4 ms·

Whether using animals is necessary for the research is one thing. I'd also quite like to know whether the research is necessary to start with. I assume that the

Whether using animals is necessary for the research is one thing. I'd also quite like to know whether the research is necessary to start with. I assume that the research design when animals are involved is generally of a higher quality than it would've been otherwise, but still, so much drivel and nonsense gets published (see http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1182327/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1182327/ and http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8124111 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8124111) that I can't help but wonder how many animals suffer because of a lack of scientific imagination and professionalism rather than because it's truly, absolutely needed to help discover life-saving drugs and treatments.

EmlynC 12y ago
Unfortunately, science isn't the sort of endeavour where anything can resolutely be considered necessary to start with. Arguably there should be some doubt about whether your research will lead to something important else you can't be doing anything novel. There is nonsense in any endeavour and that is why there are layers of ethics committees, reviews and audits within animal research that limits wanton nonsense. The price of any endeavour is that there will be waste — humans cannot help it — it is unfortunate that the waste is at the expense of animal life. The first article you link to is about the abuse of frequentist statistics, it is not a piece of nonsense primary research (1182327). The article is correct and an interesting read, but not in support of poor use of animal experiments. The second article (8124111) is about clinical research, not pre-clinical animal research although the arguments raised in the article are applicable to pre-clinical research. It is very difficult to find and expose nonsense research!

4 ms·

Whether using animals is necessary for the research is one thing. I'd also quite like to know whether the research is necessary to start with. I assume that the

by stdbrouw 12y ago

EmlynC 12y ago
Unfortunately, science isn't the sort of endeavour where anything can resolutely be considered necessary to start with. Arguably there should be some doubt about whether your research will lead to something important else you can't be doing anything novel. There is nonsense in any endeavour and that is why there are layers of ethics committees, reviews and audits within animal research that limits wanton nonsense. The price of any endeavour is that there will be waste — humans cannot help it — it is unfortunate that the waste is at the expense of animal life. The first article you link to is about the abuse of frequentist statistics, it is not a piece of nonsense primary research (1182327). The article is correct and an interesting read, but not in support of poor use of animal experiments. The second article (8124111) is about clinical research, not pre-clinical animal research although the arguments raised in the article are applicable to pre-clinical research. It is very difficult to find and expose nonsense research!