Known for his expertise in “mathy philosophy,” Dean Rayo’s domain of study lies at the intersection of the philosophy of logic, metaphysics, and the philosophy of language. He has focused on understanding the relationship between our language and the world it represents, clarifying the connection between logic and mathematics, and investigating the limits of communicable thought.
Rayo, who showed an interest in math and logic from a young age, grew up in Mexico City. He earned his undergraduate degree in 1996 from the National Autonomous University of Mexico, and his PhD from MIT in 2001. He served as a postdoc at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, an assistant professor of philosophy at the University of California at San Diego, then joined the MIT faculty in 2005.
Dean Rayo was elected to the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters in 2018, was a Burkhardt Fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, and a Professorial Fellow at the University of Oslo from 2015 to 2020. His books lnclude The Construction of Logical Space (OUP, 2013) and On the Brink of Paradox (MIT Press, 2019), which won the 2020 PROSE Award for best textbook in the humanities.
“I want to continue the work of former MIT SHASS deans, to make sure that the fields we study at the school remain at the heart of the MIT experience. If you want to change the world, you need to understand how it works.”
