Comments on: Medical Research on Animal Models – Where Do You Stand?

By: Flirting with the Dead « Anna’s Bones

Flirting with the Dead « Anna’s Bones — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 20:46:23 +0000

[...] we feel and what the context of this connection is. We relate to primates when it comes to invasive medical testing on Great Apes, but when it comes to war and torture, we squeeze the realm of living things that we connect with [...]

By: Eric

Eric — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 17:38:20 +0000

Unfortunately I was in extremely limited internet world until today, but I do take issue with the invert line. Like Miriam said there are no constraints on the use of inverts in experimentation like the are are for verts, but my feeling is that the policy is primarily a result of our vertebrate bias.

Yes, perhaps many inverts do not identify “pain” and suffering as “more advanced” species do, but at the same time they respond to sufficiently severe negative stimulus with automatic reflex movements and many have severely modified behavior afterward that interferes with their “normal” behavior and ability to rest, feed etc. Does this significantly modified behavior response constitute suffering? Even though they do not have our cognitive abilities?

You know my view on cephalopods, while not on par with great apes, they show more intelligence than many (most) mammals, in the limited way we understand them. Besides they taste good too, just ask the dolphins!

By: WhySharksMatter

WhySharksMatter — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 16:57:56 +0000

You really don’t see a difference between medical research that saves human lives and “torturing and imprisoning” animals?

By: Rena Dictor LeBlanc

Rena Dictor LeBlanc — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 15:53:18 +0000

My point was not that I expect superior aliens to take over earth and imprison and kill humans for the betterment and amusement of their alien race. (Though we’ve set a ghastly example for them should any ever arrive on this planet.}

My point was we should not be torturing, imprisoning, and killing creatures just because we consider ourselves superior to them, and just because we can.

By: WhySharksMatter

WhySharksMatter — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 05:10:37 +0000

“What if a superior race of aliens came to visit earth?”

Are you serious with this question? What if all diseases were cured overnight by eating kashi and singing songs around a campfire? What if the oceans were made out of peanut butter?

Your hypothetical completely distracts from the point of this interesting discussion. Are you saying that we shouldn’t test on animals because we’d feel bad if someone did it to us? Whatever your beliefs are on extraterrestrial life, I think we can agree that your scenario isn’t likely any time soon, I think we can agree that humans are dying from diseases right now, and I think we can agree that animal research has the potential to save human lives.

We have enough actual data to have an interesting discussion here, why are we bringing up a hypothetical superior race of aliens?

By: WhySharksMatter

WhySharksMatter — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 05:06:37 +0000

I was quoting Penn and Teller (technically just Penn, since Teller doesn’t talk), but I agree with them to some degree. I do believe that biodiversity is important and that animals shouldn’t be abused for no good reason- but I believe that saving a human life is a pretty good reason.

By: Irradiatus

Irradiatus — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 00:50:15 +0000

I completely agree. I thought about expanding my original post, but I didn’t want to complicate things too much (or make people read too much).

For instance, I definitely support all behavioral research (i.e. non-invasive, etc.) on great apes, even though it requires keeping them captive. At the same time, captivity conditions should be highly regulated. And I also agree that I don’t think chimps should be given human-level rights.
In the original post, I was primarily talking about experiments that require euthanasia, dissection, viral injection, etc. My personal view is that chimps should not be given diseases. But again, this is only because of my own (admittedly arbitrary) self-awareness cutoff.
I’m not a huge fan of keeping chimps or gorillas in zoos – but I also admit that this is absolutely necessary from a conservation standpoint.
But in essence, I agree with your points – and they’re important ones.

By: zayzayem

zayzayem — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 00:43:26 +0000

There is lots of valuable non-clinical human experimentation that goes on. But usually only on volunteers.

The issue is that animals can’t volunteer. they are either captured, or bred specifically for research.

maybe someone should do more research on how to determine when chimpanzees have given informed consent?

By: zayzayem

zayzayem — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 00:39:39 +0000

What could humans do if such a superior lifeform came along?
How can you eb sure they aren’t right.

Maybe humans ’suffer’, but not in teh same way that these other aliens measure suffering. Could they be blamed for simply following what is in their knowledge?

What would humans do if such a situation occured (a different question to my first)?
Or even more interestingly, what would humans do if non-human animals did what humans would do if they were in their situation?

By: zayzayem

zayzayem — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 00:36:11 +0000

I mean, obviously, most of the worlds humans.