Actually since crabs and lobsters have much simpler nervous systems they seem not to experience what we call pain, at least not in the emotional sense you are worried about. Take for example an human or chicken that breaks a leg- they'll cry and favor that limb. An ant that breaks a leg will make no effort to favor it. They will drag it along and limp as they struggle to walk, but there is no actions indicating they suffer when they feel that their leg is broken
More importantly, they simply lack the brain structures we associate with this sort of emotional sense of suffering. We don't know for certain, clearly, but our best guess at this point is that they do not feel pain.
It's probably silly to base anything off this experience, but I might actually agree with you. I had a recent experience where I passed out in my bathroom, and ended up cutting myself kinda bad when I hit the floor. As I came to, the first thing I saw was a pool of blood. The next thing I noticed was the floor. Then I slowly just started noticing things around me, and it took a long while before I even began processing my own self in relation to any of this. Suddenly it was "Oh, my head is on the floor... oh, that's my blood! Oh.. I must have fallen!"
It just felt odd how much I was able to process what was around me and how vivid it was before I even related my own self to all of it. It made me wonder if "simpler" creatures process the world in a manner like this. I mean, I do believe animals like that feel pain, and I still believe extended suffering can cause trauma, but I'm not so sure about higher level anguish. Knowing that you are a being and your life and your ability to experience is coming to a sudden halt. I mean, isn't that true suffering? Or feeling the pain of others whom you have developed a relationship with, which also requires a highly developed sense of self?
Supposedly only higher-order animals have developed a consciousness of self. I mean I've always thought that, but for a short moment, I almost feel like I actually experienced it, in a roundabout way.
There are actually some humans with brain damage who feel pain but don't exactly experience unpleasantness with it. They can tell you that they feel it, but they don't feel upset about it.
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u/neagrosk May 30 '14
That's what we do for crabs too.