In and outside philosophical circles, animals have traditionally been seen as very different and inferior to humans because they lack a certain intangible quality – the reason, moral action or conscience – which made them moral agents. However, recently, society has clearly begun to move beyond this strong anthropocentric notion and has begun to seek a more adequate set of moral categories to guide, evaluate, and constrain our treatment of other animals. As a growing proportion of populations in Western countries adopt the general stance of animal liberation, more and more philosophers are beginning to agree that sentient creatures are of direct moral concern to humans, although although the degree of this concern is still subject to much disagreement. . The political, cultural, and philosophical animal liberation movement demands a fundamental transformation of humans' current relationships with all sentient animals. They reject the idea that animals are merely human resources and instead claim that they have value in their own right. Animals are used, among other things, in fundamental biomedical research whose aim is to increase knowledge of fundamental processes in human anatomy. The fundamental problem with this type of research is that it allows humans to view animals as being there for their benefit, to be surgically manipulated and exploited for money. The use of animals as subjects in biomedical research raises two main underlying ethical issues: first, the imposition of avoidable suffering on creatures capable of both sensation and consciousness, and second the uncertainty associated with the notion of animal rights. Although humans exploit animals for different purposes, the use of...... middle of paper ...... Rights. In For the Defense of Animals. New York: Basil Blackwell, 1985. pp. 13-26. Regan, Tom. “The Case for Animal Rights.” In Animal Rights and Human Obligations, 2nd ed. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1989. Rollin, Bernard E. “Rise of the Apes—Expanding the Moral Community.” In The Great Apes Project. New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 1993. pp.206-219. Singer, Peter. “All animals are equal.” In Animal Liberation. New Jersey: 1989. pp. 148-162. Singer, Peter. “Animal Interests.” The New York Review of Books, March 28, 1985, Vol. 32, No. 5. Taylor, Angus. Magpies, monkeys and morality: what the philosophers of animal liberation say. Peterborough, Ont. : Broadview Press, 1999. Wilson, James GS, “Rights,” Principles of Health Care Ethics, second edition, ed. RE Ashcroft, A. Dawson, H. Draper, and JR McMillan. John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 2007.pp.. 239.