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Oh behave yourself Flashy. S'only the nobs who've been able to afford the horses, stables, servants etc needed to hunt. I spose these days, you pay a membership fee?
Captain Flashfart, earlier:
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[i]the money is not very good in animal research, anyone who says otherwise is talking bollox
and animal work is a vital part of medical research
no animal experiments, no new drugs, simple as
just wait to you get diagnosed with cancer, and a 3rd of us will,
see if your compassion for animals is stronger than your desire for a few more years with the latest drugs [/i]
I see where your coming from kimbers. Paying someone else to do the dirty work, turn a blind eye so to speak as its a necessary evil. The cancer-bit though, our society is awash in chemicals, food additives, preservatives and cigarettes. Why isn't the millions upon well billions over the years turned against these sort of areas? This comes across as a simplified and naive viewpoint but looking for a cure to cancer (in part) is trying to stop something after the horse has bolted.
I've lost the thread of Rudeboy's argument slighty, but I think it is that fox hunting is wrong, cruel and immoral because it is posh whereas anything done by genuine proles involving a ferret and some flat caps is all rather noble and good fun.
😉
Hmm, I was wondering when this sort of topic would pop up on here again.
Unfortunately it confirms my suspiscions that a lot of people on STW have very narrow minded views and opinions, basically thinking what they are told to think be the mass media etc.
Rudeboy - you are the classic example. Yep, thats a great picture you've posted there but have you actually had any contact with people who hunt (other than maybe the odd bit of random abuse throwing). I don't see any logic to your arguments. I've heard some pretty bizarre comparisons when it comes to hunting but football hooliganism? And as for the "it's all toffs on a blood rush" - yep, keep reading the papers and stay away from the real world if you like.
Fox hunting can be quite dangerous for the horse rider depending on the pace/cross country and any obstacles. I do feel it is an inhumane act though as the Fox does suffer through fear and of course for the few moments when it is caught. Better would be a pride of live and hungry Tigers with the hunters only allowed to carry .22 pistols to defend themselves. That should even up the odds somewhat.
Foxes are 'vermin' however there are less cruel ways of controlling their numbers that a symbolic archaic act thats classed as 'heritage'. So is hung drawn and quartering and the stocks but you dont see that nowadays.
have you actually had any contact with people who hunt
Thing is though, I have (lived in rural areas most of my life) and a lot of them [i]are[/i] arrogant, badly-behaved snobs I'm afraid. Like I said I don't think [i]all[/i] hunts/hunters are like that, but in my experience a lot are.
hora while smoking and environment is a massive factor in cancer
an even bigger factor is genetics
cancer is innevitable our DNA eventually reaches a stage where mutations cannot be repaired
not to mention alzheimers, and thousands of other diseases affecting young and old
as we live longer these diseases become more prevalent
people howl and wail at the newspapers when their mum is denied the latest breast cancer drug, they dont care that 300 mice died to get it to the clinic
and you still didnt answer my question, would u turn down such a drug if offered?
and that means any drug you have ever taken, they have all been tested on animals
Any form of hunting, that is for the main purpose of obtaining food, as long as it's done as humanely as possible, is fine. Any form of hunting that involves undue suffering to an animal, is barbaric and should be banned.
Hare coursing and Badger baiting, traditional 'working class' activities, are banned, and rightly so. Rabbiting with Ferrets? Well, I dunno; is there not a more humane way of killing the rabbits? Does seem a bit cruel, but I don't know much about it, tbh.
Hora, I'm going to stick my head up again and say that the reason that hanging, drawing and quartering got banned ages ago but fox hunting didn't is that there is an important moral difference between humans and foxes. As I thought there was between humans and snack size microwaveable ready-kittens...
😉
Hora - yes, I think blaming "chemicals and food additives" for cancer is a bit simplistic/naive. An awful lot of research has been aimed at these chemical and yes there have been some link shown (esp to cigarettes but thats people's own doing). There have also been a lot of infectious/viral causes of cancer identified and I think that's going to be a more likely route in the future (see vaccines for cervical cancer etc).
I'm sure people dont realise just how much research and money is spent trying to avoid animal tesing. Whilst I don't enjoy the fact that it goes on, the sad fact is we'd be a much shorter living, more diseased population if it didn't. Who has refused medication/treatments here because it had been tested on animals.
To extend our lives where do we stop? Ethics. The use of fetal/embryos and stem cells just to extend our lives? Why in the western world are we so afraid of death?
Not afraid of death. Just not keen on going back 100 years to an age where falling off your bike and catching your calf on the chain ring could lead to death from gangrene 😉
but have you actually had any contact with people who hunt
Yes, actually. Quite a few, over the years. And not one of them has ever managed to justify the unnecessary suffering of foxes caused by this method of 'vermin control'. Hmm, chasing an animal for miles, to the point where it is exhausted and terrified, then have a pack of baying hounds rip it to pieces; that's 'fun', is it? Good Lord... and maybe hunting types need a bit of a PR makeover. Most of the ones I've met have been upper middle class. I've seen a couple of pro-hunting demos in London; not exactly an eclectic mix of people, hardly a great representation of a particularly 'inclusive' social activity! Most of 'em seemed quite well to do, really. Quite a few 'Hooray Henry' types. I'm sorry, but it's what I saw. And whenever you get people on the telly, going on about how great hunting is, they're usually a bit 'posh'. Unless they rope in some 'yokel' to try and promote a 'classless' image of hunting.
And yes, I've heard all the 'practical' arguments, thank you very much. We all know there are far more effective ways to keep fox populations down.
You know I'm right, as well, really, don't you?
Well as for hunting it's another debate. The day you'll get a hunter pointing a shot gun at you and saying get out of my way you scum mountainbikers you might get a different view. I have been there and it's all but a Nice experience.
Animal testing - my info may well be out of date but when I was at uni there were vivsection labs run by post grad students replicating already known research to practice research methods. There is also animal testing for weapons research
animal testing for cosmetics - does it still happen?
I believe there is a place for animal testing but at maybe 10% of the level it is at now - and IIRC there are serious doubts about the application of some animal testing results to humans.
"The unspeakable in pursuit of the inedible"
Oscar Wilde
Says it all really.
Fox hunting is riddled with illegal activity from trespass to threatening behaviour to digging up foxes gone to earth to feeding foxes to increase populations for hunting.
TJ, that's bollox.
True, some people might get a little arsey when some "sab" deliberately gets in the way of their half tonne horse, but if people who did n;t like cycling kept getting in the way of your bike and you, wouldn't you get a little annoyed? "Sabs" really enjoying winding people up and viceotaping the results.
As for only posh people having horses, that's shite too. I'll mention that to the people I know with horses, that spend just about every spare penny they own on the dame things, getting up at 6am to put them out. It's a fool's game, but it does not make them any more posh.
The feeding foxes thing is shite too as well. If these people are "posh" or landowners or farmers, there is no way they would voluntarily increase the population of a predator that is quite happy ruining their livestock.
I will readily agree that it's a bloody stupid way to reduce the population of foxes in an area though. Shooting them is a much more effective way to do it.
"hora - Member
Cruelty to animals. They always say 'treated like a dog' to describe maltreatment.
The animal testers don't have to to test on animals. They can work somewhere else in medicine right? Oh I get it, the money is very good in animal research?
"
simple economics, the less desirable (in this case moraly reprihensible) the job the better paid it is. No one wants to be a bin man, so it has to pay better than stacking shelves etc.......
If "they" didnt do it, then the wages would just go up untill "they" (or someone else) did.
Willard - all those things I mentioned have been reported in the press on several occasions.
"The Royal Beaufort Hunt in Gloucestershire, followed by the Prince of Wales and Princes William and Harry, was under investigation last night after anti-hunt campaigners disclosed television footage showing foxes allegedly being fed to maintain their numbers for sport.
The clandestine film of a member of the hunt feeding cubs undermines claims of fox-hunters that hunts control fox numbers. Members of the International Fund for Animal Welfare who released the film said trading standards officers were investigating possible breaches of wildlife rules. IFAW's chief executive Mike Baker said: "The Prince now knows where his foxes come from and we are certain that he will no longer want to ride out with this particular hunt."
Mark Sprake of the Masters of Fox Hounds Association said conservation measures were needed in parts of the countryside; otherwise foxes "would be wiped out altogether". "We have always argued in keeping a balanced population," he said. But he added: "I was unaware that this was going on and if a formal complaint is made it will be looked into."
From [url] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/working-class-hunts-could-be-saved-715456.html [/url]
Not an isolated incedent - many more examples same with the tresspass
[url] http://www.nwlacs.co.uk/archive/cheshire_cf_97_trespass.htm [/url] for one well documented case
[url] http://www.defra.gov.uk/rural/hunting/inquiry/evidence/wsbpg.htm [/url]
And so on and so on.
Still as mtbers I quite not understand how anyone enjoying riding off road can agree with the idea of hunting...
TJ, that's bollox.True, some people might get a little arsey when some "sab" deliberately gets in the way of their half tonne horse, but if people who did n;t like cycling kept getting in the way of your bike and you, wouldn't you get a little annoyed? "Sabs" really enjoying winding people up and viceotaping the results
I don't think that TJ is talking bollox at all. I live and work in rural Devon. I see the hunt a lot. The South Devon hunt is based just outside of my village. IME they are extremely hostile, aggressive and exclusive to everyone outside of their circle. You don't have to be a "sab" to feel bullied by these people. Roads are deliberately blocked, access is denied and if you're not part of what they are doing, you are made to feel distinctly uncomfortable.
As for all this bleating I hear about "unjust laws", I think these people need to realise that the sport is banned because an overwhelming majority of the country are opposed to it. If they want to claim that it's a rural activity that town people don't understand, then it's worth reminding them that without the taxes and income of those town people then the countryside would be on its arse.
For the record, I'm not opposed to fox hunting at all. I just hate the arrogant attitude of those hunt supporters who think that they only have to abide by the laws that suit them.
kimbers
cancer is innevitable [sic] our DNA eventually reaches a stage where mutations cannot be repaired
Surely the question is why experiment on animals to stop an inevitable illness bit pointless.
Willard how much to own a horse then for 10 years to go hunting. All in stabling vets. ferriers, equipment, transport, food etc etc ..... then remember it is not exclusive!!!!! Like arguing that the £1000 per year membership of the local Golf club is not exclusive because anyone can join when in reality not everyone can afford it..... hence exclusive.
Fox hunting FFS Sport my @rse, egalitarian my @rse no one on my council estate owned a horse or when fox hunting but plenty of "town dwelling country types" did turn up to engage in this activity.
Most people object to fox hunting not because they object to hunting per se but because they object to killing things for sport BIG DIFFERENCE... If you are going to eat it (what hunting was originally) then fair enough but to do this for fun ..... really does worry me that someone can kill an animal for pleasure. If you do it for other reasons then do a trail hunt then and don't smear blood on virgins etc as the kill is not important. Like badger baiting and cock fighting rightly outlawed.
[i]I believe there is a place for animal testing but at maybe 10% of the level it is at now - and IIRC there are serious doubts about the application of some animal testing results to human[/i]
TJ u are talking bollox here, do you have any idea how many drugs fall by the wayside in development, anything as ridiculously complex as the human body and diseases requires a massive amount of testing
and animal models followed by clinical trials are essential
otherwise we would see this happening every other week rather than on a rare occurrence like this
[url= http://img.****/i/pix/2008/04_03/2EleManES_468x399.jp g" target="_blank">
and without proper testing you would have thalidomide crisis all over again, animal testing would have prevented that drug from ever reaching the clinic
but far more foxes are shot over a year than that
Many, many more are run over by traffic...so what then?
We should all get a limitless supply of foxes on the NHS?
😉
Kimbers - I am perfectly willing to accept that some trials are needed. I know for a fact that some are unnecessary - weapons testing on animals? I know that 20 odd years ago at manchester uni there was a lot of animal testing done unnecessarily by post grad students replicating known stuff - this may well have stopped by now as I said in my post.
Thalidomide was animal tested before release according to the references I can find - but not as thourghouly as it would be now.
and without proper testing you would have thalidomide crisis all over again, animal testing would have prevented that drug from ever reaching the clinic
kimbers it WAS tested on animals when do you think we began doing this?
You agree with animal experiments fine but do not say things that are NOT true to support your argument ... even the link you give you think we went straight from research to human trials ? You do not understand how the process works do you?
Have you heard of Google?
[url= http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=was+thalidomide+tested+on+animals&meta= ]Google results[/url]
Some examples
Despite the clinical evidence to the contrary British health authorities such as the Medical Research Council maintain that the vast bulk of evidence from laboratory and animal tests is against thalidomide having any genetic effects. (2)
Another one
The original animal tests by Chemie Grünenthal did not show indications of this unexpected and serious side-effect. (10) Furthermore, in several European countries, including England and Sweden, the licensees of thalidomide carried out their own animal tests, independently from the German firm, and came to the same results as Chemie Grünenthal. (11) If the tests had predicted peripheral neuritis and if the firms acted upon the results in a responsible manner, the drug would not have been released in the first place and a major disaster would have been avoided.
It failed to detect the effect because it is difficult to prevent or even detect teratogenic effects- effects on a foetus because.
'In pregnant animals, differences in the physiological structure, function and biochemistry of the placenta aggravate the usual differences in metabolism, excretion, distribution and absorption that exist between species and make reliable predictions impossible.' (15)
Dr Robert Sharpe, former senior research chemist
Thalidomide was animal tested before release according to the references I can find - but not as thourghouly as it would be now.
Bingo TJ speaking crap again.
Thalidomide is good and work well, but only the R enantiomer. The S is responsible for all the problems.
Due to greed and capitalism, when the Thalidomide went into production, no separation of the enantiomers was done hence badly formed babies. That is the most know example in any chemistry classes. Please TJ check your sources...
Juan so it was tested on animals then only badly? is that your argument then?
Rude boy or TJ your turn off to do real work now
My argument is that testing was done on only one of the enatiomer. It's the production that went wrong.
junkyard youre own results show that you have misread the data
[i]Thalidomide did initially pass safety tests in animals but this was because the proper tests were not performed: thalidomide was not tested on pregnant animals. If a thorough battery of tests had been performed in animals, the teratogenic effects would have been caught[/i]
any drug for pregnant mothers would have to be tested on pregnant animals under mopern guidelines, we would have prevented the thalidomide babies being born
and yes i work in a cancer research institute and i think i understand it a little better than you
we would have prevented the thalidomide babies being born
not even sure... As during the testing the process of making the drug is different to the process during the production phase.
Juan - do you have to be so rude?
I fully acknowledged in my posts that I am no expert in this area. It would be nice if you read my posts before leaping to the attack. I was perhaps oversimplifying a complex debate and the references I found were contradictory. It would appear it was tested on animals but not pregnant ones prior to release
The debate is fine but the personal abuse that is starting to creep in has to stop.
Rudeboy, you are being watched closely after your 'register' comments earlier. It's is NOT acceptable!
No, you're probbly right. Bit too much.
Sorry.
As long as the same 'rules' apply to everyone.
Yes they do. You are not the only person we are monitoring.
kimbers - Member
any drug for pregnant mothers would have to be tested on pregnant animals under mopern guidelines, we would have prevented the thalidomide babies being born
OR not because science/evidence /opinion/data is not absolute on this matter.
“There is at present no hard evidence to show the value of more extensive and more prolonged laboratory testing as a method of reducing eventual risk in human patients. In other words the predictive value of studies carried out in animals is uncertain... With thalidomide, for example, it is only possible to produce specific deformities in a very small number of species of animal. In this particular case, therefore, it is unlikely that specific tests in pregnant animals would have given the necessary warning: the right species would probably never have been used.” ( Professor George Teeling-Smith, in A Question of Balance; the benefits and risks of pharmaceutical innovation, p 29, publ. Office of Health Economics, 1980)
“…rats are refractory to thalidomide-induced teratogenesis” (Neurotoxicol Teratol. 2001 May-Jun;23(3):255-64. Neurobehavioral teratogenic effects of thalidomide in rats. Vorhees CV, Weisenburger WP, Minck DR)
“We chose a dose of thalidomide close to the estimated amount required to produce human anomalies. This dose had no detectable toxic effects in the monkey” (Science 1963;139:1294-95)
“Grünenthal has tried to reproduce phocomelia in rats, mice, and rabbits and has failed, In Keil the drug was fed to hens and the chicks were normal.” (Helen Taussig, Journal of the American Medical Association, June 30, 1962: A Study of the German Outbreak of Phocomelia: The Thalidomide Syndrome)
“Numerous attempts to reproduce the malformations which occured in human babies from Thalidomide-treated mothers have met with only limited success. Although many representatives of aves [birds] and mammalian experimental species have been investigated for this purpose, the results fall short of paralleling the effect of the drug on the human foetus.” (Nature 1966;210:958-959)
“More than 800 chemicals have been defined as teratogens in laboratory animals, but only a few of these, approximately 20, have been shown to be teratogenic in humans. This discrepancy can be attributed to differences in metabolism, sensitivity and exposure time.” (Dr Beat Schmid, Trends in Pharmacological Sciences; 8:133, 1987)
“In approximately 10 strains of rats, 15 strains of mice, 11 breeds of rabbits, 2 breeds of dogs, 3 strains of hamsters, 8 species of primates and in other such varied species as cats, armadillos, guinea pigs, swine and ferrets in which thalidomide has been tested, teratogenic effects have been induced only occasionally.” (Schardein, JL, Drugs as Teratogens, 1976 and Schardein, JL, Chemically Induced Birth Defects, Marcel Dekker 1985)
We have got slightly off topic here but they do not guarantee that there wil be no side effects on humans even though they have been tested on animals. It would clearly be foolish of me to argue they are not the MOST effective method but it is not without the risk of error be it bad science, poor design or inherent weaknesses of the methodology.
Whatever it is I would still class it as cruel to the animal ... necessary I am not fully convinced but cruel I am convinced.
At least we have remained polite though and in that spirit yes you clearly know more on this area than I do.
[i]And yes, I've heard all the 'practical' arguments, thank you very much. We all know there are far more effective ways to keep fox populations down.[/i]
Take away their Barry White collection and alcohol/tabs?
Thalidomide administration during early gestation results in specific and dramatic limb defects in primates,
Arch Toxicol. 1996;70(11):749-56.
The toxic metabolite of thalidomide was not produced by rat liver microsomes (the rat is not sensitive to thalidomide teratogenesis) but was produced by hepatic preparations from maternal rabbits, and rabbit, monkey, and human (all sensitive species) fetuses. A toxic arene oxide therefore may be involved in the teratogenicity of thalidomide.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1981 Apr;78(4):2545-8.
Oral administration of thalidomide in single or multiple (3-day) treatment periods to pregnant green monkeys between days 28 and 33 resulted in defects of the limbs which resemble those observed in macaques and baboons
Teratology. 1978 Dec;18(3):393-404.
all this evidence indicates to me that not enough animal testing was conducted on thalidamide
I've no been wholly convinced by either sides arguments around fox hunting TBH. I've seen the results of enough hunts first hand to know that foxes aren't ripped to pieces, and I'm not certain that the average hunt runs long enough to produce massive suffering in terms of exhaustion and so on. Once dogs have a scent, and a fox is flushed into open ground it's a matter of minutes, not hours before it's all done, and it's all too easy to see this as a class thing. Ask the average Joe in the street, and to 99% of folk it's a toffs game. It often isn't in reality, but given all the hoopla that surrounds it, they (the Hunts) don't do themselves any favours.
Having said all that, The Hunts can't claim it's pest control, and at the same time claim not to kill that many, the only figures I've ever seen claimed a yearly hunt kill of about 13000, out of a population of about 200K-250k, so not massively effective, but still a huge number of dead animals, it's one or t'other. Fox populations do need to be controlled, I'm just not certain hunting is the best way. Hunts also need to be more open about damage to Hound Packs, and the real amounts of work created by hunting (not much really) Lots of people in Britain find hunting with dogs morally wrong, so the onus is on the Hunts to justify themselves, and just saying "Townies don't understand" really isn't good enough.
It's an emotive issue the whole hunting thing. (not sh&^ sherlock)
re the hunting thing
a mate of mine was a stable girl when she was younger
she hated the rich hunt guys coz some of them were quite happy to ride the horses into the nackers yard for the sake of a good hunt
re the hunting thing
a mate of mine was a stable girl when she was younger
she loved the hunt guys coz some of them were quite happy to ride the horses and pay her wages to look after the horses properly for the sake of a good hunt
Two sides and all that....
actualy my mate looked down on most men as she prefers ladies
Pics?
In jodphurs?
😉
kimbers - Member
all this evidence indicates to me that not enough animal testing was conducted on thalidamide
well if it was anything but this topic I would be agreeing as what else can science do when their is uncertaintity but gather more data. Unfortunately in this case though that data inherently requires the suffering of animals and you (well possibly anyway and not said in an insulting manner legal free choice and all that) and other scientist do choose to do this.
Personally I would not. It is not bad science to gather evidence but it is somewhat hypocrtical (speciesism iirc the animal libs call it) as I assume no one would do these experiments on humans and it is fair to say (without getting anthropormophic)that animals are capable of feeling pain and suffering just as much as a human is.