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I don’t think there’s a binary switch at any single point from conception to birth to 1 year old where an organism switches from “not conscious to pain” to “con
by zaroth 6y ago
I don’t think there’s a binary switch at any single point from conception to birth to 1 year old where an organism switches from “not conscious to pain” to “conscious to pain”.
The first few days / weeks after birth are certainly louder but otherwise not much different developmentally from the preceding days.
- slothtrop 6y agoCertainly it doesn't change in an instant, that development is a process just like the rest. Still in the very early stages, "not conscious to pain" seems to be the case, but "conscious to pain" may begin earlier than people think.
- Aeronwen 6y agoYou certainly didn't have a brain or nervous system at the moment you were conceived. So there had to be some point in your development where you made the switch to being "conscious to pain".
- zaroth 6y agoIt’s just a fun thought experiment. If you decide that consciousness [of pain] can’t possibly be a binary switch, then perhaps that also means being conscious isn’t a binary property. If it isn’t a binary property, then is it a property that varies in degree based on developmental age (e.g. counting day 0 as conception)? Is it a quantity that can be measured quantitatively? If it can be measured, do some fully developed humans have more or less of it? Do some non-humans have more or less of it?