Call for Papers: Monothematic Issues for 2026
Nihilism Today
Guest editor: Dominik KULCSÁR
Nihilism continues to be a dominant philosophical issue of our contemporary times, as we often hear talk about relativism, hopelessness, post-truth, the absence of meaning or purpose of our actions. The goal of this monothematic issue is to bring together a rich variety of rigorous contributions. These would tackle the roots and causes of modern nihilism, where existing values are either emptied of their content or are twisted in the name of individual self-interest. For this reason, we are looking for papers that would draw upon the wide spectrum of philosophical traditions and disciplines such as ethics, existentialism, postmodernism, philosophy of religion, political theory, and literature. What is the cause of nihilism? What does nihilism mean today?
Papers should be sent directly to the guest editor: dominik.kulcsar@savba.sk
(Please specify “Filozofia submission” in the subject line.)
Call for Papers deadline: April 2, 2026
Guidelines for authors
Doing Right by the Digital Dead
Guest editors: Adam BUBEN, Vipra CHOPRA, Patrick STOKES
We are pleased to announce a monothematic issue on the ethical treatment of ‘digital remains’, to be published in early 2027. A legacy of today’s digitally driven world is the increasing number of digital remains a person leaves behind after they die, such as audio and image files, social media accounts and emails. How to deal with such remains has become an increasingly significant and costly problem for individuals, families, organisations, tech companies, and governments. Existing legal approaches focus on treating digital remains as a form of property, but they do not fully capture the sensitivities and significance of these remains in people’s lives. Additionally, we might wonder if a property-only approach can address the dangers of ‘digital reanimation’ – emerging artificial intelligence technologies that re-use digital remains to ‘revive’ the dead, making it possible to interact with them. From these interactive personality constructs of the dead (IPCDs) to CGI performances from dead actors, digital technologies create ethical dilemmas for digital souls. For example, they offer new ways to commemorate the dead and manage grief, but these technologies also threaten to exploit the dead and change our relationship with them in troubling ways. This monothematic issue will consider what sort of ethical significance digital remains have, and determine how they should be preserved, reused or disposed of in order to protect them from degrading or exploitative applications while still allowing for legitimate uses. Some possible topics include (but are not limited to):
- To what extent should reanimated digital remains be regarded as being the dead person, in what respects, and under what conditions?
- What is the pre-reanimation identity status of digital remains? Are they part of the premortem person, or something else?
- Can reanimated digital remains be regarded as extending or enacting the agency of a dead person? Under what conditions?
- Would reanimation of digital remains be a form of memorialisation or just a replacement of the dead? How might different uses of digital remains be distinguished on the remembrance vs replacement axis? Can there be morally permissible ways of replacing the dead?
- What impact does the involvement of other people in a user’s digital remains have for the reuse of digital remains?
- In what ways can our ontological and ethical conclusions help us craft a policy framework for governing and regulating the reuse and reanimation of digital remains?
- What policies should be in place to regulate the use of digital remains in addition to (or instead of) those governing intellectual property?
- Who has standing to make decisions on behalf of the dead regarding their reuse?
Email address for paper submissions: digitaldeath@deakin.edu.au
(Please specify “Filozofia submission” in the subject line.)
Call for Papers deadline: October 15, 2026
Guidelines for authors