Lesson video

Hello, I'm Miss Kendrick and welcome to this lesson on religious views on animal testing.

In this lesson we're going to be looking at what is animal testing.

We're going to look at Christian views, Islamic views, and we're going to look at some application of ethical theories as well.

For some people, this is going to be a sensitive topic.

So if that applies to you, you may want to do the rest of this lesson with a trusted adult nearby who can support you as we're going to be talking about examples of animal suffering.

For this lesson, you're going to need a pen or pencil, a different coloured pen or pencil, to make corrections and additions to your work and some paper as well.

So if you do not have those things in front of you right now, this is your opportunity to pause the video and run and get them.

And also to make sure that you are in a good working environment, that you've turned off any music or the notifications on your phone, that you've gone to a quiet space somewhere where you can work.

So we're going to start this lesson by having a look at some key concepts that are going to be really important for this unit.

If you've been going through the lessons so far, then some of them will be quite familiar to you, but I've got Situation Ethics in bold because I at least have not spoken about this yet in this unit.

In a minute, you're going to see if you can write down that the key definitions for each of these, but I will start by talking about situation ethics, because it would be very mean for to me to ask you to write about something I've not told you anything about yet.

So Situation Ethics is an ethical theory based on the Christian Command to "Love your neighbour as yourself." It says that in each particular situation, we should do the most loving thing.

So it argues, there's not overall rules that someone should always stick to, but that we should do whatever seems most loving in a particular circumstance.

So for example, if somebody was starving and desperately needed food, than rather than following the rule, do not steal, Christians who follow situation ethics would say, "Well, it's more loving to steal some food "to feed that starving person, than it would "be to just let them die." It is important to be aware that lots of Christians have criticised situation ethics as a theory, because it doesn't always fit well with some commands in the Bible.

But many Christians will follow it.

So that's just a reminder to say that some Christians follow it, but not all do.

So you're going to pause the video now and see if you can write down the definition for situation ethics and the other key terms that were on the previous slide.

I wonder if you've ever noticed a funny logo on some products like your shampoo or makeup, maybe a little bit like this one, or there's some other logos as well.

Perhaps some of you intentionally look for these logos or you, perhaps some of you intentionally look for these logos and will only buy products which have it and products like this with this logo or similar ones that are labelled cruelty free, or that might have the vegan logo, have those logos as certification that those products have not been tested on animals.

Now, animal testing is testing products or medicines on animals to determine whether or not they are safe for human use.

And we've got two types of animal testing.

We've got cosmetic testing and medical testing.

And religious people and humanists as well are going to have different views on these different types of testing.

So I'm going to start by talking about cosmetic testing, which fits with what I was just saying about looking for that logo on products like shampoo, well make up and things like that.

Now, cosmetic testing is keeping small animals in labs to test cosmetics such as makeup and shampoo to see if they're safe for human use.

Now, just to be clear, this is not a matter of just giving a rabbit, a nice little shampoo and putting them on their way, but animal testing, cosmetic testing does involve a lot of suffering to those animals.

Partly they are kept in cages, so they're not able to roam around freely.

But also they often have products put on them, which are going to cause irritation to their skin.

These products might go in their eyes and blind them and things like that.

So many people would argue that cosmetic testing causes a lot of suffering to animals.

Medical testing has a different purpose, although it might look quite similar in reality at times.

So medical testing is testing animals, testing medicine, sorry, such as cancer treatment on animals to see whether they would be safe and effective for human use.

So when testing medicines on animals, the animals might be injected with certain illnesses or cancer cells so that these drugs and medicines can be tested on those animals.

And that's going to be used to develop a huge variety of medicines, either things that people use every single day to help them to survive and to improve their quality of life or things that are going to be used just once as a life changing or life saving procedure.

So we've got medical testing and cosmetic testing.

Then we're going to give you a moment to pause, and I want you to have a think about this for yourself and write down your own opinions on whether you think cosmetic testing is acceptable and I want two reasons why.

And I want you to think about whether medical testing is acceptable and I want two reasons why.

Okay, I'm not going to give you answers for that last task, because obviously that was your own opinion.

But I wonder if you might have said some things that are quite similar to some of the ideas I'm going to talk about now, when I look at religious responses.

Now in Christianity, there are two concepts that need to be balanced when it comes to approaches to medical testing and cosmetic testing.

Firstly, there is the view that humans are unique.

So Christians believe that humans are made in the image of God, that humans have a soul.

So this links to the verse, which talks about God breathing life into Adam.

There's the belief that humans have an eternal life.

So many Christians would say that animals don't have an eternal life but humans do and that their lives are more valuable.

And there's also the belief in Christianity that humans have dominion over the animals.

So in Genesis, we've got this command from God to Adam to rule over every living creature.

We can also have a focus on stewardship when we look at those verses rather than dominion.

But either way, there's an idea of responsibility and an idea of power over nature.

Secondly, we've got the view that God cares for animals.

So animals are also created by God and Christians traditionally believe that animals do have a type of soul.

They will say it's different to a human soul, but they do have souls.

We can see examples in the Bible of God caring for animals.

So in the story of Noah's ark, God tells Noah to save some of the animals.

And we've also got this verse here, which says, "Not one Sparrow falls to the ground without your father's consent." So here we've got two things to balance.

One is the sanctity of human life that that it is special, that it's different to animals.

And we've got that, God cares for animals as well.

So I'm going to give you a moment to pause and I want you to see what you think Christians are going to say about medical testing and about cosmetic testing.

So let's look at the Christian view.

So Christians are usually against cosmetic testing and they would say that there's often other natural products that don't need to be tested on animals.

And also they'd say cosmetics do not save human lives.

So when it comes to cosmetic testings, Christians are usually going to be against it because they would say it's not necessary, it doesn't save human life.

However, Christians will often accept medical testing as long as it doesn't cause unnecessary suffering to animals and that it contributes to saving human lives.

And this is because of the belief that human life is more valuable than animal life.

And therefore sacrificing some animals, so that a cancer treatment perhaps can be developed is worthwhile.

But they would say that, as part of that, these animals should be treated as well as possible.

That unnecessary suffering shouldn't be inflicted upon them.

So I'm going to give you a moment now to pause and check your answers against what I have here.

It's to support our answers when we're writing about Christian views on things like medical and cosmetic testing, we want to make sure we have got our quotations to support our answers.

So here I've got two quotations that I've used so far in this lesson, "Not once Sparrow falls to the ground "without your Father's consent." And "So God created man in his own image." So I'm going to get you to copy down both of these quotations and explain how they can be used to support Christian views on cosmetic and medical testing.

So we're going to look at the view from Islam now.

And again, Muslims will also need a balance when considering animal testing.

So again, Muslims believe that humans are unique.

They believe they're created by Allah.

They believe that human life should be cared for, that humans have souls, so we've also got this idea of Allah breathing life into Adam.

And we've also got the belief that Muslims should care for the Ummah, the Muslim brotherhood or community, past, present, and future.

So they would say that caring for other Muslims and caring for humans generally is more important or very important.

But we also have the belief that Allah created animals.

They are part of Allah's creation and that Allah cares for animals by providing for their needs in the world.

We've also got the example of Muhammad.

So Muhammad showed respect to animals, and there's an example of Muhammad returning eggs to a bird's nest when he saw that their mother bird was really distressed, that they were missing.

And finally, we've gotten links to Islamic beliefs about Khalifah, the view that they should be Allah's stewards over creation.

And muslims believe they will be judged on whether or not they've been good Khalifahs.

And therefore they're going to be really, really careful to make sure that they are being respectful towards nature.

So again, we're going to pause and I want you to see if you can write what you think the Muslim view is going to be on cosmetic and medical testing.

So Muslims will generally be against cosmetic testing because it's not vital to human life.

And it does not follow the example of Muhammad, treating animals with respect.

And remember if Muslims are bad Khalifahs, they will be judged for it.

Medical testing, however, is seen as acceptable as it helps the Ummah.

But it should be done in such a way to minimise animal suffering.

So we can see really strong similarities to the Christian views here, but we've got slightly different reasons for those answers.

So again, you're going to pause the video and get these answers down or add them to your own.

Now again, to look at some evidence to support the Muslim view.

So we've got here the story Muhammad is said to have returned eggs to their nest when he saw how distressed the mother was, so that's a Hadith.

And we've also got this quotation here from the creation of Adam, "Then he proportioned him and breathed into him "from his created soul and made for you "hearing ambition and hearts." So this shows the creation of Adam and Adam being created in a special way, that he is different to the animals.

He's been given this soul and given this heart so that he can follow Allah.

So you're going to copy down these quotations and I want you to explain how they can support the Islamic view.

So we're just going to spend a little bit of time recapping some ethical theories and looking how we're going to apply them to animal testing.

So firstly, we've got Utilitarianism.

This is a non religious ethical view, which many humanists follow and it is based on the idea that the right action to do is the action that brings about the greatest good, for the greatest number of people.

We've got Situation ethics, an ethical theory that's based on the idea of doing the most loving thing in every situation.

And again, situation ethics is focused on loving humans, but there is the idea here as well of showing love and compassion to animals.

And we got the Sanctity of life.

The idea that all human life is valuable because it's created by God, in the image of God.

And when I refer to being in the image of God, we're looking at a particularly Christian understanding of the sanctity of life.

Muslims will also agree with the principles of sanctity of life, but they do not believe that humans were made in God's image.

But they do believe that humans are made specially by Allah.

So again, there's overlap here between Islam and Christianity, but it's not exactly the same.

So we're going to do some quick fire questions to make sure we know the difference between these theories.

So which approach focuses on the most loving thing to do? One, two, three, Situation ethics.

Which approach focuses on bringing about the most happiness for the most people? One, two, three, Utilitarianism.

Which approach focuses on the value of human life? Sanctity of life.

Which approach obviously prioritises human life above all else? Again, Sanctity of life.

which approach is most likely to be used by humanist? Utilitarianism.

So now we've had that practise, we're going to pause and you're going to write what you think each of these ethical theories is going to say about medical and cosmetic testing.

I hope you got a good idea of how to apply these ethical theories now, and that you understand the variety of belief or reasons why religious people and non religious people will be against cosmetic testing, but might agree with medical testing and say is worthwhile.

Thank you for all of your hard work in this lesson.

And you can now go and do the exit quiz.