animal testing and ethical implications

The ethics of using animals to do research is a hot-button topic that just doesn’t seem to have a right answer (or even a wrong one). Ask two people what they think, and you’re likely to get at least three answers—few are staunchly sure of where they stand on the issue. Animal testing and their use in research is not a new phenomenon; in fact, it can be traced all the way back to the writings of the Greeks in the third and fourth centuries BCE, in the works of Aristotle and Erasistratus (they were among the first to perform vivisections).