Professor Lisa Bortolotti MA (London), BPhil (Oxon), PhD (ANU)

Office hours on Wednesdays 9-10am and 12-1pm. Or email for an appointment.

I have a Laurea in Filosofia (summa cum laude) from the University of Bologna (1997), an MA in Philosophy (with Distinction) from the University of London (1998), a BPhil from Oxford (2000), and a PhD in Philosophy from the Australian National University in Canberra (2004). 

I joined the Philosophy Department at the University of Birmingham in September 2005. Since then, my research and teaching have focused on the philosophy of the cognitive sciences.

I have been Editor in chief of Philosophical Psychology (Taylor and Francis) since January 2022.

I am also the editor and founder of the Imperfect Cognitions blog and The Philosophy Garden, a virtual philosophy museum with resources on timely philosophical issues for young people and the general public.

I am the author of two textbooks and a key concept book:

• Introduction to the philosophy of science (Polity, 2008) 
• Irrationality (Polity, 2014)
• Philosophy of Psychology: An Introduction (Polity, 2021, with Kengo Miyazono).

I am the author of three monographs:

• Delusions and Other Irrational Beliefs (OUP, 2009) which won the American Philosophical Association Book Prize in 2011. 
• The Epistemic Innocence of Irrational Beliefs (OUP, 2020)
• Why Delusions Matter (Bloomsbury, 2023) which was a 2024 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title. 

I edited four volumes:

• Philosophy and Happiness (Palgrave, 2009)
• Psychiatry as Cognitive Neuroscience: Philosophical Perspectives (OUP, 2009, with Matthew Broome), one of the Guardian Books of the Year in 2009
• Delusions in Context (Palgrave, 2018), open access
• Epistemic Justice in Mental Healthcare: Recognising agency and promoting virtues across the life span (Palgrave, 2025), open access

I teach on two Masters modules: Philosophy and Mental Health for Philosophy, for on-campus and distance-learning students, and Philosophy and Ethics of Mental Health and Wellbeing for Psychology.

I supervise Philosophical Projects, Masters Dissertations, and PhD theses.

I supervise postgraduate students in Philosophy of Mind, Philosophy of Psychology and Philosophy of Psychiatry. To date, more than twenty PhD students have completed at the University of Birmingham under my supervision.

Find out more - our PhD Philosophy  page has information about doctoral research at the University of Birmingham.

My research interests include: agency, rationality, and self knowledge in psychopathology; delusion and confabulation; biased cognition; epistemic innocence and epistemic injustice; the notion of disorder in the philosophy of medicine. I am also interested in some issues within biomedical ethics.

I am currently working on Epistemic Injustice in Healthcare. This project is funded by a Wellcome Discovery Award and coordinated by Havi Carel at the University of Bristol.

In 2020-2024 my research on youth mental health and agency was supported by two UKRI funded projects (the Agency Projects), one led by Rose McCabe at City University London, and one by Michael Larkin at Aston University.

For 5 years (2014-2019), I led a project called PERFECT,  Pragmatic and Epistemic Role of Factually Erroneous Cognitions and Thoughts, funded by an ERC Consolidator Grant (EUR 1.900.065). 

• Watch Lisa's inaugural lecture: "Agency without rationality"

Professional service

Current roles:

• Editor in Chief of Philosophical Psychology.
• Series Editor for International Perspectives on Philosophy and Psychiatry, Oxford University Press. 
• Member of the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Wellbeing.
• Member of the Editorial Board of European Journal of Analytic Philosophy.
• Member of the Editorial Board of Topoi.
• On the Advisory Board of Philosophical Inquiries (philinq).

Previous roles:

• Associate Editor for Ethical Theory and Moral Practice (2013-2016).
• E-letter Editor for Journal of Medical Ethics (2005-2010).

Editor of Philosophical Psychology.

• Series Editor for International Perspectives on Philosophy and Psychiatry, Oxford University Press. 
• Member of the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Wellbeing.
• Member of the Editorial Board of History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences.
• Member of the Editorial Board of European Journal of Analytic Philosophy.
• Member of the Editorial Board of Topoi.
• On the Advisory Board of Philosophical Inquiries (philinq).
• Associate Editor for Ethical Theory and Moral Practice (2013-2016).
• E-letter Editor for Journal of Medical Ethics (2005-2010).

Membership

• I am a member of the Higher Education Academy, the British Philosophical Association, the European Society for Philosophy and Psychology, and the European Society for Analytic Philosophy.
•  Italian Society for Analytic Philosophy (SIFA)
• From 2010 to 2013 I was committee member for the British Society for the Philosophy of Science, and from 2010 to 2015 I was on the Executive of the Mind Association.