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.

In the spring of 2008, I feared America was on the verge of war with Iran — and, believing that it’s good style to get to know people before you bomb them, I made “Rick Steves’ Iran,” a one-hour special that could (and would) only debut on PBS. Sadly, this special has become pertinent again today.

Susana and I have a joint theory paper out—comparative psychology is also WEIRD.

Dolphin researcher Laela Sayigh wins the first Coller-Dolittle Prize for Two-way Inter-species Communication. Fabulous work with Peter Tyak on the meaning and function of dolphin whistles. What are the larger implications of this kind of research? 👇 www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...

In today's online final (at 2pm UK time) the first ever Coller Dolittle Prize for the best recent work decoding animal communication will be awarded, with $100,000 for the winner. But who are the four finalists? A quick 🧵. 1/5 jeremycollerfoundation.org/events/colle...

I’m moving from York to take up a Professorship at the CUNY Grad Center this fall! Graduate student training has been a focus these past years and I’m excited to help mentor next gen philosophy of animal minds in NYC!

So glad to be back together for PAMBA in Santa Barbara!

Giulia Palazzolo @giuliapalazzolo.bsky.social wrote the PAMBA prizewinning paper for 2025, and before long you will get to read it in Biology & Philosophy! Congratulations Giulia, and look forward to seeing you in Santa Barbara to share your important work!

The 2025 PAMBA prize has been awared to @giuliapalazzolo.bsky.social. The judges - @wileyprof.bsky.social, @kristinandrews.bsky.social, @susanamonso.com, @lgruen.bsky.social, and me - thought her a worthy winner. It was a very strong field, though.

Noam Miller presents the reptile 🐍 sentience markers in a new paper for the Journal of Consciousness Studies. www.ingentaconnect.com/content/imp/...

🚨New in @science.org🚨 With Simon Townsend (@nccrlanguage.bsky.social) and Martin Surbeck, we have investigated whether wild bonobos can combine calls in complex combinations, similar to how humans combine words into sentences 🧪 www.science.org/doi/10.1126/... #ScienceResearch #AnimalCommunication

So proud of my awesome students presenting their research. @tylerdelmore.bsky.social at CO3 on Toleman’s maps revisited, and at SSPP Marriah Alcantara @marriah.bsky.social on animal privacy, and Elizabeth Waldberg on theory light beyond consciousness. ❤️

Really nice Science perspective by Ammie Kalan @ammiekalan.bsky.social & Lydia Luncz on the intrinsic value of animal culture-and nice contrast with many of the instrumental arguments out there. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Animal play can seem trivial, even laughable, and such scenes make us grin with delight. But is that all there is to it? buff.ly/yQcVjNj

Great news for philosophy of animal minds! Congratulations @birchlse.bsky.social! Looking forward to seeing the Postdoc advertisements for this important work.

Animal emotions—like joy—could be key indicators of consciousness. For @sciam.bsky.social Jacek Krywko interviews @jeffsebo.bsky.social on animal consciousness. www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-... 🧵

how is this real life? how are any of these people in charge of their own bedtimes and toys let alone the united states of america? "The spokesman confirmed the veracity of the signal group, 'This appears to be an authentic message chain'...” www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...

I have a new interview at @sciam.bsky.social about my recent @science.org perspective with @kristinandrews.bsky.social and @birchlse.bsky.social on animal consciousness. We discuss why many animals might be conscious and how we can study this topic in an ethically and scientifically sound way.

And, my @sciencehomecoming.bsky.social-inspired op-ed is online at LNP/Lancaster Online — in print, it's alongside a piece from two geoscientists with local roots on the front page of the Sunday Perspectives section lancasteronline.com/opinion/colu...

We sat with @chriskrupenye.bsky.social, a leading figure in ape-hollywood as well as actual science, to cover some important questions. Can apes read minds? What skills are actually needed to succeed in social situations (asking for a friend)? How does one make a soap opera for chimpanzees?

Come join us in Louisville this Friday!

Great to see this new primer on the cognitive capacities that support multi-species sociality www.cell.com/current-biol...

Thanks, my Yorkies!

2025. A new approach for better understanding animal consciousness phys.org/news/2025-02...

I've written a free and accessible guide to Cephalopod Sentience with Alex Schnell, Piero Amodio and Peter Morse, stunningly illustrated by Roksolana Tkach. Please download and share! It's worth it for the illustrations alone! 🐙 thebrooksinstitute.org/sites/defaul...

@jeffsebo.bsky.social @birchlse.bsky.social and I put a lot of philosophy into our new Science Perspective on animal consciousness. Mill's analogical argument + inference to the best explanation + careful experiments = justification for consciousness in many animals. Where might it end?

Do you like to dip your fries in ketchup before eating it? Our cockatoos do too! In a new study in Current Biology, we showed our cockatoos innovated a new way to flavour their food: they dunk noodles in blueberry soy yoghurt. Read about it and watch our video abstract: www.cell.com/current-biol...

We uncovered the same statistical structure that is a hallmark of human language in whale song, published today in Science. @inbalarnon.bsky.social @simonkirby.bsky.social @jennyallen13.bsky.social @clairenea.bsky.social @emma-carroll.bsky.social www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Whale song has some of the structure of human languages-I got to talk about this exciting new study out of the @ellengarland.bsky.social lab in Science Magazine. www.science.org/content/arti...

Male Amazon river dolphins have been documented rolling upside down and firing urine into the air - and other dolphins seem to follow the stream. www.newscientist.com/article/2466...

Bonobos are quick to help a person who doesn’t know what they know, a sign that they are able to deduce the mental states of others. www.newscientist.com/article/2466...

My awesome colleague Jake Beck!

Great to see this coverage of our growing understanding of interspecies animal culture! www.sciencefocus.com/comment/monk...

The NYT asked me to write an op-ed on Musk and the Treasury and then took a pass. I hope it will still get read.