Tangled Bank #94

Bouncing around the net tonight I hit John Tierney's November piece Who's Afraid of "Soulless Scientism"? in the NYT, then this post, and from there to lifebeforedeath and her link to Envious capuchin monkeys react badly to raw deals at notexactlyrocketscience.
Just a glancing observation, but considering what's been done to millions of animal subjects under the banner of scientific research, and given the - pretty much experimentally validated - idea that there's most if not all of what we'd call a "person" in those animal bodies, the fact that both those aspects of current reality can sit side by side in someone's head, or heart, and not produce shame, or guilt, or remorse, or outrage, or all the above, speaks volumes about the lack of anything like a conscience, let alone a soul.
The teeming reservoirs of vocal but dim religious apologists provide strawmen in abundance, and are easily mown down, but the fact remains that something we are, or were, as human beings has been eroded by the greed for power that's the real engine of too much scientific research.
But then when it comes to a conscience, or a soul, if you don't have one to begin with, where's the loss?