Do insects feel pain?

[Ron Gatrelle]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Doug Yanega" <dyanega at ucr.edu>
Subject: Re: Do insects feel pain?


> >While I agree that there are nerve fibers (alpha and c fibers) and
> >parts of the cerebrum dedicated to pain perception, I believe the
> >actual receptors are fairly generic neurons.
>
> I hate to drag it out, but then maybe you're not recalling correctly
> - I can even remember, back in cell biology in college, an image of a
> cell with a rolled-up end like a jelly roll, with the axon encased in
> myelin and folded over so that it was very sensitive to pressure, and
> being told this was a special pain receptor; the term that comes to
> mind is "nociceptor".
***************

Perhaps we can think of this (=sensing) in terms of taste... Do insects
"taste"?  Sure, but a lot of what they like tastes to me like shit.. Wait,
it is shit!!!!!!!   Whoa, sure glad my taste and their taste is not very
similar.   I thought Doug's Darth Vader leg was a real good parallel.   I
know I have read on this specifically and seem to remember it being in
either the J. Lep. Soc. or in J. Res. on the Lepid.   The latter is on
line.  There might  even be a reference to this topic in the TILS web
site's Online Library.
http://tils-ttr.org/Online.html   But that is by Author not topic so will
take some looking, and right now I have already missed the first quarter of
Miami vs. Detroit.

Later
RG



 
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