The European politics of animal experimentation: From Victorian Britain to 'Stop Vivisection'.

This paper identifies a common political struggle behind debates on the validity and permissibility of animal experimentation, through an analysis of two recent European case studies: the Italian implementation of the European Directive 2010/63/EC regulating the use of animals in science, and the recent European Citizens' Initiative (ECI) 'Stop Vivisection'. Drawing from a historical parallel with Victorian antivivisectionism, we highlight important threads in our case studies that mark the often neglected specificities of debates on animal experimentation. From the representation of the sadistic scientist in the XIX century, to his/her claimed capture by vested interests and evasion of public scrutiny in the contemporary cases, we show that animals are not simply the focus of the debate, but also a privileged locus at which much broader issues are being raised about science, its authority, accountability and potential misalignment with public interest. By highlighting this common socio-political conflict underlying public controversies around animal experimentation, our work prompts the exploration of modes of authority and argumentation that, in establishing the usefulness of animals in science, avoid reenacting the traditional divide between epistemic and political fora.

The pollen of metaphor: Box, cage, and trap as containment in the eighteenth century.

This article uses the concept of "the pollen of metaphor" to discuss three forms of non-human animal containment in the eighteenth century: François Huber's Leaf or Book Hive bee box first described in his Nouvelles Observations sur les Abeilles (1792, English translation 1806), Sarah Trimmer's bird cages in her didactic children's book, Fabulous Histories; Or, The Story of the Robins (1786), and a mouse trap in Anna Letitia Barbauld's 1773 poem, "The Mouse's Petition, found in the trap where he had been confined all night by Dr. Priestley, for the sake of making experiments with different kinds of air." All three works highlight the eighteenth-century art of observation. The inherent commitment to relationships in the observation process suggests that interpreting ocular evidence involves "plausible relations," metaphor and/or "productive analogy." The article teases out subtle differences between the ways that each author uses containments and concludes that while Huber seeks to circumscribe non-human animal behavior within the bounds of 'reasonable' animal husbandry to better serve human needs, Trimmer goes further to connect 'appropriate' non-human animal containment to moral strictures governing humans. Barbauld's intervention using a literate, speaking animal subject confronts such moral governance to argue for equal rights based on principles of true equality rather than what is observed to be 'reasonable' and/or 'moral.'

The Magnus-Rademaker Scientific Film Collection: Ethical Issues on Animal Experimentation (1908-1940).

The Magnus-Rademaker scientific film collection (1908-1940) deals with the physiology of body posture by the equilibrium of reflex musculature contractions for which experimental studies were carried out with animals (e.g., labyrinthectomies, cerebellectomies, and brain stem sections) as well as observations done on patients. The films were made for demonstrations at congresses as well as educational objectives and film stills were published in their books. The purpose of the present study is to position these films and their makers within the contemporary discourse on ethical issues and animal rights in the Netherlands and the earlier international debates. Following an introduction on animal rights and antivivisection movements, we describe what Magnus and Rademaker thought about these issues. Their publications did not provide much information in this respect, probably reflecting their adherence to implicit ethical codes that did not need explicit mentioning in publications. Newspaper articles, however, revealed interesting information. Unnecessary suffering of an animal never found mercy in Magnus' opinion. The use of cinematography was expanded to the reduction of animal experimentation in student education, at least in the case of Rademaker, who in the 1930s was involved in a governmental committee for the regulation of vivisection and cooperated with the antivivisection movement. This resulted not only in a propaganda film for the movement but also in films that demonstrate physiological experiments for students with the purpose to avert repetition and to improve the teaching of experiments. We were able to identify the pertinent films in the Magnus-Rademaker film collection. The production of vivisection films with this purpose appears to have been common, as is shown in news messages in European medical journals of the period.

Recruiting "Friends of Medical Progress": Evolving Tactics in the Defense of Animal Experimentation, 1910s and 1920s.

In 1923, Thomas Barbour of Harvard announced the creation of a national lay organization, the Society of Friends of Medical Progress (FMP), to defend animal research in the United States against a resurgent antivivisection movement. After decades of successful behind-the-scenes lobbying and avoiding the public spotlight, medical scientists significantly altered their tactics and sought public engagement, at least by proxy. Although the authority of scientific medicine was rising, women's suffrage, the advent of the ballot initiative, and a growing alliance of antivivisectionists and other groups in opposition to allopathic medicine so altered the political landscape that medical scientists reconsidered formerly rejected ideas such partnering with laymen. Medical scientists, Walter B. Cannon and Simon Flexner chief among them, hoped that the FMP would relieve the scientists of a time-consuming burden and defend against government regulation of medical institutions without the charge of material self-interest. However, financial problems and the frequent conflicts that arose between the lay leadership and Flexner eventually undermined the FMP's value as a defender of animal experimentation and reveal the distrust of reformers like Flexner who did not believe that laymen could speak for scientific medicine.

History, ethics, advantages and limitations of experimental models for hepatic ablation.

Numerous techniques developed in medicine require careful evaluation to determine their indications, limitations and potential side effects prior to their clinical use. At present this generally involves the use of animal models which is undesirable from an ethical standpoint, requires complex and time-consuming authorization, and is very expensive. This process is exemplified in the development of hepatic ablation techniques, starting experiments on explanted livers and progressing to safety and efficacy studies in living animals prior to clinical studies. The two main approaches used are ex vivo isolated non-perfused liver models and in vivo animal models. Ex vivo non perfused models are less expensive, easier to obtain but not suitable to study the heat sink effect or experiments requiring several hours. In vivo animal models closely resemble clinical subjects but often are expensive and have small sample sizes due to ethical guidelines. Isolated perfused ex vivo liver models have been used to study drug toxicity, liver failure, organ transplantation and hepatic ablation and combine advantages of both previous models.

From cruelty to welfare: the emergence of farm animal welfare in Britain, 1964-71.

There is a long history of concern in Britain for how animals are treated. Until the 1960s, these concerns were expressed largely in terms of cruelty or suffering, which was prevented through various acts of Parliament. Over the period 1964-71, amidst public debates about intensive farming, a new discourse of animal welfare emerged. To understand what welfare meant and how it became established as a term, a concept and a target of government regulation, it is necessary to examine farming politics and practices, the existing tradition of animal protection and attempts to rethink the nature of animal suffering.

Dog fight: Darwin as animal advocate in the antivivisection controversy of 1875.

The traditional characterization of Charles Darwin as a strong advocate of physiological experimentation on animals was posited in Richard French's Antivivisection and medical science in Victorian England (1975), where French portrayed him as a soldier in Thomas Huxley's efforts to preserve anatomical experimentation on animals unfettered by government regulation. That interpretation relied too much on, inter alia, Huxley's own description of the legislative battles of 1875, and shared many historians' propensity to foster a legacy of Darwin as a leader among a new wave of scientists, even where personal interests might indicate a conflicting story. Animal rights issues concerned more than mere science for Darwin, however, and where debates over other scientific issues failed to inspire Darwin to become publicly active, he readily joined the battle over vivisection, helping to draft legislation which, in many ways, was more protective of animal rights than even the bills proposed by his friend and anti-vivisectionist, Frances Power Cobbe. Darwin may not have officially joined Cobbe's side in the fight, but personal correspondence of the period between 1870 and 1875 reveals a man whose first interest was to protect animals from inhumane treatment, and second to protect the reputations of those men and physiologists who were his friends, and who he believed incapable of inhumane acts. On this latter point he and Cobbe never did reach agreement, but they certainly agreed on the humane treatment of animals, and the need to proscribe various forms of animal experimentation.

[Bioethics and biomedical experiment evolution from Alkmaion to Pavlov. Dedicated to 160 years since I.P. Pavlov's birthday].

Ethic aspects of biomedical experiment evolution from Alkmaion to Pavlov, are analysed. The history of reflexes in the paradigm of mechanitsism and antropomorphism is reinterpreted. It is emphasized that animal life and their behaviour exceed the bounds of mechanitsizm. It is grounded the necessity of humane treating living organisms. The theory of conditioned reflexes and the method of physiological synthesis are considered in the context of bioethics. It is shown that Pavlov's methodological approaches are in correspondence with the modern principles of bioethics of scientific animal experiments.

The animal issue in xenotransplantation: controversies in France and the United States.

In recent years scientists have created genetically modified pigs for the purpose of xenotransplantations. These are transplants of animal organs into human patients. But xenotransplantation has a long history. Since the early twentieth century, many surgeons tried to insert animal organs into human and non-human bodies. This paper examines the controversies that these innovations have caused in the United States and France, including the notion of the objectification of animals. Three phases are described. The historical review shows that far from the choice of pigs being "natural" it turns out to be recent and to follow controversies surrounding the possible use of primates. During the last phase, the scientists have internalized the "animal issue" in their practice: the official donor is now the pig, and the animals are treated respectfully during all the lab manipulations. Since pigs are different from humans they can be objectified and thus absorbed. This objective distance is, however, threatened by new discourses on animal rights, by genetic manipulations that "humanise" pigs, and by scientific practice itself that recognizes a moral proximity between pigs and men.

Science, suffrage, and experimentation: Mary Putnam Jacobi and the controversy over vivisection in late nineteenth-century America.

This article examines the medical activism of the New York physician Mary Putnam Jacobi (1842-1906), to illustrate the problems of gender and science at the center of the vivisection debate in late nineteenth-century America. In the post-Civil War era, individuals both inside and outside the medical community considered vivisection to be a controversial practice. Physicians divided over the value of live animal experimentation, while reformers and activists campaigned against it. Jacobi stepped into the center of the controversy and tried to use her public defense of experimentation to the advantage of women in the medical profession. Her advocacy of vivisection was part of her broader effort to reform medical education, especially at women's institutions. It was also a political strategy aimed at associating women with scientific practices to advance a women's rights agenda. Her work demonstrates how debates over women in medicine and science in medicine, suffrage, and experimentation overlapped at a critical moment of historical transition.

[Laboratory animals and official Mexican norms (NOM-062-ZOO-1999)]. / Animales de laboratorio y la Norma Oficial Mexicana (NOM-062-ZOO-1999).

This article concerns animal experimentation and official Mexican norm Nom 0062-Zoo-1999 entitled Technical specifications for the production, care and use of laboratory animals. The history of animal experimentation is briefly resumed. During the nineteenth century, doubts arose as to the right to expose animals to experimental procedures that frequently cause pain and suffering. The first law which protected animals against cruelty was passed in Great Britain in 1876; subsequently, other nations approved similar legislation. During the second part of the twentieth century, opposition to animal experimentation grew. Other groups, mainly scientists and pharmaceutical concerns, defended the right to use animals in research. New knowledge concerning the neurophysiology, cognitive capacity, and the animal faculty to experience pain is briefly mentioned. Guidelines on care and use of animals used in research published in several countries are listed. Finally, the recently published Mexican legislation (Norm) referring to production, care and use of laboratory animals is discussed and its benefits are stressed.

[The vegetarian appeal and killing animals. An ethical challenge]. / Der vegetarische Appell und die Tiertötung. Eine ethische Herausforderung.

The demand for renunciation of killing animals has already been discussed by mankind since ancient times. Many arguments for and against this demand have accumulated in the meantime. The reproaches of the vegetarians repeatedly forced the ones who eat meat to justify their diet. Today most of these historical justifications however have to be rejected because of lacking plausibility. Many of the vegetarian arguments on the other hand must be rejected for similar reasons as well. Remaining as morally convincing is the demand for doing the killing absolutely painless and without frightening the animals, which was already formulated for example by Kant and Schopenhauer. Arguments which consider this way of killing as still immoral belong in a broad sense to the "anthropocentric" animal ethics. They do not belong to what is called in Germany "pathocentric" animal ethics, because an animal that is killed without being frightened or tortured, has not suffered, for it hasn't consciously realized anything like danger or harm. We do even argue that these animals are not harmed at all, because it seems senseless to talk about harm without negative conscious phenomena. To push ahead a ban on animal slaughter for moral reasons could be itself morally wrong because it would disturb indirectly many people's conscious well-being without being justified by protecting an animal's conscious well-being. It is however possible to derive from a general duty not to make animals suffer (pathocentric animal ethics) a duty to boycott food of animal origin if these animals had to suffer during their lives.

El status moral de los animales en la discusión sobre xenotrasplantes (parte II) / The moral status of animals in the discussions on xenotransplantation (Part II)

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