Animals have been used for several purposes for human need. Animals help us in our endeavors in health and medicine; using them as experiments in determining the successes and failures of these products. Should we humans, as part of the animal kingdom, be able to use these creatures for our own benefit? The answer is yes. We live in a world where survival is the most important thing. As the most intelligent, well-adapted and advance beings in this planet, we have a right to be dominant to other animals. If giving animals rights, then it would limit our chances for survival because it will limit the number of things we can do with animals for our own benefits.

In response to the debate on whether animals should be given a “bill of rights”, it is unnecessary and impractical to apply these rights to creatures that are essential for the survival of humanity. If rights are given to animals, the number of experiments on these animals would be greatly limited and our advancements on medicine and health will be hindered.

Animals do not have the morals that we humans have. Animals do not really have a choice between good and bad, it just follows on what its instincts tell us to do. If a tiger is hungry, it eats anything that is a part of their food pyramid. Tigers and other animals are somehow similar to human babies. Babies act out what it body needs, babies cry when they are hungry, in pain or when they feel uncomfortable. Tigers also do whatever they can to respond to stimuli which are not really connected to its decision but rather, its instincts. If animals are given rights, should we give rights to children who are incapable of making cognitive decisions as well? That would be no because animals nor human babies do not have the cognitive abilities that adults do.

Laws and  rules are needed to be able to correct the wrong doings that people did in the past. After the Second World War, the Nuremberg Code of 1947 was created. It states that human experimentation should be done after when there is enough knowledge gathered from experimenting animals. Animal experimentation is not deemed as immoral as stated by this code. This code was founded in 1947 after the war because the Nazis experimented directly on humans first. This code allowed scientists to be able to test on animals and made initial tests on other human beings illegal.  

The Bible can be interpreted in several different ways. But one thing that stands out clear was this verse: “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth”.If God created animals for the sake of human use, He must have foreseen that one day, humans will use animals for our survival and to ensure that humans will be able to live longer with the help of these animals. A notable discovery that humans created to lengthen the lives of people and enjoying the activities they want to do was the discovery of insulin. Production of insulin was first discovered when scientists took out pancreases from dogs which saved the lives of people with diabetes.

Animals in experiments often have some of their body parts removed or giving doses of medicine. In order to be able to see the full effects of these medicines, the animals should be treated properly and should be healthy prior to the experiment. If animals are not used in medical research, scientists and researchers will have a hard time determining the impacts of the medicine on complicated systems on the body like the nervous system. Using samples on individual cells only has the effects on the cells and the effects of the drug on the rest of the body would be unknown.

If animals were to be given these “rights” scientists will have a hard time advancing in medical research if experiments would not be conducted on animals. This will result in shortening the lifespan of the average and modern human being. Medicines that are effective for certain diseases would become more expensive because it will be harder to make animal tested drugs. Giving rights to animals would only decrease the protection of humans from diseases and would limit the successes that might be able to save millions of human lives in the future.