Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective • Hacker News Board

Re: Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective

#151

Post by pmoriarty » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 4:01 PM UTC

elliekelly wrote: post #53

amelius wrote: post #44

Would you rather have your drugs tested on potatoes?

Adult humans who have given informed consent would probably be preferable to potatoes. In most cases, at least.

I'd be surprised if most people who advocate that drugs be tested on consenting adult humans would themselves give consent... especially to drugs which weren't already shown to be safe when tested on animals.

It would be interesting if every citizen was required to act as a research subject every year, to more equitably distribute human testing.

But of course most people would freak out if such a requirement was ever seriously floated, as they want drugs tested on others not on them, so it would never happen.

Re: Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective

#152

Post by pmoriarty » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 4:04 PM UTC

eesmith wrote: post #40

> try to imagine that we live in a world where no one has ever used animals in research before, and someone proposes it for the very first time Why do I have to imagine? We live in that world. At some point in our history people decided to use animals in research. It seems like this is a slight-of-hand - it's asking us to imagine ourselves , now in that environment. But most of us are far removed from hunting, killin…

Interestingly, in the past there was a lot more self-experimentation done by researchers.

The history of such self-experimentation is chronicled in a book called "Who Goes First?":

https://www.amazon.com/Who-Goes-First-Lawrence-Altman/dp/052...

Re: Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective

#153

Post by darksaints » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 4:15 PM UTC

sweetheart wrote: post #145

darksaints wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a facile understanding of efficiency. For example, many animals that we eat are dramatically more efficient at absorbing or consuming certain nutrients from plants than we are: Iron, Calcium, Zinc, B12, EPA, DHA. If adding a step in a supply chain always introduced more net inefficiency, we would never own things like cars or televisions. The complexity you introduce by shortening the supply chain makes a whol…

You can live a completely healthy and nutritionally complete plant based life style though, and without consuming your body weight in anything. So if we don’t _need_ the animals to die for us, killing them is immoral. It’s immoral because it’s unnecessary.

"Completely healthy and nutritionally complete" debatable. Vegan diets are discouraged significantly for pregnant women and children because of how damaging calcium, zinc, and B12 deficiencies can be during that time. And even if you aren't a pregnant woman or child, you still have to deal with the various deficiencies that come with that, typically by eating very targeted foods or highly processed and manufactured supplements that also have problems, such as availability, allergies, cost, or simple difficulty incorporating into diets (e.g. you can't exactly use algae oil like you would olive oil, you can't sprinkle flaxseed on everything).

And speak for yourself with regards to morality. Humans evolved as omnivorous creatures, just like millions of other species. I feel no moral obligation to eliminate animal food sources from my diet. The opposite, in fact. Because a vegan diet is effectively an abandonment of culture. I'm not going to stop making Pasteis De Nata or Caldo Verde simply because you feel bad for the animals. Letting my culture wither away like that is a far bigger sin in my eyes than eating animal-derived foods, which we evolved to do.

Re: Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective

#154

Post by amanaplanacanal » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 4:37 PM UTC

rootusrootus wrote: post #96

omega3 wrote: post #76

Unpopular opinion but I'm yet to hear a convincing argument that the reduction of suffering is something that we should strive for. Edit, looking at the replies I'm disappointed in hn, expected better.

That seems like a perfectly legitimate question. Is it a good idea to anthropomorphize other animals? Is it beneficial to society overall to make macro-level policy decisions based on moral beliefs that are more of a personal thing? FWIW, HN on the weekend is a different beast entirely than it is on weekdays. Even dang needs some time off, and the reduction in moderation can be glaringly obvious. Makes me really appr…

The way you are using the word anthropomorphism implies that there is a difference between humans and other animals and that we should concern ourselves with human suffering, but not with animal suffering. If you think we shouldn’t concern ourselves with the second, then what is the argument for concerning ourselves with the first?

Of course we make policy decisions based on moral belief. We do outlaw murder and rape, for example.

Re: Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective

#155

Post by sweetheart » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 4:55 PM UTC

darksaints wrote: post #153

sweetheart wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can live a completely healthy and nutritionally complete plant based life style though, and without consuming your body weight in anything. So if we don’t _need_ the animals to die for us, killing them is immoral. It’s immoral because it’s unnecessary.

"Completely healthy and nutritionally complete" debatable. Vegan diets are discouraged significantly for pregnant women and children because of how damaging calcium, zinc, and B12 deficiencies can be during that time. And even if you aren't a pregnant woman or child, you still have to deal with the various deficiencies that come with that, typically by eating very targeted foods or highly processed and manufactured s…

The American Dietetic Association explicitly says a vegan diet is safe and appropriate for all stages of life, including pregnancy specifically, so you’re just wrong about that.

Also, cultures change and evolve. It was also a part of past cultures to do all manner of inhumane things, and we are all better off for deciding to stop. Simply saying something is a part of culture doesn’t give it a free pass.

Watch what happens to animals in slaughterhouses, and you’ll see why I don’t think preparing Caldo Verde is really super important in comparison: https://youtu.be/7Y_FHhByhBk

Re: Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective

#156

Post by darksaints » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 5:09 PM UTC

sweetheart wrote: post #155

darksaints wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Completely healthy and nutritionally complete" debatable. Vegan diets are discouraged significantly for pregnant women and children because of how damaging calcium, zinc, and B12 deficiencies can be during that time. And even if you aren't a pregnant woman or child, you still have to deal with the various deficiencies that come with that, typically by eating very targeted foods or highly processed and manufactured s…

The American Dietetic Association explicitly says a vegan diet is safe and appropriate for all stages of life, including pregnancy specifically, so you’re just wrong about that. Also, cultures change and evolve. It was also a part of past cultures to do all manner of inhumane things, and we are all better off for deciding to stop. Simply saying something is a part of culture doesn’t give it a free pass. Watch what ha…

No, they don't say that they it is safe and appropriate for all stages of life. They say it can be. That comes with a long list of caveats related to common nutritional deficiencies...some of which are far more serious for some people (such as pregnant women and children) than others. Addressing those deficiencies is hard to do for all people for a multitude of reasons, some of which have already been listed.

Again, speak for yourself about morality. I feel no moral obligation to not be an omnivore. I do feel a moral obligation to pass down my culture to my children.

Re: Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective

#157

Post by amanaplanacanal » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 5:26 PM UTC

matz1 wrote: post #130

omega3 wrote: post #76

Unpopular opinion but I'm yet to hear a convincing argument that the reduction of suffering is something that we should strive for. Edit, looking at the replies I'm disappointed in hn, expected better.

I personally don't care about animal suffering, whatever you do to non-human is fair game to me. I draw the line between human and non-human. The only reason I may care about animal suffering is because the other human that care about animal can get angry and cause me trouble.

Now I’m curious: why do you care about human suffering?

Re: Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective

#158

Post by amusedcyclist » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 5:31 PM UTC

omega3 wrote: post #137

_Microft wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You dropped a controversial opinion with absolutely nothing to back it up and are now disappointed of the replies. What else did you expect instead? (Well, beside something "better")

> What else did you expect instead? I've expected for people to formulate an interesting, persuasive counter argument. That's how you advance a conversation. You don't advance the discussion by ad hominem remarks or ignoring the argument like some people have done.

You wrote down a truly idiotic thought with no argument or justification whatsoever and you expect people to take you seriously, where did you learn to be so brave and clever.

Re: Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective

#159

Post by amanaplanacanal » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 5:37 PM UTC

eigenket wrote: post #49

mjburgess wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not considering opportunity cost. Meat-as-food can be substituted with non-meat products which net lowers suffering. Since "animal" basically means "non-human" in the case of "animal testing", by definition, there is no substitute which net lowers suffering. Humans suffer as least as much as non-human animals.

Also the way trophic levels work humans eating plants is way more efficient as a system than humans eating animals that eat the plants. Humans eating animals eating plants is an ecological disaster.

Having too many humans on this earth is more of an ecological disaster than eating animals is. Plenty of animals eat only or mostly meat, and they aren’t causing any ecological disasters.

Re: Animal testing is exploitative and largely ineffective

#160

Post by eigenket » Sun, Jun 13, 2021, 5:38 PM UTC

xwolfi wrote: post #87

eigenket wrote: post #35

As an academic who isn't directly involved in anything close to animal testing (I'm a physicist) I always find it strange that people working in biology have to jump through incredible hoops relating to how the animals they work with are treated, but then the lunch place in the biology department sells sandwiches with chicken, ham etc in with incredibly minimal oversight for how the animals are treated. The differenc…

Yet I think both these concerns come from very wealthy people who have time thinking those thoughts. Most people, when they have enough money to buy a bit of meat, are relieved to have such a good intake of protein. And most life, in the broader context, doesn't even have the ability to compute this question. I wonder if we're not overthinking it a bit. Sadistic pleasure in torturing animal should be prevented but al…

I mean pretty much everything that has ever been written, and will ever be written on hackernews counts as come(ing) from very wealthy people who have time thinking those thoughts.

I'm not sure why you wrote that here rather than on some discussion on programming or whatever else.