The first human organ created inside an animal opens the door to manufacturing ‘spare parts’ for people
english.elpais.com
Edit: Surprised at all the vegans in this thread. I didn't think there were so many of you. I'm glad you care so much about animal rights, that you're willing to forego eating them and using products made from them. If you're not vegan and have moral objections for this, maybe you should look at yourself first and all the animal abuse you sanction by eating animals and using animal products. Did you know dairy cows have to be pregnant to produce milk? They're artificially inseminated throughout most of their lives. I hope everyone complaining about this also complains about ice cream and cheese. Or else they would be hypocrites who just want to blame others but never look at themselves.
Maybe I don't have to stop drinking after all...
A truly pragmatic take away
Yeah, I'm wondering if I can pre-order
It takes time to grow, so you better!
You made me snort into my whiskey glass
I like the way you think! finishes beer and grabs another
So people kill animals for fun, but when someone suggests using animals to save lives it's evil?
Fix things in logical order and hopefully by then we'll have developed other solutions that do not depend on animals. But don't fight against progress when there are so many horrible and useless things that are allowed at the same time, pick your fights efficiently.
Farming pigs in ultra tiny spaces with horrible conditions where some of them die before getting brutally slaughtered to have cheap meat which is not necessary for human nutrition anymore, just tasty - totally fine
Farming pigs and treating them very well so that they grow healthy organs for terminally sick humans to then kill them in a controlled and anesthesized setting - how dare you
People just want to be heard.
I feel like contrarians exist because they feel more powerful going against the grain then going along with it.
Fuck it. Both good.
Am I the only one who thinks it's fucked up to experiment on animals who can't consent to this? We place so much emphasis on people being the most important thing in the world, we forgot that we are part of the ecosystem too.
This is and will always be small potatoes in terms of the suffering we put relatively intelligent animals through every day.
We would need to slaughter probably 100,000 animals yearly for the US organ demand (at ~50,000 transplants per year and a buffer).
We slaughter 125 MILLION pigs in the US for consumption a year.
Not to mention that "medical grade" pigs will probably be given a golden ticket in terms of care until they are slaughtered, compared to the extremely abysmal environment millions live in today.
If animal welfare is important to you, scientific research is a poor use of advocating resources while we still eat hundreds of pounds of meat yearly. If advocates reduce meat consumption by even a percent or two it would generally greatly outweigh banning animal based research entirely.
Sure, but the article isn't about the inhumane treatment of our industrial meat production facilities. I'm well aware of them. And I want those gone too.
Good thing you're not consuming or using animal products, then. Or else you'd be a hypocrite.
Always with the you can't participate in society and criticize it argument. It's pathetic.
I mean, you can participate in society without eating meat. Lol.
Unless you were talking to someone else?
You can't tell anyone to stop eating meat if you eat meat
Edit: Or else you'd be a hypocrite
Sure I can.
Animal testing isn’t ideal but for important medical advances, animal testing is the only way to demonstrate safety before human trials. At some point, you have to value the life of a human more than mice.
And some of the testing is fun. Like when they give them a buzzer to get more drugs. Lab rats definitely consent to more cocaine.
Confirmed, cocaine is lab rat approved.
I don't value a humans life more.
Then maybe we should eat you instead of the pig!
Mmmmm, longpig
I will never understand how wanting to treat intelligent creatures with dignity is controversial.
Seriously? Who even talks like this..
It's not controversial, most people think it's stupid. Controversial would be if so many people agreed with you that it would polarize the society. Which you might think is what happens, but it's really not.
Most people know that a human's life is more valuable than an animal's and think you guys are a little crazy. Treating them with dignity is fine by me, but pretending they're on the same level as us is not.
It's not stupid just because you think it is. Doctors also used to think that washing their hands between surgeries was unnecessary.
Point is, just because I value live in general and don't think humans are necessarily more valuable than anything else doesn't make it crazy.
I'm not saying it's a universal truth, you may have noticed I used words like "think". To me you guys are crazy and I think it's very stupid. But I never claimed it's a universal truth.
Surely you must have some system for valuing certain forms of life over others, otherwise functioning is not really possible given the reality we find ourselves in. For example, pretty much anyone at some level values the lives of humans or more intelligent animals over the lives of, say, mosquitos, cockroaches, flies, etc, but those insects are animals too after all. (And while one certainly might put some value on some insects, I know if I find a ladybug inside I'm decently likely to try to take it outside without hurting it, I've never met anyone who would get as worked up about a dead bug as they would a dead cat, or put the same effort into saving a spider that they would into saving another person from a deadly situation. Clearly, the value of such animals is at some level held to be less.) Even further, it would be even more strange to value other living creatures as much as humans, like plants or bacteria (indeed, considering that one involuntarily kills countless bacteria just by existing and must consume plants to live, a hypothetical person who cared just as much about them as people would either have absolutely no regard for the lives of others, or would be consumed by constant guilt to the point of probably being unable to survive in the long run). Clearly then, just about everyone has some sort of hierarchy of what animals are more valuable than others, whether one consciously believes it or not. If intelligence is the metric that one uses to decide this, then one must value humans more than any known animal, because while some are smart, no animal is quite as smart as humans are. If intelligence is not the metric you use, then what is?
Alternatively people who don't value other people's lives may have a personality disorder (emphasis on may). Of course that is if it's not to sound edgy on the internet but if they truly don't value human life.
I don't donate my kidney, even though I want to, because I won't give good organs to my local trump supporters.
This is another reason that animal-grown organs are good. Those people deserve to live, I just don't want to give them my kidney.
It's interesting that you bring this up because I have been encountering people lately who have a different take on insects - that they actually kind of put insects above humans. Just yesterday someone responded to me saying I get attacked by bugs that, quote "You are not getting attacked. You just live in the same world like them and take up space that once was theirs before"
So like its my fault that I'm getting bug bites. Humans are to blame for existing in the wildlife and that's why animals and insects try to take people out all the time.
There's this popular poster on tumblr who goes by bogleech - their stuff gets reposted to reddit last I saw. They also support this idea that bugs are superior and humans need to just stop being afraid of insects and respect them more.
Feel free to volunteer for testing then.
Not even the hot ones? Hot people are pretty valuable.
I mean, you're probably not the only one who thinks anything.
That said, do you eat meat? If so, the meat and dairy industries systematically do egregious things to millions of animals every day.
Dude if I can preorder a whole pig with a replacement set of lungs too ….
Dinner and an upgrade?
Bacon and breathing
I limit my meat consumption, and I don't drink milk. Not a 100% vegetarian, but it's better than nothing. One of these days I'll decide to be a vegetarian again.
So, you're eating meat and being all hypocritical about others.
Do you eat cheese or other dairy products?
We are, but being a part of the ecosystem doesn't really mean much. Ecosystems aren't obligations, authorities, sources of morality or subject to it. They're just systems of relationships between organisms in a particular place. Whatever humans do, as long as it involves other organisms, that is our role in the local ecosystem. If we start doing something else, we aren't forgetting our role in the ecosystem, no role was ever assigned to us, our "role" is merely descriptive of what impact we have.
There are plenty of carnivores in the ecosystem. But I can’t think of another one that keeps prey suffering in a box from birth to death in order to feed itself.
It’s funny that we consider ourselves higher organisms because only we can even think about ethics or have ethics. But is it ethical to treat those incapable of ethics unethically?? If we are the only one in the picture with ethics, don’t we have a double responsibility to apply them for all?
If other predators were even capable of animal agriculture, I'd bet that there's a good chance that they would do it, but that's of course not really possible to know for sure. If we were going to apply ethics to things like animals that don't naturally have them, though, wouldn't we basically be obligated to destroy the natural ecosystem even more than we already do? The natural environment is, for something living it, absolutely horrendous. Not in the same way as things for a farm animal, but still, natural ecosystems tend to result in a situation where organisms must constantly fend of starvation, predation, parasites and infection, and few creatures live as long as they potentially could. If we really cared much about the well being of all the animals out there, we'd basically have to destroy the natural biosphere completely and keep all remaining animals in idealized captive conditions, like pets or zoo animals, to keep them free of predators and disease.
We can’t call other species unethical because they are either ethical nor unethical.
And so no, although nature is brutal, we are not obligated to destroy it (though some actually do hold this position on the grounds that it would reduce suffering).
The only creature we can judge ethically is ourselves. My point is that we ket ourselves off the hook on treatment of animals. Because they have no ethical function, they are like objects to us, and we do (vaguely gestures at this post) whatever to them. Our logic seems to be “until you’re capable ethics I don’t need to treat you with any, even though I’m capable.” It’s a neat little self-serving loophole we love to exploit.
Everyone is rushing in here to say it’s fine because we eat meat too. But I find this whole thing g very revealing of attitudes we usually just don’t think about. We’d never farm organs in human embryos because GASP consent and GASP sanctity of life. But we’ll farm organs cross species, which is surely more difficulty, because we’re so comfortable doing all that to animals.
You can take the perspective that it’s fine because meat. Or you can use this to take a second look at eating meat and suddenly it seems pretty fucked up.
I eat meat. Am not talking down to anyone. I just do actually think about the ethics.
I take the perspective that it's fine because human life is more important and valuable than animal life.
Same reason we should eradicate most mosquitos on the planet to end malaria
That’s not a perspective though, it’s a bald assertion. “It’s fine because we’re important” is like saying “it’s fine because it’s fine,” or more to the point “it’s fine because I say so.”
What makes us important?
A lot of people don’t seem to understand that their logic is circular. Ask someone why they chose the car they did, and half of them will say “well it’s the one I wanted.”
Animals are things and humans are people.
You're allowed to devalue your own existence all you want but anyone entertaining the idea that all life is equal is fundamentally stupid in my opinion
You’ve graduated from bald assertions and circular logic to ad hominems.
It’s ironic what a shit job you’re doing of demonstrating our higher functions and supposed superiority.
“HUMAN GOOD! NOT HUMAN BAD.”
Have a great day there, Socrates.
Not bad, just not as valuable as a human.
Even if that claim is true, it can still be bad to eat them.
All morality ultimately comes down to assertions like that though. Ethics aren't properties inherit in the universe that can be objectively measured like the laws of physics. One can construct ethical frameworks, like utilitarianism or deontology or such, as useful tools to help one decide what one should do in an unclear situation, but ultimately, the choice of what framework to use or the rules of that framework comes down to certain things just not feeling right to a given person, and other things feeling okay.
That ethics can't be objectively measured is wrong, though. That's like saying math is not logical because we made it up and you can't observe it in nature.
It's very difficult and it's not possible to do it in practice since we can not look at every variable of every sentient being at all times. But in theory it would be possible to find the most ethical solution to every problem every time and therefore it is measurable.
it would be possible to find the most ethical solution to a problem given all the variables only if you have already selected a system to determine which combinations of values for each variable are more or less ethical. That is to say, if one goes with ultilitarianism, one could hypothetically objectively measure how much happiness or suffering results from a given situation and pick the one that maximized or minimized it, or do the equivalent for a different ethical system, but you cannot objectively decide if utilitarianism, or deontology, or whatever other ethical system one may wish to use, is even the right system to use in the first place. Before your hypothetical measurements of every variable can actually be used to determine what solution to an ethical problem is best, one has to decide what a solution even looks like, and that decision is ultimately arbitrary.
It's not arbitrary, though. It is just hard to define. Ethic theory uses certain axioms that aren't subjective. I am not talking about your moral values, but whether or not certain behaviour is ethical or not.
As a drastic example, driving over a person because it is faster than driving around them. We can certainly decide for some cases whether that is ethically good or not. For the harder to decide cases it's again just a matter of not knowing all variables. If we would know all variables, we could put each reason for driving over a person on a scale of "ethical goodness". Since we have certain axioms in ethics you can logically conclude a result for all ethical questions (in theory).
This is not more made up than mathematics are made up. The quantity (not the mass!) of objects, for example, is also just a thought we put onto objects. It's not in the nature of objects to have a quantity. And if we didn't had an inherent concept of mathematics, quantity would not exist for us. In that way, it's different from gravity and other such physical realities. It is the same with ethics.
Quantities do exist in nature, outside of our concepts though. if there exist two electrons in a given area of space vs only one electron in a differen equivalent area of space, the implications of that on everything interacting with them would exist regardless of if we had a word for what two was.
That aside though, I think that what you have just said confirms what I am trying to say, because you yourself state that ethics are based on axioms. The thing about axioms is that they are not proven, they are statements simply assumed to be true from which all else follows. Mathematics is similarly founded to my understanding, but mathematics can also be compared to measured reality to confirm if the system derived from a certain set of axioms describes that reality (for example, euclidian geometry follows logically from a set of axioms, but since the discovery of relativity seems to show that physical space does not always perfectly follow euclidian geometry, it can be shown by observation of the physical universe that this mathematical model doesn't completely fit reality. It's still useful of course, and it does still logically follow from it's axioms- but those axioms can be verified as fitting observable reality or not, it isn't arbitrary if you accept those axioms, if you're talking about our universe that is. But ethical axioms are a different matter. Sure, you can have an objective ethical system, based on a set of ethical axioms, but to do this you have to accept that particular set of axioms in the first place. If one was to use a different set of axioms, you'd get different ethics.
Suppose we were to meet some aliens- intelligent and technologically sophisticated aliens, in the same way and degree that we are. They'd probably posses ethics of some kind (since ethics are ultimately a tool for deciding what one should and should not do, and the aliens should need to make such decisions just as we do). They'd also probably posses mathematics, since they're using science and technology. It might not look like our mathematics, having different symbols and phrasing and ways to manipulate those symbols, but it should have roughly equivalent concepts, since they're using it to model the same universe as us. We can assume with reasonable certainly that the axioms used by their mathematics when describing reality will translate to be the same as ours, assuming we both take the measurements needed to confirm if our models fit, there's not room for them to take arbitrarily different axioms here, because if they do, their results just won't be useful except as a mathematical curiosity. However, there's no particular reason that I can see to assume they have to accept equivalent ethical axioms to us (if you can think of a reason to assume that they do have to arrive at the same ones, I'd be interested in hearing it). If they can create a completely different set of ethics starting with different axioms, and don't run into any contradiction with observed reality in using that different model, that would seem to imply that the choice of which axioms to use is ultimately arbitrary, and that we can just choose whatever set of them results in an ethical system that we happen to like.
You could freeze the entire universe, measure the state of every last particle, and you still wouldn't be presented with the answer to a moral question because morality is fundamentally something people made up, but don't collectively agree on. From a truly objective point of view, there is no actual difference between genocide and ending world hunger except the amount of people.
You’re right but there’s a difference between asserting rules for all actors and asserting arbitrary value assignments to different actors.
It’s just another version of the food chain
Yeah, but you see; the animals are useful in a new way so ethics doesn't matter. We'll worry about that in 50 years when we no longer need them to grow new organs for us
Yes that would be appropriate.
It's definitely fucked up. It reminds me of the WKUK breakfast pig sketch.
I would see a million pigs die before one human.
How many pigs would be too many? What is the precise pig to human exchange rate?
That's basically the attitude that is resulting in the 6th mass extinction right now.
Pigs are in no danger of extinction.
And wanting to preserve natural ecosystems does not imply wanting to improve the treatment of livestock. Incidentally, the end of meat consumption would most likely lead to the extinction of multiple species of livestock.
We brought pigs into existence for the benefit of human conditions, we will take them out of it if and when it becomes necessary.
I agree. We should be experimenting on prisoners.
Well that's just insane.
I agree. We should be experimenting on schoolchildren.
The comment section is laughable. I hope none of you or your loved ones will need an organ transplant in the future, since it's better to be put on a waiting list and cross your fingers that you won't die before an organ is available, since cattle is oh-so-important and precious.
Cattle are important and precious. There are already immoral practices brought by capitalism while raising animals for slaughter. This doesn't imply that it's moral to now bring an animal to life just to steal its organs as well.
Organ transplant can be achieved artificially by just developing the organs themselves in the lab. There already has been work done in that regard.
They'd literally be extinct if not for domestication. They evolved to be slow, stupid, and delicious
They were literally force breed by humans. They did not "evolve" to be like that.
Gonna play a drinking game with all the people who don't understand that force breeding does indeed evolve a creature.
One drink for every person confidently stating inaccuracies about this. So far I'm at 4.
Going to a cookout, so the beers will go great with the burgers.
That is literally evolution.
No, it's breeding. Maybe brush up on your biology buddy.
selective breeding still results in evolution, its just the result of artificial rather than natural selection
No, it is (artificial) selection but not evolution.
Artificial selection is a potential mechanism of evolution.
Artificial Evolution is still Evolution. Selective breeding and genetic manipulation just speed it up a few thousand years.
Stupidity clearly doesn't belong only in cattle.
Yeah it also belongs to vegans
I’m not going to say this is immoral but it does reveal how little we care about animals when we are willing to farm organs across species, which has got to be more difficult. It’s something we would never consider doing with humans but will be willing to bend over backward to do with animals., and then vociferously defend it online. It’s just revealing, that’s all. Animals have zero moral standing in our society. None.
Very weird. It’s like you told me I was wrong and then repeated what I said. There’s an obviously massive difference in value placed on humans and animals here. Is that less confusing?
We would absolutely consider doing this with humans. We actually DO this with humans. Skin grafts, organ transplants.
Yeah, I don't really take meat-eaters seriously when they complain about animal rights abuses.
They clearly don't care, or else they wouldn't be eating meat, lol.
Counterpoint: It is possible to be a person who consumes meat while also caring that the meat they are consuming is sourced ethically (e.g. not raised in confinement, humanely slaughtered with as little pain inflicted as possible, etc.).
If you asked the average consumer if they cared whether or not the meat that they were buying is abuse-free, I'd say 99% of them would say that they do in fact care, but the meat industry does everything in it's power to obfuscate the process so they can keep up their cost-saving abusive tactics to save a few pennies.
You can have humanely sourced meat. There's a vast difference between "wow Tyson is a fucking horrible company, don't buy their chicken" and "wow this local farm/butcher really fucking did a good job".
Death is a part of life. The problem with the meat industry is overconsumptiom. Not with killing animals for meat.
Do meat animals live long? Also, how many meat animals are from "local farms"?
devils advocate.
I hope aliens are real and they choose you to pump out more organs because theirs failed from all the shit they eat so this way they can keep doing unhealthy things. Because there’s plenty of selfish people out there who chose to damage their bodies.
it’s not fair that some random fucking animal gets to be brought onto the earth solely for the purpose of your fat fucking ass who can’t stop shoving burgers down your face.
Yes I did ignore legitimate uses for this sort of thing because no shit some people actually need organs at no fault of their own and no, I’m not talking about animals being used for food because that’s not the topic.
You know that people's organs also fail due to disease and cancer, right?
Clearly didn’t read what I said lmfao
It's hypocritical though to be against slaughtering animals for organs but be okay with animals being slaughtered for food. I'd argue killing animals for food is even worse because it's unnecessary.
I can’t argue about dietary findings as the gut is still a very much unknown environment which includes things like digestion and nutrient processing and I know very little on that topic frankly
I can argue however that needing a new liver because you’re a drunk and feeding your child some chicken are two veeeery different needs. Some people do need these organs, that’s fine. What I’m not fine with is knowing damn well man will abuse this shit and abuse the animals where as food is a consistent need not a resultant need.
Humans truly are the monsters in this story.
Living people is more important than dead animals.
Plus, every new kidney comes with a side of bacon. How can you resist a deal like that?
I think you are proving OP right.
If OP is an ethical vegan, then they have a point. Everyone else needs to get over themselves.
No vegan has a point if they're opposed to growing new human organs.
Human lives are more valuable than any animal's life.
That's a judgement call. I mean, I agree, but it's not objectively true.
Sure, but that's my opinion, and thankfully the opinion of the overwhelming majority of people.
Veganism is stupid
Eh.. why do you care enough to have an opinion about them? Do you know a lot of pushy vegans? If yes, the problem isn't veganism, it's pushy jerks.
Veganism is fine because I'm not vegan so I don't care.
There are vegans in this thread arguing against this life-saving procedure because it uses animals.
So they have a low value of human life. It's a weird point of view, but it's not objectively wrong.
In their defense, have you met people? Are you sure that people are better than pigs?
Yes.
And why is that? Why attach value which can be compared to living species? I dislike such kind of ethical system. This is a flawed absolutist argument.
I like that commenters keep saying animals as if that blanket term doesn't include humans. Anyone who thinks people aren't animals is not worth arguing with.
Lol
Taking context from your other comments: no I don't eat animal products.
I'd still prefer growing headless human clones for parts, but this is good enough.
No ManBearPig mentions yet? Half man, half bear, half pig?
No, it's half bear and half man pig
Correction: It's 1/3 man, 1/3 bear, 1/3 pig.
God forbid pigs learn fractions.
don't miss out your monthly payment.
I'm all for this, but this comments section is crazy. Huge ratios for both sides.
The article says embryos so I don't think it's living animals being tested on, that being said it's also China, so fuck knows what other sorts of inhumane stuff is going on that isn't being talked about.
The pigoons said they would leave your garden alone if you stopped hunting them.
Man, I have ALWAYS wished outloud "I wish we humans has spare parts, so I can replace my always congested nose, my fucked up knee and shoulder". My dream is finally coming true????
Those are sadly not organs.
Damn.
Well, it's a start. I wouldn't mind a new knee myself.
Damn!
Some Scottish scientist has been working with 3D printing organs. I haven't heard anything about it in a few years though. This is definitely cheaper, as he has to work with your specific stem cells and culture them to use as "ink"
The future looks bright.
Hopefully in my life time. Lol
It’s interesting that we go to all the trouble of farming human organs in animals specifically because we’re okay killing animals. Surely it would work way better to farm human organs in human embryos. But we go about it sideways because that’s how much we don’t give a shit about animals.
Weird take, it's like you're conflating acceptable losses and apathy.
Scientists would use human embryos, if given the ability to. Unfortunately there are people who believe that life happens the moment a man injects his baby batter into a woman's love tunnel.
These are why people kill animals for this, not because they "don't give a shit about animals".
So what happens to the clones on The Island?
Great news but an absolute braindead take from most commenters here..
Firstly, I would like to thank our Tleilaxu overlords
Is it just me, or did I see this exact headline like 10 separate times?
Right, and this time they are just as uncertain if this method will lead to usable organs. It still has lots of pig dna in some structures in the organ.
The Island and Chicken Run crossover nobody asked for!
I think China called dibs on that achievement decades ago.
China:
They don't need pigs for that when a whole bunch of fully grown political dissidents are available for slaughter at the earliest convenience.
OP spreading the word of the saviour and lord veganism.
WITH NO ETHICAL QUESTION AT ALL
Gotta break a few eggs to make an omelette. Sucks for the animals but if it can advance human medical science and saves millions of lives, I’m fine with it.
Hey, I've heard this one before!
Familiarity doesn't make it wrong
Yes, let's repeat the horrors of the past that were used to advance medicine. What a grand idea. The ends justify the means after all.
We're specifically advocating not experimenting on humans so this doesn't really fit
Gross. You're gross.
What's gross is condemning people to die for the sake of some pigs
Nobody is being condemned to die because some people want ethical treatment of animals.
If a technology could be used to save people who would have died had the technology not been used, then not using or not developing that technology effectively condemns those people to die.
So called ethical treatment impacts the speed and scope of research that can be done, and in doing so delays or prevents the benefits of conducting that research. That means that people who could be saved by animal tested medicines instead die in the time taken to find an alternative.
how is that gross? it's a reasonable answer.
I value life in a different way to you
It’s just another version of the food chain….
Idiot. You’re an idiot
How does it change anything in regards to ethics? It's still shoving animal parts inside your body, but instead of using the mouth, we cut a hole in our stomach, and use that.
If it was ethical before, it still is. If it wasn't ethical before, it still isn't.
NO STRONG FEELINGS ONE WAY OR ANOTHER.