Do lobsters and crabs have feelings?

Question

Do lobsters and crabs have feelings? A popular natural food store by the name of Whole Foods says they will stop selling live lobsters because it is inhumane. They say that lobsters and crabs have feelings when they are thrown into boiling water. Personally, when I cook a live lobster I put it in the freezer first. It is a fact that they fall asleep in the freezer so they do not feel it when they are boiled. What do you guys think?

Answer 1

ALL animals feel.....you know that.

Answer 2

As a chef, I have cooked a lot of them, I have never seen them react to the boiling water I drop them in, I have never heard them make any noise, at all, so "screaming" is far fetched. As a cook, i do not like to cook small lobsters, I do not like customers who do not respect the lobster. By that I mean, if you are going to order a lobster, make sure you are willing to eat the whole damn thing. Not just the body meat. I hate 'all you can eat lobster" as it brings out the worst in people. Read the book "The secret life of lobsters" very interesting!

Answer 3

Every living thing by definition has "sensitivity", ie the capability to respond to external stimuli, but the arthropods sensory systems are very rudimentary. Lobsters don't really scream when you drop them in boiling water, the air inside their exoskeletons turns to steam quickly and squeals as it squeezes its way out (which may seem even meaner!)

If you are bothered by this, before cooking your lobster you can plunge a sharp knife into its "neck", which will sever the main nerve carrying impulses to the brain. (The legs might still wriggle a bit, but the lobster can no longer "feel" anything because there is no pathway to the brain.)

Answer 4

at least you put yours to sleep before you boil them, which is the kindest thing you can do besides not eating them. i watched a lobster being thrown in a boiling pot when i was younger and it scared me for life since it emitted this high-pitched screaming sound. since then i have never eaten lobster or crab, or any other meat for that matter. they can feel pain and i applaud Whole Foods for their decision.

Answer 5

A lobster has a brain just like any other living, moving creature. They feel pain, yes. But not as much as you might feel it, although this is debatable. I believe people can't really test how much pain lobsters can feel because we don't know how they react to pain. It's basically almost impossible to know. But one thing is for sure, they do feel it when you touch them--- so it only seems obvious they would feel other types of touch, heat-- like cooking them or breaking them in half while still alive.

Horrible!

Answer 6

I never really thought of that, but good point. I mean, I'm against killing animals for meat altogether (I'm a vegetarian), and it's unfair that they pubicly execute the lobster, yet they abstain from cow slaughtering. I mean, both suffer pain. Then again, cows would take more work to slaughter and would cause a lot of gore, which parents would be antsy aboot it. Of course, that's no excuse to kill them, certain people aer just apathetic and don't care aboot animals.

Answer 7

just FYI...lobsters dont scream when you put them in boiling water. The high pitched sound is just steam being pushed between the shell and the meat. Like a tea kettle.

Answer 8

A lobster feels just as much pain as a head of lettuce.

Answer 9

they have a tough exterior but I would imagine that the do have feelings cause it appears the try to escape the hot boiling water when thrown in.

thanks for that little tip on putting them in the frezzer first.

and if whole foods is going to stop selling them thinking it's inhumane cause they have feeling- do they think about the cow, chicken and fish- please- we all gotta eat and unfortuantly for the most part it is at an animals life expense

Answer 10

someone else is only gonna eat it, why not you?
as if you really give thought to what particular cow your big mac came from. poor guys get slaughtered, period, but we still enjoy incorporating beef in our everyday lives without acknowledging the idea that the cow was panicing if fear for its life as it was cut to shreds. but thats the way things have always worked, even in indigenous tribes untainted from modern society the rule still applies, eat what you kill
so why stress about the lobster, i'm sure a higher life form would treat us the same

Answer 11

I'm not sure about the lobster, but I know it really pisses the crabs off when you wash them in RITZ.