Animals, science, and ethics -- Preface; introduction: the troubled middle in medias res; future directions.

This is a report from The Hastings Center project, "The Ethics of Animal Experimentation and Research." As project members, we wanted to take a fresh look at the complex ethical issues that arise in the scientific use of animals in a non-adversarial and non-ideological forum. We were convinced that these issues required a genuinely interdisciplinary approach. This meant including laboratory and field scientific researchers; veterinarians; philosophers, lawyers, and scientists particularly interested in animal welfare issues; and physicians and philosophers with long-standing bioethical interests but who previously had not confronted the ethics of the human use of animals. This Special Supplement to the Hastings Center Report is the outcome of two years of deliberation.