So it's been a while.... getting back in the swing of things with something that still leaves me confused.

Prometheus getting the punishment the reading didn't
talk about-- having his liver eaten out over and over.
Curiositymay not have killed the cat, but it sure made the cat suffer. 

Vivisection: A double-edged sword? 

Ok. I'm an idealist and not necessarily a foremost expert on this topic by any means. However, I am opinionated, so let's begin with that, shall we? First off, I don't know why I'm so hard-headed, but I need a convincing argument that animal testing/experimentation is necessary for medical advances. I need hard evidence that the cure for [fill in blank] or the key piece of knowledge to understanding [fill in the blank here] can only be found through animal means. Maybe I'm naive, but there have to be other methods, right?

Or perhaps I am too idealistically legal-minded or wrapped up in the philosophy behind rights and consent. So, therein lies my problem. I'm conflicted.There're opposing sides getting the issue all wrapped up in philosophical debates that have loopholes. Let's just look at Regan and Cohen here for a moment as examples.

Tom Regan- "An entity has inherent and not conditional value (i.e., value is not earned). Simply being an animal with a characteristic life course and a set of interests would thus be sufficient to warrant protection. (79) 

Here, I can jump on Regan's wagon. This fits in with my rather "rainbows and marshmallows" view of my personal life in which I respect all life if I can. What I mean is that this is one of the few tenets of morality that I think I adhere to pretty much across the board. (Explains a lot, doesn't it?) But really. Animals don't have to be used. Humans don't have to be used. As far as I see it, by the time a drug or pharmaceutical goes through the rigors of testing and retesting, many of those who could benefit from treatment have succumbed to their illness/injury/medical anomaly. I mean, I'm a sentimentalist, but I am also have utilitarian tendencies. Why not test on humans, with their consent? Perhaps I don't quite realize how many trials have to be done or how drugs are tweaked in the experimentation process. Or perhaps I don't quite grasp just how "imperative" certain tests are to our overall understanding of the human body or mind. Still, I'm one of those believers in "consent of the governed"--- and though we know that many animals freely risk their lives for the humans they know, I don't think of that as consent. 

Still, many would call me crazy for even giving animals rights at all. For example, Cohen's idea,  where "rights are relevant only to members of moral communities, places in which these types of reciprocal agreements are negotiated and acknowledged" and "anencephallic infants and people in a permanent vegetable state would seem to lose their membership in the rights-owning moral community" (80) just seems like a world in which a logical argument ignores what feels moral altogether and just sounds logical. I mean, that's where scientists got into trouble before, seeming cruel towards people as well as animals. Surely, all scientists are individuals, and thus have different methods of rationalizing what they do. They feel, even if objective, empirical data is still the method of communication. I particularly liked this quote as evidence: 

"To prevent me from hating myself for working with animals, I try not to get too attached to the mice because I know their death is inevitable" --- "to love with detachment." (141)

So they still feel. However, it seems to me that science, as Titus pointed out, brought both good and bad to the animal community. On one hand, we developed (and still somewhat have) a symbiotic relationship with animals and nature. ("Once nature ceased to be a constant antagonist, it could be viewed with affection. Wildness became attractive rather than ugly, wild animals might evoke sympathy rather than scorn." (133)) As evidenced by those of us in this class, that most people in society today believe that affection and love for an animal, shown in whatever form or fashion,  is a mark of a good person. However, those kinds of advances--- "the Victorian extension of rights to animals, initiated by Hume and advanced by Darwin, stopped at vivisection." (138)

For just as much as humans are logical creatures, we also claim another (seemingly contradictory innate value --- "long-accepted overarching moral goals to become individuals who relieve and reduce suffering and attempt to behave fairly." (79)--- as opposed to brutes.  Now, it's probably not fair for me to be preaching. I'm lucky. I haven't been exposed to incurable disease or debilitating injuries. I don't take medicine unless forced to. I'll not deny it. I'm against makeup as well (if you haven't noticed yet). I have a very high pain tolerance, so my sympathies towards natural pain in life is a little mixed. Sure, I'd like to avoid others hurting, but by the same token, I believe pain to be natural and educational for humans to be empowered by their own strengths and limits (as long as infliction of pain is not done intentionally by others). (Yes, that includes feeling uncomfortable, guilty, and all those other negative emotions that come with acknowledging human brutality--- as long as we don't dwell on them too long and use those emotions to promote positive action.) Still, if you're not quite so accepting of pain as I am, (and by no means do I advocate purposeful infliction of pain on another) then you can be particularly taken aback by the fact that experimentation and vivisection has occured in human populations. 

Twin subjects of Mengele's experiments. Two little
girls from a concentration camp who have been
sewn together. 

1. Tuskegee syphilis experiment
2. Harold Blauer
3. high oxygen to premature infants
4. injections of cancer cells
5. hepatitis in retarded children
6. Cincinnati radiation experiments
7. anything done by Mengele in WWII Germany

Do I find it strangely and twistedly fascinating? I'm ashamed to admit it, but yes. I could totally be accused of possessing, like St. Augustine said, "libido sciendt" --- "problems produced by the lust to know." (78) Humans must have a sick fascination with the morbid and human limits. We like to feel like we have some understanding and power over our bodies and what we can endure (thus, science exists in the first place)--- even if only to help people who have to endure the rigors of the seemingly impossible.  I used to be fascinated by what had been learned by observing animals in laboratories and such. I wanted to be a veterinarian for the longest time--- had even applied to Cornell's pre-vet program--- but realized that I didn't have the heart or the stomach to undertake the classes that would be required. (Speaking of which, does anybody else find it interesting that to be certified to save animals' lives, you must first kill a whole bunch of them in the sake of knowledge? It always seemed a bit counter-intuitive to me. I always thought that even in an experiential classroom, students shouldn't be risking lives unless lives were on the line to begin with. However, perhaps that was just how I was raised.) But I have to agree with what many have said before: we're not always learning about human disease reaction or behavior through research on them, but the animals' reaction to disease and behavior. Does that even serve the purpose that we claim... and is it worth the lives that are used?

Poor unicorn :(