Many animals (spiders, cephalopods, adult salamanders, beetles, etc.) are asocial except for mating. If feeling was exapted for other functions, in what sense is it original? — felt rather than just “functed“?  This has been dubbed the “hard problem.” Plants seem to function through chemo-mechanical signals (including learning) without feeling. Can we take feeling as given and only ask about its function? Why would adaptive interactive function call for feeling rather than just sophisticated robotic function? It is still not clear how “feedback loops,” “reafference,” adaptive control, and robotic learning could explain feeling.
Stevan Harnad