Language as Gesture and Giggling Rats

Q3 Arts and Humanities

Relations Pub Date : 2023-09-26 DOI:10.7358/rela-2023-01-rodr

Randall Rodriguez

引用次数: 0

Abstract

The use of language is frequently cited as a metric for moral consideration. This metric is typically a tool to exclude animal being from the realm of ethics or to promote human exceptionalism. Maurice Merleau-Ponty claims language is a gesture with varying degrees of complexity. Many animal beings use gesture to convey meaning complex and abstract enough to qualify as language according to Merleau-Ponty’s parameters. Rats, despite being thought of as vermin and of a lower order, are some of the beings that convey abstract and complex meaning through gesture. Rats play, work, socialize, communicate meaning, and even laugh. Rats, along with human and many other animal beings use language and should be usured into the realm of moral consideration with any and all language using beings. If not, some other metric for exclusion would have to be adopted.

查看原文本刊更多论文

语言作为手势和咯咯笑的老鼠

语言的使用经常被引用为衡量道德考量的标准。这一标准通常是将动物排除在伦理领域之外或促进人类例外论的工具。莫里斯·梅洛-庞蒂认为语言是一种具有不同复杂程度的姿态。根据梅洛-庞蒂的参数，许多动物使用手势来传达复杂而抽象的意义，足以称得上是语言。尽管老鼠被认为是一种低级的害虫，但它是一种通过手势传达抽象和复杂含义的生物。老鼠玩耍、工作、社交、交流意义，甚至会笑。老鼠，以及人类和许多其他使用语言的动物，应该被纳入道德考虑的领域，与任何和所有使用语言的生物。如果没有，就必须采用其他的排他性指标。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

求助全文

约1分钟内获得全文求助全文

来源期刊

Relations Arts and Humanities-Philosophy

CiteScore

0.30

自引率

0.00%

发文量

审稿时长

20 weeks

期刊介绍： Relations. Beyond Anthropocentrism is a peer-refereed open access journal of trans-anthropocentric ethics and related inquires. The main aim of the journal is to create a professional interdisciplinary forum in Europe to discuss moral and scientific issues that concern the increasing need of going beyond narrow anthropocentric paradigms in all fields of knowledge. The journal accepts submissions on all topics which promote European research adopting a non-anthropocentric ethical perspective on both interspecific and intraspecific relationships between all life species – humans included – and between these and the abiotic environment. We welcome papers, comments, debates, interviews, book and movie reviews, as well as presentations, reports, and other news concerning relevant activities and events. We envision inter- and trans-disciplinary contributions and dialogue from a wide variety of approaches: humanities (e.g. philosophy, literature, arts, law, and religious studies), life sciences (e.g. biology, ecology, ethology, medicine), and social sciences (e.g. economics, politics, anthropology, sociology, psychology). We especially encourage collaborative submissions from different disciplinary approaches, from both senior and junior scholars (including graduate students). All suitable submissions should address both academic and lay audiences as well as relevant stakeholders. Since the journal refers to an international readership of people from different disciplines, both inside and outside the academic community, contributors should keep in mind this heterogeneity of provenances and areas of expertise when writing.