Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member Latest Breaking News Editorials & Other Articles General Discussion The DU Lounge All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search
 

Dial H For Hero

(2,971 posts)
Thu Jul 8, 2021, 10:01 AM Jul 2021

UK weighs ban on boiling live lobsters

https://thehill.com/policy/international/561881-uk-weighs-ban-on-boiling-lobster

The United Kingdom is weighing a ban on boiling live lobsters, crabs and other crustaceans amid a push from animal welfare activists to include the invertebrates in legislation that would recognize them as sentient beings.

Legislation currently being weighed in the House of Lords would not only seriously boost animal welfare protections but also require the government to consider animals' feelings when writing regulations.

Though the legislation currently only includes vertebrates, lawmakers are weighing expanding it to include invertebrates such as lobsters, as well as octopuses and mussels, according to The Times.

The legislation comes as the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said it has commissioned a study to examine the creature’s sentience.

(excerpt)

Describing a lobster (let alone a mussel) as sentient and having feelings seems a bit of a stretch.
22 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
UK weighs ban on boiling live lobsters (Original Post) Dial H For Hero Jul 2021 OP
Why do they try desperately to escape the pot then? Treefrog Jul 2021 #1
+1 2naSalit Jul 2021 #2
Presumably because lobsters which try to get away from something which damages them are more likely Dial H For Hero Jul 2021 #4
Reflexes don't require the ability to feel pain, or even a brain. nt. Mariana Jul 2021 #10
I should think it's chauvinistic to discriminate for or against vertebrates. CoopersDad Jul 2021 #3
I love that movie and I approve the proposed changes in GB to include invertebrates for protection. MoonRiver Jul 2021 #13
From Google index Submariner Jul 2021 #5
Ah yes, Mary Tyler Moore comes to mind. Croney Jul 2021 #6
I have no conclusive evidence that other human beings feel pain as I do sanatanadharma Jul 2021 #7
All life is sentient? Clams? Fleas? Bacteria? Radishes? Surely you draw the line somewhere. Dial H For Hero Jul 2021 #14
I do draw lines and color outside of the margins sanatanadharma Jul 2021 #16
Certainly there is a line somewhere but, Disaffected Jul 2021 #17
Until very recently - Ms. Toad Jul 2021 #15
Yes, another good example of Disaffected Jul 2021 #18
Many crustaceans have sarisataka Jul 2021 #8
I'm with you on octopuses wryter2000 Jul 2021 #21
I love lobsters... NurseJackie Jul 2021 #9
They are probably better when steamed anyway... Klaralven Jul 2021 #19
If lobsters looked like puppies, we wouldn't allow it Clash City Rocker Jul 2021 #11
How does one stun mussels or clams? dhol82 Jul 2021 #12
How would they like for them to be killed? wryter2000 Jul 2021 #20
So what now? Lethal injection? 48656c6c6f20 Jul 2021 #22
 

Dial H For Hero

(2,971 posts)
4. Presumably because lobsters which try to get away from something which damages them are more likely
Thu Jul 8, 2021, 10:08 AM
Jul 2021

to survive and reproduce, thus such behavior is "hardwired" into them.

CoopersDad

(2,805 posts)
3. I should think it's chauvinistic to discriminate for or against vertebrates.
Thu Jul 8, 2021, 10:06 AM
Jul 2021

How very thick of us.
We are vertebrates, therefore other invertebrates are better than invertbrates, seems to be the logic here.
To the legislators, stop what you're doing and go to your respective libraries and give this a think.

Compare an Octopus to Ted Cruz, and then get back to me.

Submariner

(12,626 posts)
5. From Google index
Thu Jul 8, 2021, 10:08 AM
Jul 2021

Lobsters lack the brain anatomy needed to feel pain, said Ayers, who builds robots modeled on lobster and sea-lamprey neurobiology. Lobsters and other crustaceans are often swallowed whole by predators, he added, so they never needed to evolve the ability to detect pain from, say, warming water or an electric shock.

A new animal protection law in Switzerland requires that lobsters be stunned before being cooked. Animal rights activists and some scientists argue that lobsters' central nervous systems are complex enough that they can feel pain. There is no conclusive evidence about whether lobsters can feel pain.

sanatanadharma

(4,064 posts)
7. I have no conclusive evidence that other human beings feel pain as I do
Thu Jul 8, 2021, 10:33 AM
Jul 2021

Why shouldn't I think that humans are just hard-wired to pull a hand back from the fire.

After all, plenty of materialist, scientist minded people seem to deny that consciousness (the knower of pain) is any more than an epiphenomena of electro-chemical activity in the body-mind-sense-complex that we call "I" or me.

If consciousness is only an add-on to the fundamentally real and thus dispensable, there is no difference between lobster and man except the complexity of their feelings, fantasies and dreams.

All life is sentient, in my opinion-understanding. All life forms are aware of their environment and I doubt that only higher life forms seek to avoid discomfort and pain due to feelings rather than programming.

sanatanadharma

(4,064 posts)
16. I do draw lines and color outside of the margins
Thu Jul 8, 2021, 11:20 AM
Jul 2021

I am a vegetarian, so I do differentiate between rabbits and carrots, I eat the one that doesn't run.
To be consistent, I'd have to avoid the lobster and eat the life of the mussel.
Yet, though mussels can't flee, they do hide.

I won't swat a mosquito but accept my wife's killing of cockroaches.
All life is sentient, but not all life-forms have the means to express (make obvious) that inner awareness.
Science reveals that plants, non-moving, locked to one place do 'pull-back from' negative stimulus.
Radishes are silent, but trees rustle in the wind.

Disaffected

(4,983 posts)
17. Certainly there is a line somewhere but,
Thu Jul 8, 2021, 11:22 AM
Jul 2021

we simply don't know where it is. The assumption that lobsters are not sentient to any degree is only that - an assumption. And, when you get right down to it, there is not even a conclusive way of knowing that anyone, either than yourself, is actually sentient. We just do not know enough about the functioning of nervous systems to tell.

When, if ever, we come up with an explanation of exactly how a nervous system causes sentience, we will be in a better position to know.

BTW, in the 19th century IIRC there was a theory going around in certain European laboratories that animals such as dogs used in experiments were not sentient and therefore could not experience pain. So, they were strapped down and operated on without anesthesia along with other horrific experimental procedures.

Ms. Toad

(35,337 posts)
15. Until very recently -
Thu Jul 8, 2021, 11:12 AM
Jul 2021

circumcisons were done without any kind of pain control on the basis that infants were not well enough developed to feel pain.

Newborns do feel pain.

Parents don't have to be told that, and many pediatricians don't either. But the contrary belief - that the smallest babies are such primitive organisms that they are oblivious to pain - has persisted for decades among many physicians who have routinely operated on these children with little or no anesthesia.


https://www.nytimes.com/1987/11/24/science/infants-sense-of-pain-is-recognized-finally.html

When I was pregnant in 1987, and deciding about circumcision if I had a male child, the idea that infants don't feel pain was still as common as not.

sarisataka

(20,791 posts)
8. Many crustaceans have
Thu Jul 8, 2021, 10:33 AM
Jul 2021

The approximate sentience of a rock. Still I do have some issues with cooking live animals.

An octopus OTH is an extremely intelligent creature

wryter2000

(47,260 posts)
20. How would they like for them to be killed?
Thu Jul 8, 2021, 01:18 PM
Jul 2021

Unless they plan to ban eating lobsters, someone is going to have to kill them.

Latest Discussions»General Discussion»UK weighs ban on boiling ...