Use Of Animals In Science Research Articles

Animal experimentation

Millions of animals are used every year in often times extremely painful and distressing scientific procedures. Legislation of animal experimentation in modern societies is based on the supposition that this is ethically acceptable when certain more or less defined formal (e.g. logistical, technical) demands and ethical principles are met. The main parameters in this context correspond to the "3Rs" concept as defined by Russel and Burch in 1959, i.e. that all efforts to replace, reduce and refine experiments must be undertaken. The licensing of animal experiments normally requires an ethical evaluation process, often times undertaken by ethics committees. The serious problems in putting this idea into practice include inter alia unclear conditions and standards for ethical decisions, insufficient management of experiments undertaken for specific (e.g. regulatory) purposes, and conflicts of interest of ethics committees' members. There is an ongoing societal debate about ethical issues of animal use in science. Existing EU legislation on animal experimentation for cosmetics testing is an example of both the public will for setting clear limits to animal experiments and the need to further critically examine other fields and aspects of animal experimentation.

Animals in Science and Education

SUMMARY This article provides an overview of the ethical issues associated with the use of animals in scientific research and education, including references to arguments on both sides of the issue. It reviews print resources on the use of animals in science and education, dividing them into categories relating to either science/research, education, or both. Also provided are reviews of some Internet sites that offer other resources and provide full text of documents that may no longer be available in print.

The Ethics of Research on Companion Animals for the Benefit of Their Own Species

A fundamental component of the ethics of animal use in science is justification on the basis of a cost-benefit analysis where the cost is to the animals and the benefit is to the same species, another species, the environment or human society. This analysis is the baseline from which research projects can be refined to increase the benefit and reduce the animal cost. Research on companion animal species to the benefit of that species provides some interesting aspects of cost-benefit analysis. These include: the interface between clinical research in animals and the practise of veterinary science; the greater acceptance of animal research that benefits that animal species; and the allied benefits of companion animal research to society, companion animal owners, animal drug and food industries, and so forth. In many cases, these allied benefits are integral to the availability of resources to conduct the work. However, benefit to the companion animal species involved remains an important and welcome aspect of the use of these species in science.

Development of European legislation on the use of animals in science

Development of European legislation on the use of animals in science

HUMANISM, RACISM AND SPECIESISM

AbstractThe advance of biological sciences in the last two hundred years seems to have narrowed the distance between humans and animals, and scientists themselves are active in promoting the welfare of experimental animals. Does this mean that continued use of animals in science is inconsistent and morally condemnable as "speciesism"? The paper argues that philosophers' accounts of "speciesism" and the assimilation of "speciesism" to racism by Peter Singer and others are not well founded. Racism is a complex phenomenon, and there is no clear analogy to be drawn between it and the supposed prejudice of "speciesism". The humanist tradition established in the Renaissance can be a source for an ethic of care for animals, and regarding humanism simply as a bias or prejudice akin to "speciesism" (in the sense deployed by Singer) is misleading and simplistic.

An on-line information resource on the use of animals in science

Tuition in animal welfare and related ethical issues is included in an increasing number of secondary and tertiary level courses and there is a growing demand among students for information on the use of animals in science. UFAW receives many requests from students undertaking projects on this subject and seeking guidance on sources of information. This new website, which provides clear and balanced summaries of the issues, is a valuable addition to the literature to which students can be directed and has the advantage that it can accessed in seconds and for free (apart from communication line costs). The topics covered include: why study animals? minimizing the harm done to animals in science; benefits of animal-based science; balancing harm and benefit; ethics and use of animals; and control of animal use in science. The site presents well-written and succinct introductions to these topics: ideal for secondary-level - and for introduction to tertiary-level - debate on the subject. In addition, the site also provides a list of further reading and relevant videos and the web addresses of other relevant sites.

Australian animal ethics committees: we have come a long way.

Twenty years ago, Australian biomedical researchers took the first steps along a pathway toward common ground with opponents of the use of animals in science. Leaders of Australian medical research at that time saw the necessity of established science facing the ethical and political challenges that a revived antivivisectionist movement was mounting in the late 1970s and the 1980s.

The use of animals in science

The use of animals in science

The More Things Change

Among other notable accomplishments, Richard Ryder is a survivor. Whereas others have come and gone, or seen their star rise only to fall, Ryder has demonstrated true British grit Today, after more than twenty years of activism on behalf of nonhuman animals, he is more not less committed, and his influence is larger not smaller. While this former young Turk, an original member of Oxford Group, has become partof animal welfare establishment (Ryder is past chairman ofthe Royal Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals [RSPCA] and currently serves as its vice-chairman), he has not lost his fITe or his vision. With publication ofhis impressive historical work, Animal Revolution: Changing Attitudes Towards Speciesism, Ryder has consolidated his position as of world's most informed, articulate and politically astute voices being raised against those speciesist attitudes and practices that keep nonhuman animals in bondage. Ryder's own career understandably is part of history he tells. Though small in number, members of Oxford Group played-and many of them continue to play-a decisive role in struggle for animal rights. In addition to Ryder, Andrew Linzey and Stephen Clark were part of Group that was fonned in Oxford in late 19608 and early 1970s, as were three young Oxford philosophers: Roslind and Stanley Godloviteh, and John Harris, who, in 1971, with publication ofAnimals, Men and Morals: AnInquiry into Maltreatment ofNon-humans (Gollancz), fired what many regard as frrst volley in the modem movement for animal rights, a not altogether accurate characterization given earlier, pioneering work of such figures as Helen Jones, for example. Peter Singer, who knew members of Oxford Group but was not himself a member while a student in Oxford, fired next volley when, in 1973, he published his seminal review of Animals, Men and Morals in New York Review ofBooks. Here was a case where a review proved to be even more important than important book that was reviewed. Singer's briefagainst animal exploitation was clear, concise and compelling, and reader response was overwhelmingly favorable-so favorable, in fact, that New York Review ofBooks itself took unusual step ofactually publishing a book by Singer. That book was Animal Liberation. The year was 1975, same year Ryder published Victims ofScience: The Use ofAnimals in Science (Davis-Poynter), one of centIal books of animal liberation movement, in Brigid Brophy's words. A year laterAndrew Linzey's Animal Rights: A Christian Assessment of Man's

Standards for animal research: looking at the middle.

Much of the public debate over laboratory animal use has focused on either the scientist's demand for absolute freedom of inquiry, or the abolitionist's demand for an end to animal use in science. Yet many recent proposals for reform seek instead to balance the interests of laboratory animals in avoiding harm against the interests of research beneficiaries in continued animal use. This essay is an analysis of the intermediate reform positions and their underlying ethical principles.

Animal Sacrifices: Religious Perspectives on the Use of Animals in Science. Tom Regan

Previous articleNext article No AccessBook ReviewsAnimal Sacrifices: Religious Perspectives on the Use of Animals in Science. Tom Regan Mary MidgleyMary Midgley Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Ethics Volume 97, Number 4Jul., 1987 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/292908 Views: 4Total views on this site Copyright 1987 The University of Chicago PressPDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Plus ça change: anti-vivisection then and now.

The word vivisection has an old-fashioned ring, and anti-vivisectionist is even more suggestive of quixotic Victorian crusades. Yet speakers at a recent conference on Standards for Research with Animals: Current Issues and Proposed Legislation * invoked both terms frequently. As its title suggests, the focus of the conference was hardly antiquarian, and the unusually large audience it attracted testified to the timeliness of the topic. Several hundred researchers and administrators from major universities and hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, and government agencies, as well as a sprinkling of humane members, came to hear two days of panels and discussions. There was a flurry of last-minute registrations, and the organizers had to schedule extra sessions of the most popular workshops. The sponsor of the gathering, PRIM&R (Public Responsibility in Medicine and Research), a nonprofit organization based in Boston, regularly mounts conferences about ethical issues in biomedical Founded in 1974 by a group of scientists and lawyers, PRIM&R considers itself an advocacy group for appropriate and ethical research that will both improve the quality of life and benefit society at a time when public sentiment towards research has grown increasingly hostile.' The topic of the October conference was chosen because it seemed very timely in this context of concern, but even so, the organizers were surprised at the relative intensity of interest in the fate of experimental animals. The prospectus announced that the conference would explore the present conduct of research with animals in this country with emphasis on the ethical, scientific, medical and administrative aspects of such research. The actual agenda discussed by most of the speakers, however, was considerably more focused. They were primarily concerned (as was their audience, on the evidence of question periods and hallway conversations) with the threat of increased lay interference in the design and execution of scientific Although the tone of their discourse was overwhelmingly temperate and respectful, most of the scientific speakers assumed that humane criticism was rooted in either ignorance (lack of scientific understanding) or false priorities (sentimental preference for animals over humans). They also assumed that the current movement to regulate the experimental use of animals was new, even faddish, a product of the expanded liberal sensibilities of the 1960s and 1970s. Several speakers claimed that the publication of Peter Singer's Animal Liberation: A New Ethics for Our Treatment of Animals in 1975 had provoked a sudden rise in consciousness and activism.2 Both these assumptions tend to underestimate the seriousness of the animal protection movement, the strength of the response it evokes among the lay public, and the depth of its historical roots. That is not to suggest that current resistance to scientific experimentation on animals is a linear descendent of the 19th-century agitation that prompted the first British legislation about the scientific use of animals.3 Yet it is revealing that several contemporary organizations preserve the term anti-vivisection in their names, despite Harriet Ritvo is an Assistant Professor in the Humanities Department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dr. Ritvo is working on a study of animals in Victorian culture. * Held in Boston, 3 and 4 October 1983.