Philosophers at Co3

News
Written By Kristin Andrews

The Comparative Cognition Conference is back in person this year, and Simon Fitzpatrick and I are here representing the philosophers. (Next year I hope we won’t be the only ones!) Simon presented a very short talk we put together with Evan Westra called “Investigating Social Norms in Nonhuman Animals” and have been excited to hear the stories people have shared about places to examine social norms in their species. You can see the slides here.

 

Related Posts

Featured
New York Declaration on Animal Consciousness
News
New York Declaration on Animal Consciousness
News

The last ten years has seen a huge development in research on consciousness in animal species that has until recently been overlooked—including reptiles, amphibians and insects—so Jonathan Birch, Jeff Sebo, and I thought it was time to ask whether there is a scientific consensus about the likelihood of consciousness in these species. We met with 39 scholars, including neuroscientists, animal cognition researchers, and philosophers, and hammered out this declaration. If you agree that there is strong evidence of consciousness in mammals and birds, and a realistic possibility of consciousness in fish, cephalopods, decapods, insects, amphibians, and reptiles, and you have an advanced degree or other expertise in this area, we invite you to join us by signing the declaration…

Read More →
News
The week of animal social norms!
News
The week of animal social norms!
News

Two new papers on social norms in animals:

In Search of Animal Normativity: A framework for studying social norms in non-human animals in Biological Reviews focuses on how to identify behavioral patterns in animal communities that are socially maintained, and thus have the hallmark of social norms.

This was big team philosophy & science. Evan Westra, Simon Fitzpatrick, Sarah F. Brosnan, Thibaud Gruber, Catherine Hobaiter, Lydia M. Hopper, Daniel Kelly, Christopher Krupenye, Lydia V. Luncz, Jordan Theriault, Kristin Andrews

Human and Nonhuman Norms: A dimensional framework looks at the psychological mechanisms and social structures that can support social norms in humans and in other species. Animals have the right kinds of minds for social norms.

Kristin Andrews, Simon Fitzpatrick, Evan Westra

Read More →
News
New paper in Mind & Language
News
New paper in Mind & Language
News

“All animals are conscious”: Shifting the null hypothesis in consciousness science

The marker approach is taken as best practice for answering the distribution question: Which animals are conscious? However, the methodology can be used to increase confidence in animals many presume to be unconscious, including C. elegans, leading to a trilemma: accept the worms as conscious; reject the specific markers; or reject the marker methodology for answering the distribution question. I defend the third option and argue that answering the distribution question requires a secure theory of consciousness. Accepting the hypothesis all animals are conscious will promote research leading to secure theory, which is needed to create reliable consciousness tests for animals and AIs. Rather than asking the distribution question, we should shift to the dimensions question: How are animals conscious?

Read it here.

Read More →
News
Kristin Andrews

Kristin Andrews is Professor of Philosophy and York Research Chair in Animal Minds. She is the author of several books on animal mind, consciousness, sociality, morality, and methods in the science of animal mind studies.

Previous

AI and animals

Next

To know if we’ve created sentient AI, we first need to understand animal sentience