English 1A
15 March 16
We all have a right to do what we want to under the law, except the prisoners, who are against the law and, therefore, have no freedom. Now just imagine that you did nothing wrong and someone put you in jail as a prisoner and treated you in an inhumane way, what would you feel? Imagine that one day, some scientists made different kinds of experiments on you, what would you feel? Every living thing in our world has feelings, they can suffer from pain, and have emotions. Mammals as a large group of living organisms living on earth, have feelings, possess emotions, and can feel pain. Humans, as the special mammals on our planet that have wisdom, creativity and developed brain, have been living on our planet for many centuries. Does it mean that humans are the best species in the world? There is no denying that we are the most intelligent species in the entire universe now. But do we have all the rights over other species? The dilemma of the animals' rights is not about the "rights" that animals have, it is about how humans practice their rights on them, about whether we treat them equal as we treat other humans, and prevent them from suffering. What if we are taking away animals rights in order to help humans live better? Using animals in biomedical research is the case I am going to discuss.
Our medicine and medical surgery are getting better and better compared with a few centuries ago. Most of our medical development and biomedical research were relied on experimenting on animals. In his article "The Case For The Use of Animals in Biomedical Research," Carl Cohen states that "human beings are self-legislative, morally autonomous. Animals lack this capacity for free moral judgment. They are not being a kind capable for exercising or responding on moral claims. Animals therefore have no rights, and they can have none" (Cohen). Cohen's argument is right, humans have rights under law and moral that suggest what we can do and what we shouldn’t do. Animals, on the other hand, do not follow the human law. For instance, if a person kills another person, he will be put in jail. If an animal kills a person, it does not to go to jail. Animals might get kill by hunters or police because they are dangerous and post a threat on humans. The one who killed the animal can walk away freely, but has this person done anything wrong? According to contractarianism, it is not wrong because only human pain can me morally relevant; and so if no one cares about the pains and death the animal endures, it is not wrong. But this moral judgment view is unsound.
Now, let's consider the exploitation of animals in biomedical research. In contractarianism, it is totally fine to kill them for research use, because they sacrifice for humans' benefit. In this case, we can put it under the theory of utilitarianism. Tom Regan argues in defense of animal rights. He suggests, "I must ask who will be affected if I choose to do one thing rather than another, how much each individual will be affected, and where the best results are most likely to lie - which option, in other words, is most likely to bring about the best results, the best balance between satisfaction and frustration" (Regan). This theory, I believe, has been experienced by most of the people. For instance, when a patient has cancer, the doctors need to find new medicine to help the patient get rid of the cancer. And in order to make the new medicine, the doctors need lots and lots of the rats to do experiments on. So, many rats are going to die in the lab. Most of the people would choose to kill lots of rats for medicine research which can cure cancer rather than waiting for themselves to die. Regan concludes that "the rights view in principle denies the moral tolerability of any and all form of racial, sexual, or social discrimination; and unlike utilitarianism, the view in principle denies that we can justify good results by using evil means that violates an individual’s right" (Regan). Regan argues that everyone including animals have inherent value, and the values for us and animals are the same. Some people might disagree and say that animals have less inherent value than human because of their lack of autonomy, intellect and reason. But consider the retarded humans - they are mentally disable, so they also lack autonomy, intellect and reason, too. Do they have smaller inherent value than other human? Thus, we have equal inherent value no matter animals or human being.
Peter Singer points out equality between humans and non-humans in his article "All Animals are Equal." He states that "If the experimenter is not prepared to use a human infant, then his readiness to use non-human is simple discrimination, since the adult apes, cats, mice and other mammals are more aware of what is happening to them, more self-directing and, so far as we can tell, at least as sensitive to pain, as any human infant" (Singer). Singer wants us to believe that we shouldn’t ignore non-human equality and we should treat and apply the same moral judgment on non-humans and humans. Singer points out that "we have the right to perform painful experiments on retarded humans for trivial reasons; similarly it would follow that we had the right to rear and kill these humans for food." Singer argues with his critical thinking that if we think it is fine to put non-humans in suffer and pain, we can put humans in suffer and pain, too; with no responsibility.
In conclusion, animals that sacrificed in biomedical research do give a lot of benefit to our humanity, but we should always consider the equality for all living beings, and not just humans themselves. The correct treatment of all non-humans is not about how many rights we have for humans, but about how we apply moral rights to the animals.
Works cited
Cohen, Carl. "The case for the use of animals in biomedical research." The New England Journal of Medicine, 314. 1986: 865-869
Regan, Tom. "The Case for Animal Rights." In Defense of Animals. Ed. by Tom Regan. New York: Basil Blackwell, 1985,13-26.
Singer, Peter. "Animal rights and human obligations." Animal rights and human obligations. Ed. by Tom Regan & Peter Singer. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1989. 148-162
