This paper explores the ethical implications of the use of experimental animals in Victorian England after the arrival of Darwinism in the second half of the nineteenth century. On the one hand, the Darwinian thesis of common descent between animals and humans did confirmed the importance and legitimacy of employing animals in research on experimental physiology. On the other hand, the idea of common descent also served as a means for questioning the moral legitimacy of the exploitation of animals by science, since although the Darwinian animal could be considered as an ideal experimental model, it was also seen as a sensitive being, which shared with humans susceptibility to both physical and emotional suffering. The aspects of both continuity and transformation experienced by the Victorian animal with the advent of Darwinism and the rise of experimental physiology, especially in the second half of the nineteenth century, are also discussed, with special emphasis on the ethical implications - largely raised by the adepts of the antivivisection movement, such as Frances Power Cobbe - connected with the use of domestic animals in physiological experiments.
Darwin; Darwinism; Cobbe; Experimental physiology; Vivisection; Antivivisectionism; Dog; Darwinian animal; Victorian England; Animal ethics
