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March 2001
Arguing Against Vivisection: Science or Ethics?

By Patrick Kwan

 


Of all the ways animals are abused and exploited, vivisection has always struck the strongest chord in me. I view animal experimentation as morally reprehensible—something inherently evil. I mean, how ethical can it be to deprive life and comfort from one being for the sake of another? Not to mention the fact that the victims are chosen because they are powerless and trivialized by many. For as long as I’ve been an animal rights advocate I’ve wanted to work to put an end to vivisection, and in the beginning I chose to focus on using science as my argument.

Having known that toxicology is one of the most gruesome fields of vivisection, I concentrated my studies on the growing field of environmental toxicology. I thought, perhaps I can become a toxicologist who uses only non-animal tests and one who speaks out against the use of animals in science. I collected and read all the literature I could find that used scientific arguments against vivisection. My studies certainly paid off: I was able to argue forcefully on the scientific flaws of animal tests in my classes and managed to convince most of my classmates that data from animal tests are inapplicable to humans. I felt I was accomplishing what I wanted; to help put an end to vivisection by demonstrating its flaws to potential vivisectors. But a single study woke me up.

A classmate in my environmental science class cited a study involving mice in efforts to demonstrate the possible social effects of overpopulation. Hundreds of mice were separated into several containers, with one container having ample room for the mice and others with diminishing space. Months later, mice from each container were examined and compared, then killed and their brain cells examined. The study found, not surprisingly, the less room the mice had, the more aggressive they were toward each other. It also found that the less room the mice had, the higher the rate of self-mutilation and appearance of homo/bisexuality in the mice.

I was horrified after hearing about the study and quickly questioned its scientific merit. I gave very simple reasons why it could not possibly be applicable to humans: the mice were suddenly subjected to crowding while in reality overpopulation is a gradual process; the rate of human overpopulation cannot possibly lead to the levels of crowding described in the study; and there are important behavioral differences between mice and humans. My classmates were silent, not because they were struck by my scientific reasoning, but because I was visibly upset.

Later that night, I thought to myself, how could anyone possibly even start with the idea that living, feeling beings can be so expendable? Thinking about how much the hundreds of mice must have suffered while in the containers and how they were killed extremely bothered me. Surely I convinced my classmates that animal studies are misleading, based on shaky logic, and impede scientific progress by wasting precious resources. But had I been truly speaking up for the animals? I couldn’t answer that question, and I still can’t today.

I do know that I agree with George Bernard Shaw who wrote, “If we attempt to controvert a vivisectionist by showing that the experiment that he has performed has not led to any useful result, you imply that if it led to a useful result, you would consider his experiment justified. Now I’m not prepared to concede that position.” I find vivisection morally unjustifiable because I don’t believe that any living, feeling being, under any circumstances, can be deprived of the right to live out his/her life without being tortured, mutilated, slaughtered, or otherwise exploited. Not because of any other reason.

Moreover, I agree with Anne Frank who wrote in her famous diary, “After all, I still believe people are good at heart.” Though vivisectionists such as Adrian Morrison and Fred Coulston make this hard to believe, there are many more people that renew my faith, particularly Michael Allen Fox, a philosopher who wrote The Case for Animal Experimentation and renounced it shortly after it was published (his latest book is Deep Vegetarianism, published last year).

Surely, the “science” behind vivisection is highly questionable and very few (if any) informed persons would believe vivisection is everything that vivisectionists make it out to be. Perhaps vivisection would indeed end (or at least be drastically curtailed) if only more people knew that everything from broccoli to tomatoes have been shown to be carcinogens in mice, that data between mice and rats correlate only around 70 percent of the time (the two certainly have more in common than either would with humans), and that we probably would have a better chance of determining if something is toxic to humans by flipping a coin than by conducting animal tests (not to mention it would save much time and money). Even so, it would not create a consistent “hands-off” policy for using animals. There will always be an instance where using animals as surrogates would simply seem convenient and possibly lead to some scientific knowledge. We can illustrate the theory of gravity to a group of students by throwing a chimp off the roof or we can throw a rock—both methods aptly communicate the science of gravity. For a real-life, less extreme example, medical students can learn about the basics of surgical techniques by cutting up a dog, or they can use much more humane methods, such as observing the actual surgery of a person. Animals will be exploited for as long as they are viewed as expendable or worthless tools; and they will continue to be exploited until we change our collective attitude towards other animals.

But it is not to say that scientific arguments are never proper (nor am I saying that animal advocates who are pursuing studies in fields dominated by vivisectionists ought to quit); the vivisection industry is so huge and powerful that we surely ought to use whatever we can to save animals from its strangle-hold. The many scientists who have spoken out against the flaws of vivisection certainly did—and still do—much for the animals. What is of significant concern is when animal advocates leave animals out of the vivisection debate and scream about the “scientific fraud” of vivisection, instead of focusing on its extreme cruelty. I think the animals make a case for themselves and that their suffering, exploitation, and deaths deserve much more than a backseat in the vivisection debate.

I’ve come to realize that I chose scientific arguments against vivisection because I somehow believed that others cannot or would not accept moral arguments. Perhaps I simply believed that animal advocates are especially moral individuals, but how can I presume that another person cannot make the very same moral decisions that I did? Why shouldn’t I at least present them with the moral arguments that struck me so much? Certainly, few people are born animal advocates. As an animal advocate, as someone who supports animal rights, if I don’t speak up for the animals, who will?

Patrick Kwan is an activist based in New York City. He currently works as a Regional Field Organizer for an international human rights organization and is pursuing his studies in Political Science and Media Studies.

 


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