What is your moral baseline?

I was recently invited  to offer a moral justification for the scientific use of animals in medical research at the University of Wisconsin.  After the talk we had over an hour of discussion where we saw everything from some thoughtful questions to nonsensical ramble.

I presented an argument and I expected direct attacks on those arguments. Unfortunately, when some activists find it difficult to attack an argument they quickly change the topic at hand.  In this case, for example, one member of the audience decided to challenge me with the following:

“Are you vegan?  Yes or no!”

I looked back at my slides.  The title of my talk was: “The moral dilemma of animal research.”   It was not “The moral dilemma of the cheeseburger.”   Apparently, even though I was invited to defend the work of medical scientists, I was now being asked to defend the work of fast…