 After studying mathematics and physics in Tübingen, Hamburg, Bonn and Princeton, Lorenz earned his Ph.D. in 1961 under Paul Lorenzen in Kiel with a thesis about "Arithmetic and Logic as Games".In 1969 he received his habilitation degree in philosophy also under Lorenzen but this time in Erlangen.In 1970 he was offered the chair of philosophy at the University of Hamburg to succeed Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker.