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Comment by wruza | Hacker News Reader

What makes you think that experiments on living rodents aren’t hell already? What is the crucial ethical difference between these species, apart from two facts, first that a full human has a legal status, second that most people will relate to an empty human brain more than to a non-empty non-human one (regardless of packaging).

I understand legal/relatable parts, but is there more to it?

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One scientist studies tumors by causing tumors in rats. Another scientist studies tumors by causing them in humans. If you said to the second scientist "Hey, that's wrong, stop!" And he said "What's the crucial difference between rats and humans?" Would you be convinced by that line of argument?

Obviously yes, rats don’t deserve tumors.

Well, is that not basically the vegan argument against suffering, in any form, for any type of animal or sentient being? The vegan would probably posit that they are equal.

This hypothetical situation implies something I wouldn’t fail to ask first. Are these humans persons or are they “empty”? I don’t see a difference between a {person,experience}-less human and a rat (in this setting, legal and parental implications aside), but maybe you do. Both are able to experience pain and negative emotions. One of them being of a [non-]familiar kind changes nothing to me.

Iow, put yourself into the shoes of that rat or that empty brain and tell:

- which one would you choose to be (if given no other option),

- why,

- and what you expect to sense differently.

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