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> It doesn't disprove it, it just demolishes that particular argument. geezerjay made the point that the ability to experience pain is a useful survival trait,

> It doesn't disprove it, it just demolishes that particular argument. geezerjay made the point that the ability to experience pain is a useful survival trait, so we should expect it to be widespread. Filling in some gaps in your argument (please correct me if I get them wrong), you're arguing that there are other negative stimuli that could have equivalent usefulness and therefore pain itself is not beneficial for optimising survival. Any equivalent stimulus would do. Since there's no way to tell what anyone feels, the entire subjective experience of pain can only be defined by looking at analogous physiology and response. We can look at things like whether a species has nociception, whether their nociception system interacts with their central nervous system, whether they respond to painkillers, how they make choices about negative stimuli, adaptive avoidance, etc. To have the same survival value, your 'negative stimuli' must be indistinguishable from pain. They have to be because you imply they illicit the same response in the same situation, and (barring species that are clearly missing key parts of nociception) the response is all we can look at. Your argument seems to rest on redefining the (admittedly vague) biological understanding of pain to mean a unspecified subset of 'things that are indistiguishable from pain'... which I don't buy as being anything other than an existential conundrum and in my opinion doesn't seem like a basis to call geezerjay's comment "over-simplistic".

Dylan16807 9y ago
> geezerjay made the point that the ability to experience pain is a useful survival trait, so we should expect it to be widespread. While also conflating "pain" with any negative reaction at all as a "basic survival tool". > Filling in some gaps in your argument (please correct me if I get them wrong), you're arguing that there are other negative stimuli that could have equivalent usefulness and therefore pain itself is not beneficial for optimising survival. Any equivalent stimulus would do. I wouldn't say "equivalent". But I would say "sufficient". So go ahead and throw out all your argument based on them being indistinguishable. They are distinguishable, but it can be hard to distinguish them in something that doesn't talk. Keep in mind that we already know from daily experience that multiple kinds of negative stimuli exist, and only some of them are painful. Suppose that having more types requires more complexity, more metabolic energy. In that case, in simpler organisms, it could easily be true that pain improves survival but the cost is greater than the benefit. And then pain would get evolutionarily selected against despite being useful. And that assumes that pain is better than not-pain to start with. Maybe pain is a kludge. A lot of deaths have been caused because pain got too overwhelming for someone to continue to escape/fight. > We can look at things like whether a species has nociception, whether their nociception system interacts with their central nervous system, whether they respond to painkillers, how they make choices about negative stimuli, adaptive avoidance, etc. Yes, this is a good starting point. They key is acknowledging that there are multiple ways to get reactions, and pain is only one of them, so we have to have finesse in figuring out whether or not pain is involved.
- richmarr 9y ago
  I think you've overstated the extent to which this argument "demolishes" geezerjay's. You're right, there could exist a tier of organisms that do have centrally nervous nociception etc. but don't feel "pain", depending on which set of criteria you use to define what is and isn't pain (you didn't say which of the competing sets of criteria you subscribe to). As far as I see it, geezerjay put forward a reasonable argument and this adds a possible (but so far unsupported) nuance.
  - Dylan16807 9y ago
    Again, there are humans that feel some types of negative stimuli but not pain. It's not theoretical! It doesn't matter what my exact definition is for pain as long as we can agree that there is a difference. (We can agree that soft pokes to the head don't hurt, right?) And because there is a difference, it's not nuance to say "You can show that avoidance of stimuli is nearly universal, but that's not good enough to show pain". Without that equivalence, the argument is half-finished or less.

Dylan16807 9y ago

> geezerjay made the point that the ability to experience pain is a useful survival trait, so we should expect it to be widespread. While also conflating "pain" with any negative reaction at all as a "basic survival tool". > Filling in some gaps in your argument (please correct me if I get them wrong), you're arguing that there are other negative stimuli that could have equivalent usefulness and therefore pain itself is not beneficial for optimising survival. Any equivalent stimulus would do. I wouldn't say "equivalent". But I would say "sufficient". So go ahead and throw out all your argument based on them being indistinguishable. They are distinguishable, but it can be hard to distinguish them in something that doesn't talk. Keep in mind that we already know from daily experience that multiple kinds of negative stimuli exist, and only some of them are painful. Suppose that having more types requires more complexity, more metabolic energy. In that case, in simpler organisms, it could easily be true that pain improves survival but the cost is greater than the benefit. And then pain would get evolutionarily selected against despite being useful. And that assumes that pain is better than not-pain to start with. Maybe pain is a kludge. A lot of deaths have been caused because pain got too overwhelming for someone to continue to escape/fight. > We can look at things like whether a species has nociception, whether their nociception system interacts with their central nervous system, whether they respond to painkillers, how they make choices about negative stimuli, adaptive avoidance, etc. Yes, this is a good starting point. They key is acknowledging that there are multiple ways to get reactions, and pain is only one of them, so we have to have finesse in figuring out whether or not pain is involved.

richmarr 9y ago
I think you've overstated the extent to which this argument "demolishes" geezerjay's. You're right, there could exist a tier of organisms that do have centrally nervous nociception etc. but don't feel "pain", depending on which set of criteria you use to define what is and isn't pain (you didn't say which of the competing sets of criteria you subscribe to). As far as I see it, geezerjay put forward a reasonable argument and this adds a possible (but so far unsupported) nuance.
- Dylan16807 9y ago
  Again, there are humans that feel some types of negative stimuli but not pain. It's not theoretical! It doesn't matter what my exact definition is for pain as long as we can agree that there is a difference. (We can agree that soft pokes to the head don't hurt, right?) And because there is a difference, it's not nuance to say "You can show that avoidance of stimuli is nearly universal, but that's not good enough to show pain". Without that equivalence, the argument is half-finished or less.