 Tweet Hundreds of years ago, the forefathers of modern medicine performed live dissections on monkeys and other animals, peeling away layers of skin and muscle to observe the operating organs deep inside. The screams and cries of the animals were thought to be just reflexes. Today, it's common sense that all mammals feel and experience pain, but it has also been long believed that fish and other forms of animal life don't. Fishing isn't cruel, sportsmen have argued, because the fish don't have the brain power to really experience pain. New research demolishes that flawed belief. Fish do feel and experience pain. They may not be as smart as primates, but they're not so stupid that they can't feel a hook ripping their digestive organs out through their mouths. Naturally, sportsmen are screaming bloody murder at this. Or, actually, they're screaming that fishing is not bloody murder. It's just an innocent sport, something you do with the family. Something you do to bond with nature. Hunters cite the exact same arguments. 'Deer don't feel any pain,' they insist. Although, in truth, it takes a rather imaginative distortion of reality to insist that a mammal running through the woods, leaving a trail of fresh blood two miles long, somehow didn't feel anything. In time, as additional research like this emerges, more people will begin to ask the important question: 'Why is maiming animals for entertainment still legal in a civilized society?' Analysis: Fish feel pain. Fishermen disagree. Expect to see more people questioning the 'sports' of fishing and hunting as more research like this emerges. 