A Rational Defense of Animal
Research
Nathan Nobis, Ph.D.
Philosophy Department
University of Alabama, Birmingham
www.NathanNobis.com
aphilosopher@gmail.com
• 3,000-6,000 animals killed every hour of every
day by U.S. scientist and those employed by
them
• Recent review suggests just being in lab is
harmful for animals
• Video footage of Covance’s labs in Vienna, VA
– Are these actions of harming animals morally
permissible, or are they wrong?
• Is it wrong to treat us these ways, and if so, why?
Us?
• ‘conscious, sentient beings’ – many
animals are like us
• ‘us’ = ‘humans’ – be careful
– Is the suggestion that anything that is
biologically human is wrong to treat those
ways?
• Would imply it is wrong to destroy (living) cells,
tissues, organs and embryos/fetuses
Us?
• A being has 'moral rights' only if "rational" or
"intelligent" or "autonomous"?
• But, severely mentally challenged, senile,
seriously demented and babies – all considered
to be morally significant 'us' -- have rights, even
though not rational, intelligent, autonomous
– If they have rights, then basic moral ‘bar’ is set low
– Cannot be set at ‘being human’ – cells/organs
– Therefore, set at ‘consciousness’
• Ability to feel pleasure and pain
• Perspective on world
• What is morally relevant, not species but
mental life of individual
– Comparable mental lives deserve equal
respect and equal consideration and thus,
nearly all animal experimentation is wrong.
• This reasoning defended by many,
criticized by few, philosophers
Recent Objections
• Why Experimentation Matters: The Use of
Animals in Medical Research, 2001
– Defense of animal experimentation
Philosopher R.G. Frey’s essay
• “Justifying Animal Experimentation: The
Starting Point”
– Animal experimentation vs. human
experimentation
Scientist Adrian Morrison
• “human beings stand apart in a moral sense
from all other species”
– Does not identify morally-relevant characteristics
humans have that animals don’t
• Therefore, he can’t rationally criticize opposing views
• “Self preservation”
– Doesn’t explain why human experimentation would be
wrong
• Vivisectors have “God’s blessing”
Biologists Charles Nicholl and
Sharon Russell
• “Evolution has endowed us with a need to know
as much as we can”
• “to refrain from exploring nature in every
possible way would be an arrogant rejection of
evolutionary forces”
– Then why isn’t it arrogant to perform experimentation
on humans?
• Purpose of evolution
• Since animals act some way, humans can too
Others
• Scientist Jerrold Tannenbaum
– Scientists may “befriend” animals
• Scientist Stuart Zola
– “basic” vs. “applied” animal research
– No backup provided
• Philosopher Baruch Brody
– Special obligations from humans to humans
• Also special obligations from humans to animals to discount
animal interests
– To try to benefit humans, we must inflict pain,
suffering and death on animals
– More reflection and argument needed
Philosopher H. Tristam Engelhardt
• Dissenter – defends animal rights
– “to be skinned”
– “transformed into fur coats”
– “produce knowledge of interest to humans”
– “to be the object of culinary arts”
– Little discussion of scientific issues
– Remarks scattered
Morrison
• “medicine cannot progress without animal
experimentation”
– What about clinical and in vitro research,
computer and mathematical modeling,
epidemiology, etc.
Tibor Machan’s Putting Humans first:
Why We Are Nature’s Favorite
• Claim that animals possess moral rights is
“a fiction” and “a trick”
• Humans can see difference between right
and wrong, animals can’t
– Therefore humans have rights, animals don’t
• However, only some humans, not all have
these rights
– Machan’s theory provides no protection for
these humans
Tibor Machan’s Putting Humans first:
Why We Are Nature’s Favorite
• Human babies and severely mentally challenged
don’t “lack moral agency altogether”
– Must consider them as existing “normally, not
abnormally”
– However it is not true that, in general, all features of
normal beings are shared by abnormal beings
– Therefore, vulnerable humans do not meet Machan’s
necessary condition for rights; his defense of the
rights of them fails and thereby so does his argument
that animals have not moral rights
Tibor Machan’s Putting Humans first:
Why We Are Nature’s Favorite
• “politically incorrect” animals
– Morally permissible for us to act like some
animals and kill other animals
• “Humans are more important, even better,
than animals, and we deserve the benefits
that exploiting animals can provide”
– Strong arguments not given to justify this
Tibor Machan’s Putting Humans first:
Why We Are Nature’s Favorite
• Unanswered rhetorical questions too often
take the place of arguments
• Arguments not carefully and precisely
developed or defended
• Position on the use of animals is unclear
and ambivalent
Utilitarianism and animal use
• Few advocates of vivisection accept utilitarianism
• Calculated indirect harms and opportunity costs that
result from funds being directed towards vivisection and
not towards others
• Nobody has tried to show that some specified amount of
vivisection is (likely) indispensable for bringing about the
greatest possible overall medical benefits
• Nobody has argued that, despite all the other research
methods available, other methods would be better than
animal research for human benefit
Conclusions
• Status quo regarding animal use,
especially in scientific research
• Carl Cohen fails because his strategy
implies that animals actually have rights
and humans have none
• Reasoning given in favor of some antianimal perspective is faulty because it
either depends on false an/or rationally
indefensible premises
Conclusions
• Those who harm animals attempt to
develop a plausible justification for doing
so
• It is likely morally obligatory that those who
use animals in harmful manners cease in
their deeds