I know it's controversial, and it is an "ends justifies the means" "for the greater good" thing, but testing medicines on animals might help find cures and treatments for certain animal species.
It's horrible, I'll admit, and I don't think people are foolish for opposing it, but if, for example, you know about the Tasmanian Devil cancer thing that only occurs in Tas Devils? If testing on a few of them, and having them suffer during it, if that finds a treatment that would help all the Tas Devils, is it worth it?
Would humans ever try to find that cure, and if they did would they use it? No.
1) Endangered species. Humanitarians would never, ever alow someone to slice them open even if it's for their own good.
2) Does it help humans, no, so there is no funding for it.
3) Say someone does pay for it because it might link to human cancer. Will they pay for the cure to be used on all the Tasmanian Devils?
They are trying to find a cure, and there is funding. The University of Sydney has devoted a whole research grant towards it. And the cancer doesn't affect humans.
I can't answer all hypothetical situations - and I'm have a position on this, but not a firm one. Just that medical science isn't purely devoted to human illness - animal diseases are a key part of cure and treatment research.
Sorry, before anyone clicks on that Wikipedia link - There's a rather sad and distressing picture of a Devil infected with the cancer, if you're sensitive to that sort of thing.
I read that article, and I find it bewildering. yet ANOTHER disease decimating a population of animals! I know that evolution and "survival of the fittest" has something to do with it, but it seems like their are a ton of animals and plants that are dealing with species-threatening diseases.
There's always heaps of people handing out flyer and they have these laminated booklets and shite about the Devils, and I'm not sure whether this is true of not, but apparently it's due Tasmania's bush continually being cut down. Like, quite a large part of Tasmania was bushland until the early 90s, and the hippies trying to get me to join said that was the reason.
But I dunno, because like the other articles say, the disease is mostly due to spreading and breeding, so it may just be a coincidence that it occurred at the same time as the bush being reduced, and not as a dire result of it.
The thing of it is, regardless of whether or not you are all for animal rights, think that our lives are of greater/lesser importance, or even have a "for the greater good" mentality, I think when it comes to this subject people tend to have somewhat faulty logic. Sure certain animals have similar DNA, but it isn't exact. How many medication recalls have we seen, say, in the last few years? How many lawsuits against drug companies? The point I'm trying to make is, whether we like it or not, it kind of seems that because of these inaccurate results humans are the Guinea pigs anyway ... It looks to me as though medicinal animal
testing is an unnecessary step in that equation. Does that make sense?
Like I said, I'm not an expert on this.
But I guess it would be alright if the animals testing was the benefit that particular species (Ie testing on dogs for a disease in dogs) or in an animal they know the results will be similar to humans (I know that pigs have very similar organs to us).
Yes, I do agree with that. Lol and this might seem a bit off the wall but have you ever seen/heard of a movie called Fire in the Sky? A guy is abducted by aliens, they probe and torture him, yadda yadda yadda, it's old and cheesy yet as a child that scared the living shit out of me! Not just because of what happened, but why it happened. The indifference! It wasn't malicious or cruel, in fact I'm sure it was scientific. However it was the blatant and unspoken "fuck you, you don't matter" of the
situation that struck such a note of terror for
me. I suppose I see too many parallels. Haha sorry for going on and on.
The main problem with this is that animal testing for medicine is inaccurate. Medicine doesn't work the same way in monkeys or rats as in humans, so you end up with a load of painfully killed animals and not too many cured humans.
Yes. We only share less than 2% of diseases with other animals. This doesn't lead to very accurate results as we have to give the animal a disease they couldn't naturally get. For example, we have found many cures for AIDS in chimps, but none of these have worked on humans. It is just not worth it with the horrible conditions they have to live in and the inaccurate results. I do understand where OP is coming from though.
Medicine isn't tested on animals and then just given straight to people. Ever medicine available on the market has to go through clinical trials (on humans) before the FDA approves it. They do animal tests to make sure it doesn't kill the humans they'll eventually test on.
Its true that for medical purposes, animal testing is sometimes necessary. But for stuff like makeup, soap, or razors? I mean seriously,there are plenty of products that manage to stay safe and effective without killing hundreds of innocent animals in the process. They should get more recognition.
(Tallglassofwater):Yes, but there are still hundreds of thousands of other animals tested on each year. They don't even count the rats and mice.
In 2005 there were:
66,610 dogs
57,531 primates
58,598 pigs
245,786 rabbits
22,921 cats
176,988 hamsters
64,146 other farm animals
32,260 sheep
231,440 other animals
221,286 guinea pigs
And they are the lucky ones. Some are put through these trials, survive, and are put through more test even with disfigurements from the first test. Finally, when the humans decide that they are no longer useful, they murder them.
Oh cmon, rabbits and guinea pigs? Ever heard the expression "those two fuck like rabbits"? Probably a good eighth of those rabbits came from one or two rabbit couples. That's like counting the amount of gophers that have been shot by farmers.
while all these other people are right saying that many other types of animals are being tested on besides mice, why wouldn't we care about mice? a living thing is a living thing and just because it's smaller it doesn't mean it's somehow not as important as any other organism. if you test on it it will feel the excruciating pain any other living being would feel, so why dismiss that?
I agree, but I disagree too. People get paid to test new medicines. What do the animals get? But I understand the whole human lives>animal lives thing.
One of the reasons we use animals though is because you can breed them to have certain traits. Breeding humans takes waaaay too long, and no one would give up their babies to do a study.
How about NOT using animals and just letting people die? All we've ever done is destroy the Earth, it'll only do more dammage if we keep multiplying. Face it: we're a plague.
No, I am not a troll, and I know it's horrible, but just think for a second: who the fuck are we to decide that our lives are more important than every other living creature's and that we can completely unbalance nature? We haven't even done anything good to deserve the privilege of hurting others to save ourselves.
Well, first of all, a wolf doesn't think. Second, yes, a wolf DOES try to keep itself and its pack alive, but do you really think it's conscious of its prey's suffering? And even if it is, a wolf kills, he doesn't leave an animal to rot in a cage for its entire life. Third, the wolf population is far from being as great and as damaging as the human poulation. Besides, killing for food is part of the circle of life, what we humans did is deform it and make it much, much worse.
Getting a pet dog is a different situation to sponsoring a child.
And, I know this isn't relevant to the post, but it's just a "Always someone worse" argument. Like, someone wants to donate money to an animal abuse charity, and then someone points out there are women living in poverty, and people are more important than animals.
So the first person decides to donate money to the women living in poverty, but then someone else points out that the women may be poor, but they have homes, and there are homeless youth that could use the money more.
So the person decides to donate money to homeless youth organisation, but then another person says that at least these homeless youth are homeless in a 1st world country where they can at least eat food out of garbage cans and get water from drinking fountains, and people in 3rd world countries don't even have that.
In the end, just let people donate to the causes that are important to them.
Yes, but of course he goes to point out Africa in that situation. The U.S has thousands of starving kids, but do you ever hear someone saying, "Why support animals when there are starving kids in the U.S?" No.
Also, his comment almost makes it sound like Africa is the only country where there's starving kids. js
I watch movies on factory farming and what not, but honestly? i understand they are in awful shape and i donate money and stuff to help that cuase, but I alway make sure to donate more time and money to organisations that save kids with desieses in Africa, and earthquake victims in hatit. Humans need to come before animals. it is unethical to care more aboutanimals hat your own sister or brother human.
We are yes. But we have a higher brain capacity. That is to say< our brains are more advanced and therefor we can have complex emotions and can creat and produce. That makes us more advanced. Besides, elk save other elk before they would save a chipmunk. it just makes sense to save humans before other amimals. ESPECCIALLY is those humans are kids.
I'm aware of the brain structure, and I see what you're saying, but I still am not sure if an elk life is worth more than a human life.
To us, a family member's life would be worth more than an elk's, but to a baby elk, the life of their mother or father would be worth more than a human's life. It really depends who you're asking.
Well... simce we can't ask an elk (because they are not as advanced as us) i think we need to save humans first. True, an elk will miss it's mother, but when any animal (with the exaption of a few animals) they leave thier mother aand really never see them again. Not the case with hum,ans. And anyway how can you say any animal might be worth more than a human life? At this point in time, humans are the dominent creater and we need to save within our own species regardless. Sure I feel really sad when i see animals sufering and i do what i can to help them, but i always make humans the priority beauce that is what is natural and right.
Just because we're at the top of the food chain doesn't mean we're "better" than another creature. Being more advanced isn't necessarily better, it just means we have more technology. Btw, you have you ever research elephants? They emotions just as complex as humans.
And, sure, you make humans the priority...who wouldn't chose to save their mom or friend over a centipede? I still don't agree that a humans are so much better than animals.
Read this:
Isn't man an amazing animal? He kills wildlife - birds, kangaroos, deer, all kinds of cats, coyotes, beavers, groundhogs, mice, foxes, and dingoes - by the millions in order to protect his domestic animals and their feed. Then he kills domestic animals by the billions and eats them. This in turn kills man by the million, because eating all those animals leads to degenerative - and fatal - health conditions like heart disease, kidney disease, and cancer. So then man tortures and kills millions more animals to look
I didn't say we need to just go killing animals all the time, but i don't think it is ethical to save more animals than humans.Sure there need to be efforts to save animals and stop animal crualty, but it just makes sense and is natural to save humans more. I mean, yeah, I know anyone would save thier mother over an animal, but i think we should have the same compasion for a homless child or starving man. Everyone always complains about wars (usually the same people who are more for animal rights) but how can we be expected to all get along if we are mor comcerned about the elephant in the forest than the well being of other humans. Does tha make sense? it's kinda hard to explain. And here i thought it was just common sense to save your fellow human....
Maybe if we have more concern for "lesser" creatures than ourselves, we will learn to love other humans more.
I totally understand what you are saying; I'm not saying that if my best friend was sick I would say no to animal testing. I just hate it when people think that humans are so much better than animals - therefore we can domesticate them, test and torture them, and force them into factory farms. I'm not saying that an animal's life is worth more than a human life, but it's not necessarily less either. I think we need to respect other species and while we may be the more advanced, it doesn't necessarily make us God when it comes to deciding what is right with other animals. Take breeding puppies - humans artificially select which ones to breed just to make them prettier for us to keep as pets. That's just wrong. We have no right to go around enslaving other species just because we can and because it is more convenient for us.
Well... I agree with the first part I guess. i don't think humans should be able to treat tham badly, like troture tham and put them in the awful fatory farms. I do think though that hmans are better than other animals. but that does not give us a right to treat tham badly. What I mean is, we have to face the reality that humans are more advanced and complexly built with more complex emotions and feelings and understanding of concepts. That is why we are the dominent species on the planet. And scientificaly speaking, we are better than other animals. But like you siad we can not treat tham badly. It's like "with great power comes great responsibility" or watever. And the breedign thing is very differnt. If it dose not hurt or harm the animal, why can't we breed. I see your point, but dogs really do not care who they breed with like humans do. They don't understand the concept of an "arranged marrige". It dosnt bother them or harm them so why should it matter?
What makes you so sure that we have so much more complex emotions though? As I said before, an elephant has just as many emotions as a human. Just because were different from another species doesn't mean they are less than us. Squirrels could have thoughts and feelings like us - they're just part of a world where humans are at the top and we can't understand them. We have better technology and yes, we're on the top of the food chain, but that doesn't make is better - it just makes us at the top of the food chain. The only thing leading to our advanced minds was the opposable thumb mutation.
And even if breeding doesn't physically torture the animal, it is still wrong. It takes away an animal's rights. Other species were meant to live wild and on their own, not have a doggy jacket and a leash on. And I think that dogs do care who they mate with. Not as much as humans, yes, but I don't think they want to just be put with any other dog.
Also, what makes you
so sure that a dog isn't bothered by breeding? Many breeders (not to mention puppy mills) take a mother's puppies away before they are old enough. They are shoved in pet stores with bad conditions. Many breeds have things wrong with them, such as hip problems, because they have been overbred.
I do like your comment about great power coming with great responsibility, though. I completely agree.
for cures for these diseases. Elsewhere, millions of other human beings are being killed by hunger and malnutrition because food they could eat is being used to fatten domestic animals. Meanwhile, some people are dying of sad laughter at the absurdity of man, who kills so easily and so violently, and once a year sends out a card praying for "Peace on Earth."
Well if we are more advanced than other animals and we can feel complex emotions, shouldn't that seperate us from the elk? Family and other people are obviously important, but we should treat people and creatures with the same respect and kindness that we treat our equals with. Also, would you save a person who might not live much longer or an endangered animal first? I honestly don't know what i'd do.
Okay. Problem one is the fact that animal trials rarely if ever mirror human trials. Problem two is that there are faster, more accurate, AND cheaper alternatives to animal testing, such as in-vitro, but law requires all pharmaceutical companies to test on animals.
I used to be completely against the whole idea of animal testing but when my dad was diagnosed with an incurable disease, my opinion was changed. He has ALS and before they started testing, it would take a life in less than five years. Now they're testing on mice and the survival time has increased to, in some cases, 25 years. They are working on not only slowing and stopping the disease, but also reversing its effects. They have had great success in both the mice and humans. I understand it is not always like that but if one of your family members' life was at risk, wouldn't you be okay with animal testing if it would potentially save them?
If animal testing was the only option, sure. But we have alternative means of testing which have been proven to be more accurate. What happens if we found the perfect cure for mice, but when the drug gets tested on humans it's totally ineffective? If you'd tested with in-vitro or any of the other new testing methods, there's almost no chance that would happen. Testing would be faster, and the drug would be already through production.
For one thing, they would probably test the genes to make sure humans and mice share the same genes (which the probably would - http://www.newscientist.com/art...-into-men.html )
Also, many animals are bred for the sole purpose of testing, and the ones that aren't like dogs probably came from a shelter where they were going to be euthanized anyway.
In vitro tests aren't actually that effective. If you were to test a product on a cell culture, then you wouldn't have the benefit of seeing the effect on various other tissues, systems, and the body as a whole. If you were to fertilize an animal embyro in vitro, it may give some insight into development, but not likely effects on the adult.
Your INB4 was a strawman.
You weren't fighting him, but typing the usual argument against stem cell research in chatspeak and in an overly-simplistic way = strawman.
My English class is assigned a speech to defend a side in a controversial topic, and continuing the stem cell research just seems like the logical idea. Plus, there are alternatives and other ways to retrieve stem cells without "killing a baby", like parthenogenesis, the single-cell embryo biopsy method, somatic cell nuclear transfer (not done yet; theoretic), etc.
Plus, I don't mean to bash on other people's religion, but when you think about it, sometimes the Bible is halting the progress of our society. Religion was created as a story to explain what happened, but now we have logical explanations for everything. Setting laws completely around the Bible is unfair. Like same-sex marriage or stem cell research. Setting laws to agree with the Christian religions is theocracy, not democracy, and is rather ethnocentric. Son, I'm gonna go logic on their ass!
And if I've offended you by bashing the Bible a bit, sorry. Just stating my take on this topic. Long live your retarded meme.
I haven't read that much about it.
Is it true most stem cells can come from umbilical cords rather than terminated pregnancies.
Also, with regards to motivation - banning stem cell research isn't banning abortion. This is gonna sound a little morbid, but abortions are going to occur anyway, so we might as well put them to use. And I don't think legalising stem cell research will make a woman abort a pregnancy that she wouldn't have if it were illegal.
You can do stem cell research on aborted fetuses, but also on the inner cells of a blastocyst, which is a pretty early stage of development (in my opinion, it's not a baby until it pushes its way of the vagina). But I think stem cell research can also be done on somatic cells, like bone marrow or something like that (induced pluripotent stem cells) so they don't need to use embryos anymore.
I've never heard of stem cells coming from aborted fetuses. They are retrieved through a process called in vitro fertilization, which is a process to create an embryo and implant it in a woman's womb. This is for couples who can't conceive a baby naturally. Usually, multiple embryos are made, so extras are frozen and stored. With the couple's consent, they can be donated for embryonic stem cell research.
Yay someone who knows what they're talking about. Embryonic stem cells are much more useful for research and possible treatments than adult stem cells that are found in umbilical chords or bone marrow.
Yup. However, there are stem cells found in amniotic fluid with all of the properties and potency of embryonic stem cells. Then there are other alternatives, listed in the first paragraph of my comment below.
For all sake of argument, the argument of stem cell research (should be) is over. Scientists managed to take skin cells off of someone's arm, and, don't ask me for details, but they made stem cells out of them.
So theoretically in the future, if someone's liver is failing: doctors take skin cells from the arm, make into stem cells, grow liver specific to that person, do a transplant.
As a fellow animal, I believe in the preservation of my species. And if that means the sacrifice of mice, so be it. This is a sacrifice I am willing to make.
Wouldn't that actually be a kingdom? I'm not sure of the actual order of that all, only took bio in grade ten, but I don't think it's the animal species :p
YES, we are destroying the world and perhaps taking this too far, but if you consider humans to be on the same level as animals, you can argue that humans are just trying to survive. (This is ironic because we are killing off many essential animals that could collapse the ecosystem once extinct, so we are really killing ourselves)
Anyways, this probably didn't answer anything and had no relevance whatsoever to anything you said. So yeah...
I would just like to state that Earth isn't in anyway in danger as of now. Us humans are fucked though. But you said yourself that we aren't anymore important than other animals.
You make a VERY valid argument (no sarcasm here); however, as living organisms, it is only natural for humans to want to benefit human existence before thinking of animals, just like it's natural for other animals to try to continue their existence. Animals compete for resources and don't really care about the well being of the other organisms. For example, cuckoo birds will lay their eggs in starlings' nests and use the starlings as surrogate parents to raise the much larger cuckoo chick. The cuckoo can kill the starling chicks and drive the starling parents to the point of exhaustion. One can argue that humans have taken a similar approach with animal testing. Why spare human lives when you can kill off other animals, since the goal is to continue the species. Why do we not test animal medicines on humans? Because it wouldn't help our species.
Humans are actually the LEAST important species on this planet in terms of the food chain. If every single human died right now, nature would take over, our cities woils crumble, and the pollution would basically disappear. However, if every insect died, the food chain would collapse, not to mention all the dead bug bodies everywhere >.>
Sometimes I argue things just for the sake of arguing, not because I actually believe this.
But I do believe that human lives are more important than animal lives. I don't think we should kill for the sake of killing, but for our own survival and well-being. I eat meat. I drink milk. I support testing on animals.
with that logic I could say that at some point in your life you have killed an animal (not on purpose but for food or in one way or another) or multiple animals and since they are more important you are now a murderer. We are not destroying the earth like every main-stream news station will tell you and in fact, thats the dumbest thing you could say. Earth will live on no matter what effect us Humans do the only thing we can do to the Earth though is make it more hostile towards us and eventually make it uninhabitable.
Animal testing doesn't just occur in the medical field. They also use it on beauty products and such.
But it is proven that animal testing isn't accurate, and there are other less expinseve & more accurate ways to test things without harming animals. I personally find animal testing suk and disgusting.
I would. Damn straight I would. If I died I'd be one less person to take care of. If you're testing on an animal, they can't say "Oh,I want to help save a human life! Test on me!" or say no. But I can, and I'd rather be tested on that some animal that was specifically bred for testing.
I recently wrote a research paper on animal testing. It has led to some important medical advances (such as the treatment of polio) but animal testing can be very tricky. Animals aren't always infected by the same diseases as humans (monkeys can't develop human AIDS; mice can't develop human cancers), and substances that are harmful to animals might not be harmful to humans (or vice versa). For example, according to animal tests, cigarette smoke, arsenic, and asbestos have no advese effects on health, while penicillin is a deadly substance. A huge percentage of drugs created through animal testing show serious problems during clinical trials, such as severe side effects or failure to work at all. Of course, animal testing isn't as bad as many people think. A very tiny amount of experiments are classified as "high suffering." In many the animals feel little or no pain. Besides, it is still more accurate than computer programs or in vitro methods. For now, it's the best we can do.
I also just did a biology project on this, and there are several different methods for research that do not involve animals, the most popular one being stem cell research.
Humans can give consent, animals cannot, we are using these beautiful creatures for our own devices simply because we feel that we are somehow "better"
"92 percent of all drugs that are shown to be safe and effective in animal tests fail in human trials because they don’t work or are dangerous."
From this article- http://www.peta.org/issues/anim...d-science.aspx
Don't animals and humans have like.... a different generic makeup or something like that.. We're different so what might work on, let's say, a mouse, might not work on humans.
Who are we to say that we're so much better than any other species that we can test on them? Testing on animals isn't even remotely effective. We don't share enough DNA with animals to be able to test some drug on them, have it work, and be able to say that we can "safely" test on humans. Vote me down all you want, but I also believe that we don't need medication for quite a few drugs - we already have almost 7 billion people and we aren't even taking good care of everybody. When we're at the point where there are no 3rd world countries, where atleast everybody has some kind of shelter, and running water, and food (however bad it may be, it's better than nothing at all) then maybe we should start to find a cure for diseases. We could be spending the $18 BILLION dollars we spend testing on animals each year on providing clean water, food, and shelter for the families in other countries that has none of that. Vote me down all you want, it's my opinion...
Well this is a big debate. But ummm soon the world is going to be overpopulated and people are going to be KILLING each other to survive. There won't be enough space on earth, and pollution would cause havoc. I sound like an evil demon person here, but you know what let some people die. I know! I know! Its harsh, but a few dead could seriously improve the future. Think about what I said before screaming at me btw
We're not fucking up natural selection. We're just taking it on a new path. I agree though. Survival of the fittest. And it's not like what we're doing is causing mass extinction. Perhaps it is unethical to basically breed animals for the purpose of testing on them. But people could say the same thing about breeding animals to keep as pets.
LET'S STOP CAGING UP DOGS AND ALLOW THEM TO LIVE IN THE WILD AS THEY NATURALLY ARE SUPPOSED TO DO.
I don't actually believe this, and I know that keeping pets is distinctly different from testing on animals, but let's be real here. We're being cruel by domesticating animals, perhaps.
@1215367 (polarthebear): Also, I thought that domestication happened more by accident than intention (in most cases). As in, wild dogs would hang around homes because they got food scraps and were protective of that area. Obviously it wasn't long until people started "owning" them.
I definitely agree. I also agree with Simon's post about animal testing for medicinal purposes, but not cosmetic purposes.
We should test cosmetics on criminals.
It makes me happy to see that most commets on here aren't saying "OMG!!1! You're stupid! [enter opinion here] is totally the way to go and you're wrong!"
I like that most people commeting on this post are stating their opinion AND listening to the opinions of others.
There is about 7 billion people in the world now, if we all stood shoulder to shoulder we would only fill a city the size of Los Angeles. The world is not even close to being over populated.
Right now there are a little under 7 billion people in the world, and over 1 billion of these people are starving. In 2050, we are expected to have an extra 2 billion mouths to feed. That sounds just a little overpoupulated to me.
So we should just let those people who have loved ones and lives die just for the good of those lucky enough not to contract the disease? These people will pass away eventually anyway-just like the rest of the population. That does not mean that we should let them die an early death if we have possibilities to save them. The way you wrote that comment was so callous and selfish. We can't look at people as just "The Population." They are PEOPLE with LIVES and FAMILY. They matter- even if you don't think they do.
Survival of the fittest, natural selection, whatever you want to call it, the world is becoming over populated, there was always thi joke in my 9th grade social class "If we fed all the obese children in the world to all the starving kids in the world, we could solve over-population AND world hunger!"
Well, if you don't look at people as The Population and instead just their individual lives, we'll get nowhere in fixing this problem or soon-to-be problem.
As soon as we find a cure to today's diseases a bunch of new ones will appear. It's survival of the fittest, but humans have pretty much gotten rid of that concept and that's why we are so over populated. And torturing animals for our benefit is wrong.
Let me put it in an easy way: MICE ARE NOT LITTLE MEN. They dont react to things the same way as we do. Letting the monkey smoke? We know its bad why do we do it? watch "pee" (south park) let me explain: monkey flip out when they are peed on but after given a banana they shut up. Do we flip out when we get peed on and only calm down after getting a banana? I dont think so.
In my opinion I don't think this post should be POTD. It's a very debated topic and a lot of people have different views on it. It's kinda like having a POTD saying "abortion should be illegal, amirite?" except maybe not that extreme, but it's something like that.
People disagree on any post. That's the point, these are opinions. I'm pretty sure there have been posts about abortions that are the POTD or posts that talk about races, religion, possibly inappropriate jokes, etc. The POTD makes people discuss and have conversations. It helps to see both sides of the argument
Yeah, cause testing thalidamide on animals worked out grreeaat for the 20 000 people who are now dead/disabled because of the medicine that was 100% safe because poor animals were tested on and it didn't affect them.
what if we tested the medicine on people who are criminals. I would much rather see osama bin laden killed by being tested on than a bunny. (YES I KNOW HE IS DEAD)
Because I'm a horrible person and don't care for people, I strongly disagree with this post.
Why not use humans instead. It will give them more accurate results.
And whats a couple of people gone to help thousands of other people?
I mean, if the "cure" ends up not working, the lost lives still meant something. And plus it'll even out the population by a bit.
And get people who are desperate for a cure.. Because I'm sure that there are many people out there willing for it.
If not, get prisoners to do it.. They are just lying around in jail for basically their whole life doing nothing to help the world.
(Bring on the hate) (:
That's not your call though. It's not the government's job to decide who gets do live and who is forced to take potentially fatal medications. You're using the same logic as Hitler when he had German scientists perform experiments on Jews. Congratulations.
I compared your train of logic to Hitler, not you. Are you aware that the U. S. government has executed hundreds of innocent people? I'm not saying murderers don't deserve justice, but that is what prison is for. Go read 12 Angry Men; this kind of thing happens more than you know.
Can you guarantee me that EVERY SINGLE prisoner is guilty? No. No, you cannot. And Hitler and the surrounding society as a whole, except Jews in hiding I guess, believed them all to be guilty. They probably had the same views you do about the prisoners today here in the US.
ADDITIONALLY, Concentration Camps were "made by the government". Take a basic history class, please.
Actually, according to The Innocence project, there are quit a few people that have the potential to be exonerated afte being wrongly convicted, and many already have
Hitler also had scientist do testing on twins, such as taking one twin with 1 arm and one with 2, and grafting one of the twins arm on to the other one to see if it could be transplanted shudders
Well obviously they have to be in an environment that can be controlled and monitored; I'm not really clear on this, are you saying we shouldn't have prisons? What is the alternative?
They were gonna die any way. And lethal injection doesnt hurt any way, so why not use them to help cure medical problems? Cant they help out to save lots of other people to help make up for the lives they took?
Good movie.. Kind of scary. I don't think that something like that would ever happen though. And if it did, we have lots of military to take care of it before it spreads or something.
So did they, and I think it's quite possible. With all the genetic engineering and stuff going on, how long before somebody makes a mistake and we have a "Zombie Apocolypse"
I already posted my opinions on testing on prisoners on the last post about this, which got voted down quite a lot, but I think no human should be subjected to torture. Including pedophiles and serial killers. Testing on humans without their consent is torture. I would rather test on the kindest bunny in the world than Osama Bin Ladin.
Are you saying that you believe that animals deserve that treatment? That they have lesser rights then us, just because we are the more dominent species? Humans are technically animals, and we shouldn't be using animals for our own needs.
BUT, in some cases it might be nessaccary. I do kind of understand where you are coming from. It's kind of a hard subject-I believe that animals deserve equal rights, but I am also strongly against the whole 'lethal injection' punishment America offers (why should they play God?) which seems to be the most sensible alternative.
I see now that my opinion wasn't really needed : ahaha
This exactly.
Using animal testing for cosmetics (make up, shampoo, etc.) is wrong, because those things aren't nessacary.
But using animal testing for medical purposes, even though it may be horrible, could help many people AND animals.
@1198926 (Simon): Not trying to criticize, but how exactly does torturing animals help them?
I know it's controversial, and it is an "ends justifies the means" "for the greater good" thing, but testing medicines on animals might help find cures and treatments for certain animal species.
It's horrible, I'll admit, and I don't think people are foolish for opposing it, but if, for example, you know about the Tasmanian Devil cancer thing that only occurs in Tas Devils? If testing on a few of them, and having them suffer during it, if that finds a treatment that would help all the Tas Devils, is it worth it?
Would humans ever try to find that cure, and if they did would they use it? No.
1) Endangered species. Humanitarians would never, ever alow someone to slice them open even if it's for their own good.
2) Does it help humans, no, so there is no funding for it.
3) Say someone does pay for it because it might link to human cancer. Will they pay for the cure to be used on all the Tasmanian Devils?
They are trying to find a cure, and there is funding. The University of Sydney has devoted a whole research grant towards it. And the cancer doesn't affect humans.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De...tumour_disease
I can't answer all hypothetical situations - and I'm have a position on this, but not a firm one. Just that medical science isn't purely devoted to human illness - animal diseases are a key part of cure and treatment research.
Sorry, before anyone clicks on that Wikipedia link - There's a rather sad and distressing picture of a Devil infected with the cancer, if you're sensitive to that sort of thing.
I read that article, and I find it bewildering. yet ANOTHER disease decimating a population of animals! I know that evolution and "survival of the fittest" has something to do with it, but it seems like their are a ton of animals and plants that are dealing with species-threatening diseases.
let's just blame it all on Global Warming!
There's always heaps of people handing out flyer and they have these laminated booklets and shite about the Devils, and I'm not sure whether this is true of not, but apparently it's due Tasmania's bush continually being cut down. Like, quite a large part of Tasmania was bushland until the early 90s, and the hippies trying to get me to join said that was the reason.
But I dunno, because like the other articles say, the disease is mostly due to spreading and breeding, so it may just be a coincidence that it occurred at the same time as the bush being reduced, and not as a dire result of it.
This may sound bad, but I didn't want to click on the link until you said that there was a sad picture...
I actually made a post about this recently where I explain my position more: http://www.amirite.net/580365
I dunno if I'm allowed to link now that this is the POTD, but it is relevant to the topic of animal testing.
The thing of it is, regardless of whether or not you are all for animal rights, think that our lives are of greater/lesser importance, or even have a "for the greater good" mentality, I think when it comes to this subject people tend to have somewhat faulty logic. Sure certain animals have similar DNA, but it isn't exact. How many medication recalls have we seen, say, in the last few years? How many lawsuits against drug companies? The point I'm trying to make is, whether we like it or not, it kind of seems that because of these inaccurate results humans are the Guinea pigs anyway ... It looks to me as though medicinal animal
testing is an unnecessary step in that equation. Does that make sense?
Yes, that does make sense, and it is very true.
Like I said, I'm not an expert on this.
But I guess it would be alright if the animals testing was the benefit that particular species (Ie testing on dogs for a disease in dogs) or in an animal they know the results will be similar to humans (I know that pigs have very similar organs to us).
Yes, I do agree with that. Lol and this might seem a bit off the wall but have you ever seen/heard of a movie called Fire in the Sky? A guy is abducted by aliens, they probe and torture him, yadda yadda yadda, it's old and cheesy yet as a child that scared the living shit out of me! Not just because of what happened, but why it happened. The indifference! It wasn't malicious or cruel, in fact I'm sure it was scientific. However it was the blatant and unspoken "fuck you, you don't matter" of the
situation that struck such a note of terror for
me. I suppose I see too many parallels. Haha sorry for going on and on.
Well, if they've prepared for the testing, I think they would have no reason to be nervous.
The main problem with this is that animal testing for medicine is inaccurate. Medicine doesn't work the same way in monkeys or rats as in humans, so you end up with a load of painfully killed animals and not too many cured humans.
Yes. We only share less than 2% of diseases with other animals. This doesn't lead to very accurate results as we have to give the animal a disease they couldn't naturally get. For example, we have found many cures for AIDS in chimps, but none of these have worked on humans. It is just not worth it with the horrible conditions they have to live in and the inaccurate results. I do understand where OP is coming from though.
Medicine isn't tested on animals and then just given straight to people. Ever medicine available on the market has to go through clinical trials (on humans) before the FDA approves it. They do animal tests to make sure it doesn't kill the humans they'll eventually test on.
Its true that for medical purposes, animal testing is sometimes necessary. But for stuff like makeup, soap, or razors? I mean seriously,there are plenty of products that manage to stay safe and effective without killing hundreds of innocent animals in the process. They should get more recognition.
...how does a shaving razor kill hundred of animals? And why would that even need animal testing?
Thats my point exactly.
You could pretty much test that on a carpet, or plush toys
Are people really that concerned about mice?
Most people think "animal testing" means testing on puppies, like in Legally Blond...
It does. Chimpanzees, monkeys, guinea pigs, dogs, cats, sheep, rabbits, mice, rats, and many other animals are all tested on.
Don't forget the guinea pigs.
Where do you think these wings came from?
But still, mice and rats make up 90% of animals bred for testing.
(Tallglassofwater):Yes, but there are still hundreds of thousands of other animals tested on each year. They don't even count the rats and mice.
In 2005 there were:
66,610 dogs
57,531 primates
58,598 pigs
245,786 rabbits
22,921 cats
176,988 hamsters
64,146 other farm animals
32,260 sheep
231,440 other animals
221,286 guinea pigs
And they are the lucky ones. Some are put through these trials, survive, and are put through more test even with disfigurements from the first test. Finally, when the humans decide that they are no longer useful, they murder them.
In 2005 more than double of all that humans died.
That is not all the animals that died that year, that is just the animals that died from animal testing that they recorded.
WHO GIVES A FUCK.
Oh cmon, rabbits and guinea pigs? Ever heard the expression "those two fuck like rabbits"? Probably a good eighth of those rabbits came from one or two rabbit couples. That's like counting the amount of gophers that have been shot by farmers.
while all these other people are right saying that many other types of animals are being tested on besides mice, why wouldn't we care about mice? a living thing is a living thing and just because it's smaller it doesn't mean it's somehow not as important as any other organism. if you test on it it will feel the excruciating pain any other living being would feel, so why dismiss that?
I wish we just had a macne to fix all of this.
All the answers lie in the futer.
I agree, but I disagree too. People get paid to test new medicines. What do the animals get? But I understand the whole human lives>animal lives thing.
I think that the dogs would earn a free pass to dog heaven because not every animal can say they've had a positive impact on society.
What about the bunnies and kitties?
One of the reasons we use animals though is because you can breed them to have certain traits. Breeding humans takes waaaay too long, and no one would give up their babies to do a study.
We do studies on babies? I thought whenever scientists did human testing, even for baby products, it's on adult humans.
No, we don't. When we test on animals, for more scientific research (aka not cosmetics) we need specific traits, so they breed the animals.
The dogs should get a Scooby Snack.
How about NOT using animals and just letting people die? All we've ever done is destroy the Earth, it'll only do more dammage if we keep multiplying. Face it: we're a plague.
Reference to the matrix?
Nope, I never watched the movie, sorry to disappoint you...
Obvious troll is obvious.
@1215225 (Anonymous): The scariest thing about this is I don't think that this is a troll.
No, I am not a troll, and I know it's horrible, but just think for a second: who the fuck are we to decide that our lives are more important than every other living creature's and that we can completely unbalance nature? We haven't even done anything good to deserve the privilege of hurting others to save ourselves.
Does a wolf think his life is more important than yours? I can guarantee he does and will do everything to keep himself and his pack alive
Well, first of all, a wolf doesn't think. Second, yes, a wolf DOES try to keep itself and its pack alive, but do you really think it's conscious of its prey's suffering? And even if it is, a wolf kills, he doesn't leave an animal to rot in a cage for its entire life. Third, the wolf population is far from being as great and as damaging as the human poulation. Besides, killing for food is part of the circle of life, what we humans did is deform it and make it much, much worse.
Yee fo reel dawg
I love your words
thank you! i try telling this to people all the time. its like the animal commercials to adopt a pet, you should rather want to save a child in Africa
Aren't you a little young to be sponsoring African children?
I sponsor a kid in Colombia and I'm 15...but I'm going anon as to not be a douchebag
You're not a douchebag, Ben.
I know you do. I have read your profile.
And I also know that you can take jokes. I see no point in your comment. =)
Everyone has read your profile, polarthebear.
Yes. Yes, they are.
Getting a pet dog is a different situation to sponsoring a child.
And, I know this isn't relevant to the post, but it's just a "Always someone worse" argument. Like, someone wants to donate money to an animal abuse charity, and then someone points out there are women living in poverty, and people are more important than animals.
So the first person decides to donate money to the women living in poverty, but then someone else points out that the women may be poor, but they have homes, and there are homeless youth that could use the money more.
So the person decides to donate money to homeless youth organisation, but then another person says that at least these homeless youth are homeless in a 1st world country where they can at least eat food out of garbage cans and get water from drinking fountains, and people in 3rd world countries don't even have that.
In the end, just let people donate to the causes that are important to them.
whatcha doin?
I don't think he was implying that. He mean't there are are starving kids there that need help, and that is a fact.
Yes, but of course he goes to point out Africa in that situation. The U.S has thousands of starving kids, but do you ever hear someone saying, "Why support animals when there are starving kids in the U.S?" No.
Also, his comment almost makes it sound like Africa is the only country where there's starving kids. js
Continent*
Oh shit, I knew that. Heat of the moment.
ANIMALS ARE PEOPLE TOO!!!!
so true, its sad so many animals live much better lives than people.
Apparently the thought of factory farming has never crossed your mind.
I watch movies on factory farming and what not, but honestly? i understand they are in awful shape and i donate money and stuff to help that cuase, but I alway make sure to donate more time and money to organisations that save kids with desieses in Africa, and earthquake victims in hatit. Humans need to come before animals. it is unethical to care more aboutanimals hat your own sister or brother human.
What makes humans so much better than "animals"? We are an animal.
We are yes. But we have a higher brain capacity. That is to say< our brains are more advanced and therefor we can have complex emotions and can creat and produce. That makes us more advanced. Besides, elk save other elk before they would save a chipmunk. it just makes sense to save humans before other amimals. ESPECCIALLY is those humans are kids.
I'm aware of the brain structure, and I see what you're saying, but I still am not sure if an elk life is worth more than a human life.
To us, a family member's life would be worth more than an elk's, but to a baby elk, the life of their mother or father would be worth more than a human's life. It really depends who you're asking.
Well... simce we can't ask an elk (because they are not as advanced as us) i think we need to save humans first. True, an elk will miss it's mother, but when any animal (with the exaption of a few animals) they leave thier mother aand really never see them again. Not the case with hum,ans. And anyway how can you say any animal might be worth more than a human life? At this point in time, humans are the dominent creater and we need to save within our own species regardless. Sure I feel really sad when i see animals sufering and i do what i can to help them, but i always make humans the priority beauce that is what is natural and right.
Just because we're at the top of the food chain doesn't mean we're "better" than another creature. Being more advanced isn't necessarily better, it just means we have more technology. Btw, you have you ever research elephants? They emotions just as complex as humans.
And, sure, you make humans the priority...who wouldn't chose to save their mom or friend over a centipede? I still don't agree that a humans are so much better than animals.
Read this:
Isn't man an amazing animal? He kills wildlife - birds, kangaroos, deer, all kinds of cats, coyotes, beavers, groundhogs, mice, foxes, and dingoes - by the millions in order to protect his domestic animals and their feed. Then he kills domestic animals by the billions and eats them. This in turn kills man by the million, because eating all those animals leads to degenerative - and fatal - health conditions like heart disease, kidney disease, and cancer. So then man tortures and kills millions more animals to look
I didn't say we need to just go killing animals all the time, but i don't think it is ethical to save more animals than humans.Sure there need to be efforts to save animals and stop animal crualty, but it just makes sense and is natural to save humans more. I mean, yeah, I know anyone would save thier mother over an animal, but i think we should have the same compasion for a homless child or starving man. Everyone always complains about wars (usually the same people who are more for animal rights) but how can we be expected to all get along if we are mor comcerned about the elephant in the forest than the well being of other humans. Does tha make sense? it's kinda hard to explain. And here i thought it was just common sense to save your fellow human....
Maybe if we have more concern for "lesser" creatures than ourselves, we will learn to love other humans more.
I totally understand what you are saying; I'm not saying that if my best friend was sick I would say no to animal testing. I just hate it when people think that humans are so much better than animals - therefore we can domesticate them, test and torture them, and force them into factory farms. I'm not saying that an animal's life is worth more than a human life, but it's not necessarily less either. I think we need to respect other species and while we may be the more advanced, it doesn't necessarily make us God when it comes to deciding what is right with other animals. Take breeding puppies - humans artificially select which ones to breed just to make them prettier for us to keep as pets. That's just wrong. We have no right to go around enslaving other species just because we can and because it is more convenient for us.
Well... I agree with the first part I guess. i don't think humans should be able to treat tham badly, like troture tham and put them in the awful fatory farms. I do think though that hmans are better than other animals. but that does not give us a right to treat tham badly. What I mean is, we have to face the reality that humans are more advanced and complexly built with more complex emotions and feelings and understanding of concepts. That is why we are the dominent species on the planet. And scientificaly speaking, we are better than other animals. But like you siad we can not treat tham badly. It's like "with great power comes great responsibility" or watever. And the breedign thing is very differnt. If it dose not hurt or harm the animal, why can't we breed. I see your point, but dogs really do not care who they breed with like humans do. They don't understand the concept of an "arranged marrige". It dosnt bother them or harm them so why should it matter?
What makes you so sure that we have so much more complex emotions though? As I said before, an elephant has just as many emotions as a human. Just because were different from another species doesn't mean they are less than us. Squirrels could have thoughts and feelings like us - they're just part of a world where humans are at the top and we can't understand them. We have better technology and yes, we're on the top of the food chain, but that doesn't make is better - it just makes us at the top of the food chain. The only thing leading to our advanced minds was the opposable thumb mutation.
And even if breeding doesn't physically torture the animal, it is still wrong. It takes away an animal's rights. Other species were meant to live wild and on their own, not have a doggy jacket and a leash on. And I think that dogs do care who they mate with. Not as much as humans, yes, but I don't think they want to just be put with any other dog.
Also, what makes you
so sure that a dog isn't bothered by breeding? Many breeders (not to mention puppy mills) take a mother's puppies away before they are old enough. They are shoved in pet stores with bad conditions. Many breeds have things wrong with them, such as hip problems, because they have been overbred.
I do like your comment about great power coming with great responsibility, though. I completely agree.
for cures for these diseases. Elsewhere, millions of other human beings are being killed by hunger and malnutrition because food they could eat is being used to fatten domestic animals. Meanwhile, some people are dying of sad laughter at the absurdity of man, who kills so easily and so violently, and once a year sends out a card praying for "Peace on Earth."
Well if we are more advanced than other animals and we can feel complex emotions, shouldn't that seperate us from the elk? Family and other people are obviously important, but we should treat people and creatures with the same respect and kindness that we treat our equals with. Also, would you save a person who might not live much longer or an endangered animal first? I honestly don't know what i'd do.
Okay. Problem one is the fact that animal trials rarely if ever mirror human trials. Problem two is that there are faster, more accurate, AND cheaper alternatives to animal testing, such as in-vitro, but law requires all pharmaceutical companies to test on animals.
I used to be completely against the whole idea of animal testing but when my dad was diagnosed with an incurable disease, my opinion was changed. He has ALS and before they started testing, it would take a life in less than five years. Now they're testing on mice and the survival time has increased to, in some cases, 25 years. They are working on not only slowing and stopping the disease, but also reversing its effects. They have had great success in both the mice and humans. I understand it is not always like that but if one of your family members' life was at risk, wouldn't you be okay with animal testing if it would potentially save them?
If animal testing was the only option, sure. But we have alternative means of testing which have been proven to be more accurate. What happens if we found the perfect cure for mice, but when the drug gets tested on humans it's totally ineffective? If you'd tested with in-vitro or any of the other new testing methods, there's almost no chance that would happen. Testing would be faster, and the drug would be already through production.
For one thing, they would probably test the genes to make sure humans and mice share the same genes (which the probably would - http://www.newscientist.com/art...-into-men.html )
Also, many animals are bred for the sole purpose of testing, and the ones that aren't like dogs probably came from a shelter where they were going to be euthanized anyway.
In vitro tests aren't actually that effective. If you were to test a product on a cell culture, then you wouldn't have the benefit of seeing the effect on various other tissues, systems, and the body as a whole. If you were to fertilize an animal embyro in vitro, it may give some insight into development, but not likely effects on the adult.
I was aborted and I'm offended.
/not letting an overused meme die
My dad died while overusing a meme. This isn't funny, it's just offensive.
"stem sells cum from baby abortions"
As opposed to the toddler abortions, pre-teen abortions, and elderly abortions, Ben's strawman.
I'm not dissing your use of it, though.
I don't wanna debate you Ben. I'd rather debate someone who has the most loved comments, like DanielJames.
Your INB4 was a strawman.
You weren't fighting him, but typing the usual argument against stem cell research in chatspeak and in an overly-simplistic way = strawman.
My English class is assigned a speech to defend a side in a controversial topic, and continuing the stem cell research just seems like the logical idea. Plus, there are alternatives and other ways to retrieve stem cells without "killing a baby", like parthenogenesis, the single-cell embryo biopsy method, somatic cell nuclear transfer (not done yet; theoretic), etc.
Plus, I don't mean to bash on other people's religion, but when you think about it, sometimes the Bible is halting the progress of our society. Religion was created as a story to explain what happened, but now we have logical explanations for everything. Setting laws completely around the Bible is unfair. Like same-sex marriage or stem cell research. Setting laws to agree with the Christian religions is theocracy, not democracy, and is rather ethnocentric. Son, I'm gonna go logic on their ass!
And if I've offended you by bashing the Bible a bit, sorry. Just stating my take on this topic. Long live your retarded meme.
I haven't read that much about it.
Is it true most stem cells can come from umbilical cords rather than terminated pregnancies.
Also, with regards to motivation - banning stem cell research isn't banning abortion. This is gonna sound a little morbid, but abortions are going to occur anyway, so we might as well put them to use. And I don't think legalising stem cell research will make a woman abort a pregnancy that she wouldn't have if it were illegal.
You can do stem cell research on aborted fetuses, but also on the inner cells of a blastocyst, which is a pretty early stage of development (in my opinion, it's not a baby until it pushes its way of the vagina). But I think stem cell research can also be done on somatic cells, like bone marrow or something like that (induced pluripotent stem cells) so they don't need to use embryos anymore.
I've never heard of stem cells coming from aborted fetuses. They are retrieved through a process called in vitro fertilization, which is a process to create an embryo and implant it in a woman's womb. This is for couples who can't conceive a baby naturally. Usually, multiple embryos are made, so extras are frozen and stored. With the couple's consent, they can be donated for embryonic stem cell research.
Yay someone who knows what they're talking about. Embryonic stem cells are much more useful for research and possible treatments than adult stem cells that are found in umbilical chords or bone marrow.
Yup. However, there are stem cells found in amniotic fluid with all of the properties and potency of embryonic stem cells. Then there are other alternatives, listed in the first paragraph of my comment below.
For all sake of argument, the argument of stem cell research (should be) is over. Scientists managed to take skin cells off of someone's arm, and, don't ask me for details, but they made stem cells out of them.
So theoretically in the future, if someone's liver is failing: doctors take skin cells from the arm, make into stem cells, grow liver specific to that person, do a transplant.
Millions of animals in nature died today and suffered in the process. If some animals die for the benefit of humans, I'm all for it.
i don't think you can compare dying of natural causes to dying from being cut open, injected with chemicals, and mutilated.
what about.......POKEMON TESTING!?!?!?
As a fellow animal, I believe in the preservation of my species. And if that means the sacrifice of mice, so be it. This is a sacrifice I am willing to make.
..but you're not making any sacrifices.
Wouldn't that actually be a kingdom? I'm not sure of the actual order of that all, only took bio in grade ten, but I don't think it's the animal species :p
http://www.amirite.net/541697
Funny how people sway both ways, and both posts are positive.
Your's is specifying prisoners.
The two things wrong w/yours:
1) Hitler tested on innocent Jews because they were "prisoners"
(the connection I was JUST informed of below)
2) It opens the door to testing on people for anything. "Jaywalking? Eh? Hold still while you I give you this shot..."
http://www.amirite.net/71759
Self promotion chain! But keep it about animal testing people.
What if an 18 yr. old has sex with a 15 yr. old (equivalent of high school senior and sophomore)?
Statutory Rape.
Where do we draw the line?
In many states it is illegal.
So do we test animal vaccinations on humans?
YES, we are destroying the world and perhaps taking this too far, but if you consider humans to be on the same level as animals, you can argue that humans are just trying to survive. (This is ironic because we are killing off many essential animals that could collapse the ecosystem once extinct, so we are really killing ourselves)
Anyways, this probably didn't answer anything and had no relevance whatsoever to anything you said. So yeah...
I would just like to state that Earth isn't in anyway in danger as of now. Us humans are fucked though. But you said yourself that we aren't anymore important than other animals.
It isn't in danger?
You make a VERY valid argument (no sarcasm here); however, as living organisms, it is only natural for humans to want to benefit human existence before thinking of animals, just like it's natural for other animals to try to continue their existence. Animals compete for resources and don't really care about the well being of the other organisms. For example, cuckoo birds will lay their eggs in starlings' nests and use the starlings as surrogate parents to raise the much larger cuckoo chick. The cuckoo can kill the starling chicks and drive the starling parents to the point of exhaustion. One can argue that humans have taken a similar approach with animal testing. Why spare human lives when you can kill off other animals, since the goal is to continue the species. Why do we not test animal medicines on humans? Because it wouldn't help our species.
Humans are actually the LEAST important species on this planet in terms of the food chain. If every single human died right now, nature would take over, our cities woils crumble, and the pollution would basically disappear. However, if every insect died, the food chain would collapse, not to mention all the dead bug bodies everywhere >.>
As the most intelligent species, we should be smart enough to know not to exploit other animals, but to find other ways of testing new medications.
Sometimes I argue things just for the sake of arguing, not because I actually believe this.
But I do believe that human lives are more important than animal lives. I don't think we should kill for the sake of killing, but for our own survival and well-being. I eat meat. I drink milk. I support testing on animals.
with that logic I could say that at some point in your life you have killed an animal (not on purpose but for food or in one way or another) or multiple animals and since they are more important you are now a murderer. We are not destroying the earth like every main-stream news station will tell you and in fact, thats the dumbest thing you could say. Earth will live on no matter what effect us Humans do the only thing we can do to the Earth though is make it more hostile towards us and eventually make it uninhabitable.
Uninhabitable is what they mean when they say destroying it >.> they don't actually mean destroying it as in breaking it or blowing it up
@1216248 (Kluklayu): Destroying sounds like were making the earth literally fall apart. Use a better term.
Um, thanks for explaining my point to me?
I'd just like to say, no matter WHAT circumstance, animals will ALWAYS suffer due to the existence and interference of humans. Always.
Humans are animals...
Life is death
All freedom is slavery.
War is peace.
The first rule of fight club is we never talk about fight club.
No, this is Patrick.
Where would we be if there were no sacrifices?
CCC-C-C-C-COMBO BREAKER.
Animal testing doesn't just occur in the medical field. They also use it on beauty products and such.
But it is proven that animal testing isn't accurate, and there are other less expinseve & more accurate ways to test things without harming animals. I personally find animal testing suk and disgusting.
Well, a human would have a choice as to whether or not take the medicine. The animal doesn't, therefore, it is unfair.
I wonder how many people who voted NW would be willing to risk their lives to test medicine in order to keep the animals from having to.
I would. Damn straight I would. If I died I'd be one less person to take care of. If you're testing on an animal, they can't say "Oh,I want to help save a human life! Test on me!" or say no. But I can, and I'd rather be tested on that some animal that was specifically bred for testing.
Oooh a serious POTD.
I recently wrote a research paper on animal testing. It has led to some important medical advances (such as the treatment of polio) but animal testing can be very tricky. Animals aren't always infected by the same diseases as humans (monkeys can't develop human AIDS; mice can't develop human cancers), and substances that are harmful to animals might not be harmful to humans (or vice versa). For example, according to animal tests, cigarette smoke, arsenic, and asbestos have no advese effects on health, while penicillin is a deadly substance. A huge percentage of drugs created through animal testing show serious problems during clinical trials, such as severe side effects or failure to work at all. Of course, animal testing isn't as bad as many people think. A very tiny amount of experiments are classified as "high suffering." In many the animals feel little or no pain. Besides, it is still more accurate than computer programs or in vitro methods. For now, it's the best we can do.
I also just did a biology project on this, and there are several different methods for research that do not involve animals, the most popular one being stem cell research.
Humans can give consent, animals cannot, we are using these beautiful creatures for our own devices simply because we feel that we are somehow "better"
I just don't know how to vote on this. Especially after reading all these comments.
Have a family member with a disease.
Your rabbits death=Your family members death
??????
applauds you are so so right
I watched my parakeet get mauled by my dog and I was depressed for months...
"92 percent of all drugs that are shown to be safe and effective in animal tests fail in human trials because they don’t work or are dangerous."
From this article- http://www.peta.org/issues/anim...d-science.aspx
PETA?!? REALLY? PETA?
Wow. Just Wow.
Haha, I knew someone would say this
8 PERCENT SUCCESS RATE? Sweet! Just keep testing.
Don't animals and humans have like.... a different generic makeup or something like that.. We're different so what might work on, let's say, a mouse, might not work on humans.
Who are we to say that we're so much better than any other species that we can test on them? Testing on animals isn't even remotely effective. We don't share enough DNA with animals to be able to test some drug on them, have it work, and be able to say that we can "safely" test on humans. Vote me down all you want, but I also believe that we don't need medication for quite a few drugs - we already have almost 7 billion people and we aren't even taking good care of everybody. When we're at the point where there are no 3rd world countries, where atleast everybody has some kind of shelter, and running water, and food (however bad it may be, it's better than nothing at all) then maybe we should start to find a cure for diseases. We could be spending the $18 BILLION dollars we spend testing on animals each year on providing clean water, food, and shelter for the families in other countries that has none of that. Vote me down all you want, it's my opinion...
Well this is a big debate. But ummm soon the world is going to be overpopulated and people are going to be KILLING each other to survive. There won't be enough space on earth, and pollution would cause havoc. I sound like an evil demon person here, but you know what let some people die. I know! I know! Its harsh, but a few dead could seriously improve the future. Think about what I said before screaming at me btw
Thank god I'm not the only person who thinks this.
OH PHEW!!! I thought I was a crazy lunatic murderer. XD
I know. I was wondering if I was a heartless monster for thinking this xD
We're not fucking up natural selection. We're just taking it on a new path. I agree though. Survival of the fittest. And it's not like what we're doing is causing mass extinction. Perhaps it is unethical to basically breed animals for the purpose of testing on them. But people could say the same thing about breeding animals to keep as pets.
LET'S STOP CAGING UP DOGS AND ALLOW THEM TO LIVE IN THE WILD AS THEY NATURALLY ARE SUPPOSED TO DO.
I don't actually believe this, and I know that keeping pets is distinctly different from testing on animals, but let's be real here. We're being cruel by domesticating animals, perhaps.
@1215367 (polarthebear): Also, I thought that domestication happened more by accident than intention (in most cases). As in, wild dogs would hang around homes because they got food scraps and were protective of that area. Obviously it wasn't long until people started "owning" them.
I definitely agree. I also agree with Simon's post about animal testing for medicinal purposes, but not cosmetic purposes.
We should test cosmetics on criminals.
It makes me happy to see that most commets on here aren't saying "OMG!!1! You're stupid! [enter opinion here] is totally the way to go and you're wrong!"
I like that most people commeting on this post are stating their opinion AND listening to the opinions of others.
Well, if we don't let people die, that could mean trouble in the future.
No space, food, water, resources for everybody, etc. We are WAAAAY overpopulated right now and it's only going to get worse as we 'progress.'
Okay, I guess we'll just let you die then since the world is "overpopulated."
....Really?
Then, that would be a good thing. It would suck to be me, but better for the world and humanity in general.
There is about 7 billion people in the world now, if we all stood shoulder to shoulder we would only fill a city the size of Los Angeles. The world is not even close to being over populated.
Alright, fine. But we apparently don't know how to manage those 7 billion people and it will be our own downfall.
the number of people is irrelevant- its the fact that our resources are being drained at a completely unsustainable pace.
Right now there are a little under 7 billion people in the world, and over 1 billion of these people are starving. In 2050, we are expected to have an extra 2 billion mouths to feed. That sounds just a little overpoupulated to me.
I think that's more because of a lack of distributing resources than population problems, though...
the problem isn't that their is no food, its that one part of the world takes the majority of the resources
So we should just let those people who have loved ones and lives die just for the good of those lucky enough not to contract the disease? These people will pass away eventually anyway-just like the rest of the population. That does not mean that we should let them die an early death if we have possibilities to save them. The way you wrote that comment was so callous and selfish. We can't look at people as just "The Population." They are PEOPLE with LIVES and FAMILY. They matter- even if you don't think they do.
Survival of the fittest, natural selection, whatever you want to call it, the world is becoming over populated, there was always thi joke in my 9th grade social class "If we fed all the obese children in the world to all the starving kids in the world, we could solve over-population AND world hunger!"
Well, if you don't look at people as The Population and instead just their individual lives, we'll get nowhere in fixing this problem or soon-to-be problem.
DEATH TO HUMANS!
As soon as we find a cure to today's diseases a bunch of new ones will appear. It's survival of the fittest, but humans have pretty much gotten rid of that concept and that's why we are so over populated. And torturing animals for our benefit is wrong.
Let me put it in an easy way: MICE ARE NOT LITTLE MEN. They dont react to things the same way as we do. Letting the monkey smoke? We know its bad why do we do it? watch "pee" (south park) let me explain: monkey flip out when they are peed on but after given a banana they shut up. Do we flip out when we get peed on and only calm down after getting a banana? I dont think so.
If animal testing is wrong, I don't wanna be right!
...Doesn't that just sound awful?
inb4 massive debate!
Awww shucks!
As someone who is currently alive thanks to animal testing I say ABSOLUTELY YOUARERITE!
I'm probably the like 100th person to tell you this, but I love your name.
Prison.
(shy)
In my opinion I don't think this post should be POTD. It's a very debated topic and a lot of people have different views on it. It's kinda like having a POTD saying "abortion should be illegal, amirite?" except maybe not that extreme, but it's something like that.
You do realize that it's the POTD because it is a debatable topic? Obviously you don't really understand how this works
Yeah but you can see a lot of people disagreeing. I just think it's a touchy subject. Well to me at least.
People disagree on any post. That's the point, these are opinions. I'm pretty sure there have been posts about abortions that are the POTD or posts that talk about races, religion, possibly inappropriate jokes, etc. The POTD makes people discuss and have conversations. It helps to see both sides of the argument
Yeah, cause testing thalidamide on animals worked out grreeaat for the 20 000 people who are now dead/disabled because of the medicine that was 100% safe because poor animals were tested on and it didn't affect them.
Without sacrifices, where would we be?
...Animal some animals are born esecially to be tested on, they don't use innocent pets!
what if we tested the medicine on people who are criminals. I would much rather see osama bin laden killed by being tested on than a bunny. (YES I KNOW HE IS DEAD)
You could have just hit reply to my comment above, which this basically mirrors.
How can you do anything "in your face" on the internet?
I don't think you like me Credetemi, but I'm not a troll.
I agree but this is a bad POTD
Oh, I'll just look at all of your posts and choose one... Oh wait, you're anon. Make good posts, or even an account before criticizing the POTD.
Well I don't think it is very good and it shouldn't be POTD
Then go make a better one.
I never said I could and I'm not gonna try just cause some idiot online told me to
I disagree with you and I am voicing my opinion. I like the jokes way better.
Depends on the joke
They may get to save a person's life.
Because I'm a horrible person and don't care for people, I strongly disagree with this post.
Why not use humans instead. It will give them more accurate results.
And whats a couple of people gone to help thousands of other people?
I mean, if the "cure" ends up not working, the lost lives still meant something. And plus it'll even out the population by a bit.
And get people who are desperate for a cure.. Because I'm sure that there are many people out there willing for it.
If not, get prisoners to do it.. They are just lying around in jail for basically their whole life doing nothing to help the world.
(Bring on the hate) (:
The ends don't justify the means.
Do you want to be my Joseph Mengele?
I think I'll pass.. :)
@1213692 (Eminna): No one would volunteer. Forcing people to do it seems even worse than testing on lesser species.
If someone went to prison for shooting 2 people and skinning them, I think they deserve something much worse than being used to test medicine on.
That's not your call though. It's not the government's job to decide who gets do live and who is forced to take potentially fatal medications. You're using the same logic as Hitler when he had German scientists perform experiments on Jews. Congratulations.
I compared your train of logic to Hitler, not you. Are you aware that the U. S. government has executed hundreds of innocent people? I'm not saying murderers don't deserve justice, but that is what prison is for. Go read 12 Angry Men; this kind of thing happens more than you know.
That Hitler comparison just blew my mind. I also thought, why not test on prisoners, but you are you EXACTLY right. Innocent Jews were prisoners.
I am enlightened.
Can you guarantee me that EVERY SINGLE prisoner is guilty? No. No, you cannot. And Hitler and the surrounding society as a whole, except Jews in hiding I guess, believed them all to be guilty. They probably had the same views you do about the prisoners today here in the US.
ADDITIONALLY, Concentration Camps were "made by the government". Take a basic history class, please.
Actually, according to The Innocence project, there are quit a few people that have the potential to be exonerated afte being wrongly convicted, and many already have
"Prisons are made by the government." -You
vs
The concentration camps that were not?
Get over yourself and Go fuck a rabbit or some shit.
Hitler also had scientist do testing on twins, such as taking one twin with 1 arm and one with 2, and grafting one of the twins arm on to the other one to see if it could be transplanted shudders
Well obviously they have to be in an environment that can be controlled and monitored; I'm not really clear on this, are you saying we shouldn't have prisons? What is the alternative?
It sucks, doesn't it, when people misunserstand you and then tell you off for it?
They were gonna die any way. And lethal injection doesnt hurt any way, so why not use them to help cure medical problems? Cant they help out to save lots of other people to help make up for the lives they took?
Yes it does, apparently it was stopped in animals as it was to painfull.
Lethal Injection basically means an OD of morphine or other sedative, it's the same as euthanizing a dog
Watch "I Am Legend"
Good movie.. Kind of scary. I don't think that something like that would ever happen though. And if it did, we have lots of military to take care of it before it spreads or something.
So did they, and I think it's quite possible. With all the genetic engineering and stuff going on, how long before somebody makes a mistake and we have a "Zombie Apocolypse"
Here is the hate.
I already posted my opinions on testing on prisoners on the last post about this, which got voted down quite a lot, but I think no human should be subjected to torture. Including pedophiles and serial killers. Testing on humans without their consent is torture. I would rather test on the kindest bunny in the world than Osama Bin Ladin.
I respect your opinion, but because I don't like the human species very much, I think the opposite.
Aww, emo want a hug?
I'm not emo? Most stereotypical emo's tend to hate the world.. not just the species.
I take offense to that
I think that most people do. Seeing as you are people and all.
I only take offense because, as an emo, I don't hate anything
Are you saying that you believe that animals deserve that treatment? That they have lesser rights then us, just because we are the more dominent species? Humans are technically animals, and we shouldn't be using animals for our own needs.
BUT, in some cases it might be nessaccary. I do kind of understand where you are coming from. It's kind of a hard subject-I believe that animals deserve equal rights, but I am also strongly against the whole 'lethal injection' punishment America offers (why should they play God?) which seems to be the most sensible alternative.
I see now that my opinion wasn't really needed : ahaha
This.