Ethics in animal testing - extended paper part 3 of 3

Conclusion

It has been proposed that companies ought not to test on animals if other methods are available to do such research. Some have considered that there is a hierarchy of animals and that lower-tier animals have the distinctive category of testing availability, which leads to the question of animal rights. It was the purpose of this research paper to support the above claims that animal testing should be limited per the technological advances available to substitute such methods.

By showing the mission of the Center of Alternatives to Animal Testing at John Hopkins University we can easily pursue an ethical course towards in-vitro and other alternative techniques. As Alan Goldberg has mentioned, promoting animal welfare by the 5 freedoms is a good starting point in development a foundation of efficacy. A large bulk of this paper is pertaining to the 3R’s: replacement, reduction, and refinement. By adopting a motto to animal rights and reducing or eliminating animal testing can become a reality.

Pursuing alternatives to animal testing reflect our social conscience by reducing the test subjects to such animals. As alternatives become available, our moral ethos can expand. It is a shame that through a humanistic ego that we do not lay claim that animals should have protected rights as a categorical imperative. It has been shown that RCT has been a justification to animal testing but it also has shown that this theory is to clinical in nature to be humane.

Some animal activists claim that any animal test is a holocaust. They hold a position that is so polar in nature that little progress can be made in medicine or the discussion on the ethical issues at hand. Should animals be tested for our benefit? Per this research, this is not an easy question to answer. What if we use the empathy fallacy for our RCT justification? Can the Kant help guide use to some humane categorical imperative that animals are saved but humans die or the reverse? This paper is to point to the direction that science can help to become more ethical by using substitutes via technology.

It is the hope of the author of this paper that the reader comes to the realization that animal testing justification is a very difficult subject to answer. It usually depends on our ethical up-bringing and adulthood solidification. Some realize that nature is not an unlimited resource and has intrinsic value which should have protected rights. Through investigating this topic the author has become much more aware of the ramifications of mankind’s actions.





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