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Ethics of Sentience

UCD Centre for Ethics in Public Life (CEPL)

in conjunction with

UCD School of Philosophy 

are presenting

The Value of Sentience: Empathy, Vulnerability, and Recognition

 A Conference in Animal Ethics

The conference aims to contribute to the debate surrounding sentience in animal ethics by investigating, in a novel way, the connections between sentience and key moral attitudes such as feelings of empathy towards and the recognition of the vulnerability of sentient beings.

The conference is generously sponsored by:

Programme:  

Wednesday 7th March

12:00-12:30

Registration

12:30-13:30

Chair: Patrizia Setola

Keynote speaker: Elisa Aaltola (University of Eastern Finland): “The politics of emotion and affective animal ethics: From shame to joy”

13:30-14:30

Lunch

 

B1 Parallel Session I

Chair: Christopher Cowley

B2 Parallel Session II

Chair: Marinus Ferreira

14:30-15:10

Eda Keskin (Martin Luther Universitӓt Halle-Wittenberg): “Film Art and Developing Empathy for Sentient Beings”

David Mathers: “Ethical implications of indeterminate cases”

15:10-15-50

Fergal McHugh (UCD): “Bare Humanity: Imagination and Method”

Oliver Santiago Quick (Aarhus University): “Integrative Empathy and Animal Moral Status”

15:50-16:20

Coffee break

16:20-17:20

Chair: Elisa Aaltola

Keynote speaker: Ben Bramble (TCD)

 Thursday 8th March

10:00-11:00

Chair: Patrizia Setola

B1 Keynote speaker: Angela Martin (University of Fribourg): “A Conceptual Analysis of Vulnerability and Sentience and their Moral Implications”

B1 Parallel Session III

Chair: Austin Dwyer

B2 Parallel Session IV

Chair: Marinus Ferreira

11:20-11:00

Charlotte Figueroa (University of Oxford): “Using Art to Develop Empathy towards Non-Human Animals”

Friederike Zenker (Universität Basel): “Singular Animal or Placeholder? Photography, Ordinary Use, and Obvious Sentience”

11:00-12:00

Coffee break

12:00-13:00

Chair: Rowland Stout

Keynote speaker: Danielle Petherbridge (UCD)

13:00-14:00

Lunch


14:00-15:00

Chair: Angela Martin

B1 Keynote speaker: Clare Palmer (Texas A&M University): “Sentient wild animals and climate change: Towards an ethics of vulnerability”

B1 Parallel Session V

Chair: Marinus Ferreira

B2 Parallel Session VI

Chair: Rowland Stout

15:00-15:40

Catia Faria (University of Minho): “Vulnerability and the ethics of environmental enhancement”

Martin Huth (University of Vienna): “Framed Animals. The Recognizability of Nonhuman Beings"

15:40-16:20

Marc Wilcox (University of Leeds): “Against the Sentience Account” 

Jan Deckers: “How a greater focus on empathy might refresh discussions of sentience”

16:20-16:40

Coffee break

16:40-17:40

Chair: Patrizia Setola

Keynote speaker: Gary Francione (Rutgers University) (via Skype): "Accounting for All Interests--Reallocating the Burden in Matters of Personhood"

18:30

Conference Dinner

Friday 9th March

10:00-11:00

Chair: Angela Martin

Keynote speaker: Tony Milligan (KCL): “Toleration and Compassion in Animal Ethics”

11:00-11:20

Coffee break

 

B1 Parallel Session VII

Chair: Conor Morris

B2 Parallel Session VIII

Chair: Tatjana von Solodkoff

11:20-12:00

Wayne Williams (University of Hull):“A Common Sense: Sentience, Sympathy and the Metaethics of Vulnerability”

Rebekah Humphreys (University of Wales Trinity St David): “Desensitisation, compartmentalisation, and animal experimentation: on exercising moral feelings and the imagination" 

12:00-12:40

Maude Ouellette-Dubé (University of Fribourg): “Why do we need Care in animal ethics?”

Anya Daly (UCD): “The Primordial ‘we’, Sentience and Animal Ethics”

12:40-13:40

Lunch

B1 Parallel Session IX

Chair: Marinus Ferreira

B2 Parallel Session X

Chair: Patrizia Setola

13:40-14:20

Tatjana von Solodkoff (UCD): “Non-Human Animals and the Harm Relation”

Aleksy Tarasenko-Struc (Michigan State University): “Is It Possible to Objectify Animals?” (via Skype)

14:20-15:20

Chair: Alice Crary

Keynote speaker: Lori Gruen (Wesleyan University): “Challenging Disposability”

15:20-16:20

Chair: Lori Gruen

Keynote speaker: Eduardo Mendieta (Penn State University): "Emotional Companions: Animals, Pets, Robots"

16:20-16:40

Coffee break

16:40-17:40

Chair: Patrizia Setola

Keynote speaker: Alice Crary (IAS/Oxford): “Comments on a Contested Comparison: Animals and Race”

17:40-19:30

Closing remarks followed by reception

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Contact the Centre for Ethics in Public Life (CEPL)

CEPL, School of Philosophy, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland.
E: cepl@ucd.ie