Overcoming Bias

Animal experimentation: morally acceptable, or just the way things always have been?

Following the announcement last week that Oxford University’s controversial Biomedical Sciences building is now complete and will be open for business in mid-2009, the ethical issues surrounding the use of animals for scientific experimentation have been revisited in the media—see, for example, here , here, and here.

The number of animals used per year in scientific experiments worldwide has been estimated at 200 million—well in excess of the population of Brazil and over three times that of the United Kingdom. If we take the importance of an ethical issue to depend in part on how many subjects it affects, then, the ethics of animal experimentation at the very least warrants consideration alongside some of the most important issues in this country today, and arguably exceeds them in importance. So, what is being done to address this issue?

In the media, much effort seems to be devoted to discrediting concerns about animal suffering and reassuring people that animals used in science are well cared for, and relatively little effort is spent engaging with the ethical issues. However, it seems likely that no amount of reassurance about primate play areas and germ-controlled environments in Oxford’s new research lab will allay existing concerns about the acceptability of, for example, inducing heart failure in mice or inducing Parkinson’s disease in monkeys—particularly since scientists are not currently required to report exactly how much suffering their experiments cause to animals. Given the suffering involved, are we really sure that experimenting on animals is ethically justifiable?

In attempting to answer this question, it is disturbing to note some inconsistencies in popular views of science. Consider, for example, that by far the most common argument in favour of animal experimentation is that it is an essential part of scientific progress. As Oxford's oft-quoted Professor Alastair Buchan reminds us, ‘You can’t make a head injury in a dish, you can’t create a stroke in a test tube, you can’t create a heart attack on a chip: it just doesn’t work’. Using animals, we are told, is essential if science is to progress. Since many people are apparently convinced by this argument, they must therefore believe that scientific progress is something worthwhile—that, at the very least, its value outweighs the suffering of experimental animals. And yet, at the same time, we are regularly confronted with the conflicting realisation that, far from viewing science as a highly valuable and worthwhile pursuit, the public is often disillusioned and exasperated with science. Recently, for example, people have expressed bafflement that scientists have spent time and money on seemingly trifling projects—such as working out the best way to swat a fly and discovering why knots form—and on telling us things that we already know: that getting rid of credit cards helps us spend less money, and that listening to very loud music can damage hearing. Why, when the public often seems to despair of science, do so many people appear to be convinced that scientific progress is so important that it justifies the suffering of millions of animals?

Dangerous Species Warnings

For most species, officially declaring them "endangered" makes them worse off:

Ferraro, McIntosh, and Ospina (2007) find that ... for a large majority of the species studied, listing under the [U.S. Endangered Species Act] has actually harmed the species’ chances of recovery.

Ferraro et al examine two different elements of the ESA’s operation: the impact of listing a species as being endangered, and the effects of species-specific government recovery expenditures. ... For the 25 percent of the listed species that garner about 95 percent of all government recovery funding, the ESA seems to have produced improvements in the chances of recovery. But for the other 75 percent of species, those that are largely ignored by the funding process, the ESA has sharply reduced species’ viability, compared to unlisted species that are otherwise similar except for listing status. ...

Ban the Bear

I applaud the SEC's courageous move to ban short selling.  Isn't that brilliant?  I wonder why they didn't think of that during the Great Depression.

However, I feel that this valiant effort does not go far enough.

All selling of stocks should be banned.  Once you buy a stock, you have to hold it forever.

Sure, this might make the market a little less liquid.  But once stock prices can only go up, we'll all be rich!

Or maybe we should just try something simpler: pass a law making it illegal for stock prices to go down.

Deafening Silence

Dan Klein harps on a too-rarely-asked question:

Counterparts to the FDA function in other countries. The FDA could adopt a standing policy that drugs permitted in Europe, Canada, Japan, Australia, etc. automatically become permitted in the US. Why doesn't the FDA adopt such a policy? Is it because a drug that is safe and effective in Australia, Canada, or France may not be safe and effective in the United States?

Alex Tabarrok, in the office next door, says he often harps on this and has never heard a reasonable counter-argument.  I'm especially fascinated by situations like this, where a devastating argument against a status quo policy is met by complete silence and disinterest.  Why don't intellectuals feel any need to respond to such arguments?  How can we make such silences more audible to more people?

Kids often analogously complain  "But Billy's parents let him do X."  And they should add, "What makes you think you know better than Billy's parents?"  Are we similarly just overconfident in the judgment of "our" regulators? 

Alex also harps on another tough question:

What can we learn about the need for efficacy requirements from the pervasive experience of off-label medicine, which has no FDA efficacy certification? The thrust of Tabarrok's argument is that off-label seems to work quite well and so why not drop efficacy requirements entirely?

Alex tells me the two best counter arguments are that off-label uses are often similar to on-label uses, and that drug firms have low incentives to run tests near the end of a drug's patent lifetime.  But then why not approve only similar on-label uses and approve all uses of unpatentable drugs (that have passed safety tests)? 

'Anyone who thinks the Large Hadron Collider will destroy the world is a t**t.'

This week is Big Bang Week at the BBC, with various programmes devoted to the switch-on of CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) on Wednesday morning.  Many of these programmes are covered in this week’s issue of the Radio Times—the BBC’s listings magazine—which also features a short interview with Professor Brian Cox, chair of particle physics at the University of Manchester. Asked about concerns that the LHC could destroy the earth, he replies:

‘The nonsense you find on the web about “doomsday scenarios” is conspiracy theory rubbish generated by a small group of nutters, primarily on the other side of the Atlantic.  These people also think that the Theory of Relativity is a Jewish conspiracy and that America didn’t land on the Moon.  Both are more likely, by the way, than the LHC destroying the world.  I’m slightly irritated, because this non-story is symptomatic of a larger mistrust in science, particularly in the US, which includes things like intelligent design. [… A]nyone who thinks the LHC will destroy the world is a t**t.’ (Final word censored by Radio Times.) [1]

Who counts as a nutter and a t**t on this reckoning?  It is true that anyone who thinks there is a 100% chance that the LHC will definitely destroy the world is confused—but it’s probably also true that not many people really think this.  On the other hand, if anyone who thinks that it is worth taking seriously the (admittedly very slim) possibility that the LHC will destroy the world is a t**t, then there are many apparently very clever t**ts knocking about in our universities.  Among these are several of my colleagues: Nick Shackel has previously blogged about the risks of turning on the LHC, as has Toby Ord; and Rafaela Hillerbrand, Toby Ord, and Anders Sandberg recently presented on this topic at the recent Future of Humanity Institute-hosted conference on Global Catastrophic Risks. And, despite having chatted to each of these people about the LHC at some point or another, I’ve never heard any of them express sympathy for the view that the Theory or Relativity is a Jewish conspiracy or that nobody landed on the Moon.  So, are they t**ts or not?

Dumb Deplaning

So I just traveled to Portsmouth, VA for an experimental conference - in the sense that I don't expect conferences of this type to prove productive, but maybe I should try at least once - in the unlikely event that there are any local Overcoming Bias readers who want to drive out to Portsmouth for a meeting on say the evening of the 20th, email me - anyway, I am struck, for the Nth time, how uncooperative people are in getting off planes.

Most people, as soon as they have a chance to make for the exit, do so - even if they need to take down luggage first.  At any given time after the initial rush to the aisles, usually a single person is taking down luggage, while the whole line behind them waits.  Then the line moves forward a little and the next person starts taking down their luggage.

In programming we call this a "greedy local algorithm".  But since everyone does it, no one seems to feel "greedy".

How would I do it?  Off the top of my head:

"Left aisle seats, please rise and move to your luggage.  (Pause.)  Left aisle seats, please retrieve your luggage.  (Pause.)  Left aisle seats, please deplane.  (Pause.)  Right aisle seats, please rise and move to your luggage..."

Now I’m Scared

Bruce Ivins was suspected of being the anthrax killer and recently committed suicide.  Ivins was a Ph.D. MICROBIOLOGIST who worked for the U.S. military and according to his therapist was a SOCIOPATH and HOMICIDAL KILLER.

Just how much damage could a sociopathic, homicidal killing microbiologist do?  If the blind idiot God of evolution can develop microorganisms that kill millions, what could an observant, intelligent microbiologist accomplish? 

Should governments perhaps force all microbiologists to be evaluated to determine if they are sociopaths?  After all, if employees of the Department of Commerce have to undergo background checks before they can see classified commerce related information, shouldn’t microbiologists be subject to some kind of governmental screening process?

Overconfidence & Paternalism

Paul Graham tries to explain paternalism: 

Parents know they've concealed the facts about sex, and many at some point sit their kids down and explain more. But few tell their kids about the differences between the real world and the cocoon they grew up in. Combine this with the confidence parents try to instill in their kids, and every year you get a new crop of 18 year olds who think they know how to run the world.

Don't all 18 year olds think they know how to run the world? Actually this seems to be a recent innovation, no more than about 100 years old. In preindustrial times teenage kids were junior members of the adult world and comparatively well aware of their shortcomings. They could see they weren't as strong or skillful as the village smith. In past times people lied to kids about some things more than we do now, but the lies implicit in an artificial, protected environment are a recent invention. Like a lot of new inventions, the rich got this first. Children of kings and great magnates were the first to grow up out of touch with the world. Suburbia means half the population can live like kings in that respect.  ...

Paternalism Parable

My newly published parable, saying we should be clearer on what justifies our paternalism, or be less paternalistic:

Imagine finding yourself near someone about to walk off a cliff. If he seems distracted enough to not notice a crucial bend in the cliff edge, you might feel quite justified in grabbing his arm, to stop him from falling. You might even expect his gratitude.

But what if he seems well aware of the cliff before him? Well, if he seems crazy, either permanently insane or temporarily drugged, you might still grab him. You might also grab him if you knew his family would miss him terribly. In such cases you might at least expect gratitude from his family, his caretaker, or his future sober self. And if you were morally outraged enough by the very idea of walking off a cliff, you might grab him no matter who was grateful or offended.

But what if, aside from the whole cliff thing, he seems no crazier or immoral than most? What if his action mainly affected only him? What if the cliff was only five feet tall, or 20 feet tall over deep water, or if he walked near the cliff at what he considered a close but safe distance? You might still think of grabbing his arm, if you thought you understood something important that he did not. Perhaps you know the wind is unusually gusty, or the ground is unusually slippery. Perhaps there is no time to explain, or he doesn't understand your language.

But what if he does understand you, and there is time enough to say "Watch out! That cliff is dangerous." If he dismisses your concern and does not back away, would that justify your intervention? Well we can't very well allow anyone to intervene in anyone else's life anytime they feel like it. So if you persist in grabbing we might let him sue you for assault.

But what if you were not alone? What if a great many of you also thought him careless? What if you lived in a democracy and could get enough voters to pass a law banning cliff-walking? Perhaps your law requires tall fences, or threatens to jail those who approach cliffs. Are you justified now?  Even in this situation, you are arrogant if you do not at least consider the possibility the cliff-walker knows what he is doing. ...

Read the whole thing here.

Wilkinson on Paternalism

Memo to self: check Will Wilkinson more often.  From last week:

I say, again and again, that it is an embarrassing non-sequitur to argue that people are "irrational" and then leap to the conclusion that they need benevolent paternal guidance from the state. After all, if people are irrational then voters are irrational, politicians are irrational, bureaucrats are irrational, etc. ... There is no way to wriggle out of the fact that people who win elections are just like the rest of us. ... I don't doubt that non-terrible policies are sometimes successfully enacted. To doubt that would be a bit like a market skeptic doubting that anyone ever succeeds in buying a candy bar. That would be terrifically dense. What I doubt, very strongly, is that the discovery of "irrationalities" undermines the authority of market institutions more than it undermines the authority of government institutions.

Similar words have often escaped my lips.  Let me put it this way.  We each realize, to varying degrees, that we have various "irrational" tendencies, and there are many possible advisors, mechanisms, and institutions that we could rely on to help us mitigate these tendencies.  We can think twice about decisions, we can ask for advice, we can empower advisors to veto our decisions, we can join groups that make decisions together, we can seek out contexts where such problems are minimized, or we can endorse politicians who empower regulators to create and enforce rules.  It is not enough to show that we seem to have a certain problem and that a certain regulation might plausibly mitigate it.  The question is the relative value of this last option, government regulation, compared to all the other ways we might deal with our "irrationalities."

Added 7Mar: George McGovern, '72 Demo Pres Candidate, is now against paternalism. HT: Arnold Kling.