Without the reference to the Sasquatch I wouldn’t have figured out this is made up. Well done
The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
61–70 of 177 posts
Re: The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
#62Let's not forget the ice worms: Ice Worms and Their Habitats on North Cascade Glaciers https://glaciers.nichols.edu/iceworm/ and the Australian Drop Bear https://australian.museum/learn/animals/mammals/drop-bear/
Aren't iceworms real though?
Ya if you spend time on Cascade glaciers you'll see them wiggling. Pretty common.
Re: The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
#63I don't mean to spoil the fun, downvote me if this is not in the spirit, but it took me way too long to figure this out and others may be as slow as me and save some time by reading this comment: > The Pacific Northwest tree octopus is an Internet hoax created in 1998 by a humor writer under the pseudonym Lyle Zapato. Since its creation, the Pacific Northwest tree octopus website has been commonly referenced in Inter…
> has been used in multiple studies demonstrating children's gullibility
And not to make everything about this, but in light of this, interpret various currently fashionable and harmful pseudoscientific ideologies being peddled in schools and backed by the force of the regime.
Children are very gullible. That's one major reason why they need parents, to protect them from predation and to guide them toward the minimum of adulthood. Worse still when parents themselves buy into these ideologies.
Re: The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
#64I don't mean to spoil the fun, downvote me if this is not in the spirit, but it took me way too long to figure this out and others may be as slow as me and save some time by reading this comment: > The Pacific Northwest tree octopus is an Internet hoax created in 1998 by a humor writer under the pseudonym Lyle Zapato. Since its creation, the Pacific Northwest tree octopus website has been commonly referenced in Inter…
> I don't mean to spoil the fun, downvote me if this is not in the spirit, but it took me way too long to figure this out and others may be as slow as me and save some time by reading this comment: I believed it too. The thing is, this is something no one is really incentivized to lie about. If some website says "politician did X", then your lie detector turns on, because it's worth it for lots of websites to lie or…
> The thing is, this is something no one is really incentivized to lie about. If some website says "politician did X", then your lie detector turns on, because it's worth it for lots of websites to lie or mislead about that.
The purpose of misleading about “politician did X” is to sell a call to action. Any time there is a call to action supported by a claim, there is an obvious motivation for misrepresentation (the very same one present when “politicia did X” is the claim.) This contains a call to action, ergo, it has an obvious motivation for misrepresentation.
> I don't think it demonstrates much that students believed it.
I think it demonstrates a lot that half of 13-year-old students in the US study believed a page which referenced a fictitious nation-state in the Pacific Northwest was reliable, leaving aside the other indicia of deception. Though whether what it says is about internet literacy or complete failure of education on geography perhaps less clear.
Re: The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
#65Re: The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I don't mean to spoil the fun, downvote me if this is not in the spirit, but it took me way too long to figure this out and others may be as slow as me and save some time by reading this comment: I believed it too. The thing is, this is something no one is really incentivized to lie about. If some website says "politician did X", then your lie detector turns on, because it's worth it for lots of websites to lie or…
Add in that the animal world is full of wacky creatures that don't fit heuristic models for plausibility. People thought the Platypus was a hoax was it was initially discovered. It is real.
> Add in that the animal world is full of wacky creatures that don't fit heuristic models for plausibility.
The animal involved not meeting heuristic models for plausibility may be something that should trigger skepticism, but its not the thing that should tell you this is a lie.
Re: The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
Add in that the animal world is full of wacky creatures that don't fit heuristic models for plausibility. People thought the Platypus was a hoax was it was initially discovered. It is real.
Add the propensity to colloquially grant newly discovered things names that borrow from existing things: sea cow, catfish, etc. so why couldn’t there be something called a tree octopus?
> Add the propensity to colloquially grant newly discovered things names that borrow from existing things: sea cow, catfish, etc. so why couldn’t there be something called a tree octopus?
There could be. The name of the animal isn't what gives the lie away.
Re: The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
#68I don't mean to spoil the fun, downvote me if this is not in the spirit, but it took me way too long to figure this out and others may be as slow as me and save some time by reading this comment: > The Pacific Northwest tree octopus is an Internet hoax created in 1998 by a humor writer under the pseudonym Lyle Zapato. Since its creation, the Pacific Northwest tree octopus website has been commonly referenced in Inter…
Unfortunately the campaign was unsuccessful and octopus paxarboli went extinct not long after the page first was published, before internet access was common and before smartphones could easily take pictures of it etc. Just because there's minimal evidence of something from before the internet, on the internet, doesn't make it a hoax.
> Unfortunately the campaign was unsuccessful and octopus paxarboli went extinct not long after the page first was published,
Largely, the campaign failed because of the joint US/Canadian invasion of the Republic of Cascadia based on (ironically, false) claims of Weapons of Media Deception (WMD) being deployed with imminent plans for use against North American civilian targets.
Re: The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
#69There was a Discovery Channel special about future evolution that took this idea and ran with it. They had an idea of octopi being more land dwelling and becoming the dominant species.
Re: The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
Add in that the animal world is full of wacky creatures that don't fit heuristic models for plausibility. People thought the Platypus was a hoax was it was initially discovered. It is real.
People still call the dropbear a hoax.
Is it not? The Wikipedia article literally has in the tagline: famous hoax…