We are hosting a one-day mini-conference, to be held on August 6, 2025, immediately prior to the Rocky Mountain Ethics Congress (RoME) at the University of Colorado Boulder. The conference will be an in-person event. However, we will be publishing papers from the conference in a special issue of the open-access journal Essays in Philosophy.
Here is the program:
August 6, 2025. CU-Boulder. Eaton Humanities 135. All times Mountain Daylight Time.
8:30-9:00: Welcome – coffee etc.
9:00-9:50: Frauke Albersmeier (Münster), "Sentience Denial – What It Is and Why It Matters". Comments by Anton Skretta (Rice). Chair: Mylan Engel (NIU).
10:00-10:50: Arshia Batra (University of Washington), "Becoming-inanimate, Becoming-human, Becoming-animal: The Objectification and (de)Familiarization of Captive Animals in Photography". Comments by Joel MacClellan (Loyola, New Orleans). Chair: Cheryl Abbate (UNLV).
11:00-11:50: Sabina Schrynemakers (Cornell), "The Misallocation Problem and Incommensurable Values". Comments by Ben Hole (College of Lake County). Chair: Dayton Martindale (CU-Boulder).
11:50-1:30: Lunch break
1:30-2:20: Panel: Animal Law. Stephen Hernick (Friends of Animals) and Steve Silverman (CU-Boulder). Chair: Ramona Ilea (Pacific).
2:30-3:20: Dayton Martindale (CU-Boulder), "A Social and Political Case for Veganism". Comments by Ramona Ilea (Pacific). Chair: Alexander Christian (Heinrich Heine).
3:20-3:50: Short coffee break
3:50-5:00: Panel: Animal Ethics: Recent Trends and Future Directions. Cheryl Abbate (UNLV), Yolandi Coetser (The North-West University), Bob Fischer (Texas State), Oscar Horta (Santiago de Compostela), Alastair Norcross (CU-Boulder). Moderator: Avram Hiller (Portland State).
For more information, please contact Avram Hiller at ahiller@pdx.edu.
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Call for papers:
The Society for the Study of Ethics and Animals (SSEA) is pleased to announce a one-day mini-conference, to be held on August 6, 2025, immediately prior to the Rocky Mountain Ethics Congress (RoME) at the University of Colorado Boulder.
In light of exciting recent developments in animal ethics research, the theme for the mini-conference is Animal Ethics: Recent Trends and Future Directions. We invite proposals for talks and panels on any topic in animal ethics, and we especially welcome submissions that align with the theme.
Those who give talks at the mini-conference will have the option of having their paper considered for publication in a special edition of the journal Essays in Philosophy. Those choosing to do so must submit manuscripts of 4,500-9,000 words (all included) by September 1, 2025.
For individual talks, please send abstracts of 300-400 words (not including references). Speakers should prepare talks of no longer than 30 minutes. All individual talks will have commenters.
For panel proposals, please send a single abstract of 400-500 words, which include a detailed description of the panel theme as well as the names of speakers (who must confirm their participation by the time of the proposal). Panel sessions will be 90 minutes long.
The conference will be in-person at CU Boulder. We will, however, consider submissions for remote talks by those who require accessibility accommodations and cannot attend in person.
All submissions should be sent to ethicsanimals@gmail.com. Please include the words “2025 SSEA conference submission” in the subject line. Please direct any questions to Avram Hiller at ahiller@pdx.edu.
The deadline for submission is April 25, 2025. Decisions will be announced by May 15, 2025.