Tzachi Zamir

Last updated
Tzachi Zamir
Born1967 (age 56–57)
NationalityIsraeli
Alma mater Tel Aviv University
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
InstitutionsHebrew University of Jerusalem

Tzachi Zamir (born February 13, 1967 [1] ) is an Israeli philosopher and literary critic specialising in the philosophy of literature, the philosophy of theatre, and animal ethics. He is Professor of English and General & Comparative Literature at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Contents

Academic career

Zamir studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Tel-Aviv University, going on to be a Rothschild and Fulbright postdoctoral fellow in philosophy at The University of Chicago. He joined the English department of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in 2004 as a lecturer, and is now Professor of English and General & Comparative Literature. [2]

Zamir is the author of the 2006 book Double Vision: Moral Philosophy and Shakespearean Drama [3] [4] and the 2007 book Ethics & the Beast: A Speciesist Argument for Animal Liberation, [5] [6] [7] both published by Princeton University Press. His 2014 book Acts: Theater, Philosophy, and the Performing Self was published by the University of Michigan Press. [8] [9] [10] In 2018, he published both the monograph Ascent: Philosophy and Paradise Lost [11] [12] [13] and the edited collection Shakespeare's Hamlet: Philosophical Perspectives with Oxford University Press, [14] and in 2020 he published Just Literature: Philosophical Criticism and Justice with Routledge. [15]

While most contemporary scholars involved with animal ethics have written in favour of veganism, Zamir however has defended vegetarianism. [6] [16] [17]

Personal life

Zamir lives with his wife and three children in Hod HaSharon. [18]

Selected publications

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Speciesism</span> Discrimination against non-human creatures solely on the basis of their species membership

Speciesism is a term used in philosophy regarding the treatment of individuals of different species. The term has several different definitions within the relevant literature. Some sources specifically define speciesism as discrimination or unjustified treatment based on an individual's species membership, while other sources define it as differential treatment without regard to whether the treatment is justified or not. Richard Ryder, who coined the term, defined it as "a prejudice or attitude of bias in favour of the interests of members of one's own species and against those of members of other species." Speciesism results in the belief that humans have the right to use non-human animals, which scholars say is pervasive in the modern society. Studies from 2015 and 2019 suggest that people who support animal exploitation also tend to endorse racist, sexist, and other prejudicial views, which furthers the beliefs in human supremacy and group dominance to justify systems of inequality and oppression.

In ethical philosophy, utilitarianism is a family of normative ethical theories that prescribe actions that maximize happiness and well-being for the affected individuals. In other words, utilitarian ideas encourage actions that ensure the greatest good for the greatest number.

Ethics in the Bible refers to the system(s) or theory(ies) produced by the study, interpretation, and evaluation of biblical morals, that are found in the Hebrew and Christian Bibles. It comprises a narrow part of the larger fields of Jewish and Christian ethics, which are themselves parts of the larger field of philosophical ethics. Ethics in the Bible is unlike other western ethical theories in that it is seldom overtly philosophical. It presents neither a systematic nor a formal deductive ethical argument. Instead, the Bible provides patterns of moral reasoning that focus on conduct and character in what is sometimes referred to as virtue ethics. This moral reasoning is part of a broad, normative covenantal tradition where duty and virtue are inextricably tied together in a mutually reinforcing manner.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alasdair MacIntyre</span> Scottish philosopher (born 1929)

Alasdair Chalmers MacIntyre is a Scottish-American philosopher who has contributed to moral and political philosophy as well as history of philosophy and theology. MacIntyre's After Virtue (1981) is one of the most important works of Anglophone moral and political philosophy in the 20th century. He is senior research fellow at the Centre for Contemporary Aristotelian Studies in Ethics and Politics (CASEP) at London Metropolitan University, emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, and permanent senior distinguished research fellow at the Notre Dame Center for Ethics and Culture. During his lengthy academic career, he also taught at Brandeis University, Duke University, Vanderbilt University, and Boston University.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Midgley</span> British philosopher

Mary Beatrice Midgley was a British philosopher. A senior lecturer in philosophy at Newcastle University, she was known for her work on science, ethics and animal rights. She wrote her first book, Beast and Man (1978), when she was in her late fifties, and went on to write over 15 more, including Animals and Why They Matter (1983), Wickedness (1984), The Ethical Primate (1994), Evolution as a Religion (1985), and Science as Salvation (1992). She was awarded honorary doctorates by Durham and Newcastle universities. Her autobiography, The Owl of Minerva, was published in 2005.

Moral agency is an individual's ability to make moral choices based on some notion of right and wrong and to be held accountable for these actions. A moral agent is "a being who is capable of acting with reference to right and wrong."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stephen R. L. Clark</span> British philosopher

Stephen Richard Lyster Clark is an English philosopher and professor emeritus of philosophy at the University of Liverpool. Clark specialises in the philosophy of religion and animal rights, writing from a philosophical position that might broadly be described as Christian Platonist. He is the author of twenty books, including The Moral Status of Animals (1977), The Nature of the Beast (1982), Animals and Their Moral Standing (1997), G.K. Chesterton (2006), Philosophical Futures (2011), and Ancient Mediterranean Philosophy (2012), as well as 77 scholarly articles, and chapters in another 109 books. He is a former editor-in-chief of the Journal of Applied Philosophy (1990–2001).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Rachels</span> American philosopher and ethicist

James Webster Rachels was an American philosopher who specialized in ethics and animal rights.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Animal rights</span> Belief that animals have interests that should be considered

Animal rights is the philosophy according to which many or all sentient animals have moral worth independent of their utility to humans, and that their most basic interests—such as avoiding suffering—should be afforded the same consideration as similar interests of human beings. Broadly speaking, and particularly in popular discourse, the term "animal rights" is often used synonymously with "animal protection" or "animal liberation". More narrowly, "animal rights" refers to the idea that many animals have fundamental rights to be treated with respect as individuals—rights to life, liberty, and freedom from torture that may not be overridden by considerations of aggregate welfare.

The argument from marginal cases is a philosophical argument within animal rights theory regarding the moral status of non-human animals. Its proponents hold that if human infants, senile people, the comatose, and cognitively disabled people have direct moral status, non-human animals must have a similar status, since there is no known morally relevant characteristic that those marginal-case humans have that animals lack. "Moral status" may refer to a right not to be killed or made to suffer, or to a general moral requirement to be treated in a certain way.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mylan Engel</span> American philosopher

Mylan Engel Jr. is a full professor of philosophy at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb.

Joan Dunayer is an American philosopher and animal rights advocate. She is the author of two books, Animal Equality (2001) and Speciesism (2004).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alice Crary</span> American philosopher

Alice Crary is an American philosopher who currently holds the positions of University Distinguished Professor at the Graduate Faculty, The New School for Social Research in New York City and Visiting Fellow at Regent's Park College, University of Oxford, U.K..

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alasdair Cochrane</span> British political theorist and ethicist

Alasdair Cochrane is a British political theorist and ethicist who is currently Professor of Political Theory in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Sheffield. He is known for his work on animal rights from the perspective of political theory, which is the subject of his two books: An Introduction to Animals and Political Theory and Animal Rights Without Liberation. His third book, Sentientist Politics, was published by Oxford University Press in 2018. He is a founding member of the Centre for Animals and Social Justice, a UK-based think tank focused on furthering the social and political status of nonhuman animals. He joined the Department at Sheffield in 2012, having previously been a faculty member at the Centre for the Study of Human Rights, London School of Economics. Cochrane is a Sentientist. Sentientism is a naturalistic worldview that grants moral consideration to all sentient beings.

<i>Animal Rights Without Liberation</i> 2012 book by British political theorist Alasdair Cochrane

Animal Rights Without Liberation: Applied Ethics and Human Obligations is a 2012 book by the British political theorist Alasdair Cochrane, in which it is argued that animal rights philosophy can be decoupled from animal liberation philosophy by the adoption of the interest-based rights approach. Cochrane, arguing that there is no reason that (nonhuman) animals should be excluded from justice, adopts Joseph Raz's account of interest rights and extends it to include animals. He argues that sentient animals possess a right not to be made to suffer and a right not to be killed, but not a right to freedom. The book's chapters apply Cochrane's account to a number of interactions between humans and animals; first animal experimentation, then animal agriculture, the genetic engineering of animals, the use of animals in entertainment and sport, the relationship of animals to environmental practices and the use of animals in cultural practices.

John Hadley is an Australian philosopher whose research concerns moral and political philosophy, including animal ethics, environmental ethics, and metaethics. He is currently a senior lecturer in philosophy in the School of Humanities and Communication Arts at Western Sydney University. He has previously taught at Charles Sturt University and the University of Sydney, where he studied as an undergraduate and doctoral candidate. In addition to a variety of articles in peer-reviewed journals and edited collections, he is the author of the 2015 monograph Animal Property Rights and the 2019 monograph Animal Neopragmatism. He is also the co-editor, with Elisa Aaltola, of the 2015 collection Animal Ethics and Philosophy.

Jan Deckers works in bioethics at Newcastle University. His work revolves mainly around three topics: animal ethics, reproductive ethics and embryo research, and ethics of genetics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oscar Horta</span> Spanish animal activist and moral philosopher

Óscar Horta Álvarez is a Spanish animal activist and moral philosopher who is currently a professor in the Department of Philosophy and Anthropology at the University of Santiago de Compostela (USC) and one of the co-founders of the organization Animal Ethics. He is known for his work in animal ethics, especially around the problem of wild animal suffering. He has also worked on the concept of speciesism and on the clarification of the arguments for the moral consideration of nonhuman animals. In 2022, Horta published his first book in English, Making a Stand for Animals.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Predation problem</span> Consideration of the harms experienced by animals due to predation as a moral problem

The predation problem or predation argument refers to the consideration of the harms experienced by animals due to predation as a moral problem, that humans may or may not have an obligation to work towards preventing. Discourse on this topic has, by and large, been held within the disciplines of animal and environmental ethics. The issue has particularly been discussed in relation to animal rights and wild animal suffering. Some critics have considered an obligation to prevent predation as untenable or absurd and have used the position as a reductio ad absurdum to reject the concept of animal rights altogether. Others have criticized any obligation implied by the animal rights position as environmentally harmful.

Catia Faria is a Portuguese moral philosopher and activist for animal rights and feminism. She is assistant professor in Applied Ethics at the Complutense University of Madrid, and is a board member of the UPF-Centre for Animal Ethics. Faria specialises in normative and applied ethics, especially focusing on how they apply to the moral consideration of non-human animals. In 2022, she published her first book, Animal Ethics in the Wild: Wild Animal Suffering and Intervention in Nature.

References

  1. ↑ "Tzachi Zamir - CV". Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Retrieved 2019-01-26.
  2. ↑ "Tzachi Zamir: Bio & Research". Hebrew University of Jerusalem. June 2018. Retrieved 16 December 2018.
  3. ↑ Schweizer, Harold (2008). "Double Vision: Moral Philosophy and Shakespearean Drama (review)". Partial Answers . 6 (2): 503–506. doi:10.1353/pan.0.0013. S2CID   145684497.
  4. ↑ Fulton, Thomas (2008). "Tzachi Zamir. Double Vision: Moral Philosophy and Shakespearean Drama". Renaissance Quarterly . 61 (1): 301–2. doi:10.1353/ren.2008.0077. S2CID   171316057.
  5. ↑ Hadley, John (2008). "Ethics and the Beast ‐ By Tzachi Zamir". Analytic Philosophy. 49 (3): 279–80. doi:10.1111/j.1468-0149.2008.467_16.x.
  6. 1 2 Jones, Robert C. "Tzachi Zamir, Ethics and the Beast: A Speciesist Argument for Animal Liberation". Philosophy in Review . 29 (6): 448–450.
  7. ↑ Faria, Cátia (2010). "Zamir, Tzachi, Ethics and the Beast: A Speciesist Argument for Animal Liberation". Telos (in Spanish). 17 (1): 109–120.
  8. ↑ Daddario, Will (2015). "Acts: Theater, Philosophy, and the Performing Self. By Tzachi Zamir". TDR/The Drama Review . 59 (4): 189–92. doi:10.1162/DRAM_r_00508. S2CID   57563480.
  9. ↑ Hamilton, James R. (2015). "Acts: Theater, Philosophy, and the Performing Self". The Philosophical Quarterly . 65 (261): 856–9. doi:10.1093/pq/pqu103.
  10. ↑ Riggle, Nick (2015). "Acts: Theater, Philosophy, and the Performing Self". Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews (2015.09.16).
  11. ↑ Moshenska, Joe (2019). " Ascent: Philosophy and Paradise Lost, by Tzachi Zamir". Mind . 128 (511): 927–35. doi: 10.1093/mind/fzy049 .
  12. ↑ Nievergelt, Marco (2019). "Zamir, Tzachi; Ascent: Philosophy and Paradise Lost. New York: Oxford University Press, 2018; pp. x + 216" . Journal of Religious History . 43 (3): 443–6. doi:10.1111/1467-9809.12606. S2CID   203476204.
  13. ↑ Gaskin, Richard (28 February 2018). "Ascent: Philosophy and Paradise Lost".
  14. ↑ MacKay, Ellen (2019). "Recent Studies in Tudor and Stuart Drama" . SEL: Studies in English Literature 1500–1900. 59 (2): 429–79. doi:10.1353/sel.2019.0021. S2CID   191726266.
  15. ↑ McGregor, Rafe (2020). "Tzachi Zamir, "Just Literature: Philosophical Criticism and Justice."". Philosophy in Review. 40 (4): 179–81. doi: 10.7202/1074039ar . S2CID   229513068.
  16. ↑ Hanganu-Bresch, Cristina; Kondrlik, Kristin. (2021). Veg(etari)an Arguments in Culture, History, and Practice: The V Word. Palgrave. p. xxv. ISBN   978-3-030-53279-6
  17. ↑ Milburn, J. (2019). "Vegetarian Eating". In: Meiselman H. (eds) Handbook of Eating and Drinking. Springer. ISBN   978-3-319-75388-1
  18. ↑ Alexander, Neta (12 September 2014). "Mastering the Theater of the Self". Haaretz . Retrieved 18 September 2019.

https://tzachizamir.huji.ac.il/

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.