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I was wondering whether plants could feel pain, for example, does grass feel pain when you mow the lawn? Or do the plants and trees that grow vegetables and fruits feel pain when you harvest them?

The internet is very vague about it. There are several articles on the internet, but they just say that plants do not feel pain, they only send out a chemical substance. Others say that almost all multicellular organisms feel pain, because pain is defined as any signal of having impaired tissue.

I think that plants can't feel pain because they have no nerves or central nervous system. However I'm not sure whether this means that plants can't feel pain.

Since the question is clear when pain is defined as any signal of having impaired tissue, I think it would be more interesting in the case that pain is defined as actual discomfort, like humans and animals (maybe it should be restricted to Eumetazoa) feel it.

wythagoras
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    You'll have to define what you mean by "pain". If you define it as "a signal informing the organism of damage", then yes, they do. If you refer to pain as your or I would feel it, that's a different matter. – terdon Jul 26 '15 at 11:40
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    Welcome to Biology.SE. The whole issue is around the definition of pain. Tell us what pain is and we'll tell whether plants do have this sensation. I am voting to close as primarily-opinion based. – Remi.b Jul 26 '15 at 19:55
  • @terdon I have added the definition. – wythagoras Jul 26 '15 at 20:02
  • @Remi.b I've added a definition of pain, but I'm unsure what you mean by primarily-opinion based. Can you clarify? – wythagoras Jul 26 '15 at 20:03
  • @wythagoras the Stack Exchange network of sites (to which this site belongs) doesn't do opinion. We're "just the facts, ma'am". A question where multiple answers are valid ("What's your favorite flower") is a bad fit for this site and will be closed as "primarily opinion based". For more on the type of question we deal with, see http://biology.stackexchange.com/help/dont-ask – terdon Jul 26 '15 at 20:05
  • @terdon No, I mean: Why is this question primarily-opinion based? – wythagoras Jul 26 '15 at 20:07
  • I think @Remi.b meant that it was, when it lacked a definition of pain. Now, it's just virtually impossible to answer :). Can anything with no CNS feel pain? Perhaps not but everything alive (just about, and including plants) will try to move away from harm. Does that mean they feel pain? – terdon Jul 26 '15 at 20:10
  • see here for some more: http://biology.stackexchange.com/questions/29776/how-can-we-know-or-measure-pain-in-animals/29803#29803 – aaaaa says reinstate Monica Jul 26 '15 at 20:26
  • I am not quite sure the close vote "primarily-opinion based" is a good fit to this specific case. I definitely meant that the whole question circles around what you mean by pain. It is like asking "is a squirrel a big animal?", it depends on what you mean by big. – Remi.b Jul 26 '15 at 22:49
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    You suggest to define pain as any signal of having impaired tissue. This seems like a perfectly valid definition to me. It seems a bit counter-intuitive but it is valid. I'd suggest to restrict your last paragraph to this specific discussion instead and to get rid of the term pain to say "sensing impaired tissue" instead. It might interest you to open a post on Philosophy.SE to ask for definitions of pain that would be easily apply to any living things. – Remi.b Jul 26 '15 at 22:52

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I think before discussing "pain", we'd probably have to discuss whether plants actually can "feel".

This is also down to how one wants to define this (hence "opinion based"), but I assume most people (?) would equal the lack of a brain/neurons with the lack of the capability to feel. And I presume so do you, as you show by using the tag "neuroscience".

In which case the answer to your question "Can plants feel pain?" is "no", regardless of whether plants react to damage through the release of chemicals or not, and whether one would like to classify this as "pain" or not.

Gerhard
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