The Metaphysical Society of America

The 2027 conference of the MSA invites submissions on the theme of the “metaphysics of habit,” understood both as a subjective and objective genitive. Contributors may explore the metaphysical underpinnings of habit or investigate habit as a metaphysical principle in its own right. Topics of interest include, but are not necessarily limited to, the following questions:

·      Is habit a pragmatic device for assuaging epistemological impasses, as in Hume, or can it have a genuine metaphysical function? If so, how, when and under what conditions?

·      Is habit conscious or unconscious, intelligent or blind? Is it a sign of rational consistency or the erosion of thought into blind compulsion? Is it learned or inherited, adaptive or mechanical, spontaneous or rote, proactive or reactive? Is habit a result of repetition or the propensity to repeat? Or, does habit subvert these dichotomies altogether?

·      Are practice, routine, custom, tics and neuroses distinct in kind from habit itself or only various degrees or intensities of habit? Or, is habit a species of one of these categories?

·      Must habit be relegated to psychology or is habit operative at other, or even all, domains of being? What of motricity or motor habit? Are instinct and inertia species of habit? Is habit a metaphysical principle underpinning various notions of evolution? Might it underwrite scientific theories, e.g. quantum theory? Could habit account for the lawfulness of nature itself? What is the metaphysics of social and collective habits? Could there be a theology of habit?

·      Is habit an attribute or might it constitute substantiality itself? Do individuals possess habits or is the self but a nexus of habits? Are some kinds of beings inherently habitual and others impervious to habit? Can a rock acquire a habit? Can artificial intelligence?

·      Is habit an effect, a cause or the very principle of causality itself? Is habit antecedent to its effects or simultaneous with them? Is habit a result consequent to its cause(s) or simultaneous with it? Or, is it temporalization itself?

·      Can habit perform the functions Kant allotted to transcendental structures – synthesis, identity, regularity, temporal contraction? If so, are traditions that make habit into a metaphysical principle, e.g. French Spiritualism and American Pragmatism, post-Kantian? Or, are they instead post-Humean or post-Leibnizian?

·      Can habit be simultaneously empirical and contingent, yet also universal? Is habit a priori or a posteriori, transcendental or empirically real? Could habit ground a “metaphysical empiricism,” “transcendental empiricism” or “critical realism”?

·      Is habit dyadic and chiasmatic? Does habit have more to do with the Dyad or the One?

Abstracts that address these and related questions and issues in original ways are especially encouraged and will be prioritized. Submissions of abstracts for papers on other metaphysical topics are also welcome.

Guidelines for the Submission of Abstracts

Deadline: September 1, 2026

Submit to: Jessica Wahman, Vice President of the MSA ([email protected])

Format: Word documents of no more than 600 words. Late abstracts and those shorter than 400 words or longer than 600 words will not be considered. To facilitate double-anonymous review, an abstract should not contain the author’s name or otherwise identify the author. In the email to which the abstract is attached, authors should indicate full name, institutional affiliation (if any), and abstract title. The email subject-line should read:  2027 MSA Submission [last name of author)] -- for example: 2027 MSA Submission Leibniz.

Aristotle Prize

The MSA’s annual Aristotle Prize, which is only awarded if a submission is deemed worthy of the prize, is open to current students without a Ph.D. The Aristotle Prize carries a cash award of $500, inclusion in the program, and assistance with costs for attending the annual meeting.

Persons who wish to be considered for this prize must a) clearly state (in an email message accompanying their submission) their eligibility for this prize and their desire to be considered for it, and b) submit a full, final paper in addition to the abstract by the September 1, 2026 deadline. The body of the text (as is proposed to be read at the meeting) must be no longer than 3,750 words.

Plato Prize

The MSA’s annual Plato Prize, which is only awarded if a submission is deemed worthy of the prize, is open to persons who have received their first Ph.D. in the last six years—thus (for the 2027 meeting) in 2021 or more recently. The Plato Prize carries a cash award of $500, inclusion in the program, and assistance with costs for attending the annual meeting.

Persons who wish to be considered for this prize must a) clearly state (in an email message accompanying their submission) their eligibility for this prize and their desire to be considered for it, and b) submit a full, final paper in addition to the abstract by the September 1, 2026 deadline. The body of the text (as is proposed to be read at the meeting) must be no longer than 3,750 words.

Travel Grants

Thanks to the generous support of past MSA Presidents, Society members, and a grant from the Hocking-Cabot Fund for Systematic Philosophy, the MSA is pleased to be able to offer reimbursements for travel expenses up to $400 to current graduate students and post-doctoral researchers within two years of their first PhD whose submissions are selected for the conference program. Persons who wish to receive such reimbursements must state their eligibility in their submission email and, at the conference, provide the MSA with all relevant expense receipts. (Invoices are not acceptable.)

Acceptance decisions will be announced by November 20, 2026.

The MSA’s Executive Council (https://www.metaphysicalsociety.org/about.htm) operates as the vetting committee. Those accepted for the conference must submit completed papers by February 20, 2027 to allow review by session chairs. Papers may not exceed 3,750 words. Eligibility to present at the conference requires payment of both membership and registration fees (https://www.metaphysicalsociety.org/membership.htm).