Abstract
THE BISHOP OF DURHAM set the ball of controversy rolling when he delivered the eighth Fison memorial lecture on June 15 at Guy's Hospital on “Ethical Conditions of Scientific Method”. After discussing the case for and against vivisection of animals, he submitted the question whether in no case might man be subjected to vivisection in the interest of science. Dr. Henson asked if there was any objection to the vivisection of criminals who, by the law of their country, had been condemned to death. In their case, the issue of inherent rights could not be raised, for these had already been cancelled, and they were dealt with penally on this hypothesis. Why should not the punishment of a criminal take a form which was serviceable to the community? Why should he not at least be given the opportunity of making in this way some atonement for his sins against society? At present, deductions drawn from the responses of the anthropoid apes or even dogs have to suffice, where direct experiment on man would present a speedier route to knowledge. This applies to human physiology, especially of the nervous and digestive systems and in a lesser degree to pathology as regards infectivity and immunity. There is, of course, the possible difficulty to be encountered in finding an experimenter, at any rat © in England, who would impose conditions which might not meet with the penal requirements. In any event, the subject bristles with difficulties the discussion of which would take up more space than is available in these columns.
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Vivisection of Criminals. Nature 131, 902 (1933). https://doi.org/10.1038/131902c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/131902c0