[FRIAM] A Question For Tomorrow

[Nick Thompson]

Steve, 

 

Oh, all right.  Threat of damage.  I am truly puzzled by the function of pain.  I mean, pain in my ankle causes me to favor my ankle.  But what good is gut pain?  Or headaches, for instance.  Clearly, from an evolutionary standpoint, the function of pain must be what it leads you to do.  My heart pain was in my elbow.  What’s with that?  

 

Well, you say; the body can’t get everything right.  But those mistakes seem really bonehead ones.  

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf Of Steven A Smith
Sent: Sunday, April 28, 2019 10:37 PM
To: friam at redfish.com
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] A Question For Tomorrow

 

Nick -

>I think of “pain” as a damage sensor.  

I think of "pain" as a "threat" indicator.  A great deal of the pain I've experienced in my life was not really commensurate with the damage that has already occurred.   

Touching a hot stove doesn't always lead to significant damage if you react quickly to the pain.

In my late teens, I had a dentist tell me that the "pain" I was feeling from his drill was really from the *heat* of the drill, not direct damage to any nerve.   I had complained that the novacaine was more disturbing than anything I felt when he was working on me.  He said "I can do it without novacaine next time, if you prefer".  He said that the time he saves not waiting for the novacaine to kick in allows him to run the drill at a lower speed and go more carefully/slowly and that if I was willing to signal him if I began to feel pain by raising a hand and promised not to panic, he would prefer that.  Sure enough, It worked and I haven't had novacaine since excepting one root canal.  Most dentists seem perfectly familiar with this alternative.   The dentist who did the root canal *promised* me that no matter how slow she went, the process of killing and cleaning out the root would be the most excruciating pain I ever felt without novacaine.  I didn't argue.  I felt more than a little during the deep file-plunging.  

I don't associate a headache with "damage" though I do acknowledge it as some kind of warning... often nothing more than mild dehydration.   I could pop a few ibuprofen and ignore the pain or I could drink a glass or two of water and take the lesson my body was offering me.    A concussion or tumor or aneurism?  A different matter I suppose.

I *HATE* ice-cream headaches, even though I know they will pass quickly if I quite gulping it down.  My partner Mary doesn't get ice-cream headaches, in her case the same class of pain settled under one of her shoulder blades.  Once again, a glass of water is a good remedy for me...

I have never had "phantom pain" but that is another example I think of how Pain != Damage?

Glad to Frank's surgery (apparently) went well.   I hope he's back on the Tennis Court soon!

 - Steve

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