An exploration of how biological cooperation underpins all life - and why we’ve overlooked its power until now - makes thrilling reading, finds Penny Sarchet
Day 0 at the Helsinki Animal Law Conference 2026: "Reimagining Justice Across Species". We started with the Tom Regan Memorial Lecture delivered by @visakurki.bsky.social
Also, I'm fascinated by the Oodi public library (I've always been a big fan of libraries and quiet places)! 🐾📚🐦⬛
In 2019, Animal Outlook uncovered horrible abuse at a salmon hatchery in Maine. The company said sorry & promised reforms (which satisfied Maine officials). Animal Outlook returned in 2025 and found even worse abuse. This has happened over & over again w/the biggest meat co's.
If anyone wants to read more, I can recommend 'The Case for Epistemic Reparations' in the Oxford Handbook of Social Epistemology (and Lackey has a new book entirely on this topic):
Tree Bumblebees don't just use 'old' bird nests, they will take over active bird nests and evict the adults, killing any eggs/young. Nestboxes artificially increase this competition, which is much rarer in cooler natural holes in trees. We did a paper in this:
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
An exploration of how biological cooperation underpins all life - and why we’ve overlooked its power until now - makes thrilling reading, finds Penny Sarchet
🚨 I am very happy and excited to be in Helsinki and to be able to present my work at the Animal Law Conference 2026 in a couple of days! Funny thing: the sun was shining at 4am 🙈
Day 1 of the Helsinki Animal Law Conference 2026: "Reimagining Interspecies Justice" with talks by @annepetersmpil.bsky.social @eze-pz.bsky.social and Katja Tiisala!
Interesting reflections and plenty of food for thought to take home. 🐾🌱
Bumble bees can apparently play with balls, count, recognize faces, & perceive rhythm. A new study out today in @science.org argues they can also solve novel tasks spontaneously without explicit training, challenging the idea that such cognitive skills are exclusive to large-brained vertebrates.😲🐝🧪👇
New Scientist
MINT Lab
Problem-solving using novel solutions without explicit training is often considered a hallmark of cognitive flexibility. We investigated whether bumble bees (Bombus terrestris) could solve a novel obj...
AbstractThis chapter provides a discussion of epistemic reparations, which are intentionally reparative actions in the form of epistemic goods given to tho
One of the best papers I’ve read in a very long time (and just what I needed for something I’m working on).
This paper provide the first extended discussion in the philosophical literature of the epistemic significance of the phenomenon of “being known” and the relationship it has to reparations that are di...
Can bees be aware? Using a demanding learning task, researchers show that #honeybees behave as if awareness plays a role in their learning doi.org/10.1098/rspb... | #ProcB #Behaviour #Cogniton
🟢 Conference talk
“Nonhuman Animals as Epistemic Agents”
Josep Gasol (@josepgasol.com) (METIS, UNED / University of Pardubice) will speak at the Helsinki Animal Law Conference 2026: Reimagining Justice Across Species.
📍 University of Helsinki
📅 10 June 2026
More information: n9.cl/ywglr
Chris Bertram
All together now! These Tree bumblebees are fanning their nest to keep it cool 🌡️
Most UK bumblebees nest on or underground in our gardens and green spaces. Tree bumblebees, however, prefer to nest high above the ground – bird boxes containing old bird nests are a firm favourite 🐦
🎥 Annette Knight
Royal Society Publishing
We are pleased to announce the annual conference of the Helsinki Animal Law Centre in collaboration with the Legacy and Rebound projects. The conference will be held in Helsinki on June 9-10, 2026, wi...
