The purpose of this article is to explore the relationship between the thought of Richard Rorty and that of his former teacher, Charles Hartshorne. There are important similarities between the two, but ultimately the differences are more readily apparent, especially in terms of the battle between poetry (in the wide sense of the term conceived by Rorty) and (Hartshornian) metaphysics. Hartshorne is defended against Rorty.

A number of philosophers have found inspiration in the writings of Alfred Whitehead to develop their ideas on environmental and animal ethics. I explore the writings of Charles Hartshorne and Daniel Dombrowski to address the question of whether Whiteheadians should be vegetarians. I conclude that there is a morally relevant distinction between plants and animals, based on the Whiteheadian view that animals have higher grades of experience, and that this distinction grounds a moral duty to adopt minimal moral veganism.

In this short article I respond, both positively and negatively, but mostly positively, to Jan Deckers’ examination of my defense of nonhuman animal rights from the perspective of process philosophy and from the perspective of what is commonly called the argument from marginal cases.