Denis Diderot: The Ethicality Of Human Experimentation

Denis Diderot once said, “There are three principal means of acquiring knowledge... observation of nature, reflection, and experimentation. Observation collects facts; reflection combines them; experimentation verifies the result of that combination.” What Denis Diderot talks about is logical when trying to obtain information on a certain subject, and this applies to experiments performed on humans. When individuals think of human experimentation, unethical and immoral are sometimes the first words the pop into their brain. Human experimentation is beneficial in the sense that it can it can provide factual information, advancements in the medical field, and how human experimentation will be beneficial in the future. To begin with, human

The side effects are also taken into consideration in order to see if this medicine is safe enough to release to the public. In fact, according to Anthony Wrigley, author of the ‘Human experiments- the good, the bad, and the ugly’ states that “…English physician Edward Jenner’s development of the smallpox vaccine in 1796, where he injected an eight-year-old child with the pus taken from a cowpox infection and then deliberately exposed her to an infected carrier of smallpox.” Even though Edward Jenner’s experiment on a eight-year-old child seemed unethical, it provided the cure to smallpox. While taking a chance and injecting pus into the child, Edward Jenner created a vaccine that would cure many individuals. With the cure that Edward Jenner created, millions would benefit off of him. With the data and information that Edward Jenner had acquired, he test was a success, and many individuals would benefit off this vaccine that man has created. Many individuals will say that unethical practice can come into practice again, but there are organizations, such as Research ethic committees, that keep a close eye on experiments being conducted on people. For instance, in “Human

Human experimentation can help in the future by being able to provide vaccines to harmful diseases. This can help society because it is not harming or deadly in any ways because humanity has a way to counter the sickness. David B. Resnik talks about the “social benefits” that human experimentation has and “…Phase I clinic trials on healthy subjects can be justified on the grounds that they are essential to developing new treatments that will help people who have the target diseases.” Being able to create treatments that can cure incurable diseases is one of the goals of human experimentation. The ethical part of performing tests on people is to get results that will better them. Finding cures to illnesses such as AIDS, cancer, and Ebola is one of the main reasons that doctors and scientists implement the examinations. They are finding a cure that will benefit humanity as a whole, and there are individuals who call these tests unethical. Though there are individuals who are calling these experiments corrupt, they may have benefited off of it. Many pills and shots were made because of experiments, and it will always be to better individuals’ lives. For example, in the future, it is possible that there is going to be a cure for AIDS, cancer, and Ebola. Many tests will be conducted on humans who have these diseases, but there will be a cure because of experiments. They will better the future in helping