I have no intention of joining NAVS, but they have plenty of ads on a rock station I listen to, so I’m curious about one thing. Are they considered a main stream group, or are they considered out there, or even wackos?
I know this will be personal opinion, and that’s fine.
Just from their ads they want to end cosmetic and medical testing on animals. Ending cosmetic testing is one thing, but ending medical, I don’t know. They claim there are new techniques so testing on animals isn’t necessary
If that quote is too long, my apologies to the mods, I got the quote from here
Anyway, is that realistic, or overly optimistic?
Much too optimistic. Not only are our computers not powerful enough for that kind of simulation, we don’t yet have a complete knowledge of all the substances and structures in human tissue; and you can’t simulate something you don’t even know exists. Tissue samples fail because they aren’t part of a whole creature which changes the results. And using human volunteers fails because experiments can easily be fatal; in some cases such as when the brain has to be sliced up to observe the results, they are fatal by definition.
If anything they are acting as a setback for animal rights by making unreasonable demands and by causing scientists to take a hardline stance against them in self defense.
I thought it might be something like that. On the one hand their ads don’t make them sound as extremest as groups like PETA. On the other hand they don’t sound like they’re grounded much in reality either.
Yes, it’s simply factually incorrect to say that animal testing for medical purposes is no longer necessary. Believe me, no one would like to stop it more than the scientists actually doing it. It’s incredibly expensive, time-consuming, difficult, and a royal pain in the butt. Beyond that, I don’t know anything about this group specifically.
I’m a vegetarian partially for animal welfare issues, and also try to always stick to beauty products not tested on animals. I also work in medical research on the human testing end of things. Animal rights groups have been trotting out that computer modeling line for years now, at least since the early '90s. It’s not true. It would be awesome if it was - at least for the reason that would mean our knowledge of the human body and it’s biochemistry was greatly progressed past where we are now.
And sorry, I don’t know much about the group either.
It’s worth noting that a certain proportion of animal testing isn’t really being conducted for research purposes, but for “protection from lawsuit” purposes. In many cases, unnecessary testing on well-known substances is conducted just so the claim can be advanced that the product has been laboratory-tested; furthermore, in some products, lethal animal testing is conducted on each batch more because the corporation wants legal cover than because they suspect that one batch is suddenly very different.
That sort of testing, at least, is superfluous from a scientific viewpoint.
Also, computer modeling is improving, and one day will be a better guide than animal testing (or at least, the inaccuracy will be smaller than the inaccuracy caused by extrapolating animal results to human results), so the discussion is really “has that day come yet.” You’re right to use the term “optimistic” instead of “are these people completely crazy.”
True, but (nonhuman) animal testing isn’t going to ever give us complete knowledge of the subtleties of human tissue.
Look, you may be right about computers not being up to the task yet, but don’t you think a remark like this would come across differently if we said it about any other rights group?
“If anything they are acting as a setback for civil rights by making unreasonable demands and by causing Bull Connor to take a hardline stance against them in self defense.”
Ok, maybe this is a good place to ask this (GQ would be good too, but whatever). What is vivisection, exactly? I recently got some pet rats (they are totally awesome you guys!) and on the pet rat forum I read now a couple people have stuff in their signatures that’s anti-vivisection. Now, i was always under the impression that vivisection was like dissection, but done on living animals without the benefit of anesthetics, but reading about it, it seems like its just dissection done on a living animal. Which, I have to be honest, I don’t have a big problem with. So, which is it?
Thinking that we are anywhere near being able to do that, especially on a scale and speed able to replace animal testing shows that they are if not actually crazy, extremely unrealistic.
It’s much closer than computer simulation is going to come anytime soon though.
That comparison doesn’t work. Most obviously because black people weren’t genuinely lesser beings. Animals are. Less intelligent, less emotionally complex, less unique as individuals; they possess less of all the things that come with intelligence. None of that is true about blacks. And second, scientists can be reasoned with on this to a degree that bigots motivated by hatred can’t. And third, there’s a genuine necessity and a genuine higher purpose to what scientists are doing; there’s no such things involved with racists.
Vivisection is surgery done on a living animal for experimental purposes, and can be done with anesthetic. The animal rights movement uses the term vivisection more broadly to mean any experiments done on animals, whether or not they involve surgery.