In this blog post, we will focus on the necessity of animal testing and ethical issues, and consider the balance between human interests and animal rights.
I once came across a statistic that only about 14% of the animals used in animal testing survive the experiment. Because of these unignorable sacrifices, the controversy over the usefulness and justification of animal testing has continued since ancient times. So, is it ethically justifiable to pursue human interests by sacrificing animals in experiments?
To put it bluntly, I don’t think animal testing itself is ethically problematic. The ultimate goal of animal testing is to advance humanity. The experiment aims to prove scientific facts about humanity and life and apply them to improving the quality of life. But is it ethically correct to seek human benefit at the expense of species other than humans? To put it simply, I believe that there is no ethical problem with “the act of gaining profit at the expense of other species.”
For example, consider the human diet. Humans sacrifice other living things for their own survival. Of course, since humans are not independent living organisms, this is an essential act for survival, but survival is also one of the basic human needs. In terms of satisfying human needs, the “desire to explore” through animal testing, the “desire for comfort” through improving the quality of life, and the “desire to survive” through eating are essentially the same, with only a difference in degree.
There is something that needs to be addressed here. Is it ethically right to sacrifice another entity to satisfy one’s own desires? How much of a difference is there between killing a person and killing an animal? In this regard, I believe that this is a legal and ethical problem between humans, but not between humans and animals.
Before discussing the relationship between humans and animals, which is the core of the thesis, let’s look at the relationship between humans and humans. Humans can satisfy their needs by killing others, but they are afraid of dying themselves. This kind of thinking is universal, and as a result, humans form a “society” with other individuals who share this way of thinking and establish rules with each other. When the profit x that person A gains from doing an act A and the damage y that person A suffers when someone else does an act A to him/her are significantly different, a “law” is created to prohibit them from doing so. For example, in the case of murder, the damage when someone kills you is much greater than the profit you gain from killing someone, so it is strongly prohibited.
On the other hand, if the difference between profit x and loss y is not large, or if the definition is ambiguous to the point of being prohibited by law, the social convention of “ethics” is applied. There is no legal punishment for violating ethics, but there are damages such as remorse of conscience and criticism from others. In this case, both profit and loss are generally small, so even those who follow the law find it difficult to follow all ethics.
Basically, humans are considered to have agreed to the laws and ethics of the society as soon as they are born. Ideally, it is most reasonable to ask and determine whether an individual accepts the social rules, but since it is clear that virtually all humans will accept them, they automatically become members of society and comply with the law. In this process, harming others for one’s own benefit becomes legally and ethically problematic among humans of the same species.
Therefore, I will define “ethics” in this article as the norms that prevent humans from harming other humans as members of society. Does this mean that the “members of society” here only include humans? We need to be clear about this in order to discuss the ethical issues of animal testing. For many reasons, I believe that it is impossible to include animals as members of society, and therefore I believe that it is right to limit the members of society to humans.
The first reason why it is difficult for animals to be included as members of society is that humans are heterotrophs. In other words, humans cannot sustain their lives without the sacrifice of other species. If all animals are considered members of society, humans would be unable to eat even basic food physiologically and would starve to death. Even if only animals that cannot be eaten are left as members of society, the standards vary from person to person, and it seems unreasonable to discriminate against certain animals. For this reason, most countries clearly distinguish between humans and animals, limiting the members of society to humans only, and applying relatively lower regulations to animals.
The second reason is that all living things prioritize individuals → species → nature. Any living thing considers its own life to be the top priority, then its own species, and finally other species. Even in exceptional cases, the basic way of thinking follows this order. The six characteristics of living organisms, including metabolism, stimulus and response, homeostasis, reproduction and heredity, development and growth, and adaptation and evolution, are all characteristics that prioritize the continuation of one’s life or species.
Finally, humans are the only ones who are altruistic and rational. Altruism is a rare phenomenon in nature, and the altruistic behavior of bees and some birds is based on blood-related selection, so it is different from human “altruism.” In addition, other animals simply make judgments based on external reactions, experiences, and pleasure, but humans make judgments based on deep thought. Rational thinking and altruism are the major differences that distinguish humans from other animals.
For this reason, animals cannot be included as members of human society, and therefore, animal experiments that use animals for human benefit are not considered ethically problematic. This is the same level as when humans consume animals to satisfy their survival needs (appetite), and in terms of “the development of humanity and the satisfaction of needs,” it is essentially no different from eating.
However, there are also arguments against this. The position is that since animals also feel emotions and pain, there are ethical issues with treating them cruelly or causing them pain during experiments and that such practices should be avoided. They believe that humans and animals are equal in that they are both “living beings” and that pain that humans do not want should be avoided in animals as well.
I would like to present two counterarguments to this. First, it is wrong to view humans and animals as equal in terms of “living things.” Although humans and animals are both living things, it is a logical leap to include animals as members of human society. If all animals are included as members of society, even basic feeding would become a legally and ethically wrong act, and society could not be maintained.
Second, it is necessary to strictly distinguish between “animal testing” and “how animal testing is conducted.” I do not see any ethical issues with animal testing itself, but I do think that ethical issues can arise depending on the testing method. For example, experiments that involve the painful heating of live rats can cause harm to the rats themselves, as well as to those who hear about the experiments and are outraged by them. The suffering of animals is outside the rules of human society, but the experimental methods that cause suffering to people can be an ethical issue. In other words, “animal testing” itself is not a problem, but depending on the method, ethical issues may arise.
The 3R principle can be introduced to reduce the ethical problems of animal testing. The 3Rs stand for “replacement,” “refinement,” and “reduction.” “Replacement” means avoiding animal testing if other methods can be used instead of animal testing. “Refinement” means designing experiments to reduce the suffering of animals. “Reduction” means minimizing the number of animals used in animal testing. Conducting experiments according to these principles can minimize the damage caused to people with empathy.
Another counterargument is that animals think through the same emotions and experiences as humans. For example, they believe that domesticated animals and pets think like humans when they see that they are tamed and feel affection for their owners. However, this logic is not valid. Just as people’s experiences and reactions cannot be simply concluded as feelings of pleasure and pain, animals are also based on instinctive reactions rather than deep thought. Only humans make “rational judgments” based on deep thought and emotion, which is the basis for making them members of society.
In conclusion, I believe that there is no ethical problem if animal testing itself is for the benefit of humans.
