I spoke with Meagan Gillmore a few weeks ago about the Canadian sentience petition.

The Canadian government response to our petition on animal sentence was tabled. Highlight "Canadian courts have also recognized that animals are sentient beings in numerous cases dealing with animal cruelty prosecutions; sentience is a question of fact and science." www.ourcommons.ca/petitions/en...

RIP Happy. I wish this read more like an obituary, which is what she deserved. www.npr.org/2026/05/28/n...

Thanks to @jeyantvo.bsky.social for talking with me about the ethics of using AI to communicate with animals, research I did with @marriah.bsky.social and published in Topoi link.springer.com/article/10.1... Fun conversation!

Proudest day for a mentor? When your former trainee is a Jeopardy clue! @susanamonso.com

1/6 Bruce and his “one-inch beak punch” Bruce the kea is the first “disabled” animal to reach alpha rank in his group without forming coalitions or receiving help from anyone. He achieved it, at least in part, thanks to his fighting technique. (paper) www.cell.com/current-biol...

Let's remember that good science doesn't come from traumatized animals, that there are alternatives to animal studies caat.jhsph.edu and that animals like macaques are sentient, thinking, social persons tinyurl.com/3he2s4tu whose use in research has a moral cost tinyurl.com/2wtpb8sh

Cephalopods deserve higher welfare standards in research www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Some dates for your diary: My research group will host the next PAMBA bi-annual meeting at @philoswarwick.bsky.social on April 27th-29th next year. Additionally, @giuliapalazzolo.bsky.social will host a one day one workshop on animal/evolutionary syntax at Warwick on April 26th next year.

Wondering when the next Philosophy of Animal Minds and Behavior Association meeting will be? PAMBA 2027 will be at the University of Warwick on April 27-29, 2027. Confirmed keynotes: Steve Butterfill, Marta Halina, Susana Monsó @martahalina.bsky.social @susanamonso.com Stay tuned for CFP!

Nice coverage in The Guardian of our article on the importance of conserving culture for conservation. with @simonfitzpatrick.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/environment/...

New open access publication in Topoi! @kristinandrews.bsky.social and I explore the ethics of AI animal translation projects. 🖥️🐬Before we build it, we need to take stock of the ethical implications. rdcu.be/fbZwv 🧵👇1/13

I'm so happy our paper on the ethics of decoding animal signals using AI is out! First conceived for a talk at Princeton's Center for Human Values conf AI and Animals in 2023 (talk 🔗 www.tinyurl.com/4vrdyeem) we argue against decoding without first having a robust ethical commitment to listening.

✨ THIS THURSDAY ✨ is the first of 3️⃣ panels covering key themes of #JaneGoodall 's legacy, "bringing together panelists spanning across different regions and generations, all doing inspiring and transformational work connected to Dr. Jane Goodall’s life message." #animalwelfare #cognition #sentience

I'm looking forward to speaking on this panel in honor of Jane Goodall's contributions to science and conservation on April 9. parliamentofreligions.org/jane-goodall...

I’m looking forward to speaking on this panel next week!

Very happy to see this out in the world! A summary of one of my favourite publications, which I co-authored with the stellar @ldanon.bsky.social, so hopefully it will pique people's interest! (You can read it or listen to a very cringeworthy recording by yours truly)

Save the date :)

Canadians, there are five days left to sign the E-Petition to the Government of Canada supporting Animal Sentience, introduced by Elizabeth May. www.ourcommons.ca/petitions/en...

Mindscape 346 | Erica Cartmill on How Human and Animal Minds Think and Play. #MindscapePodcast www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/2026...

The Philosophy program at the CUNY GC is hiring a logician at the Associate level. Please share! cuny.jobs/new-york-ny/...

Can’t wait to see this!

free download for 2 weeks

Chimpanzees have culture. Do they also have cultural heritage worthy of protection? @simonfitzpatrick.bsky.social and I argue they do in our new paper, because their cultural practices create value. link.springer.com/epdf/10.3758...

Happy to share this new paper with @kristinandrews.bsky.social. We discuss the logic of recent arguments for the conservation of animal cultures, and what they tend to overlook: animal cultures matter first and foremost because they matter to the animals themselves. link.springer.com/article/10.3...

"Animal cultures matter first and foremost because they matter to the animals themselves." If you enjoyed our recent episode on the value of animal cultures, you may be interested in this new paper by @simonfitzpatrick.bsky.social & @kristinandrews.bsky.social! link.springer.com/article/10.3...

I know I keep posting about this but every time I check, the list gets longer and longer and longer. Hundreds and hundreds of places, everything from huge local institutions to small spots that will definitely struggle. No exaggeration, it's the most astonishing act of solidarity I've ever seen.

Time to get the knitting needles back out.

So glad this study is getting so much media attention! www.theguardian.com/science/2026...

I've been working for ages on a comprehensive revamp of the Stanford Encyclopedia Entry on "Animal Consciousness", with new sections on non-Western perspectives, methodological challenges and evolutionary big pictures, and it's out today: plato.stanford.edu/entries/cons.... Hope you find it useful!

The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy just published a revised entry on Animal Consciousness! By Michael Trestman, Jonathan Birch, Colin Allen @wileyprof.bsky.social @birchlse.bsky.social plato.stanford.edu/entries/cons...

Loved this paper by @kristinandrews.bsky.social and Noam Miller. A very convincing argument for the function of consciousness.

Last call for papers for the Southern Society for Philosophy and Psychology! Don't miss a fabulous program in sunny Atlanta this February. Submissions due Nov 20. See you there! #philosophy #psychology #CFP southernsociety.org

Canadians, time to write your MP and if you are in Ontario your MPP about Marineland's threat to kill the 30 belugas they are supposed to care for. Canada rightly denied their request to sell these animals to China. The response from Marineland is murder. www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/artic...

I don’t remember when I first heard of Jane Goodall. She was there before I knew anything, showing me that you can do science without following the old rules. Thank you Jane, for creating a path through the forest.

Hope to see folks on-line tomorrow for this great line up of talks on animal normativity, dedicated to Frans de Waal.

@compcogsoc.bsky.social I just found out today that the Comparative Cognition Society is on Bluesky!

As a Fellow in CIFAR's Future Flourishing Program, I've seen the real impact of the Global Scholar program for ECRs. New call for GS in: Child & Brain Development Multiscale Human Future Flourishing Humanity’s Urban Future Learning in Machines & Brains Quantum Materials cifar.ca/global-scholars

Join us September 12 for the 4th annual Normactivity Online Workshop, with four talks on 🐘 animal normativity 🐒, and dedicated to the memory of Frans de Waal, who launched the field. Speakers: Sarah Brosnan @lgruen.bsky.social Pier Francesco Ferrari, Phillip Kitcher. Register 👉 tinyurl.com/5akaw2j6

Nice story by @abeloomis.bsky.social! Glad to see Riddle in there too. 🙏

Interested in the Future of Food? CIFAR will be announcing a new call for Discovery Workshops to support a new program (or two?) on this topic. chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://cifar.ca/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Future-of-Food-2025-EN.pdf

Our paper on 🌱🦧ANIMAL MEDICINE🐜🍄 has been accepted for publication in Philosophy of Science! You can find the accepted version here, open access: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Congratulations to William O'Shea for successfully defending his dissertation "Social Norms in Transition: Identity, Ethics, and Social Change"! 👏🎉 Proud philosophy mama! #Philosophy #YorkU

This is one of the reasons I am so passionate about the Caleb Scholars program. We give students funds to return home to learn from elders as they go to school, and we find undergrads though professional/PhD programs bc I know how hard it was to return home during grad school. www.calebscholars.org

Cambridge Elements are free to download until 7/25-check out my little book How To Study Animal Minds. I had fun writing this one, and I'll never forget how nervous I was in front of a bunch of scientist friends, including Sara Shettleworth, hearing their thoughts on the draft! tinyurl.com/3yy6a52c

Octopuses respond to the rubber hand illusion. Check out the video abstract. Cool work by Sumire Kawashima and Yuzuru Ikeda--these are the kinds of questions we can be asking to investigate the nature of consciousness www.cell.com/current-biol...

If you care about language evolution, or are just looking for some heavy-ish weekend reading, Geurts & Moore (Eds.) Evolutionary Pragmatics is now available to order. The paper version won't be shipped until the end of August, but there's an electronic version on Oxford Academic today.