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Entomologists estimate there to be around a quintillion individual insects on the planet–and that’s just insects. Bugs are everywhere, but how much do we really know about them? Jeff Lockwood to the rescue! Professor Lockwood is answering all your bug questions–one at a time, that is. Send your question to him care of [email protected] and he’ll do his best to find you the answer.

Do bugs feel pain? Like, how does the exoskeleton work?

Well, it’s hard to know.  But then it’s hard to know what any organism experiences.  For that matter, I’m not even sure that you feel pain—or at least that your internal, mental states are the same as mine.  This is the “other minds” problem in philosophy.  At least other people can tell us what they feel (even if we can’t be certain that their experience is the same as ours), but we can’t even ask insects.  However, we can have three rather compelling lines of evidence that our six-legged brethren feel pain.

First, insects have a nervous system that resembles ours in many ways.  That is, they see, hear, smell, taste, and feel.  Many of our pains arise from pressure, shock, heat and other stimuli administered at high levels—and insects most assuredly respond to these bodily sensations.

Insects can even detect stimuli that are outside of our sensory scope.  For example, butterflies can see ultraviolet wavelengths and bees can detect the plane of polarization of light.

Next, there are relevant biochemical similarities between insect and human nervous systems.  At least some invertebrates possess endorphins and enkephalins.  These chemicals are opioids (think opium) produced by the body to alleviate pain and stress.  So the presence of these in insects suggests that they might experience pleasure/pain.  We also know that the mechanisms of neural transmission are similar in insects and humans.  This is one of the reasons that neurotoxic insecticides also poison you along with the cockroach in your kitchen.  In fact, the organophosphate insecticides are based on the nerve gases developed during World War II.  Kinda creepy, eh?

Finally, from an evolutionary perspective the awareness of pain is an enormously adaptive mechanism.  Feeling pain when you touch something hot allows a fast response—and a learning opportunity.  So it is unreasonable to assume that pain is unique to humans.  In fact, this perception might reasonably be expected in organisms whose survival can be augmented by the experience of pain, either as part of an escape mechanism or as a basis for the capacity to learn from past experience.  Insects have lots of things inflicting damage on them (fly swatters, bug zappers, lizards, bats, entomologists, etc.) and they certainly have the ability to learn (one experiment showed that headless cockroaches can learn—which is possible because insects don’t stuff all of their neural processing into their heads, like we do).  So it seems quite reasonable that insects would have evolved the capacity to feel pain.

About 30 years ago, an eminent insect physiologist addressed the question of pain in insects.   Vincent Wigglesworth (seriously, that was his name) argued that insects experience internal, visceral pain as well as pain caused by heat and electrical shock.  However, he inferred from observations that cuticular damage did not cause pain.  For example, an insect doesn’t limp when its leg is damaged.  And this leads to your question about the exoskeleton.

The insect’s exoskeleton is, well, a skele

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By F. Bailey Norwood and Jayson L. Lusk

 
After fighting each other for over a decade, the egg industry and the largest animal advocacy organization came to an agreement, one which will increase the welfare of egg-laying hens but also increase egg prices.  The United Egg Producers, under persistent pressure from the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), has agreed to transition hens out of battery cages and into enriched colony cages.  The HSUS certainly believes the higher welfare standards are worth the increase in egg prices, but do consumers agree?  My research says that when consumers are informed about the issue, yes, they applaud the move—even when they know higher egg prices will follow.

Most consumers do not wish to see farm animals crammed into small cages, but if they take the time to discover the source of their pork and eggs, these cramped animal cages are what they will see.  Chickens raised for egg production are placed in groups of 4-6 birds and raised their entire lives inside a cage so small that they cannot turn around without bumping into another chicken.  Spreading their wings is out of the question.  Sows (female hogs used for breeding) are confined even tighter, spending most of their lives in a stall so small the sow cannot even turn around.  There are more farm animal welfare issues than just space allotments.  Both layers and sows desire to forage for food, scratch or dig, socialize, and find comfortable places to rest.  All of these “behavioral” needs are neglected in the typical egg and pork production facility.  By transitioning from battery cages to enriched colony cages, the egg industry goes a long way towards meeting these space and behavioral needs.

Why are animal cages used in the first place, when the average person finds them disturbing?  In the competitive marketplace for food, farmers must employ confined production facilities to keep their costs low, because consumers generally emphasize low prices over animal welfare at the grocery store.  Yet, at the same time, consumers who purchase food from so-called “factory farms” donate money to the HSUS, who uses some of this money to ban the same animal cages used to produce most eggs and pork.  In surveys, referendums, and economic research, consumers consistently support the banning of the same cramped animal cages used to produce the food they purchase.

One reason the farm animal welfare debate cannot be quickly resolved is that consumers have difficulty resolving the issue for themselves.  They want livestock to be treated kindly, but they also want low food prices, and it is difficult to reconcile the tradeoff between animal well-being and food prices in the grocery store and/or in referendums.  For these reasons, the farm animal welfare debate is a messy, contradictory debate—the trademark of a democratic process.

Although consumer attitudes can be elusive to identify, research has revealed a few facts.  The most important fact to stem from consumer research is that, when consumers are informed about how layers and sows are raised, they consistently state they are willing to pay the higher food prices that would result from better animal care.  This does not imply that regular grocery store shoppers will reflect this level of concern in their willingness-to-pay for food, because the regular grocery store shopper is uninformed. 

However, the farm animal welfare debate is largely a policy debate.  Should we ban colony cages for layers?  Should we ban gestation stalls for sows?  It would seem prudent to base policy on the opinions of informed consumers, as opposed to uninformed consumers.  When employing this prudent procedure, there is little doubt that the ban on cramped animal cages occurring in the European Union and US states is justifi

Yes, it's true. I've posted my comic novel, Animal Cracker, on a site owned by Harper Collins called Authonomy. Those books judged the most popular (by being "backed" by readers) actually have a shot at publication by Harper Collins.

Yes, while my trip to Brazil popularity contest continues, I've entered another. Why do I keep competing in these? Perhaps it's time to return to the shrink. Hmmmmm....

In any case, feel free to read my book. It's all there. I hope you laugh. Here you go: Animal Cracker by Andi Brown

Adrian Morrison, DVM, PhD. is professor emeritus of Behavioral Neuroscience at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Veterinary Medicine.  In his new book An Odyssey With Animals he explores the touchy balance between animal rights and animal welfare.  In the original post below he discusses the various shades of gray in this debate.

Throughout history, humanity has associated with animals in ways that have benefited human beings. Animals have been hunted for food and clothing, accepted at our hearths for companionship, and brought into our fields to produce and provide food. Only during the latter two-thirds of the last century could most people – in the developed, wealthy West — begin to imagine living without animals as part of our daily lives. We were completely dependent on them. As the twentieth century progressed, though, technological advances rendered animals’ visible presence in our lives unnecessary. We can eat a steak without coming close to a living cow, or wear a wool sweater without having to shear any sheep. But now, according to some, we have no need, indeed no right, to interfere in animals’ lives, even to the extent of abandoning their use in life-saving medical research. This belief motivates the animal rights/liberation movement, which follows the thinking of a small group of vocal philosophers.

But what does the term “animal rights” mean in a practical way to most in our society? All of us do use the word “rights” quite commonly: the right to decent, humane treatment when animals are in our charge. This is our obligation as humane human beings. Indeed, this duty is embodied in law, and we can be prosecuted and punished if we ignore it as lawyer/ethicist Jerry Tannenbaum from the University of California-Davis pointed out to me years ago when I was focused on the depredations of the “animal rights movement” against biomedical researchers and blinded to the obvious. Thus, the ongoing debate – and recent violence in some California universities for example – is about a more radical (and unworkable view) of rights. To clarify things in my own mind, I have come up with a ranking of views/behavior from the extreme to the reasonable as I see it.

First, there are those within the animal rights and welfare movement who believe that human life is worth no more than that of other animals. Some of these people damage property, threaten the lives of those who use animals, and even attempt to commit assault or murder in their effort to save animals. This subsection of the animal rights movement has been classified by the FBI as “one of today’s most serious domestic terrorism threats.” They are extremists in the truest sense.

Others in the movement, such as those who condemn the fur industry, engage in stunts like parading naked with signs. Though extreme, these tactics do not, to my mind, constitute extremism—just activism. Unfortunately, there are others who damage stores, throw paint on fur coats, and release mink from farms to die in the wild. They would obviously fit into the first category: extremists.

Then there are those who gather in peaceful (and lawful) protest, or who contribute money to organizations engaged in some of the activities just described, often because they have been fooled by false claims of animal abuse or graphic photographs that have been doctored or taken out of context. Of course, overlaps among these groups are possible, if not likely. I would consider these members of the movement—those who object to animal use but who do not employ extreme measures themselves—to be animal rights and welfare activists (as opposed to extremists).

Then, there are those who use animals but are also involved in efforts to improve the treatment of them. These individuals comprise what I consider to be the animal welfare movement—whether they engage actively through contributions to local humane societies or other good works or simply share the beliefs of those who do. Certainly, I am a member of this group. We think animals have certain claims on us humans when they are under our control, including the right to decent care. Put another way, we believe that, as humans, we have a moral responsibility to treat animals as well as is practically possible.

This position is distinct from the aims of the animal rights/liberation movement, and here I think it is important again, to acknowledge the difference between “animal rights” as envisioned by the movement and “animal welfare.” Those who belong to the animal rights/liberation group believe in severely limiting the way humans use animals, encouraging our removal from the animal world in many ways. Those who belong to the animal welfare group wish to improve animal health and welfare in a number of different contexts.

There are those I place in an extreme animal welfare camp that I consider less than reasonable, though: they object to the idea that many species are “renewable resources” that humans may justifiably use—hunting them for food or fur is one example. They aim to change drastically the way we use animals. On the other hand, I think that animals are a renewable resource and that ensuring animals’ welfare while they are alive, and providing a humane death for a legitimate purpose, is our only charge.

Finally, it is my perception that over the years there has been a noticeable shift toward use of an umbrella term, animal protectionism. I do not favor this designation because, though a noble-sounding banner, it could easily cloak an extremist fringe.

Now, you can decide where you fit in this spectrum.