Evening star., 1936-02-14
Conflicting Opinions on
Vivisection Experiments

From time to time there appear on
your editorial page under the title "Stars,
Men and Atoms" faithful reports of ex-
periments performed on living animals
in the laboratories of Government sta
tions or those of medical colleges.
A recent instance In particular is the
article appearing in your issue Of Janu-
ary 80, which, in reporting experimental
, brain surgery on living cats now being
done at Johns Hopkins, presents every
phase of the torture which informed citi-
zens object to.
For two hundred years 1t has been
demonstrated that the paths of volun-
tary energy production in the brain
were perfectly defined, and that the
anatomist could demonstrate which parts
were the seat Of control. Yet we are
constantly affronted with such cerebro-
neuro experiments Of the vivisector lab
oratories because so-called scientists, not
satisfied with knowledge derived from
clinical observation of human beings,
still nourish the idea that something is
to be gained by torturing animals.
In this particular experiment the oper-
ator admits that the snarling, angry
cats "are the result of a type of brain
operation hit upon by accident.
The strange creatures (cats that accord
ing to this report are sensitive only on
one side of the body to anger, and there
fore to pain) were produced in the course
Of long continued experiments" And
what are these experiments? Some
where In very narrow area between the
top Of the brain, which is part Of the
mechanism Of unconscious functions, is
the emotion center. One day a de-
cortication operation did not come out
exactly right, and in order to stop the
bleeding 1t was necessary to remove a
little more tissue than was customary.
The result was the weird personality
combination" The faithful reporter
goes on to quote painstakingly what he
has been told. undoubtedly for the bene-
At of the public: The rage of these de-
corticated animals must be essentially
without feeling or without the recogni-
ton Of 1t. For without the brain cortex
it Is hardly possible that there can be
recognition Of anything"
These animals are admittedly kept
alive indefinitely, or as long as tortured
nature holds out, and, says the report,
ARE referred to by the psychologists not
as animals any longer but as 'prepara-
tionS-living test tubes-for the study
of physiological reactions"
Animal experimenters gather a lot of
information about what they call re
hexeS," which serve no purpose except
to satisfy peculiar form of curiosity.
They ask us to decide whether we are
alive unless we know 1t, and they blithely
tell us that the cat is not tortured be-
cause the part of the brain they have
destroyed cannot tell him about it.
The professional viviSector thus is care
full to tell the public that no suffering
is involved in this experiment, in which
only the cortex or covering of the cere-
bellum was removed. Yet Dr. Howell,
famous vivisector at Johns Hopkins, tells
us on page 166 of his text book on brain
surgery: THE cerebellum we know may
be removed in dogs and monkeys without
loss of the sensation of pain, tempera-
ture or touch"
But the public Is further blinded to
laboratory tortureS of animals by the
assertion that it is necessary for the ad-
vancement Of medical science. Compare
this falsehood with the following opinion
of what constitutes true scientific re-
search given by Prof. Charcot, the great
French brain specialist: THE only really
decisive data touching the cerebral pa
thology of man are, in my opinion, those
developed according to the principles of
the anatomico-clinical method That
method consists in ever confronting the
functional disorders observed during life
in man with the LESSONS discovered and
carefully located after death. To this
method I may justly say We owe what
ever definite knowledge we have of brain
pathology"
If profession does not end its own
abuses there is nothing left but for an
| informed public to seek laws to this end
E. B. HOWRY.