primate research debate

last night's debate on the ethics of non-human primate research at the uw was interesting but went nowhere. kinda like congress and health care reform, only more civil.

some highlights:
rick bogle of alliance for animals - "we are going to die. we can't fool ourselves into thinking that by experimenting on animals that we are going to find some magic bullet to make us immortal."

paul kaufman, uw chair of ophthalmics dept. - "if you're going to argue we're all equal, then this discussion is over. There's no reason to go on. but in fact there are differences. ... if you say an animal shares some characteristics with humans, that doesn't make them human beings."

in the end, we are monkeys, too. monkeys testing on monkeys. dance monkey dance.

declaw? heck nah!

san francisco just got one step closer to enacting a city-wide ban on declawing. we aren't for declawing but what happens when a family faces the decision of either having to give up their cats or become criminals? it's a toughie, alright. what do you think?

cats helps us in so many ways but helping women beat breast cancer has to be up there with the best of 'em. thanks, guys!

warning: from singed whiskers and tails to full-on fires, cats and candles do not mix. please be careful!

uh oh, looks like curiosity gets dogs in trouble, too. hope roxie recovers soon.

resistance is futile. so is trying not to buy this awesome shirt.

a day without cats? never!

even if we weren't crazy cat people, we would still never tire of those hilarious lolcats and wacky videos. cats own the interwebs. resistance is futile.

new research suggests that growing up with both a cat and a dog in the house may lower the risk of other allergies.

an 8-year old ohioan named sarah just set the new world-record for fastest land animal by completing the 100-yard dash in 6.13 seconds. oh yeah, sarah is a cheetah.

more interesting discussion on the "dogs in public spaces debate": pet strollers. what do you think of smuggling dogs this way?