It is common to argue that animal experimentation is justified by its essential contribution to the advancement of medical science. But note that this argument actually contains two premises: an empirical claim that animal experimentation is essential to the advancement of medical science and an ethical claim that if research is essential to the advancement of medical science, then it is justified. Both claims are open to challenge, but in the logic of the case, only one of them needs to (...) be shown false or moot in order to refute the argument. I argue that the ethical claim does not withstand scrutiny. In addition, the main so-called “alternatives” to animal research do not merit that label since they still involve the use of nonhuman animals. (shrink)

In Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass, Humpty Dumpty explains to Alice, “When I use a word … it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.” When Alice questions this license, Humpty Dumpty replies, “The question is … which is to be master — that’s all.” The present article offers a lexicon of words that are used by human beings, however unintentionally or ingenuously, to maintain their mastery or prerogatives over other animals. A motivating (...) assumption of the article is that putting on display the verbal menagerie in animal agriculture, animal experimentation, and the rest of the industries and institutions that use nonhuman animals, could go a long way toward eliminating these enterprises, since they are built as much on equivocation as on exploitation. (shrink)

Animal research is a challenging issue for the animal advocate because of what, besides animal well-being, is considered to be at stake, namely, human health. This article seeks to vindicate the antivivisectionist position. The standard defense of animal research as promoting the overwhelming good of human health is refuted on both factual and logical, or normative-theoretical, grounds. The author then attempts to clinch the case by arguing that animal research violates a deontic principle. However, this principle falls to counterexample. The (...) author concludes, nevertheless, that the principle retains force as a presumption that the current state of affairs fails to overthrow. This does suggest, though, that the antivivisection movement would be well advised to keep ahead of the curve. The author proposes it do so by emulating the vegan movement against animal agriculture with the active promotion of alternatives to animal research. (shrink)