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Times Life
Times Life
Aishwarya Kapoor

Do Insects Feel Pain? What Neuroscience Reveals About Insect Sentience and Animal Suffering

The nervous system that wasn't supposed to matter

A fruit fly injected with a small dose of acid will drag the affected limb, avoid using it, and protect it from further contact. That behaviour has a name in biology: nociception. It is the detection of damaging stimuli by specialised sensory neurons, and it is the same foundational mechanism that tells your hand to pull away from a flame before your brain has consciously registered heat.

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