In set at the height of the

In set at the height of the

In order to tackle any concept in ethics you have to think with an open mind.

We as humans need to understand that we dont stand alone on this planet, animals wander beside us. Once we understand that we share the land and its resources then we can make smart ethical choices. In medical ethics we discuss many controversial and highly debated subjects. It is obvious that different people are going to have different opinions, but that is the beauty of it. Everyone has that freedom to think differently, including animals.

They do not think like we do, but they still warrant their freedom to continue to think in their own why and live their with out suffering lives. Animals suffer like humans, and should not be exploited for medical reasons.In instances when animals are used for experimentation there is always a risk. This risk involves the animals life and its right to co-exist with humans. That is the same right that we have to be free and choose our actions. In our past history and even still to this very day risky experiments are done on animals. The thousands of animals put to suffer outweighs any of the research that has been gotten from them.

Peter Singer the author of a piece called Animal Experimentation in the book Intervention and Reflection displays and evokes the actual suffering of many harmless animals. In 1953 R. Soloman, L.

Kamin, and L. Wynne, experimenters at Harvard University, placed forty dogs in a device called a shuttle box, which consists of a box divided into two compartments, separated by a barrier. Initially the barrier was set at the height of the dogs back. Hundreds of intense electric shocks were delivered to the dogs feet through a grid floor….

they then blocked the passage between the compartments with a piece of plate glass and tested the dog again. The dog jumped forward and smashed his head against the glass. The dogs began by showing symptoms such as such as defecation, urination, yelping, and shrieking, trembling, attacking the apparatus..

.. after ten or twelve days of trials dogs who were prevented from escape shock ceased to resist.

The experimenters reported themselves impressed by this, and concluded that a combination of the plate glass barrier and foot shocker was very effective in eliminating jumping by dogs (Singer, 400).Singer argues that experiments serving no direct and urgent purpose should stop immediately, and in the remaining fields of research, we should whenever possible, seek to replace experiments that involve animals with alternative methods that do not…(Singer, 399).

His argument is strong because it relates to the risk that there always is when you have experiments done on animals. He argues that the knowledge that was gained from the experiments in some cases could have been gained in other ways. I have a slightly different take than Singer. I believe there shouldnt be any experiments on animals, but in extreme situations where a huge number of peoples lives are in jeopardy an animal my be used for an experiment.In discussing both sides of the animal rights issue, it is important to understand what is obvious, animals suffer! If aliens were to come to planet earth and force humans to suffer in order to study our behavior or try to experiment on a vaccine, how would we feel? In Singers article he presents the term speciesm. Speciesm is the notion that the interest of non-human animals need not to be considered(Singer, 398). He claims that specieism is analogous to racism, and I agree it is definitely a form of discrimination.

If one argues that the term is ridiculous, than Singer would reply by saying: would experimenters be prepared to carry out their experiments on a human orphan under six months old if that were the only way to save thousands of lives (402)? Infants dont understand whats going on around them, they are taught by their elders and by their later experiences. Human infants possess no morally relevant characteristics to a higher degree than adult non-human animals (403). Speciesism is just as bad as racism, because its the same type unjustified discrimination. Blatant speciesism leads to painful experiments on other species, defended on the grounds of their contribution to knowledge and possible usefulness for our species (Singer, 403).

In Singers article he shows how the painful experiments are similar to the painful experiments that the racist Nazi Germans did on other races. The Nazis described others as the lesser races, and subjected them to harsh experimentation. A Specieist would choose to use animals for experimentation, when brain-damaged humans dont feel pain and are at no risk of feeling pain. In order to perfect a vaccine/specimen it needs to be tried on a human, so why not use the brain dead. They have the same if not lower mental level as animals, and they are humans. Most importantly there is no risk in killing an animal.

There is an on going debate by medical experts on whether animal experimentation has increased the human life expectancy. People that oppose animal rights say that it has. That is false because studies have been done by professionals on ten infectious diseases in the U.S. and in every case except poliomyelitis the death rate had already fallen dramatically before any new form of medical treatment was introduced (Singer, 405). It is simply not a strong enough argument to say that our mortality rate has decreased, because there is no actual evidence to prove it. Singer argues that medical interventions have only a small effect on the mortality rate.

He says more money and focus should be set aside for health care and the major health problems of the world. That is the only reasonable and at the same time justifiable step to take care of the entire animal rights issue.Cohen, the author of a piece called The Case for the Use of Animals in Biomedical Research argues that animals have no rights because he says to have rights involves making a moral claim. He then adds by saying that having a moral claim means having the capacity to recognize conflicts between ones self interest and what is right and being able to restrain ones self-interest when appropriate (Cohen, 406). In response to his statements I would argue that first animals should not be compared to humans in a sophisticated manner as to say they dont think like us. They are referred to as animals for a reason, yes they are different and the way the think makes them different.

Animals and Humans are both co-existing beings that roam the earth, it is understood that animals cannot make moral claims, but does that make it justified to use them for experiments. Does that fact that they cannot make moral claims relieve them from the pain and suffering. No it doesnt, they still suffer alike humans and we are not justified in using them for medical experiments. This issue is not a question of rights is a question of suffering. Second, if animals cannot make moral claims, by the same definition neither can infants and the brain dead.

Infants are not capable of exercising or responding to moral claims. They dont even understand right from wrong or how to survive on their own. So by the same token if it is justifiable to use animals for experimentation then it is the same for infants. If one gets even more sophisticated and says that infants dont count, then what about the notion that the brain dead dont feel pain and are a one hundred percent effective.

If I were a doctor I would want to use something that is going to give a positive reaction. There is no risk in using the brain dead, they are alive because their heart is pumping blood. They dont have moral claims, they dont have emotions, and most of all they dont feel pain that animals surely do.

One thing that is often disregarded about animals is that they do reason, they communicate between their own. They do live their seperate lives, in which they reproduce and care for their young. Animals may not be able to think on complicated levels like humans, but they still use reasoning in order to survive. We share the earth with animals and we should have a hidden moral respect for them.

We cant use them for experiments, because we dont want to use are own kind. We cant discriminate against them because it would not be justified. No one, even animals, wants to suffer needlessly.