A seafood firm wants to farm octopus. Activists say they're too smart for that

Post by maxglute » Thu, Feb 08, 2024, 5:07 PM UTC

SirWart wrote: post #14

I visited an experimental octopus farm in Hawaii once, expecting to come away feeling guilty about eating octopus since I had heard so much about how smart they are. It ended up having the opposite effect, since I learned that they only live 2 years and aren't social creatures. This is opposite of every other intelligent creature that we know of, and so I'm extremely skeptical of claims of their intelligence. They mi…

Post by mytailorisrich » Thu, Feb 08, 2024, 5:08 PM UTC

irrational wrote: post #28

corethree wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Smarter then dogs. The criteria for edibility is mainly ugliness vs. Cuteness. Octopuses are recently getting more media attention with that movie about the diver that made friends with one so they are getting cuter. Try farm raising and eating baby penguins you'll get the same reaction even though penguins are dumb AF. It has nothing to do with intelligence.

You bring up a good point about penguins. They and chickens are both birds, so why are we finally eating chickens but not penguins? Cuteness definitely plays a role.

Post by fegu » Thu, Feb 08, 2024, 5:08 PM UTC

s_dev wrote: post #13

The real problem is that nearly all seafood is unsustainable. Even when using euphemisms like 'farms' make us thing it's somewhat contained to one place and we just throw them some food pellets manufactured from vegetables in another factory. The reality of salmon farms for instance is that for every 1kg of farmed Salmon it takes 20kg of wild fish to feed them to maturity.

Post by TylerE » Thu, Feb 08, 2024, 5:09 PM UTC

solardev wrote: post #20

They're probably smart enough that we could train them to farm each other . Split them into two groups, give them limited food, and make them duke it out in underwater coliseums. Winners get to raise the next generation, losers become sushi :( Hell, attach some livestreaming, raise some money, sic a few LLMs on them... we can probably learn to talk to them in a decade, teach them to ride dolphins, then invite them on…

Post by demondemidi » Thu, Feb 08, 2024, 5:10 PM UTC

s_dev wrote: post #13

The real problem is that nearly all seafood is unsustainable. Even when using euphemisms like 'farms' make us thing it's somewhat contained to one place and we just throw them some food pellets manufactured from vegetables in another factory. The reality of salmon farms for instance is that for every 1kg of farmed Salmon it takes 20kg of wild fish to feed them to maturity.