Animals or children? — A scientist's choice

动物还是孩子？—— 一位科学家的选择

1 I am the enemy! I am one of those cursed, cruel physician scientists involved in animal research. These rumors sting, for I have never thought of myself as an evil person. I became a children's doctor because of my love for children and my supreme desire to keep them healthy. During medical school and residency, I saw many children die of cancer and bloodshed from injury — circumstances against which medicine has made great progress but still has a long way to go. More importantly, I also saw children healthy thanks to advances in medical science such as infant breathing support, powerful new medicines and surgical techniques and the entire field of organ transplantation. My desire to tip the scales in favor of healthy, happy children drew me to medical research.

我就是那个敌人！我就是那些被人诅咒的、残忍的、搞动物实验的医生科学家之一。这些谣言刺痛了我，因为我从来没想到自己是一个邪恶的人。我成为一位儿科医生，因为我爱孩子，也因为我的最大愿望是让他们保持健康。在医学院学习和住院医生实习时，我看到了许多儿童死于癌症和受伤流血——虽然对此医学正取得很大进步，但远非完善。更重要的是，我还看到孩子们能保持健康得益于医学的进步，如婴儿呼吸支持器，功效强大的新药物和外科手术技术及整个器官移植领域的发展。我希望孩子们健康快乐，这促使我从事医学研究。

2 My accusers have twisted the truth into a fable and cast me as the devil. They claim that I have no moral compass, that I torture innocent animals for the sole purpose of career advancement, and that my experiments have no relevance to medicine. Meanwhile, an uncaring public barely watches, convinced that the issue has no significance, and publicity-conscious senators and politicians increasingly give way to the lobbying of animal rights activists.

控诉我的人把真相歪曲成一则神话，并把我描写成恶魔。他们声称我没有道德界限，我折磨那些无辜动物的唯一目的就是为了自己的职业升迁，而我的实验根本与医药毫不相关。与此同时，无动于衷的公众几乎不闻不问，相信这个议题毫无意义，而具有宣传意识的参议员和政治家们却对动物权利活动家的游说不断作出让步。

3 We, in medical research, have also been unbelievably uncaring. We have allowed the most extreme animal rights protesters to creep in and frame the issue as one of "animal fraud" and hatred. We have persisted in our belief that a knowledgeable public would consent to the importance of animal research for public health. Perhaps we have been mistaken in not responding to the emotional tone of the argument. Perhaps we should have responded to those sad slogans and posters of animals by waving equally sad posters of children dying of cancer or external wounds.

我们这些从事医学研究的人也显得令人难以置信的冷漠。我们允许最极端的动物权利活动家渐渐侵入，任凭他们把此类研究诬陷为“动物欺诈”和对动物的仇恨。我们一直坚信，有知识的公众会赞同动物研究对公众健康的重要性。也许我们的错误是没有对这场争论的感性基调作出反应。也许我们早应该挥动着儿童死于癌症或外伤的同样令人伤心的海报，来回应那些关于动物受害的伤感标语及海报。

4 In the animal rights forum, much is made of the volume of pain these animals experience in the name of medical science. Activists deny that we are trying to help and say it is evidence of our evil and cruel nature. A more reasonable argument, however, can be advanced in our defense. Life is often cruel to animals and human beings. Teenagers are flung from trucks and suffer severe head injuries. Young children barely able to walk find themselves at the bottom of swimming pools while a parent is occupied with something else. From everyday germs to gang violence, no life is free of pain. Physicians hoping to relieve the eternal suffering of these tragedies have only three choices: 1) create an animal model of the problem to understand the process and test new therapies; 2) experiment on human beings (some experiments will succeed, most will fail); or 3) leave medical knowledge static, hoping that accidental discoveries will lead us forward.

动物权利论坛大肆宣扬我们如何以医学的名义使这些动物经受巨大的痛苦。动物权利活动家们否认我们正在努力帮助人类，并说这是我们邪恶和残忍本性的证据。然而，一个更合理的论点可用来为我们进行辩护。生活往往对动物和人类都是残酷的。青少年被甩到卡车外，导致头部严重受伤。还不太会走路的孩子们溺水沉到游泳池底部时，他们的家长正忙于其他事务。从常见的的细菌侵害到帮派的暴力，没有谁能不受伤害。医生们希望能永远减轻这些悲剧带给人们身体上的痛苦，他们只有三个选择：1）用动物做实验，以了解整个医疗过程和测试新的疗法; 2）进行人体实验（一些实验会成功，大多数会失败）; 3）让对医疗知识的了解处于停滞状态，希望偶然的发现会带领我们向前。

5 Some animal rights activists would suggest an optional fourth choice, claiming that computer models can create animal experiments, thus omitting actual experiments. Computers can imitate the effects of well-understood principles on complex systems, as in the application of the laws of physics to airplane and automobile design. However, when the principles themselves are in question, as is the case with the complex biological systems of human life under study, computer modeling alone is of little value.

一些动物权利活动家会提出第四个选项，他们声称计算机可以模拟动物实验，这样就可省去真实的实验过程。计算机可以模拟一些为人所熟知的原理在复杂系统中的应用效果，就如物理规律在飞机和汽车设计中的应用那样。然而，当原理本身有问题时，就跟正处于研究阶段的复杂的生物系统的情况一样，仅靠计算机模拟成效甚微。

6 One of the terrifying effects of arresting the use of animals in medical research is that the impact will not be felt for years or even decades. Drugs to cure infection will remain undiscovered, surgical and diagnostic techniques will remain undeveloped, and fundamental biological processes that might have been understood will remain mysteries. There is the danger that quick decisions by well-meaning politicians will create resolution to diplomatically satisfy the small minority of loud protestors while the consequences and damaging impact of those decisions will not be apparent until long after.

阻止用动物来进行医学研究的可怕后果之一是，其影响要到几年甚至几十年后才能被人知晓：治愈感染的新药物将无法被发现，外科手术和诊断技术将得不到发展，那些有可能被发掘的基本生物学进程将是未解之谜。危险的是，那些善意的政治家匆忙作出决定后拿出的解决方案只是策略性地满足了那一小部分大声疾呼的示威者，这些决定的后果和造成的破坏性影响要很久才会显现。

7 Fortunately, most of us enjoy good health, and the agony of watching one's child die has become a rare experience. Yet our good fortune should not make us unappreciative. Protection from serious sickness and drugs to combat heart disease, high blood pressure and stroke are all based on animal research. Most complex surgical procedures such as heart or hip surgery and organ transplantation surgeries were initially developed in animals. Techniques to replace defective genes, the cause of so much disease, as well as the development of synthetic organs are presently undergoing animal studies. These studies, and any subsequent advances, will effectively end if animal research is severely restricted.

幸运的是，我们大多数人都享有健康的体魄，眼睁睁地看着孩子死亡之苦已不多见。然而，对于能够享受健康或享受医学进步能带来的健康我们不应该不心存感激。对严重疾病的预防和用于心脏病、高血压和中风的药物都基于对动物的研究。大多复杂的外科手术，如心脏或髋关节手术、器官移植手术最初都是在动物实验中进行的。取代导致众多疾病的缺陷基因的技术，以及人造器官的发展，目前正处于动物实验研究阶段。如果动物研究严格受限，这些研究和其后的任何进展都将彻底地宣告结束。

8 In America today, death has become an event isolated from our daily existence. As a doctor who has watched many children die and seen their parents' infinite grief, I am particularly angered by any minute expression of caring for the suffering of creatures and so little for sick and dying human beings. People are too protected from the reality of human life and death and what it means.

在今天的美国，死亡已经成为我们日常生活中孤立少见的事。作为一个看见过许多儿童死亡和他们父母悲痛至极的医生，我感到特别愤怒的是，有人对动物的痛苦表达入微，但对生病和生命垂危的人却冷漠无情。人们受到了太多的保护,以至于他们感觉不到现实世界里的生与死，也感觉不到其所代表的真实意义。

9 Make no mistake, however. I would never advocate needless cruel treatment of animals. The animal rights movement has made a contribution in making us more aware of animals' needs and the need to search harder for suitable alternatives. But if the more radical members of this movement are successful in threatening further research, their efforts will bring about a tragedy that will cost many lives. Hence the real question is whether an uncaring majority can be aroused to protect its future against a loud, but misdirected, minority.

但别搞错，我从来不提倡对动物实行不必要的残忍对待。动物权利运动使我们更加意识到动物应有的权利，以及努力寻找合适替代品的需要。但是，如果有更多的动物权利运动的激进分子成功地阻止了进一步的研究，那他们的努力会造成以许多人的生命为代价的悲剧。因此，真正的问题是我们能否唤起大多数漠不关心的民众来保护动物实验的将来，以反对嗓门挺大、但却是被误导的那一小部分人。