Karen Emmerman

Paul W. Taylor argued that humans have a duty to make restitution whenever we harm wild animals and plants in service of human interests. Taylor further averred that making restitution means we can escape “eternal guilt” at having used them because “there is a way to make amends.” Taylor’s insight that restitution is a vital part of our interspecies interactions is important, but he does not reflect deeply on the complications encountered by these efforts. This chapter carefully examines the complexities of making restitution to nonhuman animals when captivity is a necessary part of those efforts. It explores how sanctuaries, often thought of as remedies to the harms animals suffer at human hands, are in fact morally limited as sites of restitution. Our efforts to make amends to wild animals in sanctuaries are better understood as part of the work of moral repair.

In Philosophy for Children (P4C) theory there is a long‐standing commitment to democratizing the classroom. It is widely believed that to properly democratize the classroom question‐asking and question selection should be undertaken by the students rather than the adult facilitator. In practice, this commitment to democratization generates a tension. Asking and identifying philosophical questions is an acquired skill. For P4C practitioners, it is difficult to find a balance between the desire to democratize the classroom through a student‐centered P4C practice and the need to help students build philosophical skills. This paper examines theoretical approaches to question‐asking and question selection in P4C and, using examples from the classroom, considers possible solutions to the tension. The aim is a method that respects students’ epistemic authority and agency in the community of philosophical inquiry while enabling P4C practitioners to aid the students in developing the skills necessary for philosophical engagement.

Many familial and cultural traditions rely on animals for their fulfillment - think of Christmas ham, Rosh Hashannah chicken soup, Fourth of July barbeques, and so forth. Though philosophers writing in animal ethics often dismiss interests in certain foods as trivial, these food-based traditions pose a significant moral problem for those who take animals’ lives and interests seriously. One must either turn one’s back on one’s community or on the animals. In this paper, I consider the under-theorized area of intra-cultural critique. My focus is how we should think about and seek to resolve inter-animal conflicts of interest that arise within our own communities and cultural or religious groups. How should a theory that takes animals seriously approach a conflict between animals’ interests and culturally important human interests in the context of one’s own cultural, ethnic, or religious group? How, for example, should we think about the person staring down at a bowl of her grandmother’s chicken soup while recognizing the moral impermissibility of slaughtering chickens for human consumption? In contrast to traditional approaches that fail to take these robust, food-based, interests into account, I offer an ecofeminist approach that highlights the importance of respecting animals’ interests while also undertaking the work of moral repair to address damage done to relationships of love and care in the process.