From Arthur ten Wolde
David Hollenbach’s illustrations to Jessica Marshall’s article on remote-controlled creatures (8 March, p 40) show up an aspect not mentioned in the text: that this is a new cabinet of horrors.
The ethics of such cyborg animal experiments deserve serious debate. It is one thing to perform animal testing for medical purposes – to save human lives.
It is quite another to perform experiments on animals with the aim of gathering military intelligence. In my opinion, the latter end does not justify the means: not for rats; not for green June beetles; nor for any species with a nervous system developed enough to perform the complex tasks required. The idea of using cyborg animals for search-and-rescue missions is interesting but doesn’t in itself justify these experiments.
Haarlem, The Netherlands
