Os mártires de Bernard: a sensibilidade do animal experimental como dilema ético do darwinismo na Inglaterra vitoriana

Abstract

O presente trabalho investiga as implicações éticas do uso de animais experimentais na Inglaterra vitoriana com o advento do darwinismo, a partir de meados do século XIX. A tese darwiniana da origem comum entre animais e humanos, por um lado, afirmava a importância e justificava cientificamente o uso de animais em estudos de fisiologia experimental, mas, por outro lado, também fortalecia o questionamento da legitimidade moral da exploração dos animais pela ciência. Isso porque se o animal darwiniano figurava como um modelo experimental ideal, ele também era visto como um ser sensível, que compartilhava com os humanos a suscetibilidade ao sofrimento físico e emocional. Discutem-se também os aspectos de continuidade e de transformação sofridos pelo animal vitoriano com o advento do darwinismo e o alvorecer da fisiologia experimental na Inglaterra da segunda metade do século XIX, dando especial ênfase s implicações éticas - amplamente levantadas então pelos adeptos do movimento antivivisseccionista, como Frances Power Cobbe - quanto ao emprego de animais domésticos em experimentos fisiológicos.<br>This paper explores the ethical implications of the use of experimental animals in Victorian England after the arrival of Darwinism in the second half of the nineteenth century. On the one hand, the Darwinian thesis of common descent between animals and humans did confirmed the importance and legitimacy of employing animals in research on experimental physiology. On the other hand, the idea of common descent also served as a means for questioning the moral legitimacy of the exploitation of animals by science, since although the Darwinian animal could be considered as an ideal experimental model, it was also seen as a sensitive being, which shared with humans susceptibility to both physical and emotional suffering. The aspects of both continuity and transformation experienced by the Victorian animal with the advent of Darwinism and the rise of experimental physiology, especially in the second half of the nineteenth century, are also discussed, with special emphasis on the ethical implications - largely raised by the adepts of the antivivisection movement, such as Frances Power Cobbe - connected with the use of domestic animals in physiological experiments

Producing Quimeras: Lineages of Rodents, Laboratory Scientists and the Vicissitudes of Animal Experimentation

“…Unlike rodents, both of these animals were already clearly morally evaluated as positive by society in general (Thomas, 2010;Carvalho and Waizbort, 2012). One must also take into account that (unlike clinical studies involving dogs) the first experiments with mice were genetics studies that did not involve invasive interventions such as cuts and surgery.…”