T. J. Kasperbauer, "Subhuman: The Moral Psychology of Human Attitudes Towards Animals" (Oxford UP, 2018)
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What is the main focus of T. J. Kasperbauer’s book *Subhuman*?
Hello and welcome to New Books in Philosophy, a podcast channel with the New Books Network. I'm Carrie Figdor, Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Iowa, and I'm co-host of the channel along with Robert Talise, Professor of Philosophy at Vanderbilt University. Together we bring you conversations with philosophers about their new books. drawing from a wide range of areas of contemporary philosophical inquiry. Today's interview is with T J Casper Bauer. who is a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Bioethics at the Indiana University School of Medicine. His new book, Subhuman, The Moral Psychology of Human Attitudes Towards Animals, is just out from Oxford University Press. Nonhuman animals are companions, research subjects, creatures we fear, creatures we eat.
Why do we put other animals in the various categories that we do and treat them in the various good and bad ways that we do? These are questions about human attitudes towards other animals. animals and the moral implications of these attitudes. They're an underexplored area of moral psychology. In Subhuman, Casper Bauer examines psychological research to defend a view about why and how we dehumanize other animals and why and how we might be able to change those attitudes in order to bring our behavior towards other animals more in line with our moral values. On his view, we apply in group outgroup thinking to ensure our superior status as a species, and our ability to improve moral outcomes is limited by our psychology.
Nevertheless, knowing what these limits are is crucial for understanding how moral behavior towards animals is can be changed. Let's listen to the interview. Hello, T J Kasperbauer. Welcome to New Books in Philosophy. Hi, Gary. I'm looking forward to talking about subhuman. Um, your examination of basically human moral psychology as it pertains to animals and the possibilities for changing it in order to improve our General behavior towards animals. Um, before we get into the book itself, uh I thought maybe you would tell us a bit about yourself. I mean, how you came to philosophy. um how the book came about and also um one of the interesting things that I noticed was your dedication was to the bonobos of Iowa.
So uh so if you could say a bit about uh about the background of the book.
Yeah. So it it all act all of those things actually started over about ten years ago. Uh when I was an undergrad I was a double major in philosophy and psychology, but was fortunate enough to be invited to work uh in an ape cognition lab. So it's called the Great Ape Trust. Uh it was in Des Moines, Iowa. It since changed names, but at the time it was just getting started. It was very exciting. They were very encouraging of someone studying both philosophy and psychology. And my plan at the time was to be a cognitive scientist. I was I was mainly interested in how apes and all non humans think about the world. And I was involved in lots of studies, uh, you know, studying their linguistic abilities, their cognitive abilities, their their their memory.
Uh But what actually ended up interesting me was was when I was asked to be a tour guide. So I spent about a year doing most of the tours at the Grid Ape Trust. And what really surprised me was that when I would present The empirical studies, the research on on the apes and non human cognition. People would get sort of offended sometimes and and uh You know, I I thought it was very exciting. I wondered why they weren't just getting excited like I was, but people were surprised to hear that apes could be compared to humans in certain uh abilities like their linguistic abilities. Uh and they were also sort of just disgusted by apes. And that surprised me too. I wasn't disgusted. I didn't I wasn't uh feeling any negative uh emotions about
I've seen Apes running around and neither did my co workers. And so it was weird trying to give tours to people and c trying to convince them that Uh they should be as excited about apes as I was and instead they were uh th they just seemed offended and insulted by certain things.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the main focus of T. J. Kasperbauer’s book *Subhuman*?
0:07–7:59
2
How did Kasperbauer’s early work with ape cognition shape his interest in animal ethics?
7:59–15:34
3
What does the book argue about the psychological roots of de‑humanizing (or “infra‑humanizing”) animals?
15:34–23:32
4
How does the in‑group/out‑group psychology used on humans apply to our attitudes toward non‑human animals?
23:32–31:09
5
Which mental‑state dimensions (agency vs. experience) determine moral status for animals, according to the book’s survey?
31:09–38:33
6
Why are people emotionally resistant to changing how they treat animals, and what evolutionary factors underlie that resistance?
38:33–45:59
7
What practical strategies (nudges, policy changes, market incentives) does Kasperbauer propose to improve animal welfare?
45:59–54:01
8
What are Kasperbauer’s current research directions and his outlook on the future of animal ethics?
54:01–1:01:49
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