Nanotechnology and the nerve cell or Who said animal testing was useless again? - by SubJeff
SD on 14/3/2006 at 19:49
Quote Posted by Chimpy Chompy
A "moderate" unable to bring himself to outright condemn the lunatic fringe. Sadly familiar.
I've criticised their methods - what more are you asking me to do?
That these guys give moderates an easier ride is nothing more than an observation on my part, rather than an expression of pleasure.
I was responding to those who stated that people like the ALF have never effected any changes. Now they certainly operate in a crude and ugly manner, but nobody can deny they get results. It's like Al Capone said: "You get a lot further with a kind word and a gun than you do with just a kind word".
mopgoblin on 14/3/2006 at 20:15
Quote Posted by Agent Monkeysee
I don't think those of you saying "let's just use people instead" know what medical research on animals often entails.
In this case, it apparently involves deliberately blinding hamsters in order to try to cure that blindness. Why not try with a blind human instead? If you can't find a human who'll consent to a test, that's a pretty good indication that it's not something you should be doing to any animal.
Stitch on 14/3/2006 at 20:24
Quote Posted by mopgoblin
If you can't find a human who'll consent to a test, that's a pretty good indication that it's not something you should be doing to any animal.
Does this basic concept extend in your world outside of scientific testing as well?
If not, why?
If so, how can you live with yourself?
Agent Monkeysee on 14/3/2006 at 20:52
Quote Posted by Strontium Dog
Would it not have been a damn sight more useful if we had performed these experiments on humans who were already blind (and don't try and tell me you wouldn't have a queue of volunteers longer than the Gulf War casualty list if there was even a slight chance that their blindness could be cured)?
I don't know specifically about this particular study but in the vast majority of cases the research requires that the subject be euthanized and dissected after the experiment. That's a necessary step because showing that sight is restored isn't the end of the research. You need to get in there and find out the why and how sight was restored and that requires dissection to ensure the predicted mechanisms are actually the ones involved as well as to determine if there were other side-effects or complications that simply verifying "yep, they can see" wouldn't get at.
I don't care how blind you are, you're not going to sign up for that.
Quote Posted by mopgoblin
In this case, it apparently involves deliberately blinding hamsters in order to try to cure that blindness. Why not try with a blind human instead? If you can't find a human who'll consent to a test, that's a pretty good indication that it's not something you should be doing to any animal.
Because THEY HAVE TO DISSECT YOU AFTERWARDS.
You can't simply confirm the desired effect of the experiment. You have to validate that the method is sound, that the predicted mechanisms are valid, that your new cure for blindness didn't also destory the temporal lobe.
This is real-world research, guys, not a chemistry exam. You don't check to see you got the right answer and move on to the next problem. You have to be able to
explain and
predict the right answer. You have to ensure and reensure that the working theory actually describes the reality. That involves gathering volumes of data on the subject AFTER the treatment has been applied. Data that requires you study the organism in detail, which involves, among other things,
taking them apart.
SD on 14/3/2006 at 20:54
Dawg, if I'm blind and my sight is miraculously restored, I ain't gonna give two shits how it happened. They can dissect me when I'm dead; I'm off to a strip club :cool:.
Agent Monkeysee on 14/3/2006 at 21:00
Quote Posted by Strontium Dog
Dawg, if I'm blind and my sight is miraculously restored, I ain't gonna give two shits how it happened. They can dissect me when I'm dead; I'm off to a strip club :cool:.
And that's great because, since they were using hamsters for years before they moved to human trials, they were able to determine that the first iterations of sight restoration also caused brain tumors and liver failure and that the next iteration after that had a 95% failure rate after 2 months and caused irreperable optic nerve damage.
A couple generations of hamsters took it in the ass so you could get radical new sight restoration therapy that
didn't scar your liver or overload your visual cortex.
SD on 14/3/2006 at 21:44
Right, because if it causes tumours in animals it'll cause tumours in humans.
And if it has no side-effects on animals it'll have no side-effects on humans.
hay guys there's this great new drug thalidomide totally no side effects in lab rats you should try it
Agent Monkeysee on 14/3/2006 at 21:56
Why don't you start over and read my posts again. Ignoring the fact that you often can make legitimate conclusions from adverse effects on animal physiology there's more to medical research then simply "did your balls fall off". It's medical research. It's science first and medicine second. You can't build a comprehensive model if you can't study the subject in detail.
Vigil on 14/3/2006 at 22:10
Furthermore the whole point of the experiment is to test on species that will give a reliable gauge of what the effects (beneficial and adverse) will be on humans. This being why they choose and test on species whose physiology is close to humans in the relevant area.
That some adverse effects are missed during animal trials due to inconsistencies in physiology does not invalidate the approach, nor does it mean the treatment isn't finally tested on humans* before being brought into general use.
<small>*lol homeless people they pulled off the street and lied to because this is after all Deus Ex and not the real world at all</small>
SD on 14/3/2006 at 22:18
Quote Posted by Agent Monkeysee
Why don't you start over and read my posts again. Ignoring the fact that you often can make legitimate conclusions from adverse effects on animal physiology there's more to medical research then simply "did your balls fall off". It's medical research. It's science first and medicine second. You can't build a comprehensive model if you can't study the subject in detail.
I know you can
sometimes make legitimate conclusions from medical research, but it's far from an exact science.
I'm not hugely opposed to medical research on principle; I recognise that the suffering caused by these experiments is dwarfed by that caused by factory farming, and that the former is of far more benefit than the latter too. I'm just
very wary of placing much trust in the results we get from animal testing.
And when, even now, I can freely buy a drink laced with sodium saccharin - a substance which has apparently been proven to cause cancer in rats - then I just can't place much faith in the powers that be to protect me from ill-effects anyway. What's the point of doing these tests if you're just going to ignore the results, even if it's something with such trivial benefits as saccharin?
