# Why are testicles so sensitive?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-testicles-so-sensitive/688804>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [May 20, 2014, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-testicles-so-sensitive/688804 "2014-05-20T05:46:21Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\
**Post date:** [May 20, 2014, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-testicles-so-sensitive/688804/21 "2014-05-20T17:10:21Z")

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> [@TriPolar](#):
>
> It’s not always that much pain. In many situations you won’t feel pain at all from physical harm such as a sharp blow. Martial artists say they can tolerate the pain of a low blow but I’ve never heard one say they don’t feel it.

The point is this: pain is an evolved mechanism to influence the behaviour of an organism. And for that reason, different parts of the body are innervated differently depending on their importance, how they’re used etc.

It makes perfect sense that we can tolerate a lot of blunt trauma and cuts to our limbs because such minor injury would be common, and usually of no long-term consequence. OTOH it makes sense that strikes to the gonads should hurt like hell because that means we take extra care to protect that area.

Now, there are some things that don’t fit the model so well: e.g. tooth ache (bearing in mind that, again, pain and touch sensitivity are not coupled) and headaches.  
But the general idea of why pain exists is not seriously disputed. In fact, I’m not aware of any alternative theories. So it’s just a matter of trying to explain the one or two exceptions.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\
**Post date:** [May 20, 2014, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-testicles-so-sensitive/688804/22 "2014-05-20T20:06:46Z")

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> [@Mijin](#):
>
> The point is this: pain is an evolved mechanism to influence the behaviour of an organism. And for that reason, different parts of the body are innervated differently depending on their importance, how they’re used etc.
> 
> It makes perfect sense that we can tolerate a lot of blunt trauma and cuts to our limbs because such minor injury would be common, and usually of no long-term consequence. OTOH it makes sense that strikes to the gonads should hurt like hell because that means we take extra care to protect that area.
> 
> Now, there are some things that don’t fit the model so well: e.g. tooth ache (bearing in mind that, again, pain and touch sensitivity are not coupled) and headaches.  
> But the general idea of why pain exists is not seriously disputed. In fact, I’m not aware of any alternative theories. So it’s just a matter of trying to explain the one or two exceptions.

Well we are in agreement really. For whatever reason we have external testicles sensitivity is one of the ways to protect them as a dynamic process as opposed to something like a hard shell.

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