Centre for Theoretical Philosophy

Supporting excellence in research in theoretical philosophy.

The Centre for Theoretical Philosophy is a large and lively research group made up of academic staff and postgraduate students. We regularly host and welcome approaches from visiting researchers and postdoctoral researchers. Our research interests span topics across the traditional range of theoretical areas of analytic philosophy, and the intersections between them.

The Director of the Centre is Dr. Léa Salje.

Our research

We are a diverse group of researchers with interests in metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language, metaphilosophy, and philosophy of mind and action – including both traditional topics in these areas and social topics in metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of language. Examples of current reseach interests represented by the group include social ontology, practical rationality, self-knowledge, the relationship between thought and language, perception, explanation, attention, mental representation, metasemantics and singular reference. Our work often makes contact with the interests of neighbouring reseach centres in PRHS, such as CAMP, HPS and IDEA.

Among these areas of interest, we have clusters of researchers working on topics in metaphysics, philosophy of mind, and metaphilosophy/explanations, and we especially encourage approaches from prospective postgraduate and postdoctoral researchers interested in coming to work with us on these areas.

Our centre has a strong record of securing external funding for research. A selection of recent examples include Robbie Williams’ ERC projects ‘The Nature of Representation’ (2012-2017) and ‘Group Thinking: new foundations’ (2019-2024), Helen Steward’s AHRC ‘Persons as Animals’ (2015-2016) project, Robbie Williams and Jess Keiser’s H2020 ‘Language and Language Use’ (2019-2021) project, and Heather Logue’s BA project ‘World in Mind’ (2024-2025).

Our people

View our members

Bahram Assadian, Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow – philosophy of maths, philosophy of language, metaphysics

Darren Bradley, Professor of Metaphysics and Epistemology – self-location and self-doubt, theoretical virtues, the epistemology of metaphysics

Thomas Brouwer, Lecturer in Philosophy – social ontology, philosophy of logic, metasemantics, metaphysics

Joshua Habgood-Coote, Lecturer in Philosophy – practical knowledge, collective enquiry, work and the ethics of skill

Jessica Keiser – Associate Professor in Philosophy – philosophy of language and social/political philosophy

Heather Logue, Associate Professor in Philosophy – perception, feminist philosophy, philosophy of mind, metaphilosophy

Nick Makins, British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow – practical rationality, metaethics, decision theory, philosophy of medicine

Léa Salje, Centre Director & Associate Professor in Mind and Language – self-knowledge, thought, epistemology of mind

Ashley Shaw, Leverhulme Early Career Fellow – desire, rational agency, reasons

Helen Steward, Professor of Philosophy of Mind and Action – free will, abilities, causation, explanation

Robbie Williams, Professor of Theoretical Philosophy – mental representation, group intentionality, vagueness, social ontology, other minds

Alastair Wilson, Professor of Philosophy – metaphysics, philosophy of science, epistemology.

Seminars, talks and reading groups

The Centre for Theoretical Philosophy runs a weekly termtime work-in-progress seminar, giving staff and postgraduates the opportunity to test out new ideas in a supportive and informal setting. We host occasional visiting speakers, both from the UK and overseas, and the Centre supports members in putting on outward-facing research events with invited speakers. There are multiple reading groups for members throughout the year, and the Centre celebrates the closing of each academic year with an in-house intramural event.