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Debate Score:6
Arguments:4
Total Votes:8
Ended:08/23/12
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Is Animal testing necessary?

For

Side Score: 5
Winning Side!
VS.

Against

Side Score: 1
1 point

For a couple of reasons, of course it is.

1) Rights are dictated by society.

This debate is closely linked with some others such as "Do Animals have Rights?" The conclusion of this debate, I believe, was about how the rights of certain animals, creatures, and any rights as a society at all, are dictated by society. Therefore if the majority of people think that it is okay then the rights of animals depend on what we wish for them to depend. And for reasons listed below you shall find that people are generally in favour of animal testing when faced with some of the other alternatives.

Animal rights are dictated by society, and people are usually in favour of animal testing when the facts are supplied to them.

2) If we test on animals, we don't have to test as much on people.

Animal experimentation means that we can make advances in certain areas without causing damage to people. This is closely linked with my first point, for if people are not in favour of animals being experimented upon then the next option is simply to allow for people to be experiment on instead. How many people wish to be experimented upon when some of the results may be hazardous? I don't think I would be too keen to volunteer for everything that needs testing. Not everything is safe for human experimentation and products are rarely used on humans unless people are 100% sure that it won't hurt them. Of course there is the odd error, but the amount of injuries and casualties would increase exponentially if people were experimented on first.

The alternative to experimenting on animals is experimenting on people.

3) Do you want life to advance?

If there was no use of experimentation on animals then many products and their success would be slowed down a lot. People would struggle to find safe alternatives, other than 2), that would allow them to advance in the areas they wish to advance in. If such disadvantages are placed in their way then attempts will be slowed down hugely and become close to futile. Evolution is something that means we will gradually advance as a race, and placing barriers in the way based on how morality (something proved a waste of time in 1) and 2)) is just completely ridiculous.

We will not be able to advance as efficiently in society if we are blocked by unnecessary barriers.

Side: For
1 point

It's necessary for testing medicins and stuff.

I have nothing against animal testing, if it is for a good reason. Like finding a cure for cancer and all kinds of different diseases or illnesses.

But when it comes to beauty stuff.. testing perfume and whatever they do to those poor little animals is horrible and shouldn't be done EVER.

Side: For
1 point

Each year approximately millions of innocent animals die in lethal dose tests. There is nothing else in the world that is quite as useless, harmful and misleading as animal experimentation. This is why animal rights activists all over the world should start declining medicines that have been tested on animals.Animals not only react differently than humans to different drugs, vaccines, and experiments, they also react differently from one another. Ignoring this difference has been and continues to be very costly to human health.Clearly, if we are going to make medical progress, a new approach is needed. Human medicine can no longer be based on veterinary medicine. It is fraudulent and dangerous to apply data from one species to another. There are endless examples of the differences between humans and non-human animals.

Side: Against
OliverJDH(131) Disputed
1 point

While I would agree entirely that the conduct of the experiments can be unnecessarily cruel (and therefore in need of strict regulation), I dispute your claim that "It is fraudulent and dangerous to apply data from one species to another". Homologous skeletal structures, genetic similarities, similar brain compositions and other factors mean this is simply not the case. Of course history tells us that some drugs tested to be safe on animals are harmful to humans, and some illnesses in humans (especially psychological illnesses) are unique to our species alone - however in both instances these are the minority of cases. I am certainly not arguing that vivisection should be the only process by which we develop and test drugs - I am strongly in favour of computer modeling and Corrositex (synthetic skin) - however these alternatives must be used in conjunction with animal testing not instead of. Vivisection has brought us many valuable advances in medicine, (heart bypass surgery, for example) and continues to work on cures for cancers and AIDS. Computer models are great, but they do not allow for unknown variables - vivisection can identify these unknown variables. I look forward to a day when we no longer need animal testing, but I'm afraid that day has not yet come. Animal testing is, at the moment at least, still necessary.

http://www.genomenewsnetwork.org/articles/05_02/mouse_053102.shtml

http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/addiction/genetics/neurobiol.html

Side: For