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Octopus intelligence may be related to never-before-seen mutation

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: Octopus intelligence may be related to never-before-seen mutation

#61

Post by abeppu »

fmjrey wrote: post #6

I would imagine their intelligence is directly proportional to the so many degrees of freedom the arms have for grasping, but don't ask which one came first, chicken or egg?

Why should intelligence _other_ than motor-planning be tied to the degrees of freedom of their movement?

- snakes have a high number of degrees of freedom but aren't especially bright

- squid have 2 more limbs than octopuses and aren't as smart

I think the shallow-water vs deep-water thing mentioned in the article is important; reef and similar environments give a lot more opportunities for smart camouflage, complex navigation, tool-use opportunities etc than the open ocean.

Re: Octopus intelligence may be related to never-before-seen mutation

#62

Post by 47635274172635 »

King-Aaron wrote: post #54
bayganyo wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it interesting how people justify (or not) whether to eat another animal.

Personally that justification is based heavily on the taste.

Based on not having a realistic choice. The only person I personally know to successfully pull it off is an acquaintance that's rich by local standards, doesn't work, spends a lot of time sourcing and cooking it, and also eating it. He needs to eat more for same energy. It's so involved that most of his life revolves around it. It takes a good bit out of his time. The rest of the people from that friend group couldn't afford it, couldn't afford spending the money, couldn't afford spending the extra time on it.

I personally wouldn't eat meat if I had a good alternative. I rarely do, I eat it for health related reasons, considering my setup.

Re: Octopus intelligence may be related to never-before-seen mutation

#63

Post by mrheosuper »

colechristensen wrote: post #57
King-Aaron wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't kid yourself Jimmy, if an octopus ever got the chance he'd eat you and everyone you cared about!

So would a primitive human.

That's why cannibalism was so popular back in the day.

Re: Octopus intelligence may be related to never-before-seen mutation

#65

Post by suriyaG »

pitched wrote: post #53
suriyaG wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eating any meat is morally questionable. (I say this as a person who does eat a lot of meat). octopus passing a intelligence test does not keep it above the fold, neither does cattle go below the fold because they don't clear the bar (surprise, cattle are equally emotional, smart, curious etc.). sounds wrong when I type it out but that is just the truth. milk is actually more ethically wrong when you think about it (…

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28926931/ > Compared with meat-eaters, vegetarians were more likely to have a higher educational level, whereas vegans had a lower education level I think it’s good to question these things but the people who go full black/white on everything is where that whole movement died. Saying something strong like “eating any meat” will generally not win over hackers. But “we won’t bring cows t…

> Compared with meat-eaters, vegetarians were more likely to have a higher educational level, whereas vegans had a lower education level

this is such a... wrong conclusion to make from the study. the study has found a correlation and by no means is it a causation. there are so many cultural, societal reasons for this to be the case. (eg. in india, upper caste people are usually vegetarians who generally have more access to education.)

Re: Octopus intelligence may be related to never-before-seen mutation

#66

Post by dumberquestions »

47635274172635 wrote: post #60
suriyaG wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eating any meat is morally questionable. (I say this as a person who does eat a lot of meat). octopus passing a intelligence test does not keep it above the fold, neither does cattle go below the fold because they don't clear the bar (surprise, cattle are equally emotional, smart, curious etc.). sounds wrong when I type it out but that is just the truth. milk is actually more ethically wrong when you think about it (…

>eating any meat is morally questionable. (I say this as a person who does eat a lot of meat). I think this is very wrong. Doesn't account for when you don't have a choice, to be healthy. You need to eat more, you need to consider all possible situations, construction work people need to sustain all that physical labor somehow. It's a more serious chore to even attempt to build a non meat based diet, let alone sourci…

Interesting that you think having any drawbacks whatsoever to not eating meat is sufficient to justify eating it, I would've thought the drawbacks had to at least outweigh the suffering involved.

Re: Octopus intelligence may be related to never-before-seen mutation

#67

Post by 47635274172635 »

bayganyo wrote: post #16
hermitcrab wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, so maybe think twice before eating one.

I find it interesting how people justify (or not) whether to eat another animal.

Farm animals wouldn't even have existed in the first place if it wasn't for farming them. They wouldn't have experienced their life at all. I personally think hunting is horrible, that's going after something that is alive without you having a say in it.

But say for farmed cows, living in a field for a while, that's better than not existing at all. You cannot judge if it's worth it from the cow's perspective, it got to live, enjoy the sun, eating in the field, doing cow stuff, same as us. Even with the hardships in my life I'd rather have existed, for however long I can, than not existing at all.

So you see it's not as simple to look at and judge farming. If it was for you those animals wouldn't even have experienced this reality. It some cases you may be right, depending on their conditions obviously.

Re: Octopus intelligence may be related to never-before-seen mutation

#68

Post by suriyaG »

47635274172635 wrote: post #60
suriyaG wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eating any meat is morally questionable. (I say this as a person who does eat a lot of meat). octopus passing a intelligence test does not keep it above the fold, neither does cattle go below the fold because they don't clear the bar (surprise, cattle are equally emotional, smart, curious etc.). sounds wrong when I type it out but that is just the truth. milk is actually more ethically wrong when you think about it (…

>eating any meat is morally questionable. (I say this as a person who does eat a lot of meat). I think this is very wrong. Doesn't account for when you don't have a choice, to be healthy. You need to eat more, you need to consider all possible situations, construction work people need to sustain all that physical labor somehow. It's a more serious chore to even attempt to build a non meat based diet, let alone sourci…

I didn't suggest sourcing a non-meat diet.

I'm suggesting the opposite.

by design eating meat is morally questionable. (as do so many things with our modern society.) all meat is fair game, because all animal dependent diet is questionable anyway.

Re: Octopus intelligence may be related to never-before-seen mutation

#69

Post by pitched »

colordrops wrote: post #58
pitched wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28926931/ > Compared with meat-eaters, vegetarians were more likely to have a higher educational level, whereas vegans had a lower education level I think it’s good to question these things but the people who go full black/white on everything is where that whole movement died. Saying something strong like “eating any meat” will generally not win over hackers. But “we won’t bring cows t…

I wonder how many of these "self-reported" vegans were true ethical vegans vs instgram influencer, "I eat chicken once a week" vegans. Also, what's your point? Is there a proven direct correlation between ethics/morals and educational level? And even if there were, does that imply that this less educated group is as a whole completely wrong? And are you implying that ethics and morals were even objective and measurea…

The linked study does show that correlation. But I personally believe it’s more of a second-order effect.

Vegetarianism selects for openness and analytical/reflective thinking but the extra step to veganism selects for absolutism/purity and rigid category-based thinking. Reflective thinking and openness are definitely correlated to IQ so I believe the result in the article.

The point here is to know your audience. The people on this site are perfectly primed to respond well to a vegetarian/environmental point of view.

Re: Octopus intelligence may be related to never-before-seen mutation

#70

Post by Xorakios »

PowerElectronix wrote: post #11
hermitcrab wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, so maybe think twice before eating one.

They're too delicious to consider how smart they are.

I don't eat octopus or veal. Delicious or not, there are some lines that perhaps should not be crossed.
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