The lockdowns of the recent pandemic are said to have led to an "Anthropause" – a dramatic release of human pressure on the nonhuman world. From media coverage capturing feral hogs roaming city streets in Europe to daytime sightings of bears and bobcats in American...
The April 2022 Tales of WellBeing included a review of a book on human happiness written by social psychologist and professional ethicist Dr. Jonathan Haidt. Haidt looked at happiness and how it might be achieved from the perspective of positive psychology. Professor Ng’s new (open...
A journey into the alien mind of an insect Bees were once thought to be cleverly designed biorobots that can construct elaborate comb architectures, have labor divisions, and nest climate control. But all this engineering and complex behavior was considered to be delivered by reflex machines...
This book is remarkable and deserves to be very widely read. The cover image is unusual – what on earth could be a man's relationship riding an elephant to happiness? Haidt uses the image to metaphor the human condition in which two systems govern our...
In 1987, when I was working on the first issue of Anthrozoos (the earliest surviving academic journal on human-animal interactions), the publisher and I agreed to carry reviews and brief abstracts of relevant books and scholarly articles appearing in other journals. Back then, this was...
People have been writing epitaphs and memorials to companion dogs for millennia. Perhaps the best-known epitaph to a dog is the one Lord Byron wrote for his Newfoundland, Boatswain. Near this Spot are deposited the Remains of one who possessed Beauty without Vanity, Strength without Insolence, Courage without Ferosity, and all...
In the early days of Anthrozoos, the first academic journal to focus on human-animal interactions, I met many remarkable individuals who agreed to speak at a series of seminars organized by the Tufts Center for Animals and Public Policy. Perhaps the most successful seminar was...
This book is an imaginative analysis of what might happen to the 800 million to one billion dogs in the world if humans suddenly disappeared. Still, there are probably few better scholars to describe and flesh out this imaginary dog’s world. Both authors -- Jessica...
I was immediately attracted to this book because of its title. As a boy, I devoured many of Aesop’s fables and the various folk tales featuring wild animal heroes in Europe, Africa, and the Americas. I am not sure why anthropomorphized animal characters were so...
Congratulations to Peter Li for this comprehensive, well researched book on the history and present-day attitudes and behavior towards animals in China. As a Chinese native living in Europe and, having worked both in grassroots and international non-profit organizations, I have heard so many times...
