On zoosemiotics and bridging the value gap
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Jonathan Beever
Jonathan Beever (b. 1980) is a Post-Doctoral Scholar at Penn State's Rock Ethics Institute 〈jzb18@psu.edu〉. His research interests include moral theory, applied ethics, and biosemiotics. His publications include “Symbolic violence as subtle virulence: The philosophy of terrorism” (2011); “Violence, terrorism, and the symbolic response” (2012); and “Meaning Matters: The Biosemiotic Basis of Bioethics” (2012).
Abstract
The immanent and empirical foundation of zoosemiotics grounds a theory of moral value. According to this theory, semiosis is a morally relevant and natural property of all animals, human and nonhuman. A consequence of this semiotic theory is that all individual animals are accorded inherent moral value based on their natural ability to signify. This paper argues that such a theory of moral value offers a justificatory strategy for our contemporary moral intuitions concerning our semiotic and moral relationships with nonhuman animals while also productively pushing our normative ethical boundaries.
About the author
Jonathan Beever (b. 1980) is a Post-Doctoral Scholar at Penn State's Rock Ethics Institute 〈jzb18@psu.edu〉. His research interests include moral theory, applied ethics, and biosemiotics. His publications include “Symbolic violence as subtle virulence: The philosophy of terrorism” (2011); “Violence, terrorism, and the symbolic response” (2012); and “Meaning Matters: The Biosemiotic Basis of Bioethics” (2012).
©2014 by Walter de Gruyter Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Dimensions of zoosemiotics
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- Dimensions of zoosemiotics: Introduction
- The semiome: From genetic to semiotic scaffolding
- Codes and coding: Sebeok's zoosemiotics and the dismantling of the fixed-code fallacy
- Zoosemiotics is the study of animal forms of knowing
- Zoo-aesthetics: A natural step after Darwin
- Curs, crabs, and cranky cows: Ethological and linguistic aspects of animal-based insults
- On zoosemiotics and bridging the value gap
- Umwelt or Umwelten? How should shared representation be understood given such diversity?
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- Training guide dogs of the blind with the “phantom man” method: Historic background and semiotic footing
- From sign to action: Studies in chimpanzee pictorial competence
- Patterns and dynamics of (bird) soundscapes: A biosemiotic interpretation
- Observation ↔ Text/e ↔ Culture
- Introduction
- Culture, power, dictionaries: What lexicography reveals about cultural objects
- La culture comme objet
- La mémoire et l'événement: Les autobiographies intellectuelles au Brésil
- Human voice: Its meaning and textuality outside the verbal and the musical
- Des parcours interprétatifs à la réception des textes médiévaux
- Semiotic of pretext, semiotics of pre-text
- From text to culture through corpus: Interactivity as an argumentative keyword of contemporary cyberculture
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Articles in the same Issue
- Dimensions of zoosemiotics
- Frontmatter
- Dimensions of zoosemiotics: Introduction
- The semiome: From genetic to semiotic scaffolding
- Codes and coding: Sebeok's zoosemiotics and the dismantling of the fixed-code fallacy
- Zoosemiotics is the study of animal forms of knowing
- Zoo-aesthetics: A natural step after Darwin
- Curs, crabs, and cranky cows: Ethological and linguistic aspects of animal-based insults
- On zoosemiotics and bridging the value gap
- Umwelt or Umwelten? How should shared representation be understood given such diversity?
- Umwelt trajectories
- Training guide dogs of the blind with the “phantom man” method: Historic background and semiotic footing
- From sign to action: Studies in chimpanzee pictorial competence
- Patterns and dynamics of (bird) soundscapes: A biosemiotic interpretation
- Observation ↔ Text/e ↔ Culture
- Introduction
- Culture, power, dictionaries: What lexicography reveals about cultural objects
- La culture comme objet
- La mémoire et l'événement: Les autobiographies intellectuelles au Brésil
- Human voice: Its meaning and textuality outside the verbal and the musical
- Des parcours interprétatifs à la réception des textes médiévaux
- Semiotic of pretext, semiotics of pre-text
- From text to culture through corpus: Interactivity as an argumentative keyword of contemporary cyberculture
- Le texte comme fragment culturel: Trois scénarios d'observation
