Hugo Luzio
LanCog, University of Lisbon
Animalism is the view that each of us is a human animal. Most animalists
think that human animals are concrete particulars (i.e. individual things or, in
Aristotelian terms, individual substances) that persist over time by virtue of the
continuity of their biological lives. In their view, human animals, like you and me,
are thus living things.
Recently, however, some philosophers have argued that animalists
should abandon their underlying substance metaphysical framework in favor of
a processual one. In their view, we are not living things, but rather living
processes.
In this paper, I discuss one such challenge, recently presented by Anne
Sophie Meincke (2021). I begin by presenting Substance-Vitalist Animalism
(SVA). Then, I present Meincke’s main objections against SVA, and the
alternative animalist view she proposes: Processual Animalism (PA).
In her discussion of SVA, Meincke (2021: 253, 263-265) argues that:
(1) SV-animalists have not yet sufficiently explained their key notion of
biological identity;
(2) SV-animalists’ explanation of biological identity largely conflicts with
how biologists and philosophers of biology understand life; and,
(3) SVA is based on the wrong metaphysical framework, namely,
substance metaphysics.
In Meincke’s (2021: 265-272) view, human animals are not static things,
but rather dynamic processes that persist over time by virtue of some form of
stabilization and functional integration.
In this paper, I aim to defend SVA from Meincke’s objections. I begin by
arguing that SV-animalists do account for the constitutive dynamicity of
biological organisms that centrally motivates PA (cf. Olson 1997: 127, 136; van
Inwagen 1990: 93). Then, I argue that PA is excessively obscure and faces
serious metaphysical problems that SVA can avoid. In this way, I claim, PA is
worse positioned than SVA to offer a satisfactory account of our basic
metaphysical nature.
Chair: Christabel Cane
Time: September 13th, 10:00 – 10:30
Location: HS E.002
SOPhiA 2026 