5 ms·

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

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).
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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
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