Paper Topic:

`The Ethics of Animal Experimentation in Biomedical Research`

(Morton 7 . However given that many of the world 's cultures place more emphasis on the method of killing an animal rather than the numbers killed , determining the value of an animal 's life degenerates into a slippery slope argument . The practical aspects of considering the value of an animal 's life and henceforth suffering is therefore entirely dependent on the refining of animal experiments with regard to the experiences of pain discomfort , mental distress or lasting harm (Morton 8 . These considerations are based on the understanding that suffering free animals

are necessary for the production of high specificity and quality of the objectives in question . On the basis of proportionality , the benefits should far outweigh the degrees of suffering involved but only if such suffering is acceptable under the regulatory standards . In cases where millions of animals are continually killed without any apparent or significant benefit , such practices are unethical and morally wrong (Yarri 197 Motloch 12

The moral status of animals is also challenged by philosophical debates that view animals as biological machines that can be utilized by humans for their own benefit . Such philosophical underpinnings points to varying degrees of consciousness and sentience which are definitive of the moral basis through which moral interests can be ascribed to animals . But even in such philosophical underpinnings of ascribing moral interests , methods employed in the capture , breeding , confinement and killing of the animals are classified in terms of degrees . These classifications attempt to avoid the infliction of pain to animals as much as possible . On the basis of speciesism , it is held that just as racism and sexism are wrong , so is the mistreatment of animals (Murphy 251

In other instances , animals have been vivisected , starved , burned deprived of stimulation and eventually killed using painful methods in the name...

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