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Self Experiments: Its mission is to make inhumane animal testing obsolete by using “open suffer” collaboration of volunteer testers from around the world. The

Self Experiments: Its mission is to make inhumane animal testing obsolete by using “open suffer” collaboration of volunteer testers from around the world. The first experiment is launching next month: http://selfexperiments.com http://selfexperiments.com What could be more cool than that?

cjbprime 13y ago
Hey, this is an interesting idea. I have criticisms that are probably going to sound mean; but even though I don't like this idea, I like that you're thinking about these problems: * Human subjects research (which the selfexperiments are) is governed by IRBs; if the research did not pass IRB approval, it can't be used in academic publications. It doesn't matter that the research was done outside of academia, it still has to pass IRB approval to be usable. I don't think any IRB would approve this at the moment (though maybe they should!), so it wouldn't be able to be used to replace research in publications. * Of course, humans are not biologically valid testing replacements for animals if your goal was to test what happens in that other animal, so this can only replace research that was being done on animals because humans weren't available. * It looks like up to one million animals a year are used for research in the US, whereas several billion a year (mainly chickens, pigs, cows, with increased capability of suffering over the average testing animal) are raised for food in factory farms. Why does it make sense to work on animal testing instead of factory farming?
- contextual 13y ago
  Thanks for your comment Chris. Since you don't have the benefit of knowing what the experiments are, I don't blame you for being sceptical. * Self Experiments isn't concerned with conforming to FDA specifications and obtaining IRB approval (yet). Also keep in mind this project is iterative. A lot of mistakes will be made along the way. Oh, and the experiments will be fun, or at least extremely interesting. * Animal testing is often a proxy for testing on humans. Self Experiments will attempt to reverse this on a case by case, experiment by experiment basis. I hope Self Experiments will be preemptive and anticipate experiments that may be conducted on animals in the future - and conduct them on humans first. The trickiest part is designing the protocols for these experiments. * One million? Try 19.5 million animals are killed each year in research in the U.S. alone. This does NOT include mice, which is probably numbered in the billions: http://www.statisticbrain.com/animal-testing-statistics/ http://www.statisticbrain.com/animal-testing-statistics/ * Factory farming is deplorable, and I've mulled over how to solve the problem for several years now. I have ideas but that's all I'll say. In the meantime, I'm vegetarian and working towards vegan-ism (although it's harder than I thought).
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
quasque 13y ago
You'll never make animal testing obsolete, nor would it be a good idea to do so as the benefits from using animals in research are so immense, and most such experiments are not transferable to humans (e.g. genetically modifying humans is not viable.) But it sounds like an interesting idea nonetheless - what experiments are you considering running?
- contextual 13y ago
  A little friendly advice: don't ever tell someone what they can and can't achieve. It's impolite and the future is malleable. Feel free to sign up for when the first of many self experiments is launched: http://flowandzone.us2.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=bc7fdf29a4610b493fd5b2783&id=aace84e03e http://flowandzone.us2.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=bc7fdf29...
  - quasque 13y ago
    I understand that you must have invested a lot of your time and energy into this idea, so it may be difficult to accept criticism of its base concept. However by posting about it on a public discussion board you are implicitly inviting others to discuss and critique it, so I don't really see how that can be considered impolite.
    - ScottBurson 13y ago
      Saying flatly "this could never work" is impolite, arrogant, and possibly wrong. "I don't see how this could ever work" suffers from none of these failings.
      - quasque 13y ago
        It could never work (to make animal research obsolete) because there is no human substitute for these: http://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/how/areas-of-research/breeding-and-gm-mice/ http://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/how/areas-of-r... And unless it becomes ethically acceptable to genetically modify human embyros for testing rather than mouse embyros, then this is not going to change. This isn't arrogance or impoliteness, it's just how it is.

cjbprime 13y ago

Hey, this is an interesting idea. I have criticisms that are probably going to sound mean; but even though I don't like this idea, I like that you're thinking about these problems: * Human subjects research (which the selfexperiments are) is governed by IRBs; if the research did not pass IRB approval, it can't be used in academic publications. It doesn't matter that the research was done outside of academia, it still has to pass IRB approval to be usable. I don't think any IRB would approve this at the moment (though maybe they should!), so it wouldn't be able to be used to replace research in publications. * Of course, humans are not biologically valid testing replacements for animals if your goal was to test what happens in that other animal, so this can only replace research that was being done on animals because humans weren't available. * It looks like up to one million animals a year are used for research in the US, whereas several billion a year (mainly chickens, pigs, cows, with increased capability of suffering over the average testing animal) are raised for food in factory farms. Why does it make sense to work on animal testing instead of factory farming?

contextual 13y ago
Thanks for your comment Chris. Since you don't have the benefit of knowing what the experiments are, I don't blame you for being sceptical. * Self Experiments isn't concerned with conforming to FDA specifications and obtaining IRB approval (yet). Also keep in mind this project is iterative. A lot of mistakes will be made along the way. Oh, and the experiments will be fun, or at least extremely interesting. * Animal testing is often a proxy for testing on humans. Self Experiments will attempt to reverse this on a case by case, experiment by experiment basis. I hope Self Experiments will be preemptive and anticipate experiments that may be conducted on animals in the future - and conduct them on humans first. The trickiest part is designing the protocols for these experiments. * One million? Try 19.5 million animals are killed each year in research in the U.S. alone. This does NOT include mice, which is probably numbered in the billions: http://www.statisticbrain.com/animal-testing-statistics/ http://www.statisticbrain.com/animal-testing-statistics/ * Factory farming is deplorable, and I've mulled over how to solve the problem for several years now. I have ideas but that's all I'll say. In the meantime, I'm vegetarian and working towards vegan-ism (although it's harder than I thought).
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]

quasque 13y ago

You'll never make animal testing obsolete, nor would it be a good idea to do so as the benefits from using animals in research are so immense, and most such experiments are not transferable to humans (e.g. genetically modifying humans is not viable.) But it sounds like an interesting idea nonetheless - what experiments are you considering running?

contextual 13y ago
A little friendly advice: don't ever tell someone what they can and can't achieve. It's impolite and the future is malleable. Feel free to sign up for when the first of many self experiments is launched: http://flowandzone.us2.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=bc7fdf29a4610b493fd5b2783&id=aace84e03e http://flowandzone.us2.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=bc7fdf29...
- quasque 13y ago
  I understand that you must have invested a lot of your time and energy into this idea, so it may be difficult to accept criticism of its base concept. However by posting about it on a public discussion board you are implicitly inviting others to discuss and critique it, so I don't really see how that can be considered impolite.
  - ScottBurson 13y ago
    Saying flatly "this could never work" is impolite, arrogant, and possibly wrong. "I don't see how this could ever work" suffers from none of these failings.
    - quasque 13y ago
      It could never work (to make animal research obsolete) because there is no human substitute for these: http://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/how/areas-of-research/breeding-and-gm-mice/ http://www.understandinganimalresearch.org.uk/how/areas-of-r... And unless it becomes ethically acceptable to genetically modify human embyros for testing rather than mouse embyros, then this is not going to change. This isn't arrogance or impoliteness, it's just how it is.