The brain is weird and whacky the way it works. It has a sort of auto-gain. The less nerve stimulus over time leads to a higher sensitivity of remaining nerves. Often when people lose a limb, they still feel pain in it - the lack of nerve signals causes the remaining nerve endings to be amplified so much that despite not even having pain receptors, the noise signals are perceived as pain. So a human growing up with a cut forskin simply adapts and the brain perceives more sensitivity from the other nerves to produce the same levels of sensation.
Comment on type shit
SwingingTheLamp@piefed.zip 1 day agoThat is non-figuratively impossible. You can’t feel anything with nerve endings that have been removed.
CannonFodder@lemmy.world 1 day ago
wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 3 hours ago
So a human growing up with a cut foreskin simply adapts and the brain perceives more sensitivity from the other nerves to produce the same levels of sensation.
That is just false. You sound like someone who isn’t circumcised.
Without the foreskin intact, the glans is subject to friction throughout the day as it’s in contact with the inside of one’s clothes. This reduces sensitivity over time and builds thicker, drier, and rougher layers of skin. Whereas the glans of an uncircumcised penis is basically a mucus membrane, on a circumcised penis it’s more like the skin of a knuckle, but thicker.
SwingingTheLamp@piefed.zip 23 hours ago
That, uhh, sounds nice and all, but I don’t believe it. This doesn’t even make sense on the face of it: Why does removing one body part lead to phantom pain signals, but removing another body part lead to improved sensation? Do people who lose fingers develop better sensation in their remaining fingers to compensate? Wouldn’t it stand to reason then that some men would get phantom foreskin pain?
CannonFodder@lemmy.world 22 hours ago
There’s plenty of signals coming from the nerve bundles in the area. Phantom pain seems to need larger sets of nerve bundles removed/unstimulated. Is s not fully understood, but that seems to be how it works. People who lose fingers often do get increased sensitivity on other fingers and they can also get phantom pain.
SwingingTheLamp@piefed.zip 21 hours ago
Again, I have to express doubt. I understand brain plasticity, and why some people can read Braille, while I cannot. (I haven’t put in the work.) Sensory receptors are specific to certain functions, though, and one type cannot assume the function of another if it’s not present. Nobody can read Braille on their lower back, because it lacks fine-touch receptors.
I did read a study which made a good point about perceived intensity of sensation not correlating with number of sensory receptors. I can understand why circumcision may not affect many men. However, I stand by my statement that you cannot perceive sensation from receptors that are gone. WRT the original comment, there are some men who do experience lowered or absent sexual sensation due to circumcision. Perhaps their brains are attuned to those receptors that are gone. Also, later in life sensory perception of all kinds naturally begins to fade, and the number of missing receptors become more evident.
mr_satan@lemmy.zip 13 hours ago
Nerve endings in the foreskin are not that sensitive to sexual stimuli, I would consider that as much loss of sensitivity as amputating a leg is loss of sensitivity.
wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz 3 hours ago
Even the glans loses sensitivity. On an uncircumcised penis, that whole area is basically a mucus membrane. On a circumcised penis, it becomes dry an rougher, like the skin on your knuckle. It absolutely does reduce sensitivity.
Also,
You wouldn’t say doctors should amputate babies’ legs to reduce risk of gangrene, would you? How is that even an argument? “Oh, those nerve endings don’t matter cause it’s just like losing a leg, nbd.” What the fuck?