Vegan and pro Animals in Medical Experiments

[brimstoneSalad]

What does it go towards, then?

When we're talking about crowd sourced donations, people pull out their wallets for pictures of sick kids with cancer, and they only want to fund cancer treatment and cancer research. Propose the idea that they fund research into research models, and you lose them. So, the alternative is that it goes into buying a bigger TV, or more junk they don't need rather than to donations at all.

When it comes to government funding, that's a mess, but applies similarly to the above, since it's based on what constituents want.

People are short sighted, and so will be research and expenses.

So breed and kill the animals for testing? How is that better? And don't we already do that, in many cases?

I didn't say anything like that, I don't know what you're talking about. I said we should stop using animals in education. I didn't propose breeding or killing animals.

Why do you think it's any more ethical to kill a bad person than it is to kill a good person, in and of itself?

Nothing is in and of itself. The consequences are better.
The same reason it's better to kill a mean dog that likes to bite people than a nice dog who doesn't.

If they are of same sentience, the consequences are the same.

That doesn't follow. Sentience does not mean compassion or civil behavior. It's worse to kill somebody who is productive in society and helps others than somebody who is destructive and harms others. The consequences upon others of killing bad people can be good, and the consequences of killing good people can be bad.

You think we're already fixing it, or we already have the obligation to?

We have the obligation to. It's a huge waste of money, and just manufactures criminals for the most part.

[EquALLity]

When we're talking about crowd sourced donations, people pull out their wallets for pictures of sick kids with cancer, and they only want to fund cancer treatment and cancer research. Propose the idea that they fund research into research models, and you lose them. So, the alternative is that it goes into buying a bigger TV, or more junk they don't need rather than to donations at all.

When it comes to government funding, that's a mess, but applies similarly to the above, since it's based on what constituents want.

People are short sighted, and so will be research and expenses.

Is government funding based on what constituents want? The government is extremely out of touch with public opinion.

I didn't say anything like that, I don't know what you're talking about. I said we should stop using animals in education. I didn't propose breeding or killing animals.

Oh, I see what you're saying.
I thought you meant that we should mimic ways they're used in education in laboratories to be more ethical.

Nothing is in and of itself. The consequences are better.
The same reason it's better to kill a mean dog that likes to bite people than a nice dog who doesn't.

By in and of itself, I meant disregarding things like future actions the given people may take.

I don't see why it's better to kill the mean dog, if both are equally sentient, unless you're saying it's better based on likely future actions.

That doesn't follow. Sentience does not mean compassion or civil behavior. It's worse to kill somebody who is productive in society and helps others than somebody who is destructive and harms others. The consequences upon others of killing bad people can be good, and the consequences of killing good people can be bad.

Yes, I know- I meant disregarding future behavior (because that wouldn't really matter in this situation, when we're talking about life prison sentences).

We have the obligation to. It's a huge waste of money, and just manufactures criminals for the most part.

I agree. I wonder what Presidential candidate has made this a major issue... Hmmmmm...

[brimstoneSalad]

By in and of itself, I meant disregarding things like future actions the given people may take.

That doesn't give us morally useful information, though.

Yes, I know- I meant disregarding future behavior (because that wouldn't really matter in this situation, when we're talking about life prison sentences).

They're already removed from society, so it doesn't negatively affect society to experiment on them. It would negatively affect society to remove functional people from it in order to experiment on them -- or to kill functional members of society.

Killing prisoners mostly only affects them, and saves money on caring for them for life (assuming you don't have to deal with all of the absurd costs of death penalty appeals).

I agree. I wonder what Presidential candidate has made this a major issue... Hmmmmm...

That's one thing in the positive column. Trump will probably decriminalize drug offenses too.

reason.com/blog/2015/11/09/when-he-called-for-an-end-to-the-war-on

I'm assuming he will flop back to catch the independents and campaign to end the war on drugs by taxing and regulating.
He may not, though. We'll only know after the primaries, since right now he's pandering to conservatives.

[Jaywalker]

I oppose animal testing.

- It doesn't necessarily "save" lives. In many cases of terminal illness, it may add more years spent in suffering (which is less preferable to an outright cure, thus less compelling in a direct comparison of survival vs survival).
- More humans living longer and adding to the world population is not necessarily a good thing. In fact it's the opposite, until a significant part of humanity begins to act morally. (Although this is not something I'd advocate in a non-vegan circle for obvious reasons.)
- Many illnesses can be prevented by a healthy diet and lifestyle. People choose to increase their chances of getting a disease and then think it's acceptable to force animals to endure hell to fix what they're responsible for in the first place.
- It allows people to conduct entirely unnecessary experiments for personal gain.
- Opposing it sends a strong message, and more people opposing it will quicken the development of alternative methods.

I haven't seen any convincing pro-animal testing arguments or sources in this thread. Please provide some, and keep in mind to exclude the benefits of past research.

[EquALLity]

That doesn't give us morally useful information, though.

It fits with the situation. We're talking about criminals who would be in prison for life, so potential future actions are irrelevant.

Do you think that there's anything more moral about killing the mean dog than the nice one, if it was guaranteed the mean one wouldn't bite again?
I don't see any difference.

They're already removed from society, so it doesn't negatively affect society to experiment on them. It would negatively affect society to remove functional people from it in order to experiment on them -- or to kill functional members of society.

Killing prisoners mostly only affects them, and saves money on caring for them for life (assuming you don't have to deal with all of the absurd costs of death penalty appeals).

That's a good point.

I guess it would be justified to experiment on the prisoners, if you could prove the consequences would be better than those of animal testing.

That's one thing in the positive column. Trump will probably decriminalize drug offenses too.

reason.com/blog/2015/11/09/when-he-called-for-an-end-to-the-war-on

I'm assuming he will flop back to catch the independents and campaign to end the war on drugs by taxing and regulating.
He may not, though. We'll only know after the primaries, since right now he's pandering to conservatives.

He might think we should do that, but I doubt he'd come out and say it considering his base is extremely anti-drug.

He didn't say decriminalize, though, he said legalize.
Do you think it'd be good to legalize hard drugs?

[EquALLity]

- It doesn't necessarily "save" lives. In many cases of terminal illness, it may add more years spent in suffering (which is less preferable to an outright cure, thus less compelling in a direct comparison of survival vs survival).

In some cases, but it saves lives due to advancements in vaccines etc.. Also, it's currently being used to cure cancer.

- More humans living longer and adding to the world population is not necessarily a good thing. In fact it's the opposite, until a significant part of humanity begins to act morally. (Although this is not something I'd advocate in a non-vegan circle for obvious reasons.)

I don't know about this... Do you think most people are bad people?

It's the only reason I see that might be valid, and it's bad to advocate for it, so you can't use it in practice to oppose animal testing.

- Many illnesses can be prevented by a healthy diet and lifestyle. People choose to increase their chances of getting a disease and then think it's acceptable to force animals to endure hell to fix what they're responsible for in the first place.

I don't see why this is relevant if the end result of the testing causes less suffering than no testing.

- It allows people to conduct entirely unnecessary experiments for personal gain.

Not necessarily, for medical testing.

- Opposing it sends a strong message, and more people opposing it will quicken the development of alternative methods.

Do you actually have evidence that'll happen?

I haven't seen any convincing pro-animal testing arguments or sources in this thread. Please provide some, and keep in mind to exclude the benefits of past research.

The benefits of past research are extremely important in that they show us what medical advancements from animal testing can do for humanity.

[Cirion Spellbinder]

I don't know about this... Do you think most people are bad people?

Most people aren't necessarily evil, but most people engage in immoral behavior.

If curing their diseases by medicinal means allows them to act immoral for longer, then taking the medicine away forces them to either treat (if possible) their illnesses by adopting healthier diets (which will likely involve less animal products) and reduce the amount of immoral acts they can partake in or they die and become incapable of acting immorally. The problem is this leaves people with illnesses not treatable by dietary changes, even if they partake in moral actions, to die.

I imagine the overall result would be a reduction in harm, but it comes with its own costs and feels wrong (at least to me).

[EquALLity]

I don't know about this... Do you think most people are bad people?

Most people aren't necessarily evil, but most people engage in immoral behavior.

If curing their diseases by medicinal means allows them to act immoral for longer, then taking the medicine away forces them to either treat (if possible) their illnesses by adopting healthier diets (which will likely involve less animal products) and reduce the amount of immoral acts they can partake in or they die and become incapable of acting immorally. The problem is this leaves people with illnesses not treatable by dietary changes, even if they partake in moral actions, to die.

I imagine the overall result would be a reduction in harm, but it comes with its own costs and feels wrong (at least to me).

Everyone engages in immoral behavior, but are most people more bad than good?

Yeah, it definitely feels very wrong, but if it's true...

I'm not sure it's true, though, so I don't think it can be used as an argument for animal testing.
Also, it makes veganism look insane.

[brimstoneSalad]

It fits with the situation. We're talking about criminals who would be in prison for life, so potential future actions are irrelevant.

Compared with killing a person who is free, you are sabotaging fewer interest for the prisoner, because he or she is already denied the majority of things he or she wants in life.
Killing a prisoner may be half as wrong as killing a free person, in terms of how much it harms that person, assuming the prisoner would never be released, because he or she has very few viable interests left to violate.

Do you think that there's anything more moral about killing the mean dog than the nice one, if it was guaranteed the mean one wouldn't bite again?

This isn't a very good comparison for this, because humans can also be deterred from crime, and suffer when they think justice has not been done. BUT if that dog were guaranteed not to bite anybody by being locked in a box away from people, yes it's less wrong to kill that miserable bad dog with nothing to live for than a nice dog with a happy life ahead of it.

If you can otherwise fix a problem, like by removing a tumor that is causing bad behavior, then it's not different for the dog since it's the difference between a fully and happy life vs death, rather than imprisonment and misery vs death.

Do you think it'd be good to legalize hard drugs?

Probably not. There's a subtle difference between decriminalizing and legalizing. Legalizing is basically the government's stamp of approval, decriminalization just means we're not putting them in jails anymore.

[EquALLity]

Compared with killing a person who is free, you are sabotaging fewer interest for the prisoner, because he or she is already denied the majority of things he or she wants in life.
Killing a prisoner may be half as wrong as killing a free person, in terms of how much it harms that person, assuming the prisoner would never be released, because he or she has very few viable interests left to violate.

I don't understand your logic here.

I think the amount of interest in living is what matters, not how many other interests have been violated.

This isn't a very good comparison for this, because humans can also be deterred from crime, and suffer when they think justice has not been done. BUT if that dog were guaranteed not to bite anybody by being locked in a box away from people, yes it's less wrong to kill that miserable bad dog with nothing to live for than a nice dog with a happy life ahead of it.

I think it depends on how much the bad dog wants to live vs the good one.

Maybe, now that being caged, the bad dog has gained perspective and values life much more.

But, if we're just talking about killing a bad dog vs killing a good dog, with equal interest in living and amount of sentience, and the bad dog is guaranteed not to bite anyone, do you think it's more ethical to kill the bad one?
I still don't see the difference.

Probably not. There's a subtle difference between decriminalizing and legalizing. Legalizing is basically the government's stamp of approval, decriminalization just means we're not putting them in jails anymore.

And legalizing can involve government taxation, while decriminalizing doesn't.
So how would decriminalizing solve the problem of drug cartels?