Pain is the interpretation of nociception by consciousness, which also interprets olfactory sensation as smell, optic sensation as sight, auditory sensation and sound, and so forth. Consciousness combines all forms of sensation with memory to formulate a computer-like representation of the surrounding environment that explains awareness. Anesthetics abolish consciousness in a dose-related manner, which extinguishes the ability to perceive nociception as pain long before it eliminates the ability to speak coherently. This conveys the misleading impression that anesthesia has analgesic properties, but harmful nociception continues to activate sympathetic ganglia via spinal cord pathways regardless of anesthsia. This explains why anesthesia must be supplemented with analgesia to optimize surgical outcome and prevent the surgical stress syndrome. www.stressmechanism.com