S7E8: Pavlov’s Dogs with Matthew Adams
Matthew Adams joins Claudia on the show to talk about the dogs who were used by Ivan Pavlov in his extensive laboratory operations in St Petersburg. They discuss the importance of psychology and psychological experimentation in debates about multispecies health, also pointing to the importance of art-based research that challenges anthropocentricism.
About Matthew Adams
Matthew Adams is an academic in the School of Humanities & Social Sciences at the University of Brighton, UK. He teaches classes in ecopsychology, the psychology of human-animal relations, posthumanities and creative methods. Mathew’s research challenges conventional perceptions of animal experimentation and considers the nature of scientific work. From 2022-2024, Mathew worked as an Arts and Humanities Research Council Fellow on a project entitled Pavlov and the kingdom of dogs: Storying experimental animal histories through arts-based research. Read more about the project in Qualitative Research in Psychology and Trace: Journal for Human-Animal Studies; or explore the online exhibition. Matthew’s most recent book is titled Anthropocene Psychology: Being Human in a More-Than-Human World, and he is currently working on another, provisionally titled An A-Z of the Anthropocene: Key Ideas for Navigating End Times and New Beginnings. Find out more about Matthew and his work on instagram (@dogsofpavlov), X (@mattadams0)and via his university profile.
Featured:
Pavlov and the kingdom of dogs by Matthew Adams
Ecological Crisis, Sustainability and the Psychosocial Subject by Matthew Adams
Anthropocene Psychology: Being Human in a More-than-human world by Matthew Adams
Nature and Experience in the Culture of Delusion by David W. Kidner
When Species Meet by Donna Harraway
Nature in an Active Voice by Val Plumwood
What’s in it for the animals? By Richard Gorman
Dog Cognition with Alexandra Horowitz on The Animal Turn Podcast
ANIMAL HIGHLIGHT:
Inspired by the conversation with Matthew Adams, Priyanshu Thapliyal considers the ethics of doing ethnographic fieldwork with street dogs and the debates that arise when dogs get sick. He focuses on Ruby, a dog whose health was rapidly deteriorating and how he found himself breaking his rule of non-intervention.
Ruby
“Help us re-imagine the world in richer terms that will allow us to find ourselves in dialogue with and limited by other species’ needs, other kinds of minds. I’m not going to try to tell you how to do it. There are many ways to do it. But I hope I have convinced you that this is not a dilettante project. The struggle to think differently, to remake our reductionist culture, is a basic survival project in our present context. I hope you will join it” (Val Plumwood, 2009, Nature in an Active Voice)
Thank you to Animals in Philosophy, Politics, Law and Ethics (A.P.P.L.E) for sponsoring this podcast; Remaking One Health (ROH) Indies for sponsoring this season; Gordon Clarke (Instagram: @_con_sol_) for the bed music, Jeremy John for the logo, Rebecca Shen for her design work, Priyanshu Thapliyal for the Animal Highlight, and Christiaan Mentz for his audio editing. This episode was produced by the host Claudia Towne Hirtenfelder.
