SAES-422 Multistate Research Activity Accomplishments Report
Sections
Status: Approved
Basic Information
- Project No. and Title: WERA204 : Animal Bioethics
- Period Covered: 10/01/2000 to 10/01/2001
- Date of Report: 01/03/2002
- Annual Meeting Dates: 01/04/2001 to 01/05/2001
Participants
Members present: Bergfeld, Bloome, Cherney, Comstock, Davis, Kunkel, McGlone, Reynnells, Schillo, Swanson,Tiedeman, Thompson, Varner, Weber, Wylie
Chair Steve Davis called the meeting to order at 8:30 am January 4, 2001. Registration payment was discussed and committee member introductions were made. The nomination and election of officers resulted in the following: Davis (Chair), Cherney (Vice Chair) and Swanson (Secretary). Bloome advised members of the duties of the offices and rotation. A motion for yearly rotation and lower officer positions to ascend to the next position was offered by McGlone, seconded by Thompson, accepted by unanimous vote.
The body of the morning discussion focused on the difference between a coordinating committee and a regional project (Reynnells), committee membership (Reynells) and a presentation of the objectives of WCC 204 (Davis). Reynnells pointed out the major difference between a coordinating committee (CC) and a regional project (RP) is funding through the AES. AES directors are not obligated to commit money for expenses for participation in a CC. The WCC 204 has been approved for a period of 5 years. Discussion then centered on the initial strategy of securing a CC rather than an RP. Bloome (Davis and Reynnells) explained that if there is no established research program in the specified area, it is very difficult to successfully establish an RP. Bloome outlined the criteria for a RP. RPs must have clearly stated objectives in which each participant has a role, is multistate, multi-disciplinary, has a specified set of outcomes, and is responsive to CSREES goals.
Reynnells led a discussion regarding WCC 204 membership and ad hoc members. The emphasis in making the working group inclusive and diverse. A suggestion was made to include definitions for various memberships in a set of by-laws or within the objective of the committee. A short discussion regarding different stakeholders, industry ad hoc advisers and general criteria led to the conclusion that the committee could not act on this issue until a clear mission for the committee has been established. Chair Davis concluded the discussion by indicating a need to get projects and collaborative efforts in place before appointing ad hoc members. No action was taken.
Chair Davis provided members with an historical over view of the WCC 204 and its objectives as stated in the founding proposal. The initial impetus for the establishing the committee was to increase the number of courses offered in the area of animal bioethics, to create outreach programs, and to develop a new regional project within the Hatch system. Thompson recapped his JAS paper that served as the motivating force behind the initial proposal. Davis then reviewed each of the four original objectives. Committee members discussed each objective and areas of refinement and definition were identified. Objective 3 and 4 were identified as needing further clarification (Varner, Kunkel, McGlone, Thompson, Bloome). Several ideas emerged regarding the focus of the committee and the potential for future collaborative activities.
WCC 204 minutes
A committee brainstorming session involved the spontaneous listing of issues and subjects for collaborative activity. The following statements, topical areas or questions emerged:
Economic pressures or realities
Scientific practice - how we practice our science
The place of preference testing in assessing animal welfare
Risk analysis and assessment
Normative versus descriptive inquiry
Individual versus social issues
Which animals are conscious?
Who decides ethical versus production issues?
Is there a difference between consumer behavior and public moral sentiment?
What is the relative value of human and animal life and quality of life?
Ecological ethics and animal agriculture
Intellectual property rights
Meat eating and gender, class and race
Environmental racism and animal agriculture
Social distance and the way we think animals ought to be treated
Intensive versus extensive animal production and the structure of rural communities and
environmental considerations
Epistemic neutrality and the conception of risk
Proscriptive versus voluntary animal production models
Somatic cell nuclear technologies
Specisim
Ethics research and animal agriculture -exploration of "should" and "ought" questions
An examination of the list led to the development of two areas for potential collaborative focus: animal welfare and sustainable animal agriculture. Two groups were then formed for a break out session to discuss the assigned topic area and to develop specific researchable questions. Each group presented their questions/statements.
Sustainable Agriculture (Cherney):
1. Conceptualization (reframing) animal science and livestock production in a post-industrialist society.
- How do we conceptualize the environment and ecology?
- How should we practice good science?
2. What is a system and what does it take to re-generate it?
- restructuring of science
- theoretical approach to defining sustainability
3. Distributive justice and world agriculture
- role of animals in agriculture
- western style agriculture
- intellectual property rights and patents
- gender and race
WCC 204 minutes
Animal Welfare (Swanson)
1. Do animals have intrinsic value?
- What are the components of animal welfare?
- What is the moral significance of each component?
- What are the features of an ethically defensible system of animal production?
- How do we assess the relative quality of life of humans and animals?
- How do we decide which tradeoffs in quality of life between humans and animals are morally defensible?
2. What is the relative value of human and animal life?
After a discussion of each presentation the meeting was adjourned for the day.
Chair Davis called the meeting to order at 8:30 January 5, 2001.
Respectfully submitted by,
Janice Swanson
Secretary, WCC 204
The body of the morning discussion focused on the difference between a coordinating committee and a regional project (Reynnells), committee membership (Reynells) and a presentation of the objectives of WCC 204 (Davis). Reynnells pointed out the major difference between a coordinating committee (CC) and a regional project (RP) is funding through the AES. AES directors are not obligated to commit money for expenses for participation in a CC. The WCC 204 has been approved for a period of 5 years. Discussion then centered on the initial strategy of securing a CC rather than an RP. Bloome (Davis and Reynnells) explained that if there is no established research program in the specified area, it is very difficult to successfully establish an RP. Bloome outlined the criteria for a RP. RPs must have clearly stated objectives in which each participant has a role, is multistate, multi-disciplinary, has a specified set of outcomes, and is responsive to CSREES goals.
Reynnells led a discussion regarding WCC 204 membership and ad hoc members. The emphasis in making the working group inclusive and diverse. A suggestion was made to include definitions for various memberships in a set of by-laws or within the objective of the committee. A short discussion regarding different stakeholders, industry ad hoc advisers and general criteria led to the conclusion that the committee could not act on this issue until a clear mission for the committee has been established. Chair Davis concluded the discussion by indicating a need to get projects and collaborative efforts in place before appointing ad hoc members. No action was taken.
Chair Davis provided members with an historical over view of the WCC 204 and its objectives as stated in the founding proposal. The initial impetus for the establishing the committee was to increase the number of courses offered in the area of animal bioethics, to create outreach programs, and to develop a new regional project within the Hatch system. Thompson recapped his JAS paper that served as the motivating force behind the initial proposal. Davis then reviewed each of the four original objectives. Committee members discussed each objective and areas of refinement and definition were identified. Objective 3 and 4 were identified as needing further clarification (Varner, Kunkel, McGlone, Thompson, Bloome). Several ideas emerged regarding the focus of the committee and the potential for future collaborative activities.
WCC 204 minutes
A committee brainstorming session involved the spontaneous listing of issues and subjects for collaborative activity. The following statements, topical areas or questions emerged:
Economic pressures or realities
Scientific practice - how we practice our science
The place of preference testing in assessing animal welfare
Risk analysis and assessment
Normative versus descriptive inquiry
Individual versus social issues
Which animals are conscious?
Who decides ethical versus production issues?
Is there a difference between consumer behavior and public moral sentiment?
What is the relative value of human and animal life and quality of life?
Ecological ethics and animal agriculture
Intellectual property rights
Meat eating and gender, class and race
Environmental racism and animal agriculture
Social distance and the way we think animals ought to be treated
Intensive versus extensive animal production and the structure of rural communities and
environmental considerations
Epistemic neutrality and the conception of risk
Proscriptive versus voluntary animal production models
Somatic cell nuclear technologies
Specisim
Ethics research and animal agriculture -exploration of "should" and "ought" questions
An examination of the list led to the development of two areas for potential collaborative focus: animal welfare and sustainable animal agriculture. Two groups were then formed for a break out session to discuss the assigned topic area and to develop specific researchable questions. Each group presented their questions/statements.
Sustainable Agriculture (Cherney):
1. Conceptualization (reframing) animal science and livestock production in a post-industrialist society.
- How do we conceptualize the environment and ecology?
- How should we practice good science?
2. What is a system and what does it take to re-generate it?
- restructuring of science
- theoretical approach to defining sustainability
3. Distributive justice and world agriculture
- role of animals in agriculture
- western style agriculture
- intellectual property rights and patents
- gender and race
WCC 204 minutes
Animal Welfare (Swanson)
1. Do animals have intrinsic value?
- What are the components of animal welfare?
- What is the moral significance of each component?
- What are the features of an ethically defensible system of animal production?
- How do we assess the relative quality of life of humans and animals?
- How do we decide which tradeoffs in quality of life between humans and animals are morally defensible?
2. What is the relative value of human and animal life?
After a discussion of each presentation the meeting was adjourned for the day.
Chair Davis called the meeting to order at 8:30 January 5, 2001.
Respectfully submitted by,
Janice Swanson
Secretary, WCC 204
Accomplishments
Paul Thompson gave a short presentation on research methods. Thompson summarized research methods used in the field of applied ethics and contrasted them to the scientific method. A research methods matrix was then developed with Science (McGlone), Ethics (Thompson) and Sociology (Tiedeman) categories and their corresponding objectives, method, analysis and interpretive frameworks. Examples of techniques/methods were provided within each of the matrix blocks (eg. Science/Objectives). After the discussion a suggestion was made to develop an advanced training workshop for committee members to learn how to incorporate ethics and social science research into their programs. The committee agreed that a writing team (Davis, Thompson, Swanson) be formed to advance a proposal for USDA-CSREES Innovation Funds for the workshop. The proposal would be forwarded to Reynnells by January 12th. The suggested sites for the workshop were Portland or Lubbock. Oregon State University would administer the funding for the workshop.
A second writing team (McGlone, Thompson, Wiley) was formed to independently develop a grant proposal to submit to USDA- IFAFS for funding.
A second writing team (McGlone, Thompson, Wiley) was formed to independently develop a grant proposal to submit to USDA- IFAFS for funding.