Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 02:35, 4 January 2014

The contents of the Pain and suffering in laboratory animals page were merged into Pain in animals. For the contribution history and old versions of the redirected page, please see its history; for the discussion at that location, see its talk page.

This was split off from Pain and Pain in fish and crustaceans.

Dissection of a frog

The frog was chloroformed before the dissection was taking place as the author of the photo said. So the frog didn't feel pain. The photo isn't suitable here. --Rotatoria (talk) 15:57, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

That's a little pedantic. It is still an illustration of a "live dissection", which is all the caption claims it to be. --Geronimo20 (talk) 16:59, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

I disagree that it's pedantic. We should be precise and accurate in our choices of words. Please see the parallel discussion of this image at Talk:Vivisection. I'm going to fix it, as I did there. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:48, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) It's not pedantic at all. If there was no pain, the picture doesn't belong in this article. Also, you must not label a clearly good-faith edit as "vandalism" in your edit summary, however strongly you feel about it. I have already removed the image again. Looie496 (talk) 19:50, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

(ec again!) Correction: I agree with Looie. This page is about pain, and the image is absolutely inappropriate. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:53, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Okay. I didn't mean to label your edit "vandalism" Rotatoria. I was doing the tedious patrol of articles I monitor for vandalism, and I guess it was vandalism fatigue. My apologies for that. --Geronimo20 (talk) 20:01, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Cool, thanks, much appreciated. Looie496 (talk) 20:07, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

I posted the image originally, without reading the detail about chloroform. I completely concur with its removal. Anthony (talk) 06:34, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Descartes image

One editor has repeatedly been deleting the Descartes image from the lead of the page, in spite of the fact that both I and another editor have reverted the deletion. I don't see any alternative image being offered, nor do I really see a valid reason (in my opinion) for why the page would be better with no image. Thoughts? --Tryptofish (talk) 19:39, 3 December 2010 (UTC)

Actually it does have an image. And I am quite sure there are plenty of qute expressive images which are known to show animals experiencing pain and other suffering. The only problem is to find a free one. And it will be exactly on topic. I will look for one. And you should too.

I have nothing against this great person, and being one, he had plenty of opinions, so that half of wikipedia articles could bear his visage.

My point is this image contribute nothing to understanding of the subject. I believe there is some guideline to this end abourt relevance of images. Kaligelos (talk) 22:51, 3 December 2010 (UTC)

I was referring to no image in the lead, and we generally do try to have lead images. The relevance is that Descartes is mentioned, with multiple sources, at the beginning of the lead. It's true that an alternative would be to have an animal image, of which Misplaced Pages has no shortage, but there would potentially be issues of WP:NPOV were the image to be an inflammatory one. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:58, 3 December 2010 (UTC)

As far as I understand, the concept of NPOV is related to opinions of wikipedians creeping into an article. If there is a known image which arguably illustrates pain as argied in its source, I don't see now it is a violation of NPOV, especially since the article lede clearly ways that existence of pain in animals is a majority view today.

Now back to searching images. Surprizingly, I failed to find anything relevant in commons (may be I am not good at search there). I will look at flicker under cc-sa licenses. Kaligelos (talk) 23:19, 3 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm reasonably OK with the shark compromise, although there ought to be an image of better photographic quality. (We probably would not have had this discussion at all, if the first edit had been to replace Descartes with the shark; it was the deletion of the image with nothing in its place that caught my attention.) --Tryptofish (talk) 23:37, 3 December 2010 (UTC)

pain sensation vs suffering

This article does not descrive and maintain clear distinctions between sensing pain and suffering from pain. (I guess the reason lies in the English language and cultural perception the words "pain" and "suffering" are synonyms.) After all, there is a concept of masochism (although I have never read about masochistic animals). That animals can feel pain and try to avoid has been known beyond any doubt even in times of Descartes (I fixed the article text to this end), the true controversy is about whether animals suffer. The second rerefence ("The Ethics of research involving animals") has a reasonably good treatment of this issue, and I would like to ask a person better versed in English to summarize it from there (and from other sources with possibly different POV). Kaligelos (talk) 00:10, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

Descartes thought that animal organisms are unconscious machine because they have no soul, that they can 'sense' or 'feel' things and react to them but only like we would say that a thermostat can sense heat and react to it. According to the most current definition of pain nowadays, pain is "physical pain" and it is always a conscious experience. Another current use of the word pain is as a synonym of suffering, as indicated at the article suffering. Pain in animals can be an article that is both about physical pain and suffering, in my opinion, but care should be taken, when required, to be clear on the meanings of the terms. --Robert Daoust (talk) 02:46, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

Balance for invertebrates

Dear All, I am very new to writing for Misplaced Pages, so please be gentle with me. I'm concerned this article Pain in Animals is rather unbalanced and that a lot of (recent) scientific literature indicates the possibility of invertebrates having the capacity to experience pain. Some sections of the article appear to be mis-leading. For example, saying that fruit flies are one exception to invertebrates not having nociceptors is completely at odds with the paper by Smith and Lewin, 2009 J Comp Physiol A (2009) 195:1089–1106. My feeling is that the section on comparing 'fish and crustaceans' should be extended to 'vertebrates and invertebrates'. I am willing to do this, but afraid that the major re-write I envisage would be 'vandalism'. How should I proceed? DrChrissy (talk) 11:59, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

With relatively small or uncontroversial edits, I find WP:BRD is most efficient. Just do it, and if someone objects, revert to the earlier version and discuss. With more substantial edits, in my experience, it's more efficient to compose the new/replacement material on a subpage in my user space and copy it to the article talk page for discussion when it's ready.

Create a subpage entitled "Pain in animals" by clicking User:DrChrissy/Pain in animals.

If you want help with formatting citations or anything, ask here or on the talk page of any of the editors on this page. A good grasp of the policy Identifying reliable sources and the guideline Identifying reliable sources (medicine) will give you an idea of what will float and what will sink like a stone.

Aside from the occasional misunderstanding, this is a pretty friendly page. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 12:50, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Two things are important: (1) Write in a way that reflects the relative weight of views throughout the reputable literature; (2) Any statement that may be controversial should be attributed to a specific source that says it, e. g., "Larkin and Vrednik argue that there is no scientific basis for saying that invertebrates do not experience pain.<ref>Larkin and Vrednik</ref>", not "There is no scientific basis for saying that invertebrates do not experience pain.<ref>Larkin and Vrednik</ref>". Looie496 (talk) 17:14, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

...

If you define pain as an endogenous negative reinforcement to prevent the animal from destroying itself - which must be inherent in all living organisms to some extent - then clearly, without any shred of doubt, yes, animals, even plants, feel pain. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lekjjkonon999 (talk • contribs) 01:57, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it depends on your definition. The IASP says pain is a conscious experience, and involves suffering. Therefore, for a creature to experience pain, per that definition, it must be capable of consciousness and suffering. Determining which animals possess these faculties is the challenge. I agree, if we equate pain with avoidance learning, there is no problem. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 02:35, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Sub-sections on this page

Dear All, I would like to revisit a concern that has been raised before by Tryptofish and possibly others, namely, the inclusion of the 'Laboratory animals' subsection on the page Pain in animals. First, the article is a little misleading in that it indicates all studies in the UK performed under a Home Office license involve pain. I can understand people misunderstanding this because of the three labels of severity, however, this is for suffering, not pain. Studies where a foreign substance is administered are also regulated. For example, scientists might make a food distasteful with quinine. This does not cause pain, but the animals do not like it so it is presumed to cause suffering. Second, I do not see why there should be a section on pain in laboratory animals without similar articles on Pain in farm animals, Pain in zoo animals, Pain in pet animals, etc. also being included. I believe the 'laboratory animals' article should be moved from this page.

Similarly, I am not sure why there are sub-sections only for fish and crustaceans on Pain in animals...this neglects a huge number of animals for which there is good encyclopedic information.

Perhaps even more fundamentally, shouldn't this page be titled 'Pain in non-human animals'? After all, humans are classified as part of the animal kingdom. DrChrissy (talk) 15:59, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

About laboratory animals, we used to have a standalone page on pain in lab animals, and I merged it, per the consensus at that time, into this page instead. The previous issue was that the standalone article tended to be an anti-research POV page, and I'd rather not go back to what we had before. I live in the US, so I don't know much about the UK. If this page is inaccurate about the UK regulations, please just go ahead and edit the page to correct it. As for other categories of animals, one can certainly add more sections to this page, with proper sourcing of course. The presence and absence of sections is mostly a reflection of what editors have and have not written to date. The non-human thing has been a perennial question on various pages. I think I remember an acrimonious argument about it on the animal rights talk page about a year ago. It ends up being a no-win edit war, in my experience. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:27, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Specialists currently believe that all vertebrates can feel pain

This line appears in the body of the text with no citation. The reading I've done in philosophy, neuroscience and pain science leaves me thinking most scientists and philosophers will concede a degree of consciousness and the ability to suffer to chimps, gorillas, bonobos, orangutans and gibbons, and maybe cetaceans. As there's no source, and as this is a crucial point, I've deleted it until a source that can speak for the scientific community as a whole can be found. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 11:49, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree, good call. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:55, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

List of criteria indicating capacity for pain

I see that the seventh criterion 'High cognitive ability and sentience' has been added to the list of criteria suggesting the capacity for a species to experience pain. The reason why I omitted this from Rob Elwood's list is that some humans have a vary low cognitive ability and apparently reduced sentience, yet they clearly still experience pain. There is no strong reason about why animals need to have high cognitive ability to feel pain. That would mean mentally impaired humans feel less pain, but I doubt anyone would argue that this is the case. Having 'sentience' as a criterion is, I belive, a circular arguement. Sentience is the capacity to have positive and negative feelings, but surely pain is a negative feeling. I think the seventh added criterion should be removed. DrChrissy (talk) 11:39, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't have the Elwood paper to which the list is sourced, but I think we should only have a list that duplicates exactly a list in that source. We should neither add to nor subtract from the list that is in the Elwood paper. And if there isn't such a numbered list in the paper, then we shouldn't have the list at all. Otherwise, we are going against WP:NOR. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:20, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Added sentence on invertebrates

Someone has added the sentence "Though evidence suggests that most invertebrates do not feel pain,..." to this article. Where is the evidence to substantiate this statement? For this statement to be true, 'Most' invertebrates would have to have been tested and they clearly haven't. This sentence should be removed. DrChrissy (talk) 11:46, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

In this edit I changed

Specialists currently believe that all vertebrates can feel pain, and that some invertebrates, such as decapod crustaceans (e.g.crabs and lobsters) and cephalopods (e.g. octopuses) might.

to

Though evidence suggests that most invertebrates do not feel pain, some argue that decapod crustaceans (e.g.crabs and lobsters) and cephalopods (e.g. octopuses) may.

1. ^ "Do Invertebrates Feel Pain?", The Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, The Parliament of Canada Web Site, accessed 11 June 2008.
2. ^ Jane A. Smith (1991). "A Question of Pain in Invertebrates". ILAR Journal. 33 (1–2). {{cite journal}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |month= (help)
3. ^ Sherwin, C.M. (2001). Can invertebrates suffer? Or, how robust is argument-by-analogy? Animal Welfare, 10(supplement): 103-118

based on the cited sources. The Senate standing committee says

the balance of the evidence suggests that most invertebrates do not feel pain. The evidence is most robust for insects, and, for these animals, the consensus is that they do not feel pain.

and Smith (1991) says

The evidence seems to suggest that at least some of the cephalopods might have a nervous organization that would allow them to experience something like pain. It is unclear, however, whether cephalopods are able to "suffer" pain.

and

pain might seem less likely in the more "simple" invertebrates, than in the most "complex" invertebrates, such as the cephalopod mollusks (and, perhaps, decapod crustaceans such as crabs and lobsters, not considered here)

and

the evidence for pain perception is equivocal

and

the evidence certainly does not preclude the possibility of pain in and, moreover, suggests that pain is more likely in cephalopods than in the other invertebrates with less "complex" nervous organizations.

I think my version better represents the sources. (I can't access Sherwin, 2001.) The article should, however mention that, because of this uncertainty, invertebrates ought to be treated as though they can feel pain. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 13:09, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

But please look at the quality of the 'evidence' you are citing. The Smith et al. paper is twenty years old! We have discovered so much about invertebrates, pain and animal suffering since then. The Senate Committee paper was published in 2004 I think, and cites only 9 pieces of work - hardly fitting for such a complex issue. I can provide a copy of the Sherwin paper for you if you wish (is there a way of linking to this in a Wiki article when it is copyright material?), but this is related to suffering in general, rather than pain specifically.DrChrissy (talk) 13:48, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

I made the above correction because the existing wording did not reflect the cited sources. I did not add those sources. I corrected our text to match them. If more recent authoritative sources have revised this data, please feel free to make the changes. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 15:37, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Citation requested

If the majority of scholarly sources say that the “gold standard” measure of pain in a human is that person's testimony, then please cite to one or two of them. Thank you. Bwrs (talk) 05:30, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

It strikes me that sentience is different from the other items in the list of criteria for determining whether an animal can feel pain or not. The other items in this list are scientifically-determinable; sentience is a prerequisite for feeling anything, but how are you going to measure it? Bwrs (talk) 20:12, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Laws and guidelines on inflicting pain on animals

Does this article need a section discussing the way different jurisdictions and professions address how the various classes of animal may be treated? For example, I vaguely recall some jurisdiction outlawing throwing a live crayfish into boiling water. Anyway, I just thought I'd moot the idea. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 06:37, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

I think this would be a good article, but could get rather complicated. It could cover different jurisdictions for animals used in science, farming, entertainment, companion animals, zoo animals. But, how would also we cope with all the diferent countries and the different animals? Here in the UK for example, we have legislation protecting a single species, the badger. By the way, I think the legislation you refer to regarding lobsters is from New Zealand. DrChrissy (talk) 15:23, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Just found this on the Lobster article: The boiling method is illegal in some places, such as in Reggio Emilia, Italy, where offenders face fines of up to €495. DrChrissy (talk) 16:19, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

The only lobsters in New Zealand are spiny lobsters, and they are referred to as "crayfish" and not as lobsters. I don't think there is any legislation there specific to boiling crayfish, but this article is useful. --Epipelagic (talk) 21:12, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

There are already a lot of related pages, and I think most of them are in Category:Animal law or its subcategories. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:29, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. That's what I'm looking for. --Anthonyhcole (talk) 13:12, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Delete section on crustaceans

I propose that the small sub-section on crustaceans is deleted. Citation tags have correctly been placed on it, but even if these were added, I think the information is well covered in Pain in crustaceans. I feel all we need here is to direct the reader to this main page rather than give them very brief details on decapod crustaceans only. __DrChrissy (talk) 18:10, 11 December 2012 (UTC)

I agree, and I'm going to do that now. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:08, 12 December 2012 (UTC)

Definition of pain

this revert is a violation of NPOV. Low quality, unrepresentive source was used. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.168.57.72 (talk) 04:06, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Please try and get a consensus here instead of continuing to edit war with further reverts. You haven't explained why you think a "violation of NPOV" has occurred, nor have you established why views expressed by Marian Dawkins are "low quality" and "unrepresentive". --Epipelagic (talk) 06:40, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Did you read read the source and edit comments I added at all? That explained. 124.149.102.102 (talk) 13:12, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

You have explained nothing, only expressed your bias. You have been hopping around using different IP addresses and making gross attacks on Marian Dawkins using unreliable sources. If you want to contribute seriously, start an account so other editors can communicate coherently with you, and read some of the basic guidelines such as wp:pov, wp:rs, wp:verify, wp:nor, wp:ew. --Epipelagic (talk) 21:46, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

1)I explained to other editors (such as --Anthonyhcole ) why I don't use an account. An argument is valid or not should be independent from who said it. Or the opinion is biased.

2)basic IT knowledge: a lots of ISPs change user IPs automatically. So does mine.

3)You apparently did not look into the source I added for this article before you jump into conclusions. Do you usually do research like that? My source is well-know and important, it is a good summary of many definitions. It also shows clearly why a simple agreed definition does not exist.

4) DrChrissy has been spamming work in many places without sufficient evidence of notability. She has conflict of interests.

5) All my edits (such as criticism to Marian Stamp Dawkins) are backed up by sources.

6)The source of Dawkins is from a book edited by an ethicist (arts major), not a scientist. It is not important scientifically. 124.168.53.242 (talk)

• See Talk:Marian Stamp Dawkins#Amazon reviews online --Epipelagic (talk) 01:11, 31 December 2013 (UTC)
  • IP hopper - you have stated publicly that I have a conflict of interest by reverting to include a book written by Marian Dawkins. Please explain coherently why you state there is a conflict of interest. You also accuse me of "spamming" this book. I am not spamming, simply reverting the article to how it was before your disruptive edits. For your information, I have written Chapters/sections in several of the books YOU have included in this article and others - if I was to be inserting these as references, you might have a case for conflict of interest or spamming. Thank-you for promoting my work.__00:01, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

• I only remember added one book to the article. Can you explain which books you are talking about?
• Detailed records of DrChrissy's conflict of interests can be found here.124.168.52.248 (talk) 03:11, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Why would you want me to explain which books? Are you trying to "out" me? If you are, you will be immediately blocked.__DrChrissy (talk) 17:45, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Because, if you can't point out which books, then your statements can be a lie. You have a tracking history of lying and defamation, as documented in the talk page of animal welfare.124.170.210.84 (talk) 22:12, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

For those following this thread, see Talk:Marian Stamp Dawkins - I have only a limited amount of energy to keep refuting these wild accusations posted on multiple articles.__DrChrissy (talk) 22:57, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

I always have determination to defend truth and good science.124.168.15.129 (talk) 23:37, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

How charming you are. --Epipelagic (talk) 01:20, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. I just responded to Epipelagic's defamation against me on Beeblebrox's talk page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.168.8.38 (talk) 02:32, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

POV

views from reliable sources are rejected without explain.124.170.210.84 (talk) 22:22, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

I've been watching this dispute and, because my hands are full elsewhere, I've avoided getting in, but I'd like now to point folks to some constructive ways to get these issues resolved.

• To the IP editor: If you are concerned that Dr. Chrissy or anyone else has a conflict of interest, your best option is to stop discussing it here, and instead make use of WP:COIN. (That said, I've edited with Dr. Chrissy in the past, and I am very skeptical that this is anything other than a disagreement about how to write the content, so you may also want to consider dropping that issue, and just focusing on what you believe the page should or should not say.)
• To Epipelagic and Dr. Chrissy: If you want someone uninvolved to settle the issue of whether or not that source should be cited, once and for all, you can go to WP:RSN, and ask for an outside opinion about whether citing it supports the content. My guess is that you'll get a "yes", and that should put a rest to it; continued unwillingness to accept that advice would justify either semi-protection of the page (at WP:RFPP), or an IP rangeblock (at WP:ANI; they can block a range of IP addresses). But if instead RSN yields concerns about the source, then you should be open to reconsidering.

And everyone: you'll get to a good outcome faster if you all stop commenting on one another's supposed motivations. Just focus on what this page should or should not say, according to policies and guidelines. No comments about other users. Thanks. --Tryptofish (talk) 15:33, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

@ Tryptofish – thank you for that. But I think you've missed the main thrust of what was going on here. It was not the status of that particular source. What was happening on this page (and other pages) was strictly secondary to the attacks the IP was making on the Marian Dawkins page, and you would need to examine what happened there before you can comment meaningfully on behaviour here. Dr. Chrissy's and my behaviour on this page needs to be seen as a response to those central attacks. You suggest we just focus on the issues, which would generally be correct. But it is pointless trying to do that with an IP who has no intention of hearing what is said. --Epipelagic (talk) 18:55, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Can I add my support to the comments of Epipelagic. On numerous times I have avoided extremely uncivil behaviour and asked the IP hopper to take discussion about edits to the Talk page. This is usually ignored or comments made on the Talk page that are extremely uncivil. I appreciate this Talk page (or any other) might not be the most appropriate place to resolve these issues, but the IP hopper has on numerous occasions shown themselves unwilling to follow wikipedia policy.__DrChrissy (talk) 19:05, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Don't brush me off that easily. I went and looked at the BLP page, and I still see the IP editor expressing concern that both of you have conflicts of interest. The IP editor still needs to resolve that at WP:COIN and accept what they hear there, without continuing to make those claims about the two of you. If you, from your perspectives, see this less as a sourcing issue and more as an issue of criticism of the author of the source, then you can take the criticism of Prof. Dawkins to WP:BLPN (and I think you would be well-advised to do so!), and you could still find out about the sourcing at WP:RSN. What you both ought to stop doing is letting the IP editor annoy you to the point where the issues on any article talk page remain personal. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:39, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

No intention to brush you off - thanks for the advice.__DrChrissy (talk) 19:58, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Not trying to brush you off either, but I'm surprised you are encouraging more time wasting. The IP is already taking her issues to venues she can identify, and I suppose she can start up more threads on the additional venues you suggest. --Epipelagic (talk) 22:44, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

I already posted on COI and POV noticeboards yesterday.124.170.240.130 (talk) 22:13, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. I read the sections at COIN and NPOVN. It seems to me that uninvolved editors have reached a consensus that the IP editor is making incorrect accusations. I see no reason why Dr. Chrissy and Epipelagic could not go to WP:ANI and request what is called a rangeblock. However, I will also note the advice at COIN that Dr. Chrissy and Epipelagic are undermining their own case by needlessly raising issues about the IP editor, such as not having a registered account. You are just giving yourselves an un-needed black eye, because it looks to uninvolved editors like this is just a POV dispute, with both sides acting nasty to one another. I'm not time-wasting, just pointing out what does and what does not work. --Tryptofish (talk) 15:12, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

So it seems nothing can be done because we did things like asking the IP to stop IP hopping. If we hadn't tried relating to the IP on article talk pages we would have been told that nothing can be done because we hadn't discussed the matter. Already there has been a request to an admin for assistance, a request to RPP for page protection, a thread at the Teahouse, a thread on COIN and two threads on NPOVN. No useful intervention has resulted from any of these. The system is geared to maximise drama and minimise effective assistance to content builders. The only admin offering has been a regal side comment that these "accusations have been going on for a while and it's starting to sound a bit shrill". --Epipelagic (talk) 18:27, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Just revert the IP's bad edits. Don't bother arguing with somebody who doesn't listen. If the IP edit wars as a result, a complaint to admins will get action. Looie496 (talk) 20:03, 3 January 2014 (UTC)