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

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41–50 of 212 posts

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

#41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a lot of shit ton of algaes blooming due to climate change. Wonder if that can be sourced as protein / feed.

A lot of those algae are poisonous.

So poisonous that they can't be industrially processed? Or no one has bothered to try for feedstock. Genuinely curious.

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

#43
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…

So the people farming Octopuses are not a reliable source of information about whether it's ok to farm them.

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

#44
post #2

Pigs are pretty smart, too.

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.

My only rationale for why it's OK for me to eat pigs is that the pigs would definitely eat me if the opportunity arose, and in this respect they are different from say, cows, or indeed octopuses, which show no inclination to consume human meat.

If you (as sometimes happens to farmers) drop dead in a pig sty after not long the pigs will eat you because you're food and they're hungry.

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

#46
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.

In the 1970's I went on a field trip to a trout farm in New York (USA, obvs.). They fed plant food pellets to this giant whirling silos of fish. Not sure if salmon can eat plants but trout sure can. Of course, that was the 70's, and just one fish farm.

Trout are salmon are trout.

Some species even bridge freshwater to salt. Sockeye come to mind, a few populations are completely landlocked.

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

#47
post #24
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…

>This is opposite of every other intelligent creature that we know of, and so I'm extremely skeptical of claims of their intelligence. Octopuses can demonstrably learn: scientists put food inside a pot with a lid and gave the pot to an octopus. If my memory doesn't fail me, in the first attempt the octopus took 2 hours to open the lid and in the second one it took 5 minutes.

Sorry, my use of "intelligent" here was imprecise. They can clearly learn, but seem much less intelligent than other animals that we commonly eat, and not anywhere close to the same level of intelligence of animals that we generally do not eat, such as great apes, elephants, and whales.

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

#48

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…

But that is what we do at the FAANGs

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

#49
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to be low-effort, but you know Soylent Green is people, right? I always was a little mystified at their choice of name over at the actual Soylent meal replacement company. And their choice to feature their green Soylent product as the main banner on their webpage.

I always thought it was kind of tongue in cheek.

It is; they even made a limited edition joke product that leaned all the way in called "Soylent Green - as good as humanly possible". I love sharing them on hiking trips although they are more funny than tasty.

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

#50

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.

My only rationale for why it's OK for me to eat pigs is that the pigs would definitely eat me if the opportunity arose, and in this respect they are different from say, cows, or indeed octopuses, which show no inclination to consume human meat. If you (as sometimes happens to farmers) drop dead in a pig sty after not long the pigs will eat you because you're food and they're hungry.

Cats will do this too; do you support eating house cats?
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