Blow for fans of boiled lobster: crustaceans feel pain, study says.
Sensitive chefs, avert your eyes now. An investigation into the most contentious of kitchen dilemmas has reached its unpalatable conclusion: lobsters do feel pain.
The question of crustaceans' ability to experience pain has become an unlikely obsession for some scientists. Over the past few decades, the question has been batted back and forth as fresh evidence comes to light. Two years ago, Norwegian researchers declared the answer was a firm no, claiming the *******' nervous systems were not complex enough.
The latest salvo, published in New Scientist today, comes from Robert Elwood, an expert in ****** behaviour at Queen's University, Belfast. With help from colleagues, he set about finding an answer by daubing acetic acid on to the antennae of 144 prawns.
Immediately, the creatures began ******** and rubbing the affected antenna, while leaving untouched ones alone, a response Prof Elwood says is "consistent with an interpretation of pain experience". The same pain sensitivity is likely to be shared by lobsters, crabs and other crustaceans, the researchers believe.
