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BIDDEFORD, Maine

‘Unmute Podcast’ interviews 51Ʒphilosopher David Livingstone Smith on dehumanization

David Livingstone Smith
David Livingstone Smith

David Livingstone Smith, Ph.D., professor of philosophy, served as a guest on the Unmute Podcast on August 31 to discuss dehumanization.

Smith explained dehumanization, the conception of a group of people as subhuman, as a precursor to racism and violence. As highly social animals, he said, humans have inhibitions against harming their own kind, so viewing others as not belonging to our kind enables us to commit atrocities against them. “Dehumanization is one… way, I think, of disabling these inhibitions against doing harm,” he stated. “It’s kind of a solution to a problem.”

Smith explored the relationships among dehumanization, racial bigotry, creepiness and the conception of others as monsters. His new book, titled Making Monsters: The Uncanny Power of Dehumanization is scheduled for publication by Harvard University Press in 2018.

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