Overview
Monism is the family of views claiming that reality is fundamentally one kind of thing, one underlying principle, or one unified ontological ground. Where dualism splits reality into mind and matter (or spirit and body), monism says the split is derivative.
But “monism” is not one doctrine. It includes materialist, idealist, neutral, informational, cosmopsychist, and process-oriented variants. Some versions prioritize physics; others prioritize phenomenology; some attempt a synthesis.
This article maps major monist positions and the thinkers in your list, then closes with a practical comparative framework for navigating the field.
Quick start (2-minute version)
If you’re new to consciousness philosophy, start here:
- This article gives you a map, not a final answer.
- Each section explains one idea in plain language, then shows where it helps and where it struggles.
- You do not need to agree with everything — the goal is to understand the options clearly.
1) Russellian Monism
Russellian monism starts from a simple but profound observation: physics characterizes structure, relations, and behavior, but may be silent on intrinsic nature. If so, the intrinsic nature of reality might be continuous with, or even identical to, what we know from the inside as consciousness.
Core move:
- Physics gives us extrinsic/structural description.
- Experience may reveal intrinsic aspects.
- A unified ontology might bridge both without crude reduction.
Why it matters:
- It avoids eliminativism about consciousness.
- It avoids dualist interaction mysteries.
- It preserves scientific realism while expanding what counts as “real.”
Open challenge: specifying how macro conscious unity and micro physical descriptions fit together without hand-waving.
2) Donald Davidson: Anomalous Monism
Davidson’s anomalous monism is often misunderstood. He argues that each mental event is identical to some physical event, yet strict psychophysical laws in mental vocabulary are not available in the way strict physical laws are.
Key points:
- Token identity: mental events are physical events.
- No strict bridge laws between mental and physical descriptions.
- Mental concepts are governed by rational-normative holism, not only mechanistic law.
Contribution to monism:
Davidson gives a non-reductive monism where ontology is one, but explanatory vocabularies remain plural and irreducible in practice.
3) Max Velmans: Reflexive Monism
Velmans proposes reflexive monism: mind and world are not separate “containers”; conscious experience is neither merely internal representation nor naive external object, but a relationally constituted presentation.
What this does well:
- Rejects simplistic inner/outer dichotomy.
- Preserves first-person reality of experience.
- Connects phenomenology with cognitive science without collapsing one into the other.
Reflexive monism is especially useful for consciousness science because it respects both experimental rigor and lived experience.
4) Galen Strawson: Realistic Monism
Strawson’s realistic monism is a forceful anti-eliminativist position. If experiential consciousness is real (and it is), then any adequate physicalism must include it as part of what the physical fundamentally is.
His famous pressure point:
- If you deny consciousness, you deny the most certain datum.
- If you keep consciousness, reductionist physicalism must transform.
- Therefore “real physical” may already include experientiality.
This is often interpreted as a route to panpsychist or panexperiential forms of monism.
5) John Polkinghorne: Dual-Aspect and Theological Monism Tendencies
Polkinghorne resists strict reductionism while staying scientifically informed. His broader approach is often framed as dual-aspect or critically realist, but it carries monistic pressure: one reality disclosed under different explanatory lenses.
Distinctive element:
- Integration of science, metaphysics, and theology.
- Resistance to “nothing but” explanations.
- Emphasis on layered intelligibility and meaning.
Polkinghorne’s significance here is methodological humility: monism need not flatten value, agency, or meaning.
6) Teilhard de Chardin: Evolutionary Cosmic Monism
Teilhard sees cosmogenesis and noogenesis as one unfolding process. Matter, life, mind, and spirit are phases of a single evolutionary arc moving toward increasing complexity-consciousness and unification (Omega Point).
Strengths:
- A grand synthesis uniting cosmology and interiority.
- Teleological narrative with existential meaning.
- Bridges scientific evolution and spiritual anthropology.
Critique:
- Empirical testability of teleological claims remains contested.
- Risk of over-systematizing historical contingency.
Still, Teilhard remains one of the most influential evolutionary monists.
7) Harald Atmanspacher: Dual-Aspect and Complementarity Frameworks
Atmanspacher’s work (often connected to generalized quantum-like formalisms and complementarity) develops rigorous ways to model mind-matter relations without reduction to one side.
Core insight:
- A single underlying reality may permit complementary, context-dependent descriptions.
- Mental and physical can be co-primordial aspects of one domain.
This supports a structurally disciplined monism that avoids both crude materialism and vague mysticism.
8) Alfredo Pereira Jr.: Triple-Aspect and Neurophenomenological Integration
Pereira’s work explores integrated frameworks where neural, informational, and experiential dimensions are jointly modeled. Though not always labeled simply “monism,” the direction is unificatory: one process, multiple inseparable aspects.
Value of this approach:
- Better fit for interdisciplinary consciousness research.
- Avoids one-language imperialism.
- Encourages formal bridges between subjective report and neural dynamics.
9) V. S. Ramachandran: Neurobiological Monism with Phenomenological Sensitivity
Ramachandran is not a metaphysical system-builder in the classical sense, but his work shows how rich subjective phenomena (body image, self-models, qualia-adjacent anomalies) can be investigated through neurobiology.
Monist implication:
- One natural world, deeply structured.
- Subjective anomalies are not noise but clues to architecture.
- Consciousness science advances through explanatory daring grounded in experiment.
Ramachandran’s style is a useful antidote to both armchair metaphysics and flat reduction.
10) Max Tegmark: Mathematical/Physical Monism
Tegmark’s strongest thesis (Mathematical Universe Hypothesis) pushes monism toward radical mathematical realism: physical reality is mathematical structure.
Why this attracts monists:
- It offers maximal unification and parsimony.
- It aligns with the uncanny effectiveness of mathematics in physics.
Why it remains controversial:
- The jump from “describable by mathematics” to “identical with mathematics” is heavy.
- Bridging formal structure to lived consciousness remains unresolved.
Tegmark is important because he represents the far edge of formal monist ambition.
11) QRI Valence: Toward a Monism of Experience Quality
The Qualia Research Institute (QRI) explores formal approaches to valence and conscious texture, often through dynamical, informational, and geometric lenses. This can be read as a practical monist research program: subjective quality is lawful, structurally tractable, and continuous with physical process.
Potential contribution:
- Makes phenomenology computationally actionable.
- Connects ethics (well-being/suffering) with formal models.
- Encourages consciousness science that is both precise and humane.
Open issue: theory-ladenness and validation standards remain active debates.
12) John Leslie: Value-Centered Cosmic Monism Tendencies
Leslie’s philosophical cosmology gives unusual weight to value and ethical necessity in explaining existence. While not reducible to one school, his work supports a monist-flavored vision in which reality’s unity is not merely mechanistic but axiological.
Why include him in monist discussions:
- He challenges value-neutral ontologies.
- He asks whether goodness is explanatorily fundamental.
- He broadens monism beyond “stuff ontology” into “value ontology.”
Comparative Matrix: What Kind of One Is “One”?
A useful way to compare monisms is to ask what exactly is taken as fundamental:
- Physical-structural one (Tegmark-style extremes)
- Experiential-intrinsic one (Strawson/Russellian trajectories)
- Aspectual one (Davidson, Velmans, Atmanspacher, Pereira)
- Evolutionary-process one (Teilhard)
- Value-meaning one (Leslie, Polkinghorne-adjacent concerns)
Different answers generate different research programs, ethics, and limits.
What Monism Solves—and What It Doesn’t
What it solves well
- Avoids brute interaction problems of dualism.
- Encourages cross-domain unification.
- Forces clarity about explanatory levels.
What remains difficult
- Precise bridge principles (experience ↔ physics).
- Individuation problems (why many minds if one ground?).
- Normativity and value in formal systems.
- Empirical adjudication between sophisticated monisms.
Monism is not a final answer; it is a disciplined bet that fragmentation is not ultimate.
A Practical Synthesis for Current Work
If you want a productive working monism today:
- Take first-person experience as non-negotiable data.
- Take third-person science as indispensable constraint.
- Use plural explanatory vocabularies, but one ontological commitment.
- Treat ethics and valence as structurally central, not decorative.
That combination keeps rigor without reduction, and depth without obscurity.
Final Reflection
Monism, at its best, is not a slogan that “everything is one.” It is a demand that our ontology be coherent enough to include mathematics, matter, mind, meaning, and value without denial or duplication.
The thinkers mapped here disagree deeply—but share one intuition: the fractures in our worldview may be symptoms of incomplete description, not reality itself.
If idealism asks whether consciousness is primary, monism asks a broader strategic question: what single framework can hold all the data without remainder?
That is still an open frontier—and exactly why this conversation matters.
Mini glossary (plain English)
- Consciousness: your felt inner experience (what it is like to be you).
- Physicalism: the view that reality is fully part of nature/physics.
- Dualism: mind and matter are fundamentally different in at least one important sense.
- Monism: reality is ultimately one kind of thing or one underlying principle.
- Emergence: complex systems can show new patterns not obvious from their parts alone.
- Qualia: the felt qualities of experience (like the redness of red or pain as felt).
- Explanatory gap: the gap between describing brain processes and explaining felt experience.