Will science ever find a way to quantify pain?

[ralphc1]

It seems that people don't feel pain in the same way. Some are crippled by even slight pain and some can withstand what appears to be extreme pain. Doctors currently use a pain scale of 1-10 with 1 being slight pain and 10 being the worst pain you have ever felt. That is a rather subjective scale and very much depends on a person's life experience.

Pain should be electrical impulses from nerves that are sent to the brain. They can collect electrical data on the heart. It seems that the same should be possible with pain.

I found one study in the New England Journal of Medicine from 2013 where brain wave were studied while using heat as a stimulus.

Persistent pain is measured by means of self-report, the sole reliance on which hampers diagnosis and treatment. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) holds promise for identifying objective measures of pain, but brain measures that are sensitive and specific to physical pain have not yet been identified.

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1204471

There doesn't seem to be any follow up to this research.

There are some people who never feel pain at all and it seems like they could be compared to find out where the pain signal is transmitted and received.

There are times when things happen that we know are going to hurt but it takes time before the pain is felt.

We know that there are drugs that can eliminate or dull the pain that is felt. The human brain seems to be able to ignore pain. I know that if I have pain that goes on for some time, my brain seems to cancel it out but I become very tired and my digestion is upset to the point that I don't eat.

I would be interested to know how my pain compares to others pain. I try to avoid taking any drugs for pain.

There are people who go to doctors with pin that doctors can't find any physical reason for and it becomes difficult to tell if there is real pain or if the patient is just trying to get drugs.

Fibromyalgia is a condition where doctors have used magnetic resonance imaging to find changes in the brain that they believe amplifies pain signals.

It seems like it should be possible to track down the pain signals from the nerves.

 

[Streeter]

Why not just work on perfecting down loading n up loading consciousness that way we are immortal with synthetic bodies that also feel no pain..

 

[Panty Raider]

Pain is subjective to no.

Now someone can say if we take this reading of brain or nerve reaction and call it pain in X units, but not really the same thing as objective measurement. Yes, the measurement can be objective but associating it to pain in that way is subjective.

Why not just work on perfecting down loading n up loading consciousness that way we are immortal with synthetic bodies that also feel no pain..

we don't even have a scientific model for consciousness yet so it would be impossible to upload it.

 

[Belaya Smert]

If you mess your self up real bad the EMT or whoever will ask you to rate your pain on a scale from 1-10. Assuming you are conscious.

 

[dc007]

If you mess your self up real bad the EMT or whoever will ask you to rate your pain on a scale from 1-10. Assuming you are conscious.

But that's still subjective. I cut my finger on a broken glass down to the bone two years ago. When I went to the ER, he asked that question and I said 1. He seemed surprised so I told him "pain don't hurt"

 

[ralphc1]

If you mess your self up real bad the EMT or whoever will ask you to rate your pain on a scale from 1-10. Assuming you are conscious.

That was in the opening post. I said that is a very subjective method based on the type of pain a person has been exposed to in their life. If a person has never experienced any kind of trauma in life, any pain would rate a 10 as the worst they've ever felt.

 

[ralphc1]

But that's still subjective. I cut my finger on a broken glass down to the bone two years ago. When I went to the ER, he asked that question and I said 1. He seemed surprised so I told him "pain don't hurt"

Very true. Some people would be screaming in pain while others don't think it's too bad. When I would cut my fingers, I'd pour peroxide on and wrap it with some electrical tape just so I didn't drip blood everywhere. I had a full body scan done when I was about 50 and I was asked how I broke my ribs and tibia. I told them I had no idea that they were ever broken.

 

[Belaya Smert]

But that's still subjective. I cut my finger on a broken glass down to the bone two years ago. When I went to the ER, he asked that question and I said 1. He seemed surprised so I told him "pain don't hurt"

That would most likely be a byproduct of shock.

 

[Ares Black]

Count Rugen aka The Six-Fingered Man was working on exactly this subject.

 

[Belaya Smert]

That was in the opening post. I said that is a very subjective method based on the type of pain a person has been exposed to in their life. If a person has never experienced any kind of trauma in life, any pain would rate a 10 as the worst they've ever felt.

Maybe if you’re a girl about it. Kidney Stones vs Child Birth seems like the two strongest examples.

 

[William Huggins]

No, pain is literally all in your head and the brain can be tricked in to thinking there's pain.

 

[dc007]

That would most likely be a byproduct of shock.

I think it was a byproduct of my inner Roadhouse.

 

[Panty Raider]

No, pain is literally all in your head and the brain can be tricked in to thinking there's pain.

It is your body's defense mechanism. It is saying get this shit to stop before you suffer permanent damage or death. It is something that makes sense to evolve biologically. You are less likely to pass on your genetic material if you can't tell that you are being damaged seriously.

 

[Long Dark Blues]

Pain is subjective, there is no objective experience other than the binary: yes there is pain or no there isn't pain. The level of said pain that is experienced is subjective.

This does about as good a job as there can be in quantifying pain:

 

[William Huggins]

It is your body's defense mechanism. It is saying get this shit to stop before you suffer permanent damage or death. It is something that makes sense to evolve biologically. You are less likely to pass on your genetic material if you can't tell that you are being damaged seriously.

Yes but the brain can be tricked in to feeling pain when there's no damage at all and pain can be controlled by the mind or made worse........

 

[Belaya Smert]

I think it was a byproduct of my inner Roadhouse.

On a scale of Roadhouse to Dirty Dancing to Ghost. How would you rate the pain now?

 

[Panty Raider]

On a scale of Roadhouse to Dirty Dancing to Ghost. How would you rate the pain now?

Bodhi getting crushed on that final wave

 

[dc007]

On a scale of Roadhouse to Dirty Dancing to Ghost. How would you rate the pain now?

Dead Swayze from Ghost.

 

[Belaya Smert]

Dead Swayze from Ghost.

Pancreatic Cancer that’s an 11

 

[dc007]

Pancreatic Cancer that’s an 11