In the philosophical subdiscipline of ontology, animalism is a theory of personal identity that asserts that human persons are animals. The concept of animalism is advocated by philosophers Eric T. Olson, Peter Van Inwagen, Paul Snowdon, Stephan Blatti, David Hershenov and David Wiggins. The view stands in contrast to positions such as John Locke's psychological criterion for personal identity or various forms of mind–body dualism, such as Richard Swinburne's account. Whilst the animalist is committed to something like the claim that human persons are essentially animals, the animalist is quite content to allow non-human persons, e.g., sufficiently advanced robots, aliens, or other animals.