Philosophical Research at ELTE

Philosophical research is predominantly undertaken at the Institute of Philosophy and at the Department of Aesthetics, both of which belong to the Faculty of Humanities. Nevertheless, there are distinguished scholars active at other departments of various faculties of the university. Since the 1990s, philosophers from Eötvös Loránd University have been more and more involved in international research.

Research into philosophy at ELTE covers a broad spectrum. Traditionally, two fields stand out: logic and the history of philosophy. The latter ranges from ancient through early modern to contemporary philosophy. Some members of the faculty are engaged in Eastern – Indian and Chinese – philosophy. Continental philosophy is represented by phenomenology and hermeneutics. In the analytic tradition, the focus of research is on the philosophy of languages and the philosophy of science.

Internationally recognised members of the faculty are, among others, Béla Bacsó (aesthetics, hermeneutics), László Bene, István Bodnár (ancient philosophy), Gábor Boros (early modern philosophy), István M. Fehér (German idealism, hermeneutics), Gábor Forrai (epistemology, semantics), George Kampis (philosophy of science), Csaba Olay (hermeneutics), László Perecz (history of Hungarian philosophy), Ferenc Ruzsa (Indian philosophy), László E. Szabó (philosophy of science), Tamás Ullmann (phenomenology), and Zsófia Zvolenszky (logic, philosophy of language). Professors Emeriti include Ágnes Heller (ethics), János Kelemen (Dante, 20^th-century philosophy), and Sándor Radnóti (aesthetics, 20^th-century philosophy). Journals edited at the Institute of Philosophy are the Hungarian Review of Philosophy, published in Hungarian with one additional issue in English every year, the Budapest Review of Books, published in Hungarian, as well as the Rhizomata: A journal for ancient philosophy and science.

The faculty can boast of having active partnerships with faculties at several European and American universities. Within the region, the most important partners are Zagreb, Prague, Bratislava, Cracow, and Cluj. In other parts of Europe, the collaborators are Cambridge, Oxford, Berlin, Munich, Fribourg, Paris, and Dijon. Furthermore, there is an American partner in Pittsburgh.

Research is intended to be continued in all the major fields covered. ELTE has recently launched new projects in applied philosophical research, that is, in the field of ethical problems of artificial intelligence.