CFA: Fallout and Philosophy

Fallout and Philosophy 

Call for Abstracts 

Edited by Nathan Kellen, Nate Sheff, and Joshua Heter

The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series 

Please circulate and post widely. Apologies for cross-posting. 

To propose ideas for future volumes in the Blackwell series please contact the Series Editor, William Irwin, [email protected] 

Contributors of accepted essays will receive an honorarium. Abstracts and subsequent essays should be philosophically substantial but accessible, written to engage the intelligent lay reader. Essays may focus on the game, the show, or both.

Possible themes and topics concerning the game or show might include, but are not limited to, the following: 

• Wild Card: The Ethics of Choosing Between Fallout’s Factions
• Roleplaying Responsibly: Player Responsibility for Evil Choices
• Anti-Natalism after the Bomb: Is it Ethical to have Children in the Post-Apocalypse?
• The Master’s Plan: The Ethics of Turning People into Super Mutants
• Somewhat Like Us: The Ethics of Killing Super Mutants and Feral Ghouls
• Veronica, Dane, and You: Gender and Gender Norms in the Wasteland
• Render unto Caesar: Evaluating Fallout’s Most Notorious Leader
• Is Fallout 3 a sequel to Fallout 2? Canonicity, Copyright and Shared Universes

• What Really Happened in Shady Sands? Canon and Fictional Truth in the Fallout Universe
• Surviving through the Ages: Ghouls, Mr. House and Transhumanist Philosophy
• Brahmin, Deathclaws and Yao Guai, oh My!: Mutations and the Metaphysics of Species

• The Replicated Man: Are Synths People?
• Ghouls, Super Mutants and Smoothskins: Are Ghouls and Super Mutants Human, or Something New?
• My Pip-Boy, My Self: The Extended Mind Theory and Its Fallout
• Reuniting with the Brain in the Think Tank

• Blank Slates and Desperate Parents: Identifying with Fallout’s Protagonists
• From the Ashes: Re-evaluating Fallout 76 and Post-Release Art Criticism

• War Never Changes: Just War Theory in the Fallout Universe
• No Gods, No Masters: Freedom in the Fallout Universe
• Change in Management: The Relation between the USA and the NCR
• Growing Up in Little Lamplight: Children as Political Agents
• Nuka Caps and Hard Cash: The Philosophy of Post-Apocalyptic Economics
• Vault Dwellers and Wastelanders: Finding a Common Humanity
• Old World Blues: Is the Pre-War World a Dystopia?
• Children of the Atom: Religion in the Post-Bomb Era
• Shadows on the Vault’s Walls: Knowledge of the Pre and Post-Apocalyptic World

Submission Guidelines: 

1. Submission deadline for abstracts (350-500 words) and CVs: January 15, 2025

2. Submission deadline for drafts of accepted papers: June 16, 2025

Kindly submit by e-mail (with or without Word attachment) to [email protected]