Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
such a stage may involve missing life-saving drugs. The overall utility (for humans)
of pretesting on animals is then debatable, and the methodological necessity of the
animal experiment stage is scientifically (not merely morally) doubtful.
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My training does not permit me to appraise the literature on alternatives to animal-
based experiments, so I cannot evaluate the argument on behalf of the disutility for
humans of such experiments. The problem is not merely that I am not a scientist.
Since mastering each of the alternatives requires detailed expertise, no single scientist
can confidently assess such claims, whether she is pro or against alternatives (and
this indicates the need for incorporating different experts in the ethical committees au-
ter is different from these considerations. If animals have some kind of moral stand-
ing, we cannot simply say that morality is reducible to overall utility for humans
alone. When this limitation is recognized, it is possible that the moral case against vi-
visection will admit that experiments benefit humans while being immoral. Gaining
from a practice is simply beside the moral point. “Organized crime,” a cynical critic
might say, “is an example of a large-scale immoral practice that benefits some, yet
the Mafia never pretends that prudential benefits constitute a moral defense. Why
should the benefits of science to humans count higher on the moral ladder?” Of
course, even if animal and human victims have the same moral standing, one disana-
logy between the Mafia and science is that the former is a self-serving enterprise in-
terested in promoting the welfare of some, while science benefits everyone. But in
the new context of interspecies ethics, the cynic has a genuine and disturbing point.
Who is “everyone”? He would press to know. “Do rodents benefit from research?
And if they do not, what sets a meaningful moral difference between the violence in-
volved in types of self-serving actions that we condemn, and violence which we justi-
fy? Is it merely a matter of where 'we' are situated? Wasn't the slave-trade based
precisely upon such reasoning?”
Harming humans should experimentation stop is not, then, a morally viable factor
when assessing the moral status of animal-based research. Morally correct action can
be imprudent; prudent action might be immoral. Doing the right thing sometimes car-
ries a cost in human lives and may increase human suffering. Consider now a subtler
variation of this argument.
THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS
Say that experimenting on animals is immoral. Should it stop? Two arguments sug-
gest that it should not. The first is that when the prudential benefits of experimenta-
tion are not denied, the immorality involved may be considered as a “regrettable ne-
cessity” or a “necessary evil” (this is a variant of the argument considered above) or
