW@uva.nl no later than 7 December 2016.

Only complete applications submitted to this email address will be considered.

Please state vacancy number 16-574 in the subject line of your application. The subject of the email message and the attachment must also consist of the text 'CoSaQ + applicant's last name-postdoc'.

Candidates will be interviewed in the first week of December. Skype interviews are possible.

The preferred starting date is 1 February 2017 but slight delays may be negotiated.