Fish Pain

[community begginer]

g'day guys and girls. how is everyone??
i have recently had arguments with others over whether fish feel pain or not.
my argument is that they do just like all living things would and theirs is that they do not feel any pain what so ever..
tell me..... who is right and who wrong??
feel free to share your own oppinon with me. im always open for discussion.
regards community begginer.

 

[The-Wolf]

fish have a central nervouse system like all complex lifeforms do.
therefore they do feel pain.
whether or not they percieve that pain the same as us(mankind) is the debatable topic.

I for one belive that all life is worthy of our respect and therefor I have a moral duty to ensure I don't inflict unessicary surrering.

 

[community begginer]

you have my ut most respect on that one.
cheers.
community begginer

 

[ncjharris]

Have a search. There have been loads and loads and loads of topics on this, sometimes with some quite interesting arguements.
I usually stems from the differing laws in various countries with regard to feeding live fish to other fish.

 

[Tempestuousfury]

Generally speaking, aren't those people who are in the "fish feel pain" camp aquarists who care about their fish and are generally prone to taking moderately decent care of their fish?

The "fish don't feel pain" camp is no doubt a mixture of people who could care less about fishy pain, keep fish as novelty items, or are simply unwilling to accept the possibility (a good possibility) that fish feel pain.

In all honesty, changing their minds is like trying to get those obdurate people that so many of us know to: not keep goldfish in bowls/ realize that many fish get really big and need bigger tanks/ corydoras and sucker cats are not vacuum cleaners/ the water needs to be changed/ etc.

Therefore, IMO, it is pointless to debate the issue, though if it were proven that fish do not feel pain, would you be any more reason to do something that you felt would otherwise cause them pain?

 

[community begginer]

sorry i am a bit slow with taking all of this in.
i dont fully understand where you are coming form and can you possibly please refraise in shorter sentences??
sorry bout this.
regards community begginer.

 

[Tempestuousfury]

Lol.

Ok, the way I see it, if you care about the fish, you won't cause them pain. Those people who say fish don't feel pain don't care about them, and if they own fish, they keep them as decorations, or furniture, not pets.

 

[Jules H-T]

The funny thing is, quite a lot of enthusiastic and diligent fishkeepers, also go fishing.

It's probably a bit harsh to say that anyone who doesn't think fish feel pain doesn't care about their welfare, it's a position of the individual's understanding of the physiology of fish.

I don't know, and TBH it doesn't make much difference to me- I'm not going to put any fish in a position where it might feel pain, either way.

 

[Tempestuousfury]

The word "intentionally" was ommitted. Sheesh.

 

[andywg]

Actually, the "Fish don't Feel Pain" people are as likely to include aquarists as not.

Basically, fish do not have the area of the brain (though I forget its name) that we and other mammels use to process pain, or at least it is nowhere near the same level of development. Therefore, unless pain is processed in an entirely different area for the fish then it cannot go through the pain in the same way as we do.

They react to a physical stimulus (such as an moving away from something hot or sharp) but this happens at a lower level, such as the spinal cord.

Consider putting your hand on a hot kettle. You will often move your hand away before you fully realise what has happened, this is because it is a reflex action from your spinal cord. You then have your brain process the pain and you start to notice how much it hurts. this is you processing the pain. fish do not have the ability to attach psychological meanings and affects to physical stimuli in the same way we would (IIRC).

Science i gradually showing that fish do have pain receptors under the skin, but they are still unaware of exactly how a fish could process pain, hence the belief that they don't feel pain.

I for one am entirely undecided at this point in time, but one must be very careful about sweeping generalisations such as made above.

Edit--

One of the biggest barriers to this debate is the misunderstanding between injury and pain. One must be careful to avoid interchanging the two.

 

[OohFeeshy]

For the sake of not making assumptions that, while might be correct, are not beneficial in any way, is it not just better, until it is definately proven to assume they do?

 

[Bloo]

There have been countless topics discussing this. Here are a couple that might give you some instant views asap:

Do Fish Feel Pain?

Do fish have memory and do they feel pain?

 

[ajbettle]

about the fishing thing fish do feel pain but it has been proven that the they do not have nerves in there mouths so therefore wen hooked do not feel pain, (but its still not nice eing dragged around a lake!) just thought id share that..