3 ms·

I'd rather not sacrifice people on the altar of a single study, no matter how significant the results. Down that path lies atrocities, too, albeit of a quieter

• dalke 10y ago
  As I said earlier, there are alternatives which are both moral and can verify effectiveness without having to repeat the original experiment. You chose to not verify, and insist upon repeating, thus likely consigning people to unneeded pain and even death. I'll give a real-world example to be more clear cut about modern ethics and science. Ever hear of TGN1412? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TGN1412 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TGN1412 It went into early human trials, and very quickly caused a reaction. "After very first infusion of a dose 500 times smaller than that found safe in animal studies, all six human volunteers faced life-threatening conditions involving multiorgan failure for which they were moved to intensive care unit." (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2964774/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2964774/ ) Here's a publication of the effects: http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa063842 http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa063842 . Is it moral to reproduce that experiment? I say it is not moral, and must not be repeated even though it is possible to do so. Can a publication about the effects still be good science even though medical ethics prevent us from repeating the experiment? Absolutely. What say you?