February 15, 2005
EVEN GOD HATES THEM (via Bryan Francoeur):
Study: Unlikely lobsters feel pain in boiling water (AP, 2/15/05)
A new study out of Norway concludes it's unlikely lobsters feel pain, stirring up a long-simmering debate over whether Maine's most valuable seafood suffers when it's being cooked.Animal activists for years have claimed that lobsters are in agony when being cooked, and that dropping one in a pot of boiling water is tantamount to torture.
The study, funded by the Norwegian government and written by a scientist at the University of Oslo, suggests lobsters and other invertebrates such as crabs, snails and worms probably don't suffer even if lobsters do tend to thrash in boiling water.
"Lobsters and crabs have some capacity of learning, but it is unlikely that they can feel pain," concluded the 39-page report, aimed at determining if creatures without backbones should be subject to animal welfare legislation as Norway revises its animal welfare law.
We had a wonderful psychology professor at Colgate who had spent his entire career studying crayfish and their learning capacity. He brought his main experiment to class one day and demonstrated it. There was a box in the shape of a "Y" and he'd place a crawdad at the base of the letter. In one arm of the Y was a light and some food while the other was dark. He'd let them crawl to one or the other and then see if they could learn to go to the light. He informed us that: "After twenty plus years of running this experiment, I can with some confidence state that these godforsaken creatures are ineducable."
I don't eat seafood, but ever since then I've liked dropping crustaceans in the boiling pot with a : "This is for Professor Longo."
Posted by Orrin Judd at February 15, 2005 2:07 PMShrimp are truly ugly creatures, and I have therefore made it my life's work to consume them into extinction. If you wish to join me in this endeavour, I particularly recommend the Shrimp Creole at this place or a nice ginger sesame stir fry.
Posted by: Mike Morley at February 15, 2005 2:16 PMShrimp are fast little buggers, though. One day while I was in Japan, I had some very fresh sushi which came straight from the fish tank. The guy didn't try to catch the shrimp. Instead, he put the net at the other end of the tank and then poked at the shrimp. They zipped scross the tank in a flash, right in to the net and thence to my plate.
Posted by: Annoying Old Guy at February 15, 2005 2:25 PMWell, for those of us who do eat fish, and really enjoy lobster, this bit of news is well received. Not only will Norwegian fretters rest easy but the dreadful advance of these unbalanced biophiles will be arrested http://www.peta.org/mc/NewsItem.asp?id=5906
Posted by: Luciferous at February 15, 2005 3:54 PMI'm offering a hundred bucks for any picture of Orrin dining out on shrimp and wine at a Quebec ski resort.
Posted by: Peter B at February 15, 2005 4:18 PMUnfortunately, in 4 years at Colgate OJ also never learned to crawl towards light...although he had no problem dragging himself to a keg of beer...
Posted by: Foos at February 15, 2005 4:19 PMLight is a tool of Satan. If God had wanted it bright all the time he'd not have had the sun's orbit take it behind us for half the day.
Posted by: oj at February 15, 2005 4:42 PMPeter: Is that a hundred bucks Canadian?
Posted by: David Cohen at February 15, 2005 4:47 PMDavid:
Nope, real money. I want the challenge to reflect my undying respect for Orrin.
Posted by: Peter B at February 15, 2005 7:22 PMThe reason he couldn't teach them is that they're hardwired to avoid light. They are scavengers, and they rely on darkness to protect themselves from predators.
I've caught them with bacon and chicken meat, but they're very timid and cautious.
Posted by: AST at February 15, 2005 7:29 PMWhy would you put any stock in a science experiment?
Posted by: Semolina at February 15, 2005 7:50 PMAST:
They won't crawl to the dark one for food either. They're just stupid.
Posted by: oj at February 15, 2005 8:16 PMI avoid them (lobsters, crawfish) in observance of the Never Eat Bait Rule. However it seems some folks have taken up the cudgels for them:
Lobster Liberation Front homepage
Posted by: joe shropshire at February 15, 2005 10:05 PMI have been touched by these heroic tales of lobster liberation, and I feel I must make my own contribution. I will therefore immediately establish The Lobster Refuge, where all these liberated lobsters can live in peace for the rest of their days. Send me your liberated lobsters to ensure them everything they deserve.
Hmmm, will they go for a melted butter refuge? Oops, did I say that out loud?
Posted by: David Cohen at February 16, 2005 7:40 AMSo what? Who cares? If God did not want us to eat animals, why did he make them out of meat? People eat tasty animals.
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at February 16, 2005 12:28 PMEating seafood is a blow for independence from our cow masters.
Posted by: David Cohen at February 16, 2005 2:58 PMTruer than you suspsect, David:
Cows With Guns (Flash animation)
Posted by: joe shropshire at February 16, 2005 10:21 PMSince there are not really enough lobsters to go around, I always tell people who ask that they scream when you drop them in the pot.
Years ago, until the first Arab oil embargo put an end to it, I used to buy 2 8-pound lobsters off the dock in Norfolk every payday.
At home, we'd race them and eat the loser.
On Saturdays, we ate the winner.
Posted by: Harry Eagar at February 17, 2005 1:26 AM