Overview

Non-human animals are a topic of intense philosophical interest in the modern day. It is often supposed that this is a recent development, but in fact pre-modern philosophers were intensely interested in animals. Aristotle initiated a long-standing zoological tradition, but it was only part of the vast literature on animals in antiquity and the middle ages. To do it justice, this book gathers twenty-five studies of animals in Greek, Arabic, and Latin philosophy. Major themes include the cognitive capacities of animals, the difference between humans and animals and the question of how humans should treat animals, as well as God’s relationship towards animals, animal diet and mating, language among animals, animal suffering, animals as ethical exemplars, and reincarnation. Contributors Peter Adamson, Tommaso Alpina, Hanif Amin Beidokhti, Zack Candy, Sophia M. Connell, Racha el-Omari, Kosta Gligorijevic, Guy Guldentops, Rotraud Hansberger, Paloma Hernández–Rubio, Tua Korhonen, Behnam Khodapanah, Philip Line, Thornton Lockwood, Ruizhi Ma, Janne Mattila, Robert Mayhew, Michele Meroni, Bahodir Musametov, Giulio Navarra, Marilù Papandreou, Nicolas Payen, Michael Payne, Jens-Ole Schmitt, John Skalko, and Miira Tuominen.

Full Product Details

Author:   Peter Adamson ,  Miira Tuominen
Publisher:   Brill
Imprint:   Brill
Volume:   190
Dimensions:   Width: 15.50cm , Height: 4.70cm , Length: 23.50cm
Weight:   1.193kg
ISBN:  

9789004744127

ISBN 10:   9004744126
Pages:   644
Publication Date:   09 October 2025
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand  
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Table of Contents

Introduction  Peter Adamson and Miira Tuominen 1 Animals “as if”: Homeric and Oppianic Animal Similes in the Context of Philosophical Discussion on Animals  Tua Korhonen 2 Aristotle on Animal Intelligence: A Difference in Degree or by Analogy?  Miira Tuominen 3 Aristotle on Human Use of Non-human Animals  Sophia M. Connell 4 Non-human Animals in the Nicomachean and Eudemian Ethics  Thornton Lockwood 5 Builders and Weavers of the Animal Kingdom: Non-human Poiêsis in Aristotle and the Ancient Commentators  Marilù Papandreou 6 The Divine Enema-Inventing Egyptian Ibis  Robert Mayhew 7 Galen, Priscian, and al-Fārābī on Theodicy and Venomous Animals  Kosta Gligorijevic 8 Animal and Human Souls in the Overall Arrangement of the Cosmos The Kindī-Circle’s Adaptation of Alexander of Aphrodisias’ De providentia as a Case Study of the Nascent “Arabic Aristotelianism”  Giulio Navarra 9 Sensing Dimly in the Light of Reason? Downgrading Animal Perception in Parts of the Arabic Aristotelian Tradition  Rotraud Hansberger 10 Debating Hybridity in al-Jāḥiẓ’s Book of Mules  Michael Payne 11 The Problem of Animal Suffering in the Brethren of Purity and Abū Bakr al-Rāzī: The Muʿtazilite Context  Janne Mattila 12 Classes of Animals in al-Fārābī’s Works  Nicolas Payen 13 Demarcating Animals from Plants: Abū al-Ḥassan al-‘Āmirī in Dialogue with Avicenna  Ruizhi Ma 14 Something in the Milk: Ibn Abī l-Ashʿath on the Content and Function of Milk for Animals and Humans  Jens-Ole Schmitt 15 Deconstructing the Idea of the Human as the Noblest Animal: A Treatise by Qābūs Ibn Wushmgir  Behnam Khodanpah 16 Ibn Mattawayh’s (fl. Fifth/Eleventh Century) “Chapter on Life” (al-Kalām fī l-ḥayā) and Its Arguments from Animals A Preliminary Introduction  Racha el-Omari 17 Dogs Fear Mud, the Wooden Stick, and Other Things: Notes on Animal Emotions in Avicenna  Tommaso Alpina 18 Ibn Bājja on the Foundations of the Science of Animals  Bahodir Musametov 19 “Unto Him Thou Shalt All Return”: The Resurrection of Animals in Ṣadr al-Dīn Shīrāzī  Hanif Amin Beidokhti 20 Political Allegories or Moral Exemplars? The Role of Animals in Petrus Alfonsi’s Disciplina Clericalis and Its Medieval English Reception  Zack Candy 21 Dicit Commentator quod cogitativa in nobis perfectior est quam aestimativa in brutis: How the Latin Averroes Came to Believe in Avicenna’s Estimative Power  Michele Meroni 22 The Irrational Language: Albert the Great on the Perception and Language of Pygmies  Paloma Hernández-Rubio 23 Can Animals Count? How Might Aquinas Explain Recent Cases of Animals Cognizing Quantities or Numbers?  John Skalko 24 “Loving Animals Has Never Prevented Me from Killing Them”: Later Medieval Scholastics on Moral Behavior toward Non-human Animals  Guy Guldentops 25 “A Dog Must Know Almost Everything”: The Dog in Medieval European Philosophy and Practical Treatises  Philip Line Index

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Author Information

Peter Adamson, Ph.D. (2000), University of Notre Dame, is Professor of Late Ancient and Arabic Philosophy at the LMU in Munich. He is the author of Al-Kindī and Al-Razī in the series “Great Medieval Thinkers” and the book series A History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps. Miira Tuominen, Ph.D. (2002), University of Helsinki, is Associate Professor of Theoretical Philosophy at Stockholm University. She has published articles, books and edited volumes mainly on Platonic-Aristotelian philosophy, including Living with Justice: A Philosophical Study of Porphyry’s On Abstinence (2025). Contributors Peter Adamson, Tommaso Alpina, Hanif Amin Beidokhti, Zack Candy, Sophia M. Connell, Racha el-Omari, Kosta Gligorijevic, Guy Guldentops, Rotraud Hansberger, Paloma Hernández–Rubio, Tua Korhonen, Behnam Khodapanah, Philip Line, Thornton Lockwood, Ruizhi Ma, Janne Mattila, Robert Mayhew, Michele Meroni, Bahodir Musametov, Giulio Navarra, Marilù Papandreou, Nicolas Payen, Michael Payne, Jens-Ole Schmitt, John Skalko, and Miira Tuominen.

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