Speaker

Melanie

Challenger

Founding Director

Animals in the Room

Biography

Melanie Challenger is a writer, researcher and broadcaster on history of ideas. She is the author of On Extinction: How we became estranged from nature (2011), How to Be Animal: What it means to be human (2021), and anthology editor of Animal Dignity: Philosophical Reflections on Non-human Existence (2023). She is the current Deputy Co-Chair of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics and a Vice President of the RSPCA. She is also a founding director of Animals in the Room, which seeks to establish representation methods for the interests of non-human animals. Melanie writes widely for publications and contributes to films and broadcast, including documentaries for BBC, Netflix, Arte, and ZDF. She hosts the podcast series The Psychosphere about intelligence and agency in nature.

Quote

The spirit of innovation is to renew that which we might need but have forgotten and to make new that which we know but no longer need. The radical challenges we and the rest of the living world face call on us to harness what is useful from past histories and also to envision bold new ways to expand our institutions to consider more than human interests. In that spirit, I am delighted to join the IID2025 events.

Browse Other Speakers
At IID 2025