This continues the Carrier-Bali debate. See introduction, comments policy, and Bali’s opening statement in Should Science Be Experimenting on Animals? A Debate with Paul Bali; as well as my first response to that In Defense of the Scientific Use of Animals, and Bali’s first reply.


In Defense of the Scientific Use of Animals

— Part II —

by Richard Carrier, Ph.D.

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Paul hasn’t responded to my First Reply. No account of why anything he describes is actually wrong. Why should we care about any of it? We cannot know where to draw the line, if we don’t even know why we are drawing lines at all. Paul also hasn’t accounted for the cognitive and thus moral distinctions between kinds of animals experimented on (fruit flies, vs. rats; dogs; monkeys; apes). Is he okay with certain animals? Why? Why not? And what kind of animal experimentation is okay and why? Paul sanctions “non-invasive” experimentation, but what all counts as invasive, and why does that matter? Paul also needs to explain where a line goes between practices we could continue once improved (e.g. limit cage time to what is actually necessary for a study); and those to abandon. Paul also hasn’t acknowledged why we do experiments at all.

Here appears a graphic, whose content is described in the main text.

The above graphic breaks down some major categories of animal experimentation. The top goals are animal welfare and human welfare. For the former, Paul’s argument that we shouldn’t sacrifice animal suffering for human welfare is negated. We must experiment on animals to perfect our ability to care for them. This includes veterinary science, e.g. medicine, surgery, animal psychology and care; and dietary science, e.g. developing better feeds, for pets, livestock, animals in zoos and the wild; and so on.

Paul then hasn’t presented any actual argument for why we should not sacrifice animal suffering for human welfare. Three subcategories here: experimentation for frivolous ends and for serious ends, and edge cases (debating whether ends are frivolous or serious). Edge cases are case-by-case, and thus cannot be resolved by general conclusion. Frivolous ends (e.g. perfecting cosmetics) can be wrong, when actually entailing significant suffering, as that trade lacks merit. Though not all does. Experimenting with animal harness design, for example, is not invasive or misery-inducing, and actually by design attends to determining the animal’s health and comfort, rather than ignoring it; and thus neither would experimenting with a frivolous equivalent, like pet costumes. But the rule of necessity would rule out needlessly doing this (e.g. there is no value in testing human mascara on a monkey, when it’s safe enough for paid human volunteers to do this).

Which leaves us with experimentation that (a) is actually necessary, yet causes (b) some measurable suffering, in trade for accomplishing (c) serious ends. This includes medicinal and surgical safety, and useful anatomical and physiological knowledge; and ranges in purpose from (d) averting more harm (where outcomes would statistically be worse if we skipped animal testing and went straight to human trials) to (e) discovering goods (where an overall programme produces a statistical net benefit in human welfare; thus “hit rate” doesn’t matter as Paul claims); and functions in a scale of gradually increased risk (from computers etc., to animals, to preliminary human trials, to full-scale human trials, to worldwide application), to attenuate greater overall harms. Just as a catastrophic or negative result shutting down a small human trial saves us from the harms resulting from jumping directly to a large-scale human trial, a result shutting down an animal trial saves us from the harms resulting from jumping directly to testing in humans. And none of this can be accomplished with what Paul calls “Alt” methods. We use animals because physiologies are far too complex and unpredictable to model computationally. “Alt” can reduce animal harm (by narrowing what we have to test on animals). But that’s another argument for reform (if we could do this more than we are; though that hasn’t been demonstrated), not abolition. Computer and in vitro and other models cannot replace animal experimentation, for exactly the same reason they cannot replace human trials.[1]

The real issue is that the death of an animal,[2] even many, is not comparable to, but is in fact a much lesser harm, than the death of a person. Likewise, the suffering of an animal is not comparable to even the suffering of a human, much less their death. And not all suffering is the same. Mild or transitory discomfort (like getting poked with needles; feeling stressed for a short period; having to be caged temporarily) is simply not serious, even in humans; much less so in animals. Hence we experiment on animals as a means to reduce harm. Because we conclude on a valid objective basis that animal lives and cognition do not count the same as human.[3] Animals are not persons. They lack narrative memory, self-identity, abstract goals, even a comprehension of the significance of life or death. The (humane) death of an animal is simply, objectively, insignificant. Because “one more year of life” doesn’t mean anything to an animal. The overall quality of their experiential life matters (because they are not automata), and therefore animals subject to experimentation deserve compassion, thence a reasonable attendance to their emotional and physical welfare (possibly more than is practiced, but that becomes an argument for reform, not abolition); attending the rule of necessity (if a practice causes suffering yet isn’t necessary, then it should not be a component of the experimental procedure).

Humans are not obligated to make animals “feel better” than they’d experience in the wild (any more than we ought to erase every ounce of human suffering); it is only our obligation to at least not make it worse without a necessary purpose.[4] This is obvious in our ethic with regard to babies and children, who are also “innocents” who “cannot” consent and who at the lowest ages can’t even comprehend what is being done to them, yet on whom we also perform experimentation, and even full medical procedures (pharmaceutical to surgical; and psychological). We allow and inflict on them all manner of necessary or unavoidable suffering (from stress to needle pricks to drugging them to cutting them with knives). Yet babies already have a cognition exceeding “animals,” and have a substantially greater cognitive future besides. Thus even babies far exceed animals in moral value and concern. So if we accept experimentation on babies (and toddlers, children, teens), as in fact we do, we must the more grant the same for animals. “That they are innocent” and “that they cannot consent” only sets the bar that must be met in respect to the necessity and benefits of what precisely we do.

Still animals are not the moral equivalent of human babies. For human infant and child experimentation,[5] our moral standards reflect things like concern for their future development (they will be adults someday; so experimentation should not cause lasting harm), which animals do not have (they remain animals; they experience no cognitive development like this to be concerned for); and in older children, a recognition of their cognitive modeling of events (their ability to appreciate harms done to them exceeds that of animals, and renders those harms morally greater). Being drugged or stabbed with a needle means something to children of most ages; whereas these events are incomprehensible to animals; the harm animals endure is therefore of lower cognitive content, and of more transient duration.

For all these reasons, none of Paul’s reasons warrant ending animal experimentation.

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See Dr. Bali’s reply.

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Endnotes

[1] See: “Are There Alternatives to the Use of Animals in Research?” in Science, Medicine, and Animals (1991) by the National Academy of Science, Engineering, and Medicine; whose conclusions have not since changed: Juan Carlos Marvizon, “Computer Models Are Not Replacing Animal Research, and Probably Never Will,” Speaking of Research (7 January 2020). See also Stanford’s statement on Why Animal Research is still a thing.

[2] I’m using a restricted definition of the word “animal” for this debate, per Foundations §(2) in Richard Carrier, “In Defense of the Scientific Use of Animals — Part I.”

[3] I outline why animals cognitively (and therefore morally) differ from humans in Foundations §(2) in Richard Carrier, “In Defense of the Scientific Use of Animals — Part I.”

[4] I outline how obligations originate in Foundations §(1) in Richard Carrier, “In Defense of the Scientific Use of Animals — Part I.”

[5] Marilyn Field and Richard Behrman, eds., Ethical Conduct of Clinical Research Involving Children (National Academies Press, 2004).

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