Study Finds It Unlikely Lobsters Feel Pain (PETA Alert)

AP/MSNBC ^ | 02/15/2005 | AP

[drt1]

Activists say Norwegian report slanted to favor fishing industry PORTLAND, Maine - A new study out of Norway concludes it’s unlikely lobsters feel pain, stirring up a long-simmering debate over whether Maine’s most valuable seafood suffers when it’s being cooked.

Animal activists for years have claimed that lobsters are in agony when being cooked, and that dropping one in a pot of boiling water is tantamount to torture.

The study, funded by the Norwegian government and written by a scientist at the University of Oslo, suggests lobsters and other invertebrates such as crabs, snails and worms probably don’t suffer even if lobsters do tend to thrash in boiling water....

[L98Fiero]

"Overlooking the fact that they MAY feel such horrible pain is, in my mind, total and utter ignorance."

I, for one, don't much care. I'm not concerned with the feelings or emotional well being of my food. As long as they are tasty, I'm cool.

[_n0rmaL]

"I, for one, don't much care..."

This makes me chuckle, because thats what a big part of ignorance is, when you overlook something important by choice and not by lack of education on the subject or lack of comprehension.

Thinking of lobsters as food is fine when they are cooked just like beef, but you don't see people treating cows like food when they are alive do you? No one ever goes and takes a bit out of a cow when it's standing on a field because most people comprehend that it's a living thing which feels pain. We therefore relate to it. The further something gets from our own "form" (the human form) they less we feel like we must be humanitarian towards it. With the papularity of meat on the market the line between food and animal has blurred.

[eBuddha]

OK, lobsters and crabs are part of the Arthropod Phylum, whereas cows, pigs, and other fish are from the Chordate Phylum. Lobsters and crabs are more similar to cockroaches and grasshoppers than they are to fish or pigs. I mean, hell, when you look at a lobster the damn thing looks like a cockroach. Do they feel pain, emphatically no, and even if they did it wouldn't deter me from ripping into their soft, tender, moist white flesh.

[L98Fiero]

"This makes me chuckle, because thats what a big part of ignorance is, when you overlook something important by choice and not by lack of education on the subject or lack of comprehension."

Get bent, troll. I eat animals, just like other carnivors. There is no lack of comprehension, understanding or any other of your lame attempts at insults. I eat meat. Meat comes from living creatures that may in fact feel pain when they are killed. I understand completely, punk. I just don't give a crap. They are food. That is the way the cycle of life works, regardless of how liberal weenies like you wish you could change it.