The experimental animal: In search of a moral ecology of science?

This chapter focuses on the nineteenth and twentieth century, as animal bodies were established as a basic resource for experimental research in the then emergent life sciences during this 'modern' period. It reviews how the experimental animal tends to be sublimated within social history as concern for the animal is read against wider societal themes such as class, gender, and race. The chapter presents an overview of the historiography of science to show how animals have been included within histories of the production of scientific knowledge in such a way that the wider societal themes fade out of analysis. It argues that one approach to the historical study of a 'moral ecology of science' would be to borrow and repurpose the Derridean question: and say the animal responded? Lords of the Fly examines the role of the fly in shaping the scientific work of T. H. Morgan, the social organisation of his laboratory, and the moral rules governing the drosophila community.