Pain
While large mechanosensory neurons such as type I/group Aß display adaptation, smaller type IV/group C nociceptive neurons do not. As a result, pain does not usually subside rapidly but persists for long periods of time; in contrast, one quickly stops receiving touch or sensory information if surroundings remain constant.
Read more about this topic: Neural Adaptation
Famous quotes containing the word pain:
“For pain is perhaps but a violent pleasure? Who could determine the point where pleasure becomes pain, where pain is still a pleasure? Is not the utmost brightness of the ideal world soothing to us, while the lightest shadows of the physical world annoy?”
—Honoré De Balzac (1799–1850)
“The fox, he felt, had never seen his past disposed of like a fall of water. He had never measured off his day in moments: another—another—another. But now, thrown down so deeply in himself, into the darkness of the well, surprised by pain and hunger, might he not revert to an earlier condition, regain capacities which formerly were useless to him, pass from animal to Henry, become human in his prison, X his days, count, wait, listen for another—another—another—another?”
—William Gass (b. 1924)
“This is a pain I mostly hide,
but ties of blood, or seed endure,
and even now I feel inside
the hunger for his outstretched hand,
a man’s embrace to take me in,
the need for just a word of praise.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)