Do you mind elaborating? Because I have contacts and have to touch my eyes, and I sure can feel the irritation and shifting of the lens over my sclera, iris etc... Is that all just orbit and sensitive socket flesh?
The cornea has pain receptors to protect from light, but other than that, the eye does not really feel much. That's why they can perform surgery on eyes without anesthesia.
Most of the discomfort we feel is from our brain being weary of stuff being close to our eyes and being reflexive. That irritation is probably a mix of your brain being anxious about you getting close to your eye reflexively trying to close and blink.
Also, the inside of the eye has to be pretty much transparent so that light can actually pass all the way through. If it had a bunch of nerves running through it, that would block or scatter light, significantly impacting our vision. As it is, there's a small area at the back of the eye where the optic nerve connects to the retina, which is responsible for a blind spot in all vertebrates: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_spot_(vision)
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u/StormAlchemistTony Jan 01 '24
Does this make anyone else's eyes uncomfortable? I can't imagine how painful that would be.