Simon Coghlan
Biographic Data
| ID | 1490355 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Simon Coghlan |
| GIVEN NAMES | Simon |
| FAMILY NAME | Coghlan |
| SIGNATURE | COGHLAN S |
| AFFILIATIONS | The University of Melbourne |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6021-9878 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 22 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 13 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 22 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2014 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Ethical gaps and power dynamics in decision-making about AI adoption: The case of AI for monitoring student learning in education
Adopting AI in multi-stakeholder contexts often involves complex ethical challenges, particularly when decision-makers are not directly impacted by the technology. Ethical challenges arise not only from the design of the AI technology but also from social factors in its development and deployment which may harm disempowered stakeholders. This paper examines how stakeholder dynamics in AI adoption may help to create or mitigate such harm, using a …
Clarifying Anthropomorphism for Robots and AI: A Critical Review
‘Anthropomorphism’, broadly understood as associating humanness with nonhuman entities, has been widely studied in the context of human interactions with social robots and computers. However, despite its centrality in human-machine interaction studies, the idea remains confusing and requires further clarification. This paper provides a critical conceptual review of how anthropomorphism is essentially characterized or conceptualized by scholars fo…
Beyond ‘Basic’ AI-Animal Alignment
In their article ‘AI Alignment: The Case for Including Animals’, Tse et al. compellingly argue for extending alignment endeavours beyond humans to also protect sentient animals. They call for AI alignment with a ‘basic’ level of animal welfare. Since ‘basic’ alignment carries minimal human cost, they argue, it can be widely accepted and is thus currently more strategically appropriate than is pursuing advanced or ideal alignment with animal welfa…
Animal Privacy and Information Technology
Emerging discussion asks whether it makes sense to speak of animal privacy and how information technologies might increasingly affect it. In an excellent recent article, “Digital Platforms, Privacy, and the Ethics of Wildlife Information Sharing,” Alan Rubel and colleagues defend the idea and ethical importance of animal privacy. Though their argument is compelling, some readers may still worry that the language of ‘animal privacy’ is problematic…
Cut the crap: A critical response to “ChatGPT is bullshit
In a recent thought-provoking essay called “ChatGPT is Bullshit,” Hicks, Humphries and Slater call such large language models (LLMs) “bullshitters” and “bullshit machines.” Unlike the term “bullshit,” they argue, commonly used anthropomorphic terms such as “hallucination” and “confabulation” mispresent LLMs and sow confusion that could be socially harmful. This paper criticizes their essay in two steps. First, its reliance on Harry Frankfurt’s cl…
Nonhuman Animal Dignity
The concept of nonhuman animal dignity is much less discussed than human dignity but is starting to attract philosophical interest. This paper examines 'animal dignity' and details four possible kinds, namely dignity as inherent worth and/or high moral significance, dignity related to flourishing animal natures and justice, social dignity, and honour-based dignity. The paper reviews criticisms of animal dignity and offers some replies. It conside…
An irreducible understanding of animal dignity
Alongside lively philosophical debate about human dignity (Etinson, 2020; Rosen, 2012), several philosophers have begun asking whether “dignity” could also illuminate our moral relations with nonhuman animals (e.g., Abbate, 2020; Anderson, 2005; Gruen, 2014; Humphreys, 2016; Nussbaum, 2006; Ortiz, 2004). Increasing talk of animal dignity is also occurring in public and even legal discourse (Kotzmann & Seery, 2017). For example, in a recent habeas…
Ethics of using artificial intelligence (AI) in veterinary medicine
This paper provides the first comprehensive analysis of ethical issues raised by artificial intelligence (AI) in veterinary medicine for companion animals. Veterinary medicine is a socially valued service, which, like human medicine, will likely be significantly affected by AI. Veterinary AI raises some unique ethical issues because of the nature of the client–patient–practitioner relationship, society’s relatively minimal valuation and protectio…
Helping and not Harming Animals with AI
Ethical discussions about Artificial Intelligence (AI) often overlook its potentially large impact on nonhuman animals. In a recent commentary on our paper about AI’s possible harms, Leonie Bossert argues for a focus not just on the possible negative impacts but also the possible beneficial outcomes of AI for animals. We welcome this call to increase awareness of AI that helps animals: developing and using AI to improve animal wellbeing and promo…
Harm to Nonhuman Animals from AI: A Systematic Account and Framework
This paper provides a systematic account of how artificial intelligence (AI) technologies could harm nonhuman animals and explains why animal harms, often neglected in AI ethics, should be better recognised. After giving reasons for caring about animals and outlining the nature of animal harm, interests, and wellbeing, the paper develops a comprehensive ‘harms framework’ which draws on scientist David Fraser’s influential mapping of human activit…
It’s About Safety Not Snooping”: Parental Attitudes to Child Tracking Technologies and Geolocation Data
Families are increasingly using new apps and devices that provide detailed information about the location and activities of children and other family members. While typically performed for benevolent reasons such as maintaining child safety, tracking technologies like Life360 and Find My iPhone raise concerns about snooping and surveillance. This paper examines parental behaviours and attitudes towards this controversial practice via an online su…
The role of ethical reflection and dialogue in conceptualising animal welfare
This paper argues that ethical reflection and dialogue can assist in understanding what animal welfare is. Questions about animal welfare’s nature are thorny and contested. Responding to an essay by Donald Bruckner, the paper acknowledges that animal welfare is a type of normative value (namely prudential value) distinct from ethical value and that the methodology for determining prudential value is not simply reducible to ethical thought. Howeve…
Improving ethical attitudes to animals with digital technologies: The case of apes and zoos
The “digital animal intuition: ” The Ethics of Violence Against Animals in Video Games
Good Proctor or “Big Brother”? Ethics of Online Exam Supervision Technologies
Online exam supervision technologies have recently generated significant controversy and concern. Their use is now booming due to growing demand for online courses and for off-campus assessment options amid COVID-19 lockdowns. Online proctoring technologies purport to effectively oversee students sitting online exams by using artificial intelligence (AI) systems supplemented by human invigilators. Such technologies have alarmed some students who …
Digital Phenotyping: An Epistemic and Methodological Analysis
Robots and the Possibility of Humanistic Care
Could Social Robots Make Us Kinder or Crueller to Humans and Animals
Strong Patient Advocacy and the Fundamental Ethical Role of Veterinarians
This essay examines the fundamental role of veterinarians in companion animal practice by developing the idea of veterinarians as strong advocates for their nonhuman animal patients. While the practitioner-patient relationship has been explored extensively in medical ethics, the relation between practitioner and animal patient has received relatively less attention in the expanding but still young field of veterinary ethics. Over recent decades, …
The Essential Connection Between Human Value and Saintly Behavior
Humanism, Anti-Humanism, and Nonhuman Animals
Many attacks against the anthropocentric prejudice that nonhuman animals have a slight or impoverished ethical subjecthood are also attacks on the humanistic idea of human moral uniqueness. This essay examines a way of overturning that anthropocentric prejudice by deploying certain conceptual resources of an expansive ethical humanism. Although this may appear to be a strange route to that destination, the suggestion is raised that this approach …
Australia and Live Animal Export: Wronging Nonhuman Animals
The decades-old trade of exporting nonhuman mammals by ship from Australia became a major political issue in 2011, when video taken by animal rights group Animals Australia was broadcast on television, showing Australian cattle being appallingly abused in Indonesian abattoirs. Taking its cue from the unprecedented response from Australians to the 2011 footage, many of whom were haunted by the video images, this article argues that the live export…
It’s About Safety Not Snooping”: Parental Attitudes to Child Tracking Technologies and Geolocation Data
Families are increasingly using new apps and devices that provide detailed information about the location and activities of children and other family members. While typically performed for benevolent reasons such as maintaining child safety, tracking technologies like Life360 and Find My iPhone raise concerns about snooping and surveillance. This paper examines parental behaviours and attitudes towards this controversial practice via an online su…
Robots and the Possibility of Humanistic Care
Cut the crap: A critical response to “ChatGPT is bullshit
In a recent thought-provoking essay called “ChatGPT is Bullshit,” Hicks, Humphries and Slater call such large language models (LLMs) “bullshitters” and “bullshit machines.” Unlike the term “bullshit,” they argue, commonly used anthropomorphic terms such as “hallucination” and “confabulation” mispresent LLMs and sow confusion that could be socially harmful. This paper criticizes their essay in two steps. First, its reliance on Harry Frankfurt’s cl…
Could Social Robots Make Us Kinder or Crueller to Humans and Animals
Strong Patient Advocacy and the Fundamental Ethical Role of Veterinarians
This essay examines the fundamental role of veterinarians in companion animal practice by developing the idea of veterinarians as strong advocates for their nonhuman animal patients. While the practitioner-patient relationship has been explored extensively in medical ethics, the relation between practitioner and animal patient has received relatively less attention in the expanding but still young field of veterinary ethics. Over recent decades, …
Australia and Live Animal Export: Wronging Nonhuman Animals
The decades-old trade of exporting nonhuman mammals by ship from Australia became a major political issue in 2011, when video taken by animal rights group Animals Australia was broadcast on television, showing Australian cattle being appallingly abused in Indonesian abattoirs. Taking its cue from the unprecedented response from Australians to the 2011 footage, many of whom were haunted by the video images, this article argues that the live export…
The Essential Connection Between Human Value and Saintly Behavior
Humanism, Anti-Humanism, and Nonhuman Animals
Many attacks against the anthropocentric prejudice that nonhuman animals have a slight or impoverished ethical subjecthood are also attacks on the humanistic idea of human moral uniqueness. This essay examines a way of overturning that anthropocentric prejudice by deploying certain conceptual resources of an expansive ethical humanism. Although this may appear to be a strange route to that destination, the suggestion is raised that this approach …
Strong Patient Advocacy and the Fundamental Ethical Role of Veterinarians
This essay examines the fundamental role of veterinarians in companion animal practice by developing the idea of veterinarians as strong advocates for their nonhuman animal patients. While the practitioner-patient relationship has been explored extensively in medical ethics, the relation between practitioner and animal patient has received relatively less attention in the expanding but still young field of veterinary ethics. Over recent decades, …
Could Social Robots Make Us Kinder or Crueller to Humans and Animals
Improving ethical attitudes to animals with digital technologies: The case of apes and zoos
The “digital animal intuition: ” The Ethics of Violence Against Animals in Video Games
Good Proctor or “Big Brother”? Ethics of Online Exam Supervision Technologies
Online exam supervision technologies have recently generated significant controversy and concern. Their use is now booming due to growing demand for online courses and for off-campus assessment options amid COVID-19 lockdowns. Online proctoring technologies purport to effectively oversee students sitting online exams by using artificial intelligence (AI) systems supplemented by human invigilators. Such technologies have alarmed some students who …
Digital Phenotyping: An Epistemic and Methodological Analysis
Robots and the Possibility of Humanistic Care
The role of ethical reflection and dialogue in conceptualising animal welfare
This paper argues that ethical reflection and dialogue can assist in understanding what animal welfare is. Questions about animal welfare’s nature are thorny and contested. Responding to an essay by Donald Bruckner, the paper acknowledges that animal welfare is a type of normative value (namely prudential value) distinct from ethical value and that the methodology for determining prudential value is not simply reducible to ethical thought. Howeve…
Harm to Nonhuman Animals from AI: A Systematic Account and Framework
This paper provides a systematic account of how artificial intelligence (AI) technologies could harm nonhuman animals and explains why animal harms, often neglected in AI ethics, should be better recognised. After giving reasons for caring about animals and outlining the nature of animal harm, interests, and wellbeing, the paper develops a comprehensive ‘harms framework’ which draws on scientist David Fraser’s influential mapping of human activit…
It’s About Safety Not Snooping”: Parental Attitudes to Child Tracking Technologies and Geolocation Data
Families are increasingly using new apps and devices that provide detailed information about the location and activities of children and other family members. While typically performed for benevolent reasons such as maintaining child safety, tracking technologies like Life360 and Find My iPhone raise concerns about snooping and surveillance. This paper examines parental behaviours and attitudes towards this controversial practice via an online su…
An irreducible understanding of animal dignity
Alongside lively philosophical debate about human dignity (Etinson, 2020; Rosen, 2012), several philosophers have begun asking whether “dignity” could also illuminate our moral relations with nonhuman animals (e.g., Abbate, 2020; Anderson, 2005; Gruen, 2014; Humphreys, 2016; Nussbaum, 2006; Ortiz, 2004). Increasing talk of animal dignity is also occurring in public and even legal discourse (Kotzmann & Seery, 2017). For example, in a recent habeas…
Ethics of using artificial intelligence (AI) in veterinary medicine
This paper provides the first comprehensive analysis of ethical issues raised by artificial intelligence (AI) in veterinary medicine for companion animals. Veterinary medicine is a socially valued service, which, like human medicine, will likely be significantly affected by AI. Veterinary AI raises some unique ethical issues because of the nature of the client–patient–practitioner relationship, society’s relatively minimal valuation and protectio…
Helping and not Harming Animals with AI
Ethical discussions about Artificial Intelligence (AI) often overlook its potentially large impact on nonhuman animals. In a recent commentary on our paper about AI’s possible harms, Leonie Bossert argues for a focus not just on the possible negative impacts but also the possible beneficial outcomes of AI for animals. We welcome this call to increase awareness of AI that helps animals: developing and using AI to improve animal wellbeing and promo…
Animal Privacy and Information Technology
Emerging discussion asks whether it makes sense to speak of animal privacy and how information technologies might increasingly affect it. In an excellent recent article, “Digital Platforms, Privacy, and the Ethics of Wildlife Information Sharing,” Alan Rubel and colleagues defend the idea and ethical importance of animal privacy. Though their argument is compelling, some readers may still worry that the language of ‘animal privacy’ is problematic…
Cut the crap: A critical response to “ChatGPT is bullshit
In a recent thought-provoking essay called “ChatGPT is Bullshit,” Hicks, Humphries and Slater call such large language models (LLMs) “bullshitters” and “bullshit machines.” Unlike the term “bullshit,” they argue, commonly used anthropomorphic terms such as “hallucination” and “confabulation” mispresent LLMs and sow confusion that could be socially harmful. This paper criticizes their essay in two steps. First, its reliance on Harry Frankfurt’s cl…
Nonhuman Animal Dignity
The concept of nonhuman animal dignity is much less discussed than human dignity but is starting to attract philosophical interest. This paper examines 'animal dignity' and details four possible kinds, namely dignity as inherent worth and/or high moral significance, dignity related to flourishing animal natures and justice, social dignity, and honour-based dignity. The paper reviews criticisms of animal dignity and offers some replies. It conside…
Ethical gaps and power dynamics in decision-making about AI adoption: The case of AI for monitoring student learning in education
Adopting AI in multi-stakeholder contexts often involves complex ethical challenges, particularly when decision-makers are not directly impacted by the technology. Ethical challenges arise not only from the design of the AI technology but also from social factors in its development and deployment which may harm disempowered stakeholders. This paper examines how stakeholder dynamics in AI adoption may help to create or mitigate such harm, using a …
Clarifying Anthropomorphism for Robots and AI: A Critical Review
‘Anthropomorphism’, broadly understood as associating humanness with nonhuman entities, has been widely studied in the context of human interactions with social robots and computers. However, despite its centrality in human-machine interaction studies, the idea remains confusing and requires further clarification. This paper provides a critical conceptual review of how anthropomorphism is essentially characterized or conceptualized by scholars fo…
Beyond ‘Basic’ AI-Animal Alignment
In their article ‘AI Alignment: The Case for Including Animals’, Tse et al. compellingly argue for extending alignment endeavours beyond humans to also protect sentient animals. They call for AI alignment with a ‘basic’ level of animal welfare. Since ‘basic’ alignment carries minimal human cost, they argue, it can be widely accepted and is thus currently more strategically appropriate than is pursuing advanced or ideal alignment with animal welfa…
Epistemology (11 works) · Psychology (11 works) · Political science (9 works) · Sociology (9 works) · Computer Science (8 works) · Ethics and Social Impacts of AI (8 works) · Engineering (7 works) · Law (7 works) · Philosophy (7 works) · Engineering ethics (6 works)