Editor
Fraser MacBride
About the journal
Founded in 1888 by Edward C. Hegeler, The Monist is one of the world's oldest and most important journals in philosophy.
Find out more
What We Owe to Ourselves
Advisory Editors: Yuliya Kanygina, Janis David Schaab, Daniel Munoz
Volume 108, Issue 1
In the 20th century, most Western philosophers thought of duties to oneself as quaint at best, nonsense at worst. But in recent years, the topic has roared back to life. Philosophers are returning with fresh eyes to classic questions about how we know ourselves, how we relate to ourselves, and how we should approach conflicts between our own projects and the needs of others. This special issue, the first on the topic in decades, contains cutting-edge work on the traditional questions of duties to self, with an aim of breaking new ground and bringing together work from different disciplines and traditions.
Image source: "Alone in a crowd" by Dennis Wells
The Ethics of Partiality: Ancient and Modern Perspectives
Advisory Editors: Philipp Brüllmann & Monika Betzler
Volume 108, Issue 2
The reference to ancient theories has always played an important role in modern discussions of partiality. Since ancient ethics gives much more attention to relationships than does modern moral philosophy, it is an obvious source of inspiration for any engagement with partial reasons. We believe, however, that recent developments in modern debates call for another look at ancient ethics; for it seems that ancient philosophers already presuppose what the new ethics of partiality wants to establish: a relational perspective on questions of morality. The aim of this special issue is to follow that idea and to illustrate how ancient and modern perspectives on partiality can illuminate each other.
Coming soon
The Philosophy of Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna)
Advisory Editor: Mohammed Saleh Zarepour
Volume 108, Issue 3
Abū ʿAli al-Ḥusayn Ibn Sīnā (d. 1037), better known to the intellectual historians by his Latinized name ‘Avicenna’, is arguably the most influential thinker of medieval Islamic thought, whose philosophical ideas inspired generations of philosophers from not only the Arabic/Islamic but also the Hebrew/Jewish and Latin/Christian traditions. Some of his ideas have even found their way into contemporary philosophy through discussions by philosophers fascinated by medieval or early modern European philosophers who were directly or indirectly inspired by Ibn Sīnā (e.g., Aquinas and Leibniz). This issue shed light on previously unexplored aspects of Ibn Sīnā’s philosophy, its reception in the later Arabic-Islamic tradition, and its contemporary relevance.
Image source: Krueger, H.C. (1963) Avicenna's Poem on Medicine. Springfield, Illinois: Charles C. Thomas Publisher, p. 52a.
Coming soon
The Philosophy of Ian Hacking
Advisory Editors: Philip Roth and Matteo Vageli
Volume 108, Issue 4
Ian Hacking is one the most renown and influential contemporary philosophers. His contributions span a diverse and impressive range of topics: the logic of statistical inference), the history and philosophy of probability and statistical reasoning, the philosophy of language); philosophy of physics and experimentation, the history and philosophy of psychology, realism v. constructivism debate, and the philosophy of mathematics. However, despite his influence, there exists almost no attempts at careful or comprehensive analysis of his wide-ranging oeuvre. This special issue aims remedy to this lack by fostering a close discussion of some of Hacking’s most controversial and influential idea.
Coming soon
Du Bois and Democracy
Advisory Editors: Elvira Basevich
Volume 107, Issue 1
What are the moral, aesthetic, and epistemic dimensions of W.E.B. Du Bois’s democratic theory? Du Bois (1868-1963) was an American philosopher, sociologist, historian, and journalist who studied the problem of racial exclusion in a systematic fashion and in 1909 co-founded the leading civil rights organization The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). It pays special attention to the values and ideals that inform his defense of democratic practices, including his proposed models of democratic government, political leadership, philosophy of science, aesthetics, and socialist politics.
Read now
Existential risk
The risk of human extinction is has in the last few decades gone from being of interest mostly to occasional philosophers and science-fiction fans, to being a core issue in normative ethics and regularly discussed in mainstream media. But, perhaps surprisingly, it is not evident what it would mean for humanity to go extinct nor how to understand “existential risk”. Further, it is unclear if, or why, we should be concerned by human extinction. Finally, there is considerable uncertainty over which types of events pose existential risk. The aim of this special issue is to add clarity to the aforementioned issues, so that we can better understand “existential risk”, whether it is worth avoiding, and what actions we should then take.
Read now
Contemporary African Moral and Political Philosophy
Contemporary African philosophy is a globally much neglected area of philosophical discourse. Since around the 1960s, many professional philosophers have emerged on the African continent, often taking ideas from indigenous African societies and exploring their philosophical implications with great care and erudition. This special issue seeks to bring a number of important themes in African moral and political philosophy to an Anglo-American audience. This includes discussion of normative issues in characteristically communal or relational terms. In addition, the issue includes analysis of the political and epistemic challenges around conducting African philosophy in the academy.
Read now
Nietzsche and Ethics
Though Nietzsche was a thinker interested in an extraordinary range of issues, his philosophical energies were trained primarily on a series of normative questions relating to individual and cultural flourishing. The present issue looks at a variety of important aspects of Nietzsche’s thought as they relate to this overarching theme, including Nietzsche’s conception of the ideal individual, his attitude toward religion and art, his genealogical method, and his views on the value of truthfulness.
Read now
Faith, Hope and Trust
Advisory Editors: Finlay Malcolm
Volume 106, Issue 1
Faith, hope and trust are attitudes of critical importance, enabling people to flourish in relationships, see good in the world and in others, and pursue long-term commitments. This special issue makes progress on our understanding of these attitudes by exploring the relationships between them. The papers investigate how faith, hope and trust are related to, and differ from one-another; how they bring value to human life; and how each attitude contributes to the rationality of the others.
Read now
Transgenerationality, Community and Justice
Advisory Editors: Tiziana Andina and Fausto Corvino
Volume 106, Issue 2
What are the ontological foundations of the transgenerational community? Can transgenerational collective actions provide justification to normative obligations? This special issue analyses advantages and limitations of community-based approaches to justice between generations, as opposed to the perhaps better known and more debated individualistic approaches. To this end, it brings together a series of reflections, ranging from ontology to political philosophy and ethics, and focusing on the concept of social bonds that bind people distant in time.
Read now
Against Metaphysical Grounding
Advisory Editors: Chris Daly
Volume 106, Issue 3
Appeals to metaphysical grounding have become a near orthodoxy in contemporary analytic philosophy. Grounding is championed as a notion widely, if often only implicitly, used in philosophical practice and as something that provides superior formulations of philosophical distinctions and theses. How much of this is warranted? Is talk of grounding ‘a bill of goods’? This issue explores routes by which metaphysics might be viable without appeal to the false promise of grounding.
Read now
Infallibilism
Advisory Editors: Christos Kyriacou and Gregory Stoutenburg
Volume 106, Issue 4
Ιnfallibilism about knowledge is the thesis that knowledge requires infallibly justified belief. That is, justified belief that couldn’t be false. Although infallibilism was historically prominent (from Plato and Aristotle to Descartes and Locke), nowadays it is generally accepted that ‘we are all fallibilists’. In this issue, we bring together leading and more junior epistemologists to reconsider infallibilism: its historical provenance, its proper formulation and its proper role and function in epistemological theorizing (if any such role is to be assigned). Our goal is to contribute to the momentum of renewed interest in infallibilism and further advance the debate.
Read now
Call for Issue Proposals
The Monist publishes quarterly thematic issues, edited by Advisory Editors which include commissioned papers and where there is also a call for papers, submitted papers. If you are interested in editing a special issue proposal, you will need to submit a proposal to the Editor.
Learn more
Open Calls for Papers
The Monist invites submissions on the following themes:
Past Issues
Browse all previous issues of The Monist to inspire your future research.
Explore the archive
Latest articles
Email alerts
Register to receive table of contents email alerts as soon as new issues of The Monist are published online.
Sign up
Submit your research
Interested in submitting your research to The Monist? Read the journal's author guidelines to learn more.
Access the guidelines
Developing countries initiative
Your institution could be eligible to free or deeply discounted online access to The Monist through the Oxford Developing Countries Initiative.
Find out more
