Animal Experimentation Quotes

Why is taste, the crudest of our senses, exempted from the ethical rules that govern our other senses? ~ Jonathan Safran Foer

That's the business model. How quickly can they be made to grow, how tightly can they be packed, how much or little can they eat, how sick can they get without dying. This isn't animal experimentation, where you can imagine some proportionate good at the other end of the suffering. This is what we feel like eating ... Why doesn't a horny person have as strong a claim to raping an animal as a hungry one does to killing and eating it? It's easy to dismiss that question but hard to respond to it ... How riveting wold the sound of a tortured animal need to be to make you want to hear it that badly? ~ Jonathan Safran Foer

This isn't animal experimentation, where you an imagine some proportionate good at the other end of the suffering. This is what we feel like eating. Tell me something: Why is taste, the crudest of our sense, exempted from the ethical rules that govern our other sense? If you stop and think about it, it's crazy. Why doesn't a horny person has as strong a claim to raping an animal as a hungry one does to killing and eating it? ~ Jonathan Safran Foer

Ask the experimenters why they experiment on animals and the answer is: Because the animals are like us. Ask the experimenters why it is morally okay to experiment on animals and the answer is: Because the animals are not like us. Animal experimentation rests on a logical contradiction. ~ Charles R. Magel Philosophy Professor

Animal experimentation has been essential to the development of all cardiac surgery, transplantation surgery, joint replacements and all vaccinations. ~ Joseph Murray

At the same time we see the phenomenon of successful women adopting the standards of men with a vengeance. Will women's march to power ascendancy, won against all odds, mean that they too will choose to flaunt their preferences for red meat, animal skin, sport hunting, and even bullfighting? As women are swelling the ranks of biomedical science, many have adopted the practice of animal experimentation. Will animal exploitation become the ultimate symbol of equality with the white male? ~ Maria Comninou

Even if animal experimentation was proved to be of value, it would be morally wrong. ~ George Bernard Shaw

I think it's part of moral progress to be able to face things that once looked as if they weren't problems. I have that kind of feeling about our relation to animals... Abortion's a similar case-there are complicated moral issues. Feminist issues were a similar case. Slavery was a similar case. I mean, some of these things seem easy now, because we've solved them and there's a kind of shared consensus-but I think it's a very good thing that people are asking questions these days about, say, animal rights. I think there are serious questions there. Like, to what extent do we have a right to experiment on and torture animals? I mean, yes, you want to do animal experimentation for the prevention of diseases. But what's the balance, where's the trade-off? ~ Noam Chomsky

When we say that humans have a "right" not to be used for these purposes, this means simply that the interest of humans in not being used as non-consenting subjects in experiments will be protected even if the consequences of using them would be very beneficial for the rest of us. The question, then, is why do we think that it is morally acceptable to use nonhumans in experiments but not to use humans?

Vivisection, Part Two: The Moral Justification of Vivisection | Animal Rights: The Abolitionist Approach ~ Gary L. Francione

Most animal experimentation is useless. ~ Henry Heimlich

[Referring to the birds:] Nat listened to the tearing sound of splintering wood, and wondered how many million years of memory were stored in those little brains, behind the stabbing beaks, the piercing eyes, now giving them this instinct to destroy mankind with all the deft precision of machines. ~ Daphne Du Maurier

I can tell you this on a stack of Bibles: prisons are archaic, brutal, unregenerative, overcrowded hell holes where the inmates are treated like animals with absolutely not one humane thought given to what they are going to do once they are released. You're an animal in a cage and you're treated like one. ~ Jimmy Hoffa

When I was a little girl,' I said, sitting down, 'the wallpaper in my room had pictures of Noah's story.' [ ... ]
You know what's weird though? It's weird that the ark would be such a kids' story, you know? I mean, it's ... really a story about death. Every person who isn't in Noah's family? They die. Every animal, apart from two of each on the boat? They die. They all die in the flood. Billions of creatures. It's the worst tragedy ever,' I finished, my voice tied off by a knot in my chest.[ ... ] 'What the hell,'I said, 'pardon my language, was that doing on my wallpaper? ~ Adam Rex

And your very flesh shall be a great poem. ~ Walt Whitman

The human body is essentially something other than an animal organism. ~ Martin Heidegger

If experiments on animals were abandoned on grounds of compassion, mankind would have made a fundamental advance. ~ Richard Wagner

In every animal which has not passed the limit of its development, a more frequent and continuous use of any organ gradually strengthens, develops and enlarges that organ, and gives it a power proportional to the length of time it has been so used; while the permanent disuse of any organ imperceptibly weakens and deteriorates it, and progressively diminishes its functional capacity, until it finally disappears. ~ Jean-Baptiste Lamarck

That tuft of jungle feathers,
That animal eye,
Is just what you say. That savage of fire,
That seed,
Have it your way. The world is ugly,
And the people are sad. ~ Wallace Stevens

A zoo is not an ideal place for an animal - of course the best place for a chimp is the wilds of Tanzania - but a good zoo is a decent, acceptable place. Animals are far more flexible than we realize. IF they weren't, they wouldn't have survived. But my opinion about zoos came after research. Initially I had the opinion that most people have, that they are jails. ~ Yann Martel

The cuddler and its buddies were all on the other side. That didn't make me feel much better. I watch Animal Planet. Sharks move fast.
"Tell why I'm doing this again," I whispered.
"Because you want to," Alex whispered back. "Face your fears, Grasshopper, and you will be free.Now,in you go. ~ Melissa Jensen

Herein lies our problem. If we level that much land to grow rice and whatever, then no other animal could live there except for some insect pest species. Which is very unfortunate. ~ Steve Irwin

Meat is necessary when there is hard physical work to be done, or in a very cold climate, or when edible plants cannot be found ... Animal flesh provides all the substances we need, both for the intensive working of our organism and for maintaining a normal temperature in cold climates. ~ G.I. Gurdjieff

We discover too late that we have turned a blind eye to the extinction of a species that is essential to the balance of life in a particular context. Or we discover too late that the importation of a foreign life-form, animal or vegetable, has upset local ecosystems, damaging soil or neighbouring life-forms. We discover that we have come near the end of supplies-of fossil-fuels for example -on which we have built immense structures of routine expectation. ~ Rowan Williams

I love children. I'd prefer to be around children much more than adults, actually. And I like animals, too. I'm just really into beings who are at ease with themselves. ~ Meshell Ndegeocello

A seagull was flying over a beach, when it saw a mouse. It flew down and asked the mouse: "Where are your wings?" Each animal speaks its own language, and so the mouse didn't under stand the question, but stared at the two strange, large things attached to the other creature's body. "It must have some illness," thought the mouse. The seagull noticed the mouse staring at its wings and thought: "Poor thing. It must have been attacked by monsters that left it deaf and took away its wings." Feeling sorry for the mouse, the seagull picked it up in its beak and took it for a ride in the skies. "It's probably homesick," the seagull thought while they were flying. Then, very carefully, it deposited the mouse once more on the ground. For some months afterward, the mouse was sunk in gloom; it had known the heights and seen a vast and beautiful world. However, in time, it grew accustomed to being just a mouse again and came to believe that the miracle that had occurred in its life was nothing but a dream. ~ Paulo Coelho

When I started Ashes and Snow in 1992, I set out to explore the relationship between man and animals from the inside out. In discovering the shared language and poetic sensibilities of all animals, I am working towards restoring the common ground that once existed when people lived in harmony with animals. ~ Gregory Colbert

Now in many cases - too many cases - the activity of the immature human being is simply played upon to secure habits which are useful. He is trained like an animal rather than educated like a human being. ~ John Dewey

I've broken an arm before, but no one wanted to shoot me!' Suzie says. 'I mean, when you go to the emergency room I hope to God the doctors don't decide it might cost too much to care for.' -Suzie Schwab co-owner of East Maui Animal Refuge ~ Toni Polancy

During an abusive episode, pets often react by shivering or shaking, cowering, hiding, or urinating - similar physical manifestations of stress that are displayed by humans. Therefore, it is important to understand that both women and animals are victimized by the abuse of the other. A man's violence toward an animal also hurts his partner (and children), just as his violence toward her also hurts the animal. ~ Clif Flynn

Aware of the suffering caused by the destruction of life, I am committed to cultivating compassion and learning ways to protect the lives of people, animals, plants, and minerals. I am determined not to kill, not to let others kill, and not to support any act of killing in the world, in my thinking, and in my way of life. ~ Nhat Hanh

We are not the only animal that mourns; apes do, and elephants, and dogs. Yet we are the only one that tortures. ~ Geraldine Brooks

When I am at rodeo I find it difficult not to root for the animals. ~ Demetri Martin

We fill the hands and nurseries of our children with all manner of dolls, drums and horses, withdrawing their eyes from the plain face and ... Nature, the sun and moon, the animals, the water and stones, which should be their toys. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

If you get yourself out of politics, religion, everything, and think as a human, think based on love to everybody, at that moment you have a choice: to be an animal, or to be a human. I choose to be a human being, with conscience and responsibility. ~ Mosab Hassan Yousef

There is no 'need' for us to eat meat, dairy or eggs. Indeed, these foods are increasingly linked to various human diseases and animal agriculture is an environmental disaster for the planet. ~ Gary L. Francione

Let me recall at this point Nietzsche's statements regarding classic and romantic art. He identified two types or orders of each. There is the romanticism of true power that shatters contemporary forms to go beyond these to new forms; and there is, on the other hand, the romanticism that is unable to achieve form at all, and so smashes and disparages out of resentment. And with respect to classicism likewise, there is the classicism that finds an achievement of the recognized forms easy and can play with them at will, expressing through them its own creative aims in a rich and vital way; and there is the classicism that clings to form desperately out of weakness, dry and hard, authoritarian and cold. The point I would make - and which I believe was also Nietzsche's - is that form is the medium, the vehicle, through which life becomes manifest in its grand style, articulate and grandiose, and that the mere shattering of form is for human as well as for animal life a disaster, ritual and decorum being the structuring forms of all civilization. ~ Joseph Campbell

California, Labor Day weekend...early, with ocean fog still in the streets, outlaw motorcyclists wearing chains, shades and greasy Levis roll out from damp garages, all-night diners and cast-off one-night pads in Fricso, Hollywood, Berdoo and East Oakland, heading for the Monterey peninsula, north of Big Sur...The Menace is loose again, the Hell's Angels, the hundred-carat headline, running fast and loud on the early morning freeway, low in the saddle, nobody smiles, jamming crazy through traffic and ninety miles an hour down the center stripe, missing by inches...like Genghis Khan on an iron horse, a monster steed with a fiery anus, flat out through the eye of a beer can and up your daughter's leg with no quarter asked and non given; show the squares some class, give em a whiff of those kicks they'll never know...Ah, these righteous dudes, they love to screw it on...Little Jesus, the Gimp, Chocolate George, Buzzard, Zorro, Hambone, Clean Cut, Tiny, Terry the Tramp, Frenchy, Mouldy Marvin, Mother Miles, Dirty Ed, Chuck the Duck, Fat Freddy, Filthy Phil, Charger Charley the Child Molester, Crazy Cross, Puff, Magoo, Animal and at least a hundred more...tense for the action, long hair in the wind, beards and bandanas flapping, earrings, armpits, chain whips, swastikas and stripped-down Harleys flashing chrome as traffic on 101 moves over, nervous, to let the formation pass like a burst of dirty thunder... ~ Hunter S. Thompson

Philemon explained how Jung treated thoughts as though they were generated by himself, while for Philemon thoughts were like animals in the forest, or people in a room, or birds in the air. Jung concluded that Philemon taught him psychic objectivity, the reality of the psyche. This helped Jung to understand that there is something in me which can say things that I do not know and do not intend. ~ Stanislav Grof

The sexual regions constitute a particularly vulnerable spot, and remain so even in man, and the need for their protection which thus exists conflicts with the prominent display required for sexual allurement. This end is far more effectively attained, with greater advantage and less disadvantage, by concentrating the chief ensigns of sexual attractiveness on the upper and more conspicuous parts of the body. This method is well-nigh universal among animals as well as in man. ~ Havelock Ellis

The queen! someone shouted in alarm, and the King erupted like a wild animal caught in a snare. ~ Megan Whalen Turner

In order to survive, an animal must be born into a favoring or at least tolerant environment. Similarly, in order to achieve preservation and recognition, a specimen of fossil man must be discovered in intelligence, attested by scientific knowledge, and interpreted by evolutionary experience. These rigorous prerequisites have undoubtedly caused many still-births in human palaeontology and are partly responsible for the high infant mortality of discoveries of geologically ancient man. ~ Earnest Hooton

As one grows older, the sense of separateness is slowly reduced. Old people do not live on an ego level. Their concerns are not about their individuality but about the river of life, the family, the community, the nation, people, animals, nature, life. They can die easily if they are assured that life will continue positively, for they feel part of the river again, and soon they will be part of the ocean. When they are very old, they no longer belong to our time and space, but to all time and all space. ~ Alexander Lowen

People look at me as if I were some sort of monster, but I can't think why. In my macabre pictures, I have either been a monster-maker or a monster-destroyer, but never a monster. Actually, I'm a gentle fellow. Never harmed a fly. I love animals, and when I'm in the country I'm a keen bird-watcher. ~ Peter Cushing

Man is the "ethical animal" ethical in potentiality even if, unfortunately, not in actuality. His capacity for ethical judgment like freedom, reason and the other unique characteristics of the human being is based upon his consciousness of himself. ~ Rollo May

a pig produces about four times as much solid waste as an average person, a typical CAFO [Concentrated Animal Feed Operation] of 5000 pigs is equivalent to a small city of 20 000 people with no sewage treatment plant (51) ~ Polly Walker

My uncle said physically disciplining children fell into the same category as hitting an animal, neither has the emotional or intellectual capacity to understand the action on any level other than pain and fear. He said discipline is a concept that can only be understood by adults. ~ Fabian Black

For architecture, among all the arts, is the one that most boldly tries to reproduce in its rhythm the order of the universe, which the ancients called "kosmos," that is to say ornate, since it is like a great animal on whom there shine the perfection and the proportion of all its members. And praised be our Creator who, as the Scriptures say, has decreed all things in number, weight, and measure. ~ Umberto Eco

To kill animals for the purpose of feeding on their flesh is one of the most deplorable and shameful infirmities of the human state ~ Alphonse De Lamartine

I was like you once, long time ago. I believed in the dignity of man. Decency. Humanity. But I was lucky. I found out the truth early, boy.
And what is the truth, Stark?
It's all very simple. There's no such thing as the dignity of man. Man is a base, pathetic and vulgar animal. ~ Charles Grandison Finney

I only live in the world of animal protection. I speak only of that. I think only of that. I am obsessed. ~ Brigitte Bardot

He took a dog-doo snow cone and stuffed it in my right eye. He took a dog-doo snow cone and stuffed it in my other eye. ~ Frank Zappa

I have three dogs, a cat, fish. I'm a huge animal lover. They're amazing. ~ Willow Shields