Boiling lobsters while they are alive and conscious will be banned as part of a government strategy to improve animal welfare in England.
Government ministers say that “live boiling is not an acceptable killing method” for crustaceans and alternative guidance will be published.
The practice is already illegal in Switzerland, Norway and New Zealand. Animal welfare charities say that stunning lobsters with an electric gun or chilling them in cold air or ice before boiling them is more humane.
Do plants feel pain the way a lobster would? I genuinely don’t know.
I do know that making an animal suffer rather than giving it a quick death is wrong.
From what I’ve read so far, unfortunately, it seems like they might. Plants can communicate with each other and form underground resource networks with other plants, fungi, and microorganisms. Including for illness, boring bugs and pain responses. The smell of fresh cut grass is one of those warning/pain responses.
I’ve wanted to do some bonsai succulents, but the process towards any living thing seems cruel and painful.
You only quoted part of their question. Yes, plants react to pain, but that doesn’t mean they feel pain the same way a lobster does.
We cannot measure pain for neither plants nor animals. You presuppose the feelings of the animal while at the same time rejecting it for the plant when we really do not know.
Do they require a nervous system? Maybe. To what extent? We do not know.
No, I’m simply going by my best guess, informed by what I know about the current state of research. That’s not conclusive evidence, but it is morally incredibly hard to argue against it.
After all, I cannot measure pain for humans besides myself. You may just be a philosophical zombie. When I’m treating you like you can experience pain, I’m presupposing your feelings. What if you’re programmed to act scared of pain & secretly wish to experience it?
I do not know. Does that mean you may have a lesser pain experience than plants? How should that affect my decision making?
No, you are at best basing your opinion on measured pain response in order to determine the level of pain experienced. Many animals have a measured pain reaction. You also know of your own experienced pain and assume it in other people and animals while excluding plants.
The first part is scientific and the second is not. The problem is that you are acting like your belief about how animals feel pain is qualitatively different from the above regarding plants.
We both know why you get agressive about it: You want to some extent anthropomorphize animals because you care about them, which is ok, but not scientific.
Now this I can agree with.