The University of Miami School of Law and the global legal academy mourn the passing of Professor Susan Haack. A professor of law and Distinguished Professor in the Humanities at the University of Miami, Haack was a towering figure whose intellectual rigor bridged the often-disparate worlds of formal logic and legal practice.
Haack’s scholarly output was remarkable. She authored a dozen books, including the seminal Evidence Matters: Science, Proof, and Truth in the Law and Philosophy of Logics. Her work, appearing in 18 languages across 36 countries, sought to "put philosophy to work," particularly in how courts evaluate scientific evidence. Her influence was such that her career was the subject of four volumes of essays—Susan Haack: A Lady of Distinctions (2007), Susan Haack: Reintegrating Philosophy (2016), a special issue of Estudios filosóficos (2018), and Philosophy, the World, Life and the Law (2020).
Throughout her career, Haack was recognized with some of the highest honors in the academic world. She was awarded the Ulysses Medal from University College Dublin and the Premio internacional de cultura jurídica from the University of Girona in Spain. Her inclusion in Peter J. King’s One Hundred Philosophers cemented her status as one of the most significant thinkers of the modern era.
“Susan Haack embodied the intellectual rigor and interdisciplinary curiosity that we strive to instill in every law student. She was a devoted educator and her contributions to legal philosophy were profound. Her influence was truly global,” said School of Law Dean Patricia Sanchez Abril.
Beyond her more than 700 global lectures and her vast bibliography, Haack was a dedicated educator. She received numerous awards for excellence in teaching, pushing her students to look beyond mere rhetoric to the underlying logic of a legal argument. She remained active in her scholarship, with her most recent work focusing on pragmatist legal philosophy.
Educated at Oxford and Cambridge, Haack earned her Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge in 1972. Before joining the University of Miami faculty in 1990, she served as a fellow of New Hall, Cambridge, and a professor at the University of Warwick.
In 2025, she was featured in the University of Miami's College of Arts and Sciences magazine commemorating its centennial. The magazine selected just thirteen notable and "influential scholars, creators and leaders" to highlight from its 100-year history and Haack made the list featured as a “historymaker.”
Reflecting on her 2014 milestone of 600 external lectures, Haack was asked what she found most rewarding about her global travels. She noted that she most valued the "new friends and new ideas" encountered along the way, as well as the frequent requests from her hosts to return.
Regarding the future of her travels, she remarked that many invitations arrived unexpectedly and expressed her hope to "keep going as long as they keep coming."
