•  17
    Report on Books and Articles
    with Gary Backhaus, John Murungi, Jennifer Bates, Emily Brady, Emily Brady Haapala, J. Baird Callicott, and Robert L. Chapman
    Environmental Ethics 24 (2): 75-91. 2003.
  •  1
    Book Review: Zoos in Postmodernism: Signs and Simulation (review)
    Environmental Values 16 (4): 536-538. 2007.
  •  1
    Book Review: Animal Subjects: An Ethical Reader in a Posthuman World (review)
    Environmental Values 18 (1): 118-122. 2009.
  • Book Review: Ciferae: A Bestiary in Five Fingers (review)
    Environmental Values 22 (5): 677-679. 2013.
  •  1
    Book Review: The Postmodern Animal (review)
    Environmental Values 10 (3): 417-418. 2001.
  •  24
    Species Conservation and Minority Rights: The Case of Springtime Bird Hunting in Aland
    with Markku Oksanen
    Environmental Values 11 (4): 443-460. 2002.
    The article examines the case of springtime bird hunting in Aland from a moral point of view. In Aland springtime hunting has been a cultural practice for centuries but is now under investigation due to the EU Directive on the protection of birds. The main question of the article is whether restrictions on bird hunting have a sound basis. We approach this question by analysing three principles: The animal rights principle states that if hunting is not necessary for survival, it cannot be morally…Read more
  •  272
    The Anthropocentric Paradigm and the Possibility of Animal Ethics
    Ethics and the Environment 15 (1): 27. 2010.
    Animal ethics has tended to follow an analytical approach and has focused much attention on moral reason and theory. Recently, some have argued this to be a fundamental problem. The 'paradigmatic account' claims that instead of reason and theory, ethics ought to emphasize common paradigms and meanings. Since these paradigms and meanings tend to be anthropocentric, the pro-animal arguments presented within animal ethics ought to be viewed critically. The paper explores two variants of this accoun…Read more
  •  27
    The article examines the case of springtime bird hunting in Åland from a moral point of view. In Åland springtime hunting has been a cultural practice for centuries but is now under investigation due to the EU Directive on the protection of birds. The main question of the article is whether restrictions on bird hunting have a sound basis. We approach this question by analysing three principles: The animal rights principle states that if hunting is not necessary for survival, it cannot be morally…Read more
  •  26
    Platonic Love of Nonhuman Nature and Animals
    The Harvard Review of Philosophy 29 33-44. 2022.
    Some philosophers have argued that love has moral-psychological power, as it can motivate one to appreciate the existence of others and to offer care for them. This appears evident in the context of our relations with nonhuman animals and nature: love can motivate one to think of them as morally considerable. But what is love? The paper at hand investigates one classic philosophical definition of love and applies it to our relationship with other animals and nature. This definition is the qualit…Read more
  •  1
    Green Screen: Environmentalism and Hollywood Cinema
    Environmental Values 14 (4): 539-543. 2005.
  • Review (review)
    Journal of Animal Ethics 4 (2): 102-104. 2014.
  • Vastaus Ruonakoskelle ja Salmelalle
    Ajatus 76 (1): 337-346. 2019.
    Vastaus Ruonakoskelle ja Salmelalle.
  •  1
    Varieties of Empathy: Moral Psychology and Animal Ethics kartoittaa empatian eri muotoja ja niiden suhdetta moraaliseen toimijuuteen sekä eläinetiikkaan. Kirjan lähtökohtana on empatian käsitteellinen ja konkreettinen vaihtelevuus sekä tapa, jolla empatian suhde moraaliseen toimijuuteen riippuu tästä vaihtelusta. Keskeisiä kysymyksiä ovat: Mitä "empatia" tarkoittaa? Miten eri empatian muodot vaikuttavat moraaliseen kyvykkyyteen? Läpi kirjan esimerkkitapauksena toimii moraalinen toimijuus suhtees…Read more
  • The postmodern animal
    Environmental Values. 2001.
  •  48
    Defensive over Climate Change? Climate Shame as a Method of Moral Cultivation
    Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics 34 (1): 1-23. 2021.
    The climate crisis is an enormous challenge for contemporary societies. Yet, public discussions on it often lead to anger, mocking, denial and other defensive behaviours, one prominent example of which is the reception met by the climate advocate Greta Thunberg. The paper approaches this curious phenomenon via shame. It argues that the very idea of anthropogenic climate change invites feelings of human failure and thereby may also entice shame. The notion of “climate shame” is introduced and dis…Read more
  •  20
    Egoistic Love of the Nonhuman World? Biology and the Love Paradox
    Ethics, Policy and Environment 26 (1): 86-105. 2023.
    Love is a difficult emotion to define. Some suggest that it should not be intellectualized too meticulously lest its nuances be lost (Hamilton, 2006) or that it escapes analytic definitions altoget...
  •  6
    Emotion, Empathy and Core Moral Agency
    Proceedings of the XXIII World Congress of Philosophy 25 3-9. 2018.
    With the recent sentimentalism revival, both emotion and empathy have re-emerged as prominent contenders for the throne of moral agency. Particularly the emotive argument, according to which emotions are both the necessary and sufficient criterion for moral ability, has become increasingly popular. The emotive argument is supported by neurostudies and social psychology, which have manifested that the majority of moral decision-making appears to be rested on immediate intuition, and ultimately em…Read more
  •  27
    The first impression after opening Mark Wood’s Rethinking Wilderness is that of vigor and thoroughness: clearly a significant amount of research and work has gone into this book. In analyzing diffe...
  •  17
    Varieties of Empathy: Moral Psychology and Animal Ethics
    Rowman & Littlefield International. 2018.
    Empathy is a term used increasingly both in moral theory and animal ethics. Yet, its precise meaning is often left unexplored. The book aims to tackle this by clarifying the different and even contradictory ways in which “empathy” can be defined.
  • Animal Minds, Skepticism and the Affective Stance
    Teorema: International Journal of Philosophy 29 (2). 2010.
  • Animal Rights Activism, Marginalization, and Violence
    In Jonathan Lynch & Gary Wheeler (eds.), Cultures of Violence, Inter-disciplinary Press. 2004.
  •  28
    Thinking Animals: Why Animal Studies Now?
    Journal of Animal Ethics 4 (1): 109-110. 2014.
  •  137
    Animal Suffering: Philosophy and Culture
    Palgrave-Macmillan. 2012.
    Animal Suffering: Philosophy and Culture explores the multifaceted moral meanings allocated to non-human suffering in contemporary Western culture.
  •  38
    The Moral Value of Animals: Three Versions Based on Altruism
    Essays in Philosophy 5 (2): 1. 2004.
    As it comes to animal ethics, broad versions of contractualism are often used as a reason for excluding animals from the category of those with moral value in the individualistic sense. Ideas of “reciprocity” and “moral agency” are invoked to show that only those capable of understanding and respecting the value of others may have value themselves. Because of this, possible duties toward animals are often made dependent upon altruism: to pay regard to animals is to act in an other-regarding mann…Read more
  •  4
    The Moral Value of Animals: Three Altruistic Versions
    The Proceedings of the Twenty-First World Congress of Philosophy 3 219-225. 2007.
    Altruism has often been thought to be the reason we treat animals with a certain moral respect. Animals are not moral agents who could reciprocally honour our well being, and because of this duties toward them are considered to be based on other-directed motivations. Altruism is a vague notion, and in the context of animals can be divided into at least three different alternatives. The first one equates altruism with benevolence or "kindness"; the second one argues altruism is based on recognisi…Read more
  •  48
    Philosophy and Animal Studies: Calarco, Castricano, and Diamond
    Society and Animals 17 (3): 279-286. 2009.
    Recently, animal studies has started to gain popularity. This interdisciplinary field investigates the human- animal relationship from different perspectives, including philosophy, cultural studies, and biology. In 2008, at least three books explored themes related to animal studies : Matthew Calarco, Zoographies: The Question of the Animal ; Jodey Castricano, Animal Subjects: An Ethics Reader in a Posthuman World; and Cora Diamond, Cary Wolfe, et al. Philosophy and Animal Life. Each volume appr…Read more
  •  150
    Empathy has become a common point of debate in moral psychology. Recent developments in psychiatry, neurosciences and social psychology have led to the revival of sentimentalism, and the ‘empathy thesis’ has suggested that affective empathy, in particular, is a necessary criterion of moral agency. The case of psychopaths – individuals incapable of affective empathy and moral agency, yet capable of rationality – has been utilised in support of this case. Critics, however, have been vocal. They ha…Read more
  •  8
    Coetzee and alternative animal ethics
    In Peter Singer & Anton Leist (eds.), J.M. Coetzee and Ethics, Columbia University Press. 2010.
    Animal ethics has become a valuable part of philosophy. The main elements include criticism of anthropocentric assumptions and emphasis on experientialism. The analytic approach, which has applied standard moral theories to other animals, has been accompanied by the postmodern approach, which emphasizes matters such as plurality and contextuality. This is where J. M. Coetzee becomes relevant. His novels present ethical views related to nonhuman animals, constantly underpinned by the issue of how…Read more
  •  133
    Skepticism, Empathy, and Animal Suffering
    Journal of Bioethical Inquiry 10 (4): 457-467. 2013.
    The suffering of nonhuman animals has become a noted factor in deciding public policy and legislative change. Yet, despite this growing concern, skepticism toward such suffering is still surprisingly common. This paper analyzes the merits of the skeptical approach, both in its moderate and extreme forms. In the first part it is claimed that the type of criterion for verification concerning the mental states of other animals posed by skepticism is overly (and, in the case of extreme skepticism, i…Read more