Mia Minnes

I was never one of those kids who instinctively knew what they wanted to be when they grew up. But, I did always know that learning would be a key part of my life. One of my favorite stories from my early childhood is of my parents catching my sister and I typing intently on imaginary typewriters and proclaiming that we were working.

Throughout high school and university, I enjoyed studying both the sciences and the humanities. In fact, not willing to give up either of these, I received dual Bachelor's degrees at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario in Applied Science (Mathematics & Engineering, Computing and Communications) and Philosophy. At Queen's, I had my first encounter with programming and fell in love with the power behind logical thinking. Considering graduate studies, mathematical logic was a natural fit as it lay in the intersection of my favorite philosophy courses (philosophy of language and science) and engineering courses (computer architecture, programming, and math). As I started my graduate studies at Cornell University, I was fascinated by the deep and abstract theorems of Logic, and excited by the many interactions the subject has with other fields. I love discovering new theorems that help understand the theoretical basis underpinning computers and describing to what extent they can describe the (physical and mathematical) world we inhabit. After receiving my PhD, I was thrilled to join the MIT mathematics department as a postdoc here. Being here gave me the opportunity to run the Logic seminar and teach extraordinarily gifted students. Though I will miss my many friends here, I am looking forward to moving to UCSD this summer.

SE Warschawski Assistant Professor UCSD 2010-present
CLE Moore Instructor 2008-2010