Fish Feel Pain!: Scrutiny of a Dogma

Fish feel pain is the battle cry of animal rights zealots who would love to see a ban on recreational fishing and all other use of fish by humans. This radicalism is rooted in research purporting to demonstrate beyond doubt that fish and aquatic invertebrates are capable of experiencing pain, suffering and other mental states. The fish feel pain claim is widely accepted by movers, shakers and opinion leaders with a leaning to animal rights. Many countries all over the world legislations now recognize fish as 'sentient' beings. The actual and potential consequences produced by legislation based on the fish feel pain claim produce environmental lose (fish) - lose (humans) situations and in terms of economics and food security dire outlooks.

Although the fish feel pain question has been around for a while, the scientific claim to fish pain dates back to 2003. Ever since there have been believers and sceptics in the scientific community. The believers have at this moment in time the upper hand because animal rights philosophers and activists joined the debate. They morphed an open scientific question into an ethical one and the underlying dogma is 'fish feel pain'.

This book scrutinizes the fish feel pain claim from a historical, philosophical, scientific and practical angle. It exposes the dogmatic, misanthropic and pessimistic foundation of animal rights and the flaws of the the fish feel pain science. It highlights instead a pragmatic fish- and human friendly perspective.