11a. Key, Brian (2016) Why fish do not feel pain
Consciousness means sentience which means the capacity to feel. We are not the only species that feels: Does it matter?
Reading: Key, Brian (2016) Why fish do not feel pain. Animal Sentience 3(1) (read the abstracts of some of the commentaries too)
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The author argues that fish do not feel pain because they lack specific brain structures that are involved in creating the sensation of pain. Further, the author argues that behavioural studies misrepresent the experience of fish, and animals in general, through poor operationalizations of pain through behaviours. Most notably, when fish are given a craniotomy, a pain inducing procedure in humans and other mammals, the fish do not have changes to any species-specific behaviour. One aspect of this reading that I struggled to understand was how the author could conclude that there is no specific “fish pain” because it would need to be consciously processed through specific neural architecture the fish lack. Wouldn’t the idea of “fish pain” inherently denote it is being processed in a fish specific cortical structure?
ReplyDeleteI agree! Key’s argument about fish being incapable of feeling pain is erroneous for multiple reasons. The major mistake that the author made in claiming that fish do not feel pain was mapping mammalian cortical structures necessary for pain onto species as far from mammals in the phylogenetic tree as simple invertebrates, like fish. Mammals and invertebrates, being subjected to the same evolutionary threats would not generate the same biological defense mechanisms geared towards minimizing bodily harm (by alerting the nervous system of injury through pain). Thus, in claiming that fish cannot feel pain because they lack mammalian brain regions correlated with pain perception completely disregards the fact that they may experience pain perception through neural structures non-analogous to those present in the mammalian nervous system.
DeleteJesse, that's right, but there are many other things Key gets wrong: can you spot some more?
ReplyDelete***EVERYBODY PLEASE NOTE: I REDUCED THE MINIMUM NUMBER OF SKYWRITINGS. BUT THE READINGS ARE **ALL** RELEVANT TO AN OVERALL UNDERSTANDING OF THE COURSE. SO, EVEN IF YOU DO NOT DO A SKYWRITING ON ALL OF THEM, AT LEAST FEED EACH READING YOU DO NOT READ TO CHATGPT AND ASK IT FOR A SUMMARY, SO YOU KNOW WHAT THE READING SAID — OTHERWISE YOU WILL NOT HAVE A COMPLETE GRASP OF THE COURSE TO INTEGRATE AND INTERCONNECT FOR THE FINAL EXAM.***
Brian Key’s paper argues pretty boldly that fish “lack the necessary neurocytoarchitecture… for feeling pain,” and I found his approach both scientific and a bit unsettling. He draws a sharp distinction between nociception, which is the automatic responses to harmful stimuli, and the conscious experience of pain, which he says depends on cortical structures fish simply don’t have.
ReplyDeleteWhat struck me most was his emphasis that we often misread animal behaviour because of “anthropomorphic tendencies.” I appreciated his comparison to human spinal reflexes: just because something moves away from harm doesn’t mean it feels anything. At the same time, I found myself wondering about the ethical implications. Even if fish don’t feel pain the way humans do, Key’s argument made me reflect on how easily we project our own experiences onto other species and how complicated it is to draw lines around consciousness at all.
This is by far the worst article I've ever laid my eyes upon. The author patronizes the reader with principles of neuroscience, although he does not even understand said principles correctly. So I will correct him.
ReplyDeleteKey argues:
"Interestingly, many people, because of anthropomorphic tendencies, will instinctively endow fish with the ability to feel pain simply because they attempt to escape from noxious stimuli. To indicate that fish do not then feel like humans seems rather contradictory to this anthropomorphism."
Isn't it hypocritical to denounce anthropomorphic views of pain while mapping the experience of pain to human pain circuits? Furthermore, albeit pain perception will most likely differ between species, pain is a raw and evolutionary feeling, not a cultural or social one; I argue that "fish pain" is not merely anthropomorphism, but rather probing a shared feeling across species.
Key argues:
"If 'fish pain' existed, it would need to be consciously processed using at least the minimal neural architecture described above."
This is false. First, it is possible to feel pain while unconscious - namely, in anesthesia whithout analgesia, a patient will still feel pain. Secondly, the highly hierarchized cortical circuits of human pain structures surely cannot be the minimal structural substrate for pain perception, as our cortical structure is the most advanced one.
A𝛿 and C fibers associated with nociception have been found in the trigeminal nerve of the rainbow trout (Dunlop & Laming, 2005). However, Key argues:
"[...], as noted earlier, most of the fish nervous system circuitry is constructed using feedforward pathways that allow rapid execution of unfelt motor programs subserving survival behaviours."
Why, then, evolve the nerve fibers known to be the 1) least myelinated and 2) have the smallest diameter, i.e. the slower action potential-propagating fibers?
Finally, his comparison of the MMR vaccination case and the fish pain case is laughable.
This connects to our discussion of the hard problem, as even if we examine all the aspects of the easy problem of pain in a fish (seeing behavioural reactions, looking at brain structures etc), we still have no way of concretely knowing if/how they feel.
ReplyDeleteI, however, strongly disagree with the treatment of this issue. Key writes: accepting at “face value” that fish feel pain may seem like a harmless alternative, but it has led to inappropriate approaches to fish welfare.
I don’t understand how respecting organisms in nature could lead to outcomes besides better sustainability and relationships with natural resources. (I recently read the Braiding Sweetgrass chapter "Burning Cascade Head” and I highly recommend it).
I really appreciate your comment Kira. Key seems to throw morality out of the window in his article. I can understand his arguement that apply to many restrictive policies on fishing could disadvantage native populations, but if this is his main arguement for not worrying about fish sentience, he has picked the wrong arguement. If anyone would be concerned with the well being an consciousness of an animal being used as a resource, it would be many native populations.
DeleteClaiming that the dynamic activity of the cortical network defines the subjective experience of pain is reductive. The author mentions that the dorsal-posterior insular cortex correlates positively with the subjective intensity of pain, but seems to forget a crucial concept which is that “causation and correlation are not the same”. He draws causal conclusion, which we see by his use of “evoke” from pure correlation (from the passage “There are at least three principal lines of evidence supporting the cortical origins of human pain: […] (3) direct stimulation of cortical regions in this network evoke pain.”). Overall he makes many claims and shortcuts, which is outrageous as studies like this one can result in poor treatment of fish. This study contrast with the rise in awareness for marine life. We can notably think of the Shrimp Welfare Project (SWP), a charity focused on saving shrimp as recent studies and experiments suggest that shrimp, along with other crustaceans, likely feel pain, and are not simply reacting through reflex.
ReplyDeleteI agree that Key makes a correlation-to-causation leap, but what your comment made me think about is an even deeper problem. Even if Key had perfect causal evidence about which human brain regions generate our pain experience, that still would not justify using human architecture as the universal template for every species. The hard problem reminds us that no neural circuit, not even ours, explains why activity in that circuit feels like anything. So claiming that only a certain cortical layout can produce feeling is not just reductive, it is methodologically unsupported. This is why I also think dismissing fish or crustacean pain risks going far beyond what the evidence can ever rule out.
DeleteKey’s argument has several problems. Beyond the fact that he ignores fish-specific cortical areas that could support fish-like forms of pain experience—something Jesse C. pointed out—Key overlooks many other important considerations. He claims that we can’t have direct proof of conscious experience for any fish, but that is equally true for any non-human and even other humans, which is exactly the 'other-minds problem.' Demanding perfect proof only for fish is inconsistent, and when a being might feel pain, the precautionary principle says we should err on the side of caution. Key dismisses this, which critics see as ethically risky. He also disregards broader evidence that vertebrates (including birds, reptiles, mammals, fish) share key features associated with sentience/consciousness: nociceptors, centralized nervous systems, stress responses, certain behaviours, etc. By treating fish as fundamentally different from other vertebrates, Key contradicts what evolutionary continuity strongly suggests: that the biological systems supporting "feeling" and "pain" did not vanish in fish and then reappear in mammals, but are conserved across vertebrates.
ReplyDeleteRachael and Elle (below), you are of course right. Look at the commentaries in the journal (and also the skywritings of your classmates), and you’ll see they’ve picked up on Key’s error too. And that paediatric surgeons made the same mistake, not anesthetizing babies. Descartes and Malebranche did too, in assuring doubters that the same was true when Malebranche vivisected dogs. Who do you think are real victims of these errors? Not the confident theorists who make them. (What is the Precautionary Principle?)
DeleteIn this paper, Key argues that specific cortical structures are necessary for pain; fish that lack these structures therefore cannot feel pain…I find this logic problematic (for several reasons, but I’ll only focus on one). If we accept Key’s structure criteria as necessary, then newborn babies cannot feel pain either (babies are born with incomplete cortical structures and development to maturity takes years). Yet babies clearly show affective pain responses -they cry, show elevated stress hormones, etc (and frankly its intuitively absurd to even consider otherwise). Babies meet all of Key’s criteria except for the structural one. This is revealing that Key has confused correlation with necessity. The infant case shows that even within our own species, less developed neural tissue is capable of generating pain. And if immature cortical structures can lead to pain, Key offers no justification for why different neural architectures, such as that of the fish, cannot. In fact, his argument proves too much; in setting human neuroanatomy as the defining foundation he actually excludes his own species at various stages of life.
ReplyDeleteHuman empathy is one thing, we can’t empathize with a fish to discover if it has pain or not. Also using empathy as a qualitative method for empirical judgements is unsound (duh), and I fail to see how strategies used to “better understand the evolution of feathers and flight from dinosaurs to birds” (Key 2016, p. 2) has to do with making inferences about whether fish feel pain. In asserting that fish don’t feel pain because of a lack of certain cortical structures, Keys made the correlation/causation mistake - just because 2 things occur together (i.e. feeling pain and the presence of a cortical structure), doesn’t mean that they are necessarily dependent on each other (at least I think so - most of the neuroscientific part of this paper went over my head).
ReplyDeleteKey’s argument has several deep problems. First, he assumes that only mammalian-style cortical structures can support pain, but this ignores the possibility that fish may have their own specialized pallial regions capable of performing similar integrative functions in a different architectural form. Declaring in advance that these structures “don’t count” presupposes the very conclusion he wants to defend. Second, Key insists that because we can’t directly prove a fish feels pain, we should assume they do not, but that same standard applies to all non-humans and even other humans. This is just the classic other-minds problem, and applying it selectively to fish is inconsistent. When there is reasonable chance of sentience, the ethical norm is the precautionary principle, and Key’s decision to dismiss it strikes many critics as irresponsible. Third, his claim that fish are fundamentally different from other vertebrates underestimates the overwhelming evidence of evolutionary continuity: fish share nociceptors, centralized nervous systems, stress physiology, and many behavioural indicators linked to pain across vertebrates. Evolutionarily, it makes little sense to imagine that conscious affect “disappears” in fish and then magically “reappears” in mammals. By isolating fish from the broader vertebrate lineage and demanding a level of proof he does not require elsewhere, Key’s argument ends up resting more on restrictive assumptions than on the evidence itself.
ReplyDeleteGpt discussion (or more like debate) about Key's paper: https://chatgpt.com/share/69253d22-f608-800f-9cc4-7001cc839bd6
ReplyDeleteKey argues that fish don’t feel pain, only nociception. His main point is structural: the neural machinery required for feeling pain in humans (specific cortical circuits for conscious qualia) just isn’t present in fish. So their escape behaviors don’t prove they’re feeling anything, just evolved reflexes. What struck me is his reminder that complex-looking behavior isn’t evidence of consciousness. Even spinal-lesioned animals can do flexible nocifensive actions with no feeling at all. That makes the “fish reacted, therefore they felt pain” argument shaky.
ReplyDeleteWhere I’m unsure is his assumption that only human-like cortical structures could support feeling. That’s still an open question. But his warning about anthropomorphism and “benefit of the doubt” leading to bad science/policy is worth thinking about.
Hi Shireen!
DeleteI agree with this. Key’s structural argument is compelling in showing why we can’t take behavioural complexity as evidence for feeling. The examples of spinal-lesioned animals really highlight how much can happen without any conscious experience at all, which weakens the “reaction = pain” claim.
I’m also with you on the open question: assuming that only human-like cortical circuits can generate feeling seems too strong. We still don’t know what the minimal neural architecture for conscious experience is, and that gap makes it hard to conclude definitively either way. But I think Key’s caution against anthropomorphism is important. If we start from “they probably feel,” rather than “what evidence would show that they feel,” we risk building ethics and policy on assumptions instead of mechanisms.
Key makes a reductive argument that fish do not feel pain, relying on the principle that "structure determines function". This directly connects to our discussion on the "easy problem" versus the "hard problem" of consiousness. Key concludes that because fish lack human-like neuroanatomical structures and cortical processing associated with pain, they therefore lack the subjective experience of pain. However, the hard problem reminds us that no physical or functional description of a nervous system can explain why or whether any system feels in the first place. In addition, the "other minds problem" shows that we cannot directly know the subjective states of any organism other than ourselves; all claims about what fish feel are necessarily inferences rather than certainties.
ReplyDeleteKey’s paper argues that fish don’t feel pain because they lack the brain structures required for experiencing it. The paper contains a lot of dense neuroscientific concepts that I admittedly got a bit lost in, but at the end he offers an alternative hypothesis: that fish don’t feel “human pain,” but instead feel “fish pain.” This distinction, in my opinion, is irrelevant. Contrary to his view, I fall into the camp that believes fish should be given the benefit of the doubt regarding their capacity to feel pain.
ReplyDeleteHe cites Nagel’s famous essay “What Is It Like to Be a Bat?”, which I think is perfectly applicable to the topic of animal sentience. Conscious experience is subjective, so I can’t know for certain whether a fish feels pain or “feels happy being in the company of other fish.” But based on my own experience as a human—if I instinctively retract my hand from a noxious stimulus, and I see a fish doing the same—I think it’s reasonable to assume that we share a similar motivation: we don’t want to be hurt. Human or fish, that basic reaction doesn’t seem fundamentally different.
I can’t be certain of this, but of course, we can’t be certain of most things. Therefore, I believe it is better to give animals the benefit of the doubt. Moreover, Key’s claim that fish lack the brain structures required for pain presupposes that pain must be implemented in the same way across species. But different animals can have functionally similar systems even if their neural architecture is not identical. The absence of human pain structures doesn’t imply the absence of any structure capable of supporting pain-like experiences in fish.
Esosa,
DeleteI think you make a strong point in challenging Key’s assumption that pain must be implemented in a human-like cortical architecture to count as feeling. As you said, Nagel’s argument reminds us that subjective experience is inaccessible by design, so insisting on a specific neural layout as the only possible basis for pain seems too restrictive to me. The behavioural parallels you mention (withdrawal, avoidance, and context-dependent reactions) don’t prove that fish feel, but they also don’t justify ruling it out, especially given how often evolution produces functionally almost, if not exactly, equivilant systems with very different structures. Given this uncertainty, your “benefit of the doubt” stance seems like a reasonable ethical stance.
Key argues that because fish lack the specific cortical architecture that generates subjective pain in mammals, their brains cannot support the ‘what-it’s-like’ aspect of suffering and feeling pain. However, fish show learning, analgesic responses, and behavioral changes that go beyond simple reflexes. This makes us ask, what counts as evidence for another creature’s subjective experience when we can’t access it directly. If we require human-like brains for attributing pain, we then risk ignoring or dismissing consciousness when it definitely does exist in other forms.
ReplyDelete“Given the proposition that the above organizational principles are necessary for conscious neural processes of pain, and that fish lack many of these prerequisites neuroanatomical features, it is reasonable to conclude that fish do not feel pain.”
ReplyDeleteMy issue with Key’s conclusions comes from the fact that he states that the mammalian organizational principles are necessary for the conscious neural processes of pain, which is not something we can be sure of. As Professor Harnad has said, as humans, we have very good “mind-reading” ability when it comes to other beings. We think we can infer others’ feelings through their apparent behaviour, and we can relate what we see to our own feelings, a process that Key takes as a certain truth. The problem with Key’s argument here is that it is completely based on the claim that our subjective experience of pain originates from certain subcortical areas, which hasn’t been proven, as demonstrated by the hard problem. Those subcortical areas can help correlate some nociception with brain activity, but cannot reveal how and why we feel pain, at least for now. To infer that other humans other than us experience the subjective experience of pain is to base your argument on an unproven statement, and to further use that statement to “prove” that fish do not experience that subjective experience of pain is wrong, to say the least. To argue that the organizational principles of the mammalian brain exclusively have the ability to experience pain is also misjudged, in my opinion. There are other levels of his argument that are shaky, as many people have pointed out in this thread, but I think this one is the very foundation of the issue.
The main idea in this article is that fish lack the necessary neural structures like a cortical pain network that allow them to feel pain like a human. So even though they might have reflexive behavior against painful stimuli this is just non-conscious neural processing to protect them. It also points out that we may project feeling onto fish because we ourselves have feeling in a similar manner to how we project feeling onto other people. However, I disagree with this sentiment and how it ties into the hard problem. The hard problem is explaining how and why cognitive beings feel and has yet to be solved (and is in fact very far away from being solved). So we have no real idea of how cognitive beings actually feel. For example, if we had a fake fish that passes the easy problem (how and why a fish can do what it can do) and is the same on the inside (t4) that won’t sort out if its feeling or not feeling because it is not observable. So there is no real way of figuring out right now if a fish actually feels pain or not.
ReplyDeleteWhat stands out to me in this question is that “does it matter?” depends on something deeper than any argument about brain structures. Feeling is private, and we cannot directly access it in any species but ourselves. So when we claim that only humans or only mammals feel, we are already assuming a level of certainty that science cannot give. For me, this uncertainty is exactly why it does matter. If sentience can only ever be inferred, not observed, then drawing strict borders around who feels risks being more about our assumptions than their actual experience. That alone should make us cautious about excluding other species from the category of creatures that matter.
ReplyDeleteBrian Key argues that fish do not feel pain because they lack the necessary neuroanatomical structures, such as the neocortex, required for conscious pain processing in humans. His argument is based on the bioengineering principle that structure determines function. According to this view, observable actions like swimming away from an electric shock are merely non-conscious nocifensive reflexes, not experiences of suffering.
ReplyDeleteWhat I find interesting, especially as someone who researches with animal models, is that Key neglects the phylogenetic fact that the same function can be produced by different structures across species. Relying on the human neocortex as the blueprint for all sentience seems oversimplified. I think Key overassumes a level of strong equivalence in pain processing across species.
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DeleteAdelka, I like your point about how some neural structures overlap in function! Key’s argument about whether fish can feel pain leaves no room for alternate explanations, as he defends his thesis that fish do not feel pain because they lack the underlying neural structures for experiencing these sensations. He describes the cortex as “necessary and sufficient for the feeling of pain in humans”, yet this does not mean that fish also require these same structures to feel pain. Therefore, my question is: how can we assume that the neural cytoarchitecture involved in feeling pain for humans is the same as that involved in pain for fish? And before we even try to answer this question, shouldn’t we ask ourselves what feeling is, and how and why living organisms feel the way they do?
DeleteI think your closing questions point exactly to what Key’s argument overlooks: evolution doesn’t build every organism with the same neural layouts. Different species can evolve distinct neural architectures that solve the same adaptive problems including detecting harm, responding to threats, and regulating internal states. There’s no evolutionary reason to expect a fish to use a cortex-like structure to generate feeling, any more than we expect it to use lungs to breathe.
DeleteWithout answering your second question (as you said must be answered first), Key claiming that only human-style neural layouts can support pain isn’t just premature, it also ignores the evolutionary diversity of the adaptive solutions different organisms have come up with for universal adversities.
There is a lot wrong with his claims. Key is assuming a lot and is incredibly human-centric by assuming that a mammal-like cortex is required to feel. Harnad himself says that we do not need similar structures to gain the same results. Evolution can develop sentience in diverse ways. Key is so certain that fish do not feel pain when we cannot know if another organism is capable of feeling, as demonstrated by the other-minds problem. We can only infer that others feel based on behaviour and Key ignores and dismisses any signs of pain that fish display behaviourally and reduces them solely to reflexes. His evidence is too weak to prove anything and it seems he already had a belief before testing his hypothesis about fish pain that influenced his uninformed conclusion. He seems to make many assumptions which should not be made about something as important as organism suffering. Bold claims like this can be dangerous and lead to further normalization of animal suffering.
ReplyDeleteIn this article, the author has tackled the easy problem of pain in humans and fish. That is, he identified neural correlates of the feeling of pain in humans and, based on this analysis, has concluded that fish (which supposedly lack these neural correlates) do not feel pain. I think this is a very hasty conclusion. Indeed, this “easy” answer is based on the correlates of pain and entirely bypasses the other minds problem. The author seems to believe that, because humans are the only species with the ability to verbally report their feelings, they ipso facto are the reference for feeling and that only their brains contain “proof” of feelings. This presupposes that there is only one answer to the hard problem of sentience (how and why do we feel?), and that it is located in the human brain, while purposefully ignoring the fact that we can never know for sure what (or whether) another animal feels unless we become it. If this human-centric assumption turns out to be wrong (which it most probably is), the author’s entire argument collapses.
ReplyDelete11.a. Key argues that fish can’t feel pain because they lack the cortical architecture humans use for conscious experience, but the whole argument feels like it smuggles in its conclusion. He defines pain as necessarily cortical, then uses that definition to rule out fish by default. The challenge is that we don’t actually know whether consciousness must look like the human cortex to exist; evolution often finds different neural solutions to similar problems. Key raises valid caution against anthropomorphism, but his strict “structure determines function” stance seems too rigid for a system as diverse and plastic as brains. The paper pushes a strong claim with confidence, but the evidence doesn’t quite match the certainty.
ReplyDeleteI like your statement, "evolution often finds different neural solutions to similar problems". Key seems too restricted to cognitive frameworks in humans to leave room for the possibility that consciousness in another animals may look different. I think of octopi, who are considered one of the smartest invertebrates, with nervous systems that look completely different from ours. The majority of their neurons are in their arms, rather than their brain - who are we to say that octopus arms don't possess a level of consciousness? Not only is Key failing to recognize the 'other-minds problem', but maybe he's overlooking the 'other-body problem' as well - the fact that different physical mechanims can give rise to different styles of cognition.
DeleteKey’s argument that “fish lack the neural architecture for feeling pain” is a bold one as it insinuates that fish do not possess consciousness, which we know to not be true. One takeaway I do not understand is that if Key states that we can use pain to recognise between conscious and non-conscious processing (p. 2), and in the end claims that noxious stimuli would not feel like anything to a fish (p. 17), is he implying that fish are not conscious organisms? How would he classify them as animals then, because they do move, live, and possess a range of cognitive abilities. I disagree with Key and would argue that accepting through his correlation investigation that fish do not feel pain can lead to even more devastating consequences as it would lead to incorrectly defining which organisms possess consciousness and which do.
ReplyDeleteHi Maya! I agree with your sentiment. Before I further elaborate this take, I think his caution on anthropomorphism and the “benefit of the doubt” view is valid though. It is important to gather evidence of fish feeling pain to support an argument like that. Evidence based claims are important. So, Key makes an argument that possessing neuroanatomical features is a necessary and sufficient condition for the consciousness experience of pain. However, Key’s argument is too rigid and not nuanced enough. He assumes that the only possible biological mechanism for conscious pain is the cortical architecture found in humans and other mammals. I agree with you that there is a correlation but not a casual relationship. While neural architecture certainly facilitates pain experience, it is not clear that it is the sole prerequisite. For example, human babies that have incomplete cortical structures (as Elle pointed out) clearly experience pain. Additionally, Key does not adequately consider the possibility that different species may evolve different solutions for similar functional outcomes. His argument relies heavily on structural similarity to mammals rather than functional equivalence. Thus, while Key appropriately urges caution against anthropomorphism, his conclusion that noxious stimuli would not feel like anything to a fish overextends the evidence. I think Key’s argument risks implying that many living organisms should be excluded from being treated as capable of feeling pain.
DeleteKey’s central claim is that fish lack the “necessary neurocytoarchitecture” for conscious pain. That sounds precise, but the step it hides is very strong: in mammals, pain is associated with certain cortical regions; therefore, those regions—or close analogues—are necessary for any feeling at all. That’s doing most of the work in the paper, and it’s the step I find hardest to justify.
ReplyDeleteEven if we grant that in humans certain cortical areas are crucial for normal pain experience, it doesn’t follow that no other kind of neural organization could underwrite feeling. Evolution routinely reuses and repurposes different structures for similar functional outcomes. Treating the mammalian layout as the only possible implementation of sentience feels more like anthropocentric conservatism than a discovered law. On the behavioural side, his handling of the evidence is similar. When fish show flexible, context-dependent avoidance of noxious stimuli, long-term changes, or drug-sensitive modulation that looks like centrally integrated pain, he tends to reclassify that as “mere nociception” rather than letting it challenge his architectural criterion. Combined with the ethical asymmetry, a false positive is less serious than a false negative, that makes the confident “fish do not feel pain” conclusion look both scientifically and morally overreaching.
Key's argument that fish don't feel pain relies heavily on mapping their neuroanatomy onto the human standard, especially the cerebral cortex. He sets up really strict criteria for feeling pain, like needing a laminated and columnar organisation and strong reciprocal interconnections to achieve global integration. But arguing fish lack pain because their non-laminated pallium isn't equivalent to our cortex feels like assuming that consciousness can only emerge through human architecture. I'm also skeptical of dismissing all behavioural responses as mere nociception. Key claims things like escape movements are just non-conscious reflexes because fish rely on feedforward pathways. He then relies on the idea that fish must exhibit pain-suppressed behaviours (like reduced feeding) to prove they feel pain. This definition feels problematic because it forces other species to conform to our specific neurological and behavioural manifestations of pain, potentially ignoring how pain might be expressed in a totally different system.
ReplyDeleteKey argues that fish don’t feel pain because they lack the neural architecture required for conscious experience. He distinguishes nociception, automatic reactions to harmful stimuli, from the subjective feeling of pain, which he claims only emerges through cortical processing. His evidence that certain cortical regions are activated during human pain and that lesions disrupt this experience shows a strong connection between cortical integration and pain in mammals, however, his leap from “pain in humans requires cortical architecture” to “fish cannot feel pain at all” is less convincing to me. He assumes that the only possible way for pain to exist is through the specific mechanisms seen in mammals, without exploring whether alternative vertebrate systems could support different states. He also interprets the fish’s behavioural responses largely as reflexes which can overlook subtle indicators of affect. The paper was good in my opinion for grounding pain discussions in neurobiology.
ReplyDeleteThe paper presents a clear distinction between non-conscious neural processing and the motor behaviours that result from harmful stimuli, called nocifensive behaviours, which are executed without conscious awareness. Key argues that we feel pain only because our neural circuitry supports conscious processing, and that this complex architecture is what makes the feeling of pain possible. He bases his argument on the idea that fish lack this “necessary neural hardware,” and therefore cannot experience pain as humans do. What struck me personally is how this challenges the intuitive assumption that visible struggle always reflects inner suffering. I realized how quickly I project human feelings onto animals. Key’s argument made me rethink how much of my empathy is based on appearance rather than biology.
ReplyDelete