Ethical Implications of Animal Cognition -- talk at Stanford

[Guest guest]

Here's an announcement of a talk at Stanford University this coming

Friday at noon. This lecture is open to the public. Admission is free.

The location is Building 100, Room 101K, which is in the northwest part

of the Main Quad.

 

For a map, go to http://campus-map.stanford.edu/campus_map/index.jsp and

search for " 450 SERRA MALL, BLDG. 100 " as the Address. More maps are at

http://www.stanford.edu/home/visitors/maps.html

 

See also:

http://events.stanford.edu/events/64/6441/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_cognition

 

-- Mike

 

 

owner-animalrights

[owner-animalrights] On Behalf Of Sam Lord

<sjlord

Tuesday, November 29, 2005 9:28 AM

animalrights; ARF Planning

[Fwd: ETHICS@NOON: " Ethical Implications of Animal

Cognition " --Dr. Robert Jones]

 

 

-------

ETHICS@NOON: " Ethical Implications of Animal Cognition " --Dr.

Robert Jones

Tue, 29 Nov 2005 08:14:30 -0800

David M. Burk <dburk

<ethicsatnoon

 

We are pleased to announce this week's Ethics (AT) Noon (DOT) Our speaker is Dr.

Robert Jones, a Teaching Fellow in the Department of Philosophy. His

talk is called " Rethinking the Ethical Implications of Animal

Cognition " . In it he will discuss the distinctions, and lack of

distinctions, between humans and other animals, and what this means for

how we act. An abstract is below.

 

Friday, Dec. 2, 12noon, Bldg 100, Rm 101K. Please bring your lunch and

join us!

 

 

----------------------

Many philosophers believe there is a fundamental moral boundary between

human beings and nonhuman animals. Surely, however, the mere existence

of a species boundary alone has, in itself, no moral salience. My

dissertation investigates the substantive properties that do and should

bear on the moral considerabilty of both human and nonhuman animals. If

we are to get beyond blunt appeals to the mere species boundary, we must

identify the genuine morally relevant properties bearing on the moral

considerability of animals. I argue that the key properties (for both

human and non-human animals) are specific features of the animals'

cognitive capacities. I then argue, based on recent empirical findings,

that since there are deep and important continuities across species in

these features, no fundamental distinction of moral considerability

between humans and other animals can be sustained. I show that the

common arguments for such a distinction in the literature ultimately

must fall back on appeals to the mere species boundary, and are, in that

sense, instances of unjustifiable speciesism.

 

 

 

 

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