Do insects feel pain?

[Ron Gatrelle]

When the average person sprays a roach with "Raid" the reaction of the
roach is certainly something that tells the sprayer the they sure wouldn't
want to be in the roach's skin.   Torment is the term that comes to my
mind.  But, I am relating (translating, actually) that reaction into my
human paradigm of "feelings" and reactions.

No, they are not robots. Yes, all life "feels" in some way to some degree.
But unless we are in the other creatures skin we really can never know.
Enjoyment is a reaction that I think is the opposite of pain and suffering.
So, I would assess the pain and suffering capability of an organism by the
opposite reaction at the other end of the same "feeling spectrum".   I have
never seen anything that remotely resembles "enjoyment" in insects. Thus, I
might do well to not translate the roach's reaction to being sprayed with
"Raid" through my human experience as being in torment.

Ron Gatrelle.



 
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