Susana Monsó & Cristian Saborido: Animal medicine

[This talk has been canceled and postponed until further notice]

Tuesday May 14 2023 @12:00 (CEST)
Sala B, Edificio de Humanidades, UNED & online

Abstract
Most scholars who have reflected on the concept of medicine have characterised it as an institutionalised social practice circumscribed to the human realm. Though animals and even plants can be the objects of curative practices, it is presupposed that only humans can carry out medicine. And yet, a number of ethological studies have begun to question this claim, by documenting self- and other-directed prophylactic and therapeutic practices in several nonhuman species. In this paper, we explore the mechanisms behind these behaviours and advance a tentative taxonomy and a reconceptualisation of medicine according to which this concept would be far from a uniquely human prerogative, extending instead to many other members of the animal kingdom.

Bio
Susana Monsó is assistant professor at the Department of Logic, History, and Philosophy of Science of UNED, where she is known as ‘monkey girl’. She’s friends with a wild magpie called Florence, reads every book on whales she can get her hands on, and is generally obsessed with all things animal. She spends her free time acting in plays of dubious quality and shares her office with a man who owns an inflatable palm tree.

Cristian Saborido has watched all episodes of Once Upon a Time… Life several times and still preserves his collection of Cousteau documentaries in VHS form. He also likes the smell of freshly baked bread, going for long walks in the countryside, and fruits whose name starts with a consonant. Apart from that, he’s associate professor at the Department of Logic, History, and Philosophy of Science of UNED and has an inflatable palm tree in his office.