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This is kinda disturbing. Animal experimentation that saves lives is being disrupted while this kind of thing, with no observable value, and clear detriment to

This is kinda disturbing. Animal experimentation that saves lives is being disrupted while this kind of thing, with no observable value, and clear detriment to the animal, persists? Sure, I am curious about animals and music, but this just seems to misrepresent both. Someone please explan how I am wrong and overreacting, since that is usually my rally cry in comments.

ggm 7y ago
What if understanding innate brain response to music helps inform brain science and cognition and in turn leads to better understanding of e.g. locked-in or coma patients? What if dancing helps improve the lives of animals held for scientific experimentation?
CobrastanJorji 7y ago
Sometimes science involves learning things for which an immediate economic benefit is not apparent. It could very well be that a decade or two from now, our knowledge that animals brains universally react to rhythms is a useful datum in cracking some critical piece of knowledge about how brains work and, potentially, how to fix them. Or, alternately, it could turn out to be practically worthless. But we don't know, and knowing more things is almost always not worse than knowing fewer things. Also, your argument assumes a lot of things: 1.) animal experimentation is being disrupted, 2.) playing music for chimps is clearly detrimental to them, and 3.) the resources that went into this study (these particular chimps, these researchers, and their funding) could have gone into some specific but unidentified better study which did have an pre-observable value. If all of those things are true, which has definitely not been established, than I would grant that science is likely not being conducted in a way that is maximally efficient, but unless there's some hugely valuable experiment that is being overlooked for this, I don't see why you're disturbed.
- randyrand 7y ago
  tho if there is one field that almost always results in nothing from random experimentation, it’s psychology.
- 15__characters 7y ago
  > Sometimes science involves learning things for which an immediate economic benefit is not apparent. Exactly. That's why I want to find out how you would react to being stimulated with a powerful current 5 minutes after you fell asleep. My thesis is that you wouldn't last long, but who knows what use could come from the experiment decades down the road? So instead of delaying, strap on those electrodes so we can make some progress up in this bitch. As you yourself said, knowing more things is almost always better than knowing fewer things.

ggm 7y ago

What if understanding innate brain response to music helps inform brain science and cognition and in turn leads to better understanding of e.g. locked-in or coma patients? What if dancing helps improve the lives of animals held for scientific experimentation?

CobrastanJorji 7y ago

Sometimes science involves learning things for which an immediate economic benefit is not apparent. It could very well be that a decade or two from now, our knowledge that animals brains universally react to rhythms is a useful datum in cracking some critical piece of knowledge about how brains work and, potentially, how to fix them. Or, alternately, it could turn out to be practically worthless. But we don't know, and knowing more things is almost always not worse than knowing fewer things. Also, your argument assumes a lot of things: 1.) animal experimentation is being disrupted, 2.) playing music for chimps is clearly detrimental to them, and 3.) the resources that went into this study (these particular chimps, these researchers, and their funding) could have gone into some specific but unidentified better study which did have an pre-observable value. If all of those things are true, which has definitely not been established, than I would grant that science is likely not being conducted in a way that is maximally efficient, but unless there's some hugely valuable experiment that is being overlooked for this, I don't see why you're disturbed.

randyrand 7y ago
tho if there is one field that almost always results in nothing from random experimentation, it’s psychology.
15__characters 7y ago
> Sometimes science involves learning things for which an immediate economic benefit is not apparent. Exactly. That's why I want to find out how you would react to being stimulated with a powerful current 5 minutes after you fell asleep. My thesis is that you wouldn't last long, but who knows what use could come from the experiment decades down the road? So instead of delaying, strap on those electrodes so we can make some progress up in this bitch. As you yourself said, knowing more things is almost always better than knowing fewer things.