Do You Think Experimentation on Animals other than small rodents and insects should be done?

Question

I'm in the 8th grade at A school in Illiinois and we are doing a United States stimulation thinger [[and for all the "blondes" out there that doesn't know what that is its were we act like we are the senate i guess..]] and we pick topics that we want to do a "bill" on and we discuss it with our class and then we pass or decline it and if it gets passed it goes to our principal and i want to see how many people agree with me on this issue?

Answer 1

Well, firstly I think you need to define what you mean by "experimentation". Most of the people who have posted answers seem to have assumed that it refers specifically to experiments involving drugs, other chemicals or invasive techniques. Maybe that's what you're assuming too, but there are many other fields of science that use animals for experiments to find out about their behaviour or ecology. Some of these studies might involve wild animals, captive bred lab animals or wild animals caught for the experiment. So now someone might think "well, ok but it's just the cruel medical experiments that make animals suffer that we are wanting to consider". But it isn't that simple. Some behavioural experiments might involve, food and water deprivation, handling stress, allowing animals to fight and injure / kill each other. And similarly, a lot of medical and neuroscience research is carried out in such a way that the animals involved have a reasonable quality of life and a relatively humane and painless death. So banning ALL experimentation on animals (except small rodents and insects) would clearly damage our ability to learn about our world, the ecosystems in it, the diseases that kill us and a whole range of other important things that science is currently investigating. However, the other side of the coin is that allowing an open slather on all animal research would clearly expose many animals to cruel, painful procedures that yield only superficial gains for humans and for animals (tests of allergies to cosmetic products springs to mind as an example of cruel research yielding little gain). What I'm trying to illustrate here is that, like most moral and political issues, animal experimentation is complicated and contains a lot of grey areas. There is no one answer that is correct and appropriate for all situations. You must way up the cost to animal (in terms of pain, distress and quality of life) with the potential benefits of the research (progress in disease treatments, better understanding of ecology and environment, for example). And of course not everybody will agree on how costs and benefits would way up. Imagine some experiments that work in such a way that for every monkey who dies (humanely) an extra person will be saved by the treatment. Would you consider that reasonable? What if the monkey died a painful death instead of a humane one? What if it were ten monkeys to every person saved, or a hundred monkeys? What if it were a thousand people each monkey could save? What if the monkey couldn't save anyone's life but could just prolong the lives of sick people for a while? What if it wasn't a monkey, but a cat or a rat? What if there were other research options available, but they might take 6mths longer, or six years longer before the treatments are available? Even if everybody was considering all the same aspects, people would differ in where they draw the line between reasonable and unreasonable. So for this complicated issue, maybe the best "bill" is one that provides guidelines and instructions on how research should be evaluated, but leaves the decision of whether or not each particular experiment goes ahead up to a group of relevant people who understand the costs and benefits and can make an informed decision. I hope this helps you have an interesting discussion in class.

Answer 2

Yes, unfortunately animal experimentation is necessary. Animals get a lot of the same diseases as humans and if we can find cures using the animals both the animals and humans are better for it.

Experiments and studies are conducted on humans as well, they are called Clinical Trials. Many people participate in them--some 100% healthy.

Answer 3

Humans are animals. There is zero evidence for anything like a soul in any animal. When you die, if your body is buried in the ground or left somewhere intact it will rot and be eaten by bacteria and/or scavengers. One way or another your body will break down and continue the cycle of life. There is zero evidence of life after death. That's why it's called "death". To deny any of the statements above is to deny the last 500 years of human progress.

Answer 4

Sorry, but until computers are sophistocated enough to model what a living organism's behavior and response will be to new drugs and treatments, it's the only way we have to learn more about curing diseases.

Answer 5

As long as it is done ethically and humanely, I have no problem with medical/scientific experimenting on animals. Cosmetic animal testing is another story...

Answer 6

it should not be because animals also have God given rights which we, humans should abuse