Postdoc Neurosymbolic Reasoning in Multimodal World Models

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU); Netherlands; On-site; EUR 41,000 - 64,000; Part time

Benefits offered by this job

Salary scale UFO 10 (min €3,706; max €

Job summary

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU) is seeking a Postdoctoral researcher to advance multimodal world models with commonsense abstraction and reasoning. You will collaborate with a strong team, publish in top venues, and contribute to teaching activities, while shaping your academic career.

The role is funded as part of the NWO AiNed talent project and involves supervision of PhD students and collaboration with national and international partners.

Qualifications

• PhD in Machine Learning, Computer Vision, NLP, Neurosymbolic AI, or related field.
• Record of publishing in high-quality conferences or journals.
• Ability to develop and evaluate novel multimodal algorithms.
• Excellent communication in English, written and spoken.

Responsibilities

• Demonstrate independence in achieving research goals and supervise PhD students.
• Innovate and describe novel multimodal abstraction and reasoning methods.
• Publish and present research at international venues.
• Collaborate with researchers locally and internationally.
• Contribute to teaching activities such as lectures and labs.
• Develop portfolio and vision for future academic positions.

Skills

Teamwork

English communication

Independent research

Supervising PhD students

Education

PhD in ML / CV / NLP / Neurosymbolic AI

Tools

Python deep learning toolkits

Job description

Organisation/Company Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU) Research Field Computer science Researcher Profile Recognised Researcher (R2) Application Deadline 10 Oct 2026 - 21:59 (UTC) Country Netherlands Type of Contract Temporary Job Status Not Applicable Hours Per Week 38.0 Is the job funded through the EU Research Framework Programme? Not funded by a EU programme Is the Job related to staff position within a Research Infrastructure? No

Offer Description

While the performance of multimodal world models has significantly improved, they still lack commonsense abstraction and reasoning capabilities. These models fail to capture the causal aspects of the physical and social world. To address the grand challenge of commonsense abstraction and reasoning with multimodal world models, we will explore methods to enhance their robustness, abstraction, and visual grounding abilities. We will focus on learning explicit, effective abstractions from limited human-labeled data, serving as dynamic, neurosymbolic world models. Following cognitive principles, we will evaluate these methods on tasks that require commonsense reasoning over space, time, and causality.

This project is funded by the NWO AiNed talent project “Human-centric AI with common sense” of Dr. Filip Ilievski (Learning and Reasoning, VU Amsterdam). The Postdoc will be co-supervised by Dr. Filip Ilievski, Dr. Emile van Krieken (Learning and Reasoning, VU Amsterdam), and Prof. Cees Snoek (Video & Image Sense Lab, UvA). The Postdoc will be part of ELLIS Unit Amsterdam.

Your duties

• to show independence in achieving research goals and willingness to collaborate and supervise PhD students working on multimodal abstraction, commonsense reasoning, and world models
• to invent, evaluate, and describe novel techniques for multimodal abstraction and explicit reasoning as dynamic, neurosymbolic world models
• to publish and present this research at international conferences, workshops, and journals
• to become an active member of the research community and to collaborate with other researchers, both in Amsterdam and internationally
• to contribute to teaching activities, such as lectures, lab courses, or supervising bachelor and master students
• to develop your portfolio and vision towards your next career position in academia
• you have a PhD in Machine Learning, Computer Vision, Natural Language Processing, Neurosymbolic AI, or a closely related area
• you can invent and evaluate novel algorithms and present these orally and in writing
• you have a record of publishing in relevant, high-quality conferences or journals in the above fields
• you are eager to tackle fundamental challenges in the areas of multimodality, abstraction, commonsense reasoning, and neurosymbolic world models
• you can implement and evaluate commonsense reasoning methods with multimodal foundation models, e.g., using Python deep learning toolkits
• you can work well in teams and communicate effectively in written and spoken English

As a university, we strive for equal opportunities for all, recognising that diversity takes many forms. We believe that diversity in all its complexity is invaluable for the quality of our teaching, research and service. We are always looking for talent with diverse backgrounds and experiences. This also means that we are committed to creating an inclusive community so that we can use diversity as an asset.

We realise that each individual brings a unique set of skills, expertise and mindset. Therefore we are happy to invite anyone who recognises themselves in the profile to apply, even if you do not meet all the requirements.

Additional Information

A challenging position in a socially engaged organisation. At VU Amsterdam, you contribute to education, research and service for a better world. And that is valuable. So in return for your efforts, we offer you:

• a salary of minimum € 3.706,00 (Scale 10) and maximum € 5.760,00 (Scale 10) gross per month, on a full-time basis. This is based on UFO profile Researcher 4. The exact salary depends on your education and experience
• a position for 1 FTE. Your employment contract will be for 2 years, preferably starting in Q1 of 2027

We also offer you attractive fringe benefits and regulations. Some examples:

• a full-time 38-hour working week comes with a holiday leave entitlement of 232 hours per year. If you choose to work 40 hours, you have 96 extra holiday leave hours on an annual basis. For part-timers, this is calculated pro rata
• 8% holiday allowance and 8.3% end-of-year bonus
• optional model for designing a personalized benefits package
• contribution to commuting expenses

Vacancy questions

If you have any questions regarding this vacancy, you may contact:

Name: Filip Ilievski
Position: Assistant professor
E-mail: [e-mail]

Relocation support
If you have any questions regarding moving to Amsterdam, and working at VU Amsterdam, you may contact:
International Staff Support: [e-mail]