INTRODUCTION

The question whether experiments on living animals can be morally justified is today a central issue in bioethics. Advocates of animal experimentation argue for the scientists’ right to use animals in research by stressing the medical benefits that arise from this practice (Botting 1992; Paton 1993). In other words, they appeal to the reduction of human suffering as their basic argument – and sometimes also the reduction of animal suffering, through progress in veterinary medicine. Adversaries, on the other hand, emphasize the interest of animals in avoiding pain, an interest that animals share with human beings. These critics demand protection of animals, some of them claiming that we have to acknowledge animal rights just as we respect human rights (Taylor 1999). The source of this conflict lies in different evaluations of the human–animal relationship (Manning and Serpell 1994). It is a matter of debate whether there are characteristics that principally distinguish all human beings from all animals; if they exist, whether they are morally relevant; or, to put the question from the opposite perspective, whether there are certain features that are common to human beings and higher animals that oblige us to apply the principle of equality.

These questions are not new and widely differing answers have been given to them. The wider debate about the moral status of animals was often taken up in the context of medical experimentation on animals.