Where do you stand on animal testing? Is it necessary to our preservation? What other ways can we do the testing we need to do? Is there a better way?

__________________
InterfaithForums.com-Where your ideas and beliefs count.

To me, it totally depends on the nature of the testing. An American Indian in an unfamiliar woods, knowing none of the plants, will often pay attention to which plants are eaten by the creatures of the woods. In a way, that is animal testing.

Lets say that you want to test a plant that you are about 80% sure is safe. I'm not against giving that plant in small quantities to animals and (1) seeing if they will eat it, and (2) seeing what reactions to it they have if they do eat it. You can even learn something if they don't eat it, because that will tell you that there is some substance in it that they object to. For instance, American Indians have been using Foxglove for centuries. If you try feeding it to animals, very few will eat it. That doesn't mean that there is something wrong with using it, only that great care must be used when using it. (Digitalis, or Foxglove, in moderate to high doses, will greatly elevate heart beat and blood pressure. For someone NOT suffering from low blood pressure or irregular/slow heartbeat, that can lead to a heart attack or stroke.)

What I think is absurd is when scientists already know that a substance is quite toxic, and inject it into animals (taking the choice away from the animals) just to see HOW toxic it is! Following that logic, one would expect them to drop a new design for an atomic bomb on a fair sized city to see just how destructive it is, in human loss. Of course, they would never consider doing that (I hope), but it is equally irresponsible to use animals to test substances you know are going to kill the animal.

That said, some good has come out of animal testing. On the other hand, many of the substances the FDA considers carcinogenic were given to animals in dosages anywhere from 10 thousand to 10 million times stronger than what a human would ever be subjected to, and all at one time. One example is a emulsifier that used to be used in some cold creams. Using their test results, I would conclude that it WOULD cause cancer of the stomach in humans...if a human ATE 15 or 20 gallons of it in one setting. I think most people would agree that people usually don't eat cold cream, and I've never seen anyone eat 15-20 gallons of anything in one setting! So what does that testing really tell us? Maybe that gluttony isn't a really good thing? That we probably shouldn't eat things that are inedible?

Well, that didn't keep them from injecting African-American prisoners with syphillis in the 1940s and letting it go untreated, just to see what would happen....

__________________
Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control;
these three alone lead one to sovereign power.
Tennyson

I think animal testing should be kept to an absolute minimum. Why should animals die while we play chemical games? There are cases, such as with medications that it is helpful and not fatal or maming to the animals (they can't always predict that, though). However, they have to "give" the condition to the animal first. These things have to be tested, and in many cases, tested better than they are now, but it's a lose-lose situation whether you do animal or human testing. Such a disregard for the quality of one life while trying to help others.

It wasn't just blacks that got that sort of inhumane treatment. Prisoners of any color have been used. I don't agree with doing that. Some of the tests that they did with agent orange on living people who never knew that they were part of the test were downright gross. Of course, they've denied doing that sort of thing, but there is too much evidence that says that they did.

People must unerstand that one of life's main purposes is to be beholding to life. Everything that is alive is not alive to serve you but to serve life. Life is not a debt to be paid off but a moment of sharing. Animals die the example of Jesus Christ every day and don't regret it.

Animals live this way of life. They teach us the value of life and the value of death. This is not a sacrifice. It is a purpose! Not every animal that exists becomes a test subject in a laboratory or a meal on a table. People must understand purpose not only to be understanding to other humans’ behavior but to animals’ as well.

__________________
"There is one thing that organized religion is not qualified to teach and that is an individual's purpose."-GOD

As a firm believer in empirical study I took our two gerbils and asked them to complete a simple multi-choice test...they both failed miserably.....QED

Ok..after that whim of a quip I tend to think that why test things on animals for human use when there are plenty of humans out there who would probably..for a fee,..sign up to be tested instead .... after all....it's for human vanity, health, cosmetic dependency that all these things are for are they not ?

__________________
Snowman1 Men are the same as women, just inside out !Snowman1

and these are mine, mine mine mine ...oh...and wifeys too !