Question

We respect Dr. Trudeau and all those earlier scientists who did the best they could within the contemporary understanding of the problem they addressed and utilizing the materials and technology they had at hand. Modern-day biologists like to talk about resistance/susceptibility genes and patterns of inheritance, rather than family blood. They think about infectious disease in terms of microbes and pathogenicity, rather than speaking of bad humors. They have identified vitamins and other nutrients that are abundant in some foodstuffs and lacking in other that are essential for optimal immune function. Without the benefit of such modern formulations, Dr. Trudeau, by a disciplined application of scientific curiosity and careful, clever methodology, shed light on each of these concerns, light that helped to illuminate the minds of scientists who came after. Still, a look at his original paper leaves us wondering, were the rabbits genetically identical? Probably not! Why? Were they all of the same sex and age? Couldn’t he have given the animals kept on short rations just a smaller amount of the same varieties of food available to the animals fed abundantly—after all, there might be some important nutrient missing in potatoes. In light of the title of the paper, why not measure bacterial numbers in the rabbits on post mortem rather than just survival time? (In a subsequent paper, he did exactly that.) Once you start critiquing an experiment from 100 years ago, or 10 years ago, or sometimes even last year, it’s hard to stop. Can you think of anything else you would have changed about the Rabbit Island Experiment?

Answer 1

In the Rabbit Island experiment performed, there are two groups that were put in dark and confined space. In this experiment, the infected rabbits formed one group where they were kept in cramped condition with no light, fresh air, exercise and proper food. In the second group it was the healthy rabbits that were kept in similar conditions. The third group was infected rabbits that were kept in environment with proper sunshine, fresh air, good food and exercise. The results shows the survival rate of group 1 is 20%, survival rate of group 2 is 100% and survival rate of group 3 is 80%. Hence it was shown that if you have good food, sunshine and other things, the survival rate increases. The living quality reduces significantly due to unhygienic conditions. It is shown that if someone is suffering from a disease, their survival in unhealthy condition is very less. In the third group, it was shown that even the diseased rabbits showed good survival level when it was kept in a good condition. However, there are many factors that were not considered for the experiment.

The phenotypic and genotypic characteristics of the rabbits were not considered. It is found that all the rabbits do not have the same genetic presence and some might have superior characteristics as compared to others. However, the survival was shown to increase with good conditions but it was not measured on the possibility of reoccurrence of the disease. The Rabbit Island Experiment probably could have changed and things done in different if all the characteristics were considered and measured before it is being used. In order to identify the rate of survival, it is important that all rabbits are of equal superiority or caliber. The variable factors like age, sex, immunity, genetics, ability to resistance, adaptability and microbial count after survival must be considered before a conclusion.