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Hesiod in his Works and Days (c. 700 BC) talks about the behaviour of octopuses, saying that when octopuses get hungry they will eat their own tentacles. Amazingly, Hesiod was right about this behaviour (octopuses do sometimes eat their own tentacles) but it's not because they're hungry, but because they're stressed.
How does the octopus persuade the tentacles to allow themselves to get eaten? :)
Hesiod in his Works and Days (c. 700 BC) talks about the behaviour of octopuses, saying that when octopuses get hungry they will eat their own tentacles. Amazingly, Hesiod was right about this behaviour (octopuses do sometimes eat their own tentacles) but it's not because they're hungry, but because they're stressed.
Why is eating your tentacle useful when "stressed"? Eating your tentacle is a net negative in "calories" long term, and there is probably the opportunity cost of not having said tentacle (for some time?) I guess maybe they want a quick snack for the high energy jet propulsion predator escape that they are preparing for when stressed. But then Hesoid is kid of right, they do eat it because they need more energy.
I read these articles about octopuses, and then lament the fact that we hunt them down and eat them. Given all of the other sources of nourishment available to us, why eat them?
Hesiod in his Works and Days (c. 700 BC) talks about the behaviour of octopuses, saying that when octopuses get hungry they will eat their own tentacles. Amazingly, Hesiod was right about this behaviour (octopuses do sometimes eat their own tentacles) but it's not because they're hungry, but because they're stressed.
> Amazingly, Hesiod was right about this behaviour I don't see why this is a surprise.
Hesiod in his Works and Days (c. 700 BC) talks about the behaviour of octopuses, saying that when octopuses get hungry they will eat their own tentacles. Amazingly, Hesiod was right about this behaviour (octopuses do sometimes eat their own tentacles) but it's not because they're hungry, but because they're stressed.
Why is eating your tentacle useful when "stressed"? Eating your tentacle is a net negative in "calories" long term, and there is probably the opportunity cost of not having said tentacle (for some time?) I guess maybe they want a quick snack for the high energy jet propulsion predator escape that they are preparing for when stressed. But then Hesoid is kid of right, they do eat it because they need more energy.
Hesiod in his Works and Days (c. 700 BC) talks about the behaviour of octopuses, saying that when octopuses get hungry they will eat their own tentacles. Amazingly, Hesiod was right about this behaviour (octopuses do sometimes eat their own tentacles) but it's not because they're hungry, but because they're stressed.
Why is eating your tentacle useful when "stressed"? Eating your tentacle is a net negative in "calories" long term, and there is probably the opportunity cost of not having said tentacle (for some time?) I guess maybe they want a quick snack for the high energy jet propulsion predator escape that they are preparing for when stressed. But then Hesoid is kid of right, they do eat it because they need more energy.
Octopi are remarkably intelligent creatures, as any good aquarium owner will tell you.
An even better aquarium owner wouldn't have them at all. My Octopus Teacher is a fantastic look into the life of an octopus, their intellectual capacity, and their propensity to interact with humans.
I was watching Clint's Reptiles on Youtube where he's reviewing an octopus staying at an aquarium. It gets all the food it needs, entertainment via puzzles, interaction with the keepers etc. For an octopus it seemed like a very safe and easy life as compared to the wild.
Now the real questions would be if whether they prefer to migrate around or stay in one place. If they prefer one safe place, then perhaps given this safe aquarium space they'd choose to stay in it?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why is eating your tentacle useful when "stressed"? Eating your tentacle is a net negative in "calories" long term, and there is probably the opportunity cost of not having said tentacle (for some time?) I guess maybe they want a quick snack for the high energy jet propulsion predator escape that they are preparing for when stressed. But then Hesoid is kid of right, they do eat it because they need more energy.
It's a misunderstanding that evolution leads to only positive behaviours remaining. Eating your own tentacles might be similar to humans cutting themselves, or the stress response behaviours spillover by zoo animals: a spillover réaction that turns adaptive behavioural patterns (eating) into maladaptive (eating yourself)
Evolution predicts that self-harming behaviour will be observed less frequently compared to self benefitting behaviours.
So whenever an apparently self-harming behaviour is observed it is quite useful to ask: "is it really self-harm or secretly useful somehow?". And also: "how often does that really happen?"
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The notion of sentience is something that's unsurprisingly well-trodden in both philosophy and neuroscience. Your statements presumes that such is flippant. While there's not a single well-agreed on definition, there are different things like ability to see and project oneself into the future and to assign value to those projections, the ability to empathize, the ability to miss things that are no longer there, etc.…
Something to remember about the MSR test. The high level conclusion that we draw from it is a large leap from what the experiment is able to show and we haven’t been able to distinguish it from any number of plausible theories. For example, I caught my dog looking at me through the mirror in the room when she didn’t have direct line of sight and we were the only two in the room and I was talking in ways that would ge…
Are there MSR tests that used windows to other animals instead mirrors as a control?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd be pretty surprised if I saw a guy eating his hands.
I mean, I do it. (Less now than I used to.) The amount of flesh I take off is unnoticeable visually or as a percentage of my hand. But more to the point, if somebody from a coastal, extensively seafaring culture 2700 years ago says octopi sometimes eat their own tentacles, there is every reason to believe he's saying it because it's true. The options are (I) octopi sometimes eat their own tentacles, as advertised; (I…