Clare Palmer
  • Professor of Philosophy and the George T. and Gladys H. Abell
  • Professor of Liberal Arts

Areas of Specialization

  • Environmental Ethics
  • Animal Ethics
  • Climate Ethics
  • Ethics and Emerging Technologies
  • Ethical Theory
  • Environmental Studies (humanities and social sciences approaches)

Contributes to Departmental Research Strengths In

  • Value Theory and Applied Ethics

Biography

Clare Palmer is the George T. and Gladys H. Abell Professor of Liberal Arts and Professor of Philosophy. She is the author or co-author of four books, including Wildlife Ethics: The ethics of wildlife management and conservation (Wiley Blackwell 2023); Companion Animal Ethics (Wiley Blackwell 2015) and Animal Ethics in Context (Columbia University Press 2010). She has edited or co-edited a number of collections, including Linking Ecology and Ethics for a Changing World (Springer, 2014). She is also the author or co-author of more than 100 other publications, in journals ranging from Philosophical Studies and the Journal of Applied Philosophy to The Veterinary Record and Trends in Ecology and Evolution. She was the founding editor of the journal Worldviews: Environment, Culture, Religion (Brill Academic Press) and held the position of President of the International Society for Environmental Ethics from 2007-2010. In 2023, together with Ron Sandler at Northeastern University, she was awarded a grant by the National Endowment for the Humanities for the project “Ethics of Conservation Biotechnology: A Conceptual Engineering Approach”. She was co-PI on the NSF grant Genomics and Society from 2012-2016 and served from 2017-2019 on a National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine committee on the potential for biotechnology to address forest health. She serves on the editorial board of several journals, including The Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics; Ethics, Policy and Environment and Environmental Humanities. Together with Peter Sandøe and Dan Weary, she co-authors a monthly Ethics column in the Canadian Veterinary Journal.

Educational Background

  • Ph.D., The Queen’s College, University of Oxford, 1993

Scholarly Achievements

  • Wildlife Ethics: The Ethics of Wildlife Management and Conservation (Oxford: Wiley Blackwell, 2023)

  • NEH grant: “The Ethics of Conservation Biotechnology” (Co-PI, 2023)

Fall 2024 Course Schedule

  • Phil 314.500/501 - Environmental Ethics. M, W - 4:10-5:25 p.m. - RICH 106.

Office Hours

  • 2:30-3:30 pm on Wednesday

  • Zoom by appointment