5/5: "Discussing the Lives of Animals"

Last Tuesday at the Sustainable Resources Center on UCSD's Main Campus, Ike Sharpless, a PhD Student in Political Science, led a discussion centered around two texts dealing with "animals:" J.L. Coetzee's The Lives of Animals and John Berger's "Why Look at Animals." Taking a comprehensive approach, Ike first introduced the larger context of - mainly philosophical - debates on the nature, rights, ethics involving our relationship to the non-human other we collectively call "animals:"  Can we use them for medical tests? Can we eat them? Or are their lives equal in value to ours? Such were the questions for which Ike introduced the theoretical framework, which he then explored through a reading of the two texts mentioned above.

Members of the audience continued the exploration Ike started by placing their own views on animal lives in the larger context that was introduced. Arguments varied from saying that environment-wise, eating imported vegetable materials is as harmful as eating animals, to the proposition that, if humanity really wants to move forward, we have to find a manner of eating without killing. Overall,  it was particularly nice to have our colleagues at COLEF join us for this session for a different perspective on this matter.

Two sessions remain in this second year of the Forum. Next week, on Tuesday 5/19, we will continue in the direction Ike took us in by exploring more environmental literature, this time in the cast of Science Fiction. A short, but very stimulating, short story by Octavia Butler, namely "The Book of Martha," will be the centerpiece for this session, together with the film Snowpiercer. Finally, on June 2nd we will conclude another productive year with our traditional visit to COLEF and dinner in downtown Tijuana.