[ExI] Human Testing

[Stefano Vaj]

On 3 March 2012 15:39, spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:
> Ja, and this latest case will really tear the mask off of that problem.  We
> have long known there are maddening ethical dilemmas posed by medical
> research.  Imagine that there is a class of molecules which somehow breaks
> up beta amyloid clumps, thereby saving Alzheimer's and Parkinson's patients
> (as well as a long list of lesser known degenerative maladies) and this
> class of molecules are easily synthesized.  In order to determine the
> efficacy, you need a control group, a subset of patients who get a placebo.
> These die, and ruin their families in the process, all while there is
> growing consensus and evidence that the medications given to the others are
> effective.  These live, and perhaps leave the medical facility.

This is a well-known conundrum, but I suspect that after all in a
dominant mentality still shaped by 1500+ years of monotheist values
the real problem is not so much in the placebo patients who are after
all left in the care of the Providence, but of the reluctance to
decide in the God's stead who is going to live or die , who is going
to run a risk and who is going to have a chance, etc.

Sure, at the end of the day the survival instinct, the demand for
medical treatment and the wish to stop suffering are so strong that
*some* research and progress are of course in place. But I maintain
that the obsession also in this field for the Precautionary Principle
betrays a deep and deeply rooted, superstitious unease with regard to
any technoscientific effort involving the human body and the human
life.

--
Stefano Vaj