: Animal testing is just plain wrong... They are killing the animals during this! Cynic: Many times, yes. I have nothing against animal testing on premise, only in practice. Toxicity tests that require 50% of the test subjects to die from overdose so we can understand toxin levels in the foodstuffs, drugs, etc. are patently ridiculous. But then I imagine forbidding tests will complicate the process of medical discovery. I have large problems with impediment of both moral and medical progress, and believe both myself, and others, ill-equipped to properly balance these two intrinsic goods.
: Its not fair. Who is to say its alright.
Cynic: But then again, who is to say it's not fair or alright, and how can one say this with any more certainty than one who advocates animal testing?
: are you an animal ?
Cynic: Yes I am, and so are you.
: do you know if its ok and its not hurting anybody?
Cynic: Testing on nonhuman animals doesn't hurt humans, no. Testing on nonhuman animals certainly harms the animals tested on. But then again I question whether you'd care if most medical testing were performed on animals that don't fit the moniker "cute."
: well most of the time it doesnt even work! It's nasty, cruel, barbearic, and just mean!
Cynic: The process needs reform, not abolition. If we can ensure that only suffeciently necessary testing be performed on animals, then that would be a good thing.
: ****each year, millions of animals are killed in labratories...
Cynic: Yep. Mostly cute ones like bunnies, mice, and dogs too.
: cosmetics and household products and ingredients are NOT required to be tested on animals, and since NON-ANIMAL akternatives exists... WHY DO WE STILL USE ANIMALS IN TESTING?
Cynic: Because there's an assumption that household cleaners, shampoos, etc., could have serious side effects, and it'd be better to know what these effects are before marketing a product to humans. I'll agree with you, though, that most of these tests seem overdone and there are many cases where animal testing seems patently unnecessary.
I've thought about testing on criminals, even voluntarily, and people leaped down my throat for it in this forum. Believe it or not, you piss even more people off mentioning human testing than animal testing. That evidence has for me been very telling.
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: who is to say that humans are better than animals?
Cynic: Someone who's thought about it and discovered the final answer, I suppose. But then again, though you may claim to, you really don't feel the way you think you do about animals and humans being equal.
: who was here first? ANIMALS.
Cynic: Some of the nonhuman animals, that is. There are research scientists who can't figure out exactly when new species appeared on Earth. The "who was here first?" argument doesn't work. If that were the case, we could test on any animals that appeared on Earth after we did without questioning the morality of it. I promise you, even though I know little of the subject, that human beings were not the last species to evolve out of the muck.
: yeah we are more sophisticated but we are once you get to thinking of it ANIMALS. And if we all are animals in ways why are we testing on EACHOTHER?
Cynic: It's this simple, Tina. We don't test on humans, and we generally think it wrong because we ARE humans. As much as you claim to love animals, even if they are cute, I'd almost positive you'd save the life of a human infant over that of a puppy if one of the two was going to die and you could only rescue one of them. I bet you love your little sister more than your dog. You're a speciesist at heart, and so are most of those against animal testing. If you can't even abide by what you're preaching, why should you expect others to take you seriously?
Ideology unapplied by its own advocate is questionable at best.
You've got a right inclination towards your subject, anyone that deserves their mind should always be exercising it and testing every idea he or she comes across... but you have to stop relying on emotional appeals. There's still time to figure things out, since you're young. Do what you want, but down get bogged down into a mindset about much of anything yet. Explore your world, and all its opinions... you can start fighting for one over the others when you get to be an old grouch like me.
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