Welcome to PHIL 489/689, Special Topics: Animal Ethics and Science
Fall 2009, with Gary Varner
MW 4:10-5:25 p.m. in Bolton Hall room 213
Note: You will need an ID and a password to retrieve most of the materials linked below. That's because some of these are copyrighted materials. As a registered student in the class, the fair use doctrine entitles you to download a copy for your own use in the course, but it may be illegal for you to distribute the files or in any other way reproduce them. If you're a student in the class, I will give you an ID and a password to use.
Readings, handouts, and web pages used
- Monday, August 31
- Course syllabus.
- Overview of course topic.
- Wednesday, September 2
- Gary Varner, "Animals" in Gary Comstock, ed., Life Science Ethics (Iowa State University Press, 2002), pp. 141-68.
- Handouts: handout on the above essay, four positions on animal ethics, figure 7.2, more on applying Regan's two principles.
- Monday, September 7
- Peter Singer, "All Animals are Equal" from his Animal Liberation, second edition (Avon Books, 1990), pp. 1-23.
- Some related stuff:
- A reconstruction of Singer's argument for equality of all sentient animals.
- The "standard argument by analogy" regarding the scope of pain in the animal kingdom.
- Wednesday, September 9
- Lynne Sneddon et al., "Do fishes have nociceptors? Evidence for the evolution of a vertebrate sensory system," Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B Vol. 270 (2003), pp. 1115-1121.
- Monday, September 14
- Colin Allen, "Animal Pain," Nous 38:617-643.
- Wednesday, September 16
- Jim Grau, "Learning and Memory Without a Brain."
- Monday, September 21
- Tom Regan, "The Animal Rights Debate," a 1999 presentation at Texas A&M.
- Wednesday, September 23
Please read the following:
- Gallup et al. 2002, "The Mirror Test," and
- Plotnik et al. 2006, "Self-recognition in an Asian elephant". Related movies on the journal web site:
- Maxine examining the mirror on the first day
- Some early self-directed behavior by Happy
- Happy examines her mark using the mirror
(BTW, why doesn't this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bKx17VHSUc&feature=related video constitute good evidence of mirror self-recognition?)
Although not assigned readings, I may describe:
- Reiss and Marino 2001, "Mirror self-recognition in the bottlenose dophin: A case of cognitive convergence" [click here for the article]
- and Pepperberg et al. 1995, "Mirror Use by African Grey Parrots" [click here for the article]
Here's an overhead summarizing the "four stages of mirror use" according to Plotnik et al.
Finally, here's a 2008 study of mirror-self recognition in magpies:
- On-line article (includes links to videos).
- PDF version.
- Monday, September 28
Wheeler, Mark A., Donald T. Stuss, and Endel Tulving. 1997. “Toward a Theory of Episodic Memory: The Frontal Lobes and Autonoetic Consciousness." Psychological Bulletin 121:331-54.
- Wednesday, September 30
Clayton, N.S., D.P. Griffiths, N.J. Emery, and A. Dickinson. 2001. "Elements of episodic-like memory in animals." Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London B 356:1483-91.
- Monday, October 5
- Wednesday, October 7
- Mulcahy and Call, "Apes Save Tools for Future Use" (2006).
- Raby, Clayton, et al. 2007, "Planning for the future by western scrub-jays" (2007).
Materials that T.J. Kasperbauer referred to during discussion of (A):
- Monday, October 12
- Wednesday, October 14
- Monday, October 19
No class -- consultations on first longer papers.
- Wednesday, October 21
- Monday, October 26
Varner, "Utilitarianism and the Evolution of Ecological Ethics" (2008).
- Wednesday, October 28
Varner, "A Harean Perspective on Humane Sustainability" (accepted for publication in Ethics and the Environment).
Referee's report on the manuscript.
- Monday, November 2
Schechtman, "The Truth about Memory" (1994).
- Wednesday, November 4
Kasperbauer's handout on "valence" (re. intuitions about phenomenal consciousness).
- Monday, November 9
Bernard Rollin, "The New Social Ethic for Animals" (1995).
- Wednesday, November 11
Gregory et al., "Broken bones in Domestic Fowls: Effect of Husbandry System and Stunning Method in End-of-Lay Hens" (1990).
- Monday, November 16
Kirkden and Pajor, "Using preference, motivation and aversion tests to ask scientific questions about animals' feelings" (2006).
- Wednesday, November 18
Chandroo et al., "An evaluation of current perspectives on consciousness and pain in fishes" (2004 – presented by Ross Colebrook)
- Monday, November 23
Hursthouse, "Virtue Ethics and Animals" (2008 – presented by David Wright)
- Wednesday, November 25
No class – Thanksgiving eve
- Monday, November 30
TBD (presented by Maggie McClean)
- Wednesday, December 2
Last class
Other resources
- Varner's book manuscript is here: http://philosophy.tamu.edu/~gary/abstract.newbook.html (use "guest" and "enter" when prompted for an ID and a password, respectively).
- You should be familiar with the provisions of the TAMU Student Rules, especially those dealing with the following:
If you need guidance on what counts as plagiarism, first work through this on-line exercise: http://philosophy.tamu.edu/~gary/intro/plagiarism.index.html, then ask your instructors if you have any questions.
- part one, section 7 on excused absences, and
- part one, section 20 on academic misconduct, which includes plagiarism, lying to your instructor, and other things.
- The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is a top-notch reference work on philosophy.
- The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy is also pretty good.
- And The International Society for Environmental Ethics maintains a searchable database of publications on environmental philosophy.
- You might be interested in attending some of the Philosophy Department's public talks or colloquia.