PhD Position in the History of Philosophy and Logic (full time)

The interdisciplinary research will be carried out in the context of a tight collaboration between the Centre for Logic and Philosophy of Science at the Institute of Philosophy and the Research Group of Latin Literature at the Faculty of Arts. The Centre for Logic and Philosophy of Science (CLPS) at the Institute of Philosophy focuses on logic and philosophy of science, and also does research on (formal) epistemology, philosophy of mind and philosophy of language. The members of CLPS work within the tradition of analytic philosophy. The Research Group of Latin Literature at the Faculty of Arts has a long-standing tradition of early Modern intellectual history, with particular interest in the multilingual interactions between Neo-Latin and the vernacular languages, including Dutch. The Research Group also hosts expertise in the long history of language studies, with which the study of logic was for a long time entangled.

Project

This project, which is funded by the Research Foundation – Flanders (FWO), deals with the emergence of Dutch vernacular logic, focusing on its philosophical, logical and linguistic aspects. While there has been much research on the development of vernacular logic traditions in Western Europe as well as on the development of Dutch as a scientific language, hardly any work has been done on the specific area of Dutch vernacular logic. In this project we will study a corpus of about 10 logic textbooks from the period 1585 – 1685, which were either originally written in Dutch or translated from Latin/French into Dutch. From a philosophical perspective, our goal is to investigate to what extent humanist philosophy of language can help to explain the emergence of Dutch vernacular logic. From a logical perspective, our goal is to investigate where the Dutch vernacular works stand with respect to certain general trends of logic in that era (e.g. the interplay between Scholasticism and Cartesianism). From a linguistic perspective, our goal is to explore the various techniques that authors and translators used to create new logical vocabulary, thereby contributing to the development of Dutch as a scientific language. A special focus of the project will concern the logical contributions of Simon Stevin (1548 – 1620). While Stevin is widely celebrated for his contributions to mathematics and Dutch mathematical vocabulary, hardly anyone knows that Stevin is also the author of the first logic textbook in Dutch: Dialectike ofte bewysconst (1585).

Profile

You have a Master’s degree that is relevant to this PhD position (typically: MA in philosophy, MA in linguistics, MA in the relevant languages and literatures).

You have an excellent knowledge of Dutch (in order to read the primary sources) and of English (in order to read secondary literature and to publish your own findings). Ideally, you also have some knowledge of Latin and/or Greek.

You have a basic understanding of (traditional) logic and of the general philosophical climate at the end of the Middle Ages – Renaissance – Early Modernity.

You are willing to work in the context of an interdisciplinary research team.

Candidates who possess some, but not all of the aforementioned knowledge and skillsets but who are nevertheless enthusiastic about this PhD position, are strongly encouraged to get in touch with us. Depending on your exact background, we can set up a remedial trajectory in the first year of your PhD, which will allow you to fully flourish in the remainder of the project!

Offer

We offer a full-time PhD position for four years (subject to positive intermediate evaluations), situated in a stimulating scientific working environment within one of Europe’s leading research universities. We offer an attractive wage and a budget for research expenses (including small equipment, travel and accommodation costs, the organization of events).

The starting date is currently set at 1 October, but this is negotiable (within the calendar year 2022).

Interested?

For more information please contact Prof. dr. Lorenz Demey, mail: lorenz.demey@kuleuven.be, dr. Raf Van Rooy, mail: raf.vanrooy@kuleuven.be and dr. Christophe Geudens, mail: christophe.geudens@kuleuven.be.

You can apply for this job no later than July 31, 2022 via the online application tool

KU Leuven seeks to foster an environment where all talents can flourish, regardless of gender, age, cultural background, nationality or impairments. If you have any questions relating to accessibility or support, please contact us at diversiteit.HR@kuleuven.be.