The Ethics File
Selected correspondence from the ethics review opened on 11 March 2026, following the widening of the Fireproof Cat study to include biological modification of the animal itself. Reproduced here from the file. The file is not on the shelf. It is in a drawer. The drawer's location is not recorded.
Distribution: the file. The parent report (HIB-MAT-2026-0147, Rev 3.0, §5) anticipated that of four ethics reviews, two would fail and one would pass only on the condition that the work be described, in writing, as something else. The correspondence below is included to show that the anticipation was accurate. The Division does not regard the accuracy as a point of pride.
Eleven items, filed in order.
Items are reproduced as filed, with the file's own marginal notes where they exist. The Division's replies are reproduced in full; the welfare officer's letters are reproduced in full too, which the Division considers the least it can do.
I have read the revised scope for HIB-MAT-2026-0147, and I am opening a review. I note that Workstream 5.1 has been demonstrated in mice. I note that Workstream 5.4 has been demonstrated in mice. I would be grateful for the Division's position on whether the mice constitute precedent or rehearsal, as the distinction determines what I put in the minutes.
I note further that the review has been opened after the scope was issued, which I am given to understand is the usual order of events in reverse.
The Division's position is that the mice constitute neither precedent nor rehearsal. The mice were not consulted and, on balance, would not have consented.
The Division acknowledges the order of events. It is the order the Client's rejection of Rev 2.0 required.
I have been asked to review the technical documentation for Workstream 5.3. I am requesting that, in all internal and external correspondence, this workstream be referred to as “thermal management,” which is what it is, as opposed to what it is called.
The capsules, once infused, cannot be recovered. The modification is, in the strict sense, permanent. I do not think the technical name should be the last thing the animal is called.
The request is granted. All internal correspondence will refer to Workstream 5.3 as “thermal management.” The Division notes that the change of nomenclature does not alter the workstream's contents, and hopes that the two are not confused by the animal, which is not a party to the correspondence.
The Committee has reached an interim position on the programme. The work may proceed provided it is described, in writing, as something else. The Committee has not specified what. The Committee has specified that the description be in writing.
The Committee's reasoning is that a written description can be withdrawn, whereas a verbal one cannot, and the Committee anticipates that the withdrawal will be requested.
The programme is expected to require four ethics reviews. The Division anticipates that two will fail. I would be grateful if the Division could indicate, at the earliest opportunity, which two, so that I can plan accordingly.
I note that I have begun to plan around failures, and that I have stopped noticing that I have begun to plan around failures.
The Division does not anticipate which two reviews will fail; the Division anticipates that two will fail. The Committee, similarly, has not indicated which two. All four reviews are scheduled, and the Division proposes to attend all four.
The Division has noticed the second paragraph of your letter, and has filed it without comment.
The Committee has reviewed the descriptions proposed by the Division — “thermal management,” “coat conditioning,” “behavioural hygiene.” Each is acceptable. The Committee has accepted them in that order.
The Committee notes that it has not been asked what it thinks of the work, only what it thinks of the description, and that this appears to be the order of business.
I note that the trial subject is loaned from a policyholder. I am not asking whose. I am asking whether the loan is refundable, because I have read the programme documents, and I would like the record to distinguish between the animal that is returned and the animal that is restored.
The loan is not refundable. The animal will be returned. The two are not the same thing, and the Division is grateful for the distinction, which it has adopted as its own.
The Committee has no formal objection to Workstream 5.4, which will, if successful, produce an animal that will not sit on a lap. The Committee would like the record to show that it has no formal objection, and that the record is the only place the Committee wishes it to be.
The file, and where it is.
On 30 June 2026, the file was closed for filing and moved from the shelf to a drawer. The drawer's location is not recorded. This is the Division's policy, and it is working.
On the file's completeness.
This file is selective. It does not contain the welfare officer's earlier letters, which were written in a register the Division has chosen not to reproduce; it contains the correspondence from the review proper. The Division's position is that a file is a working document, and that a working document should show the work.
The parent report records that the ethics file “has grown considerably during the preparation of Rev. 3.0 and is now kept in a drawer rather than on the shelf.” This page is that record, and the drawer is that drawer, or a drawer, and the distinction has ceased to matter to anyone but the Division.
The review's interim position — that the work may proceed provided it is described, in writing, as something else — was anticipated in the parent report and is now on the record as having occurred. The Division's accuracy on this point is the file's central achievement, and the Division does not consider it an achievement.
The file contains no objection from the subject. This is not because none was raised. It is because the subject's objections, where raised, were raised to the sessions themselves, and are recorded in the trial log (Annex A), which the subject has not signed and has not been asked to.