Boiling Lobster

Lobster Pain Followup - As a followup to a post of mine LINK to my blog. It seems there is some disagreement about Lobsters feeling pain.

A Switzerland law went into effect March 1, 2018 that bans the common cooking method of tossing a live lobster into a big pot of boiling water, quickly killing the tasty crustacean. That practice is outlawed because the Swiss say it is cruel and lobsters can sense pain.

The first national legislation of its kind in the world calls for a more humane death for lobsters, by “rendering them unconscious” before plunging them into scalding water. Two methods are recommended: Electrocution or sedating the lobster by dipping it into salt water and then thrusting a knife into its brain.

The new lobster legislation that boils down to a pain-free death was driven by research, including a study by Queen’s University in Belfast that found crustaceans are sentient creatures. “These studies show that lobsters, like other animals, experience pain and distress,” said Stefan Kunfermann, a spokesman for the Federal Office of Food Safety and Veterinary Affairs.

Animal Pain

Animals with simple nervous systems, like lobsters, snails and worms, do not have the ability to process emotional information and therefore do not experience suffering, say most researchers.

Vertebrates with spines have much more advanced nervous systems and can feel real pain and suffering.

The research regarding whether or not lobsters feel pain is still inconclusive. The hiss that sounds when crustaceans hit the boiling water is not a scream. They do not have vocal cords.

Origins of Things

The famous Hollywood sign was originally a real estate ad.


Gender color of pink for boys and blue for girls was an early 1900s department store way to advertise clothing colors. Customers did not like the choice, so the store changed to blue for boys and pink for girls.

Sweetest Day tradition was started by a panel of candy company owners in the early 1920s as a way to boost sales of candy. Contrary to the notion that many people still think it was started by greeting card companies.

Deodorants were not used until Edna Murphey came along. She had an antiperspirant/deodorant product that her father had used in surgery, to keep his hands from sweating. She got the help of an ad agency and started a marketing campaign to convince people that being sweaty and smelly was absolutely the height of social embarrassment. It worked.

Lobster was once considered a poor person’s food. There was an overabundance of it. Indentured servants complained about getting so much lobster that rules were established limiting it to only three meals per week.


As canneries on the coasts became bigger and figured out how to send lobster throughout the country. They began to market it as an exotic delicacy. Before long, demand skyrocketed and the price did also.

Immortal Lobster Myth

Photos of lobsters can be found at many sites on the net with captions calling the crustaceans biologically immortal. A 2007 news story that reported that lobsters do not show typical signs of senescence, the process of growing older. The report said that lobsters do not age the way other living creatures do, because they do not lower their reproductive ability, slow their metabolism, or decrease in strength.

It is true that lobsters continue reproducing, and growing until the end. Like most decapod crustaceans, which also include crayfish and shrimp, they have indeterminate growth. That means they do not reach a set size limit in their lifetimes, continuing to grow until they die. Previous research has suggested that the biggest European lobster males in the wild live an average of 31 years, and the females an average of 54 years.

According to the Animal Aging and Longevity Database, other organisms with negligible aging includes: Rougheye rockfish  – 205 years, Painted turtle – 61 years, Blanding's turtle – 77 years, Eastern box turtle – 138 years, and Red sea urchin – 200 years, among others.

Seven Interesting Facts

Coke would be green if coloring was not added.
An average hummingbird weighs less than a penny.
The total weight of ants on earth is greater than the total weight of humans.
The average person is one percent shorter in the evening.
Half of all people in history aged 65 or older are still living.
Frozen lobsters can come back to life when thawed (they do not squeal when being boiled).
Eyes remain the same size from birth, but the nose and ears never stop growing.

Lobster Colors

Before you cook a lobster it looks grey-blue, and when you cook it, it turns pink. It does not really change color, the red pigment is already there, but is surrounded by the grey and blue pigments. When those pigments are heated they are destroyed. The red pigments take the heat and remain.