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What's it like to be an Octopus? (2017)

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Re: What's it like to be an Octopus? (2017)

#151

Post by AnIdiotOnTheNet »

chrisweekly wrote: post #114
sradman wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cephalopods are magnificent. I knew they were smart and curious but I was caught off guard the first time I realized that a curious cuttlefish was making eye contact with me. No other reef animals exhibit anything like this kind of intelligence; the dissimilarity is striking. When you start to doubt your interpretation they quite literally flash their emotional state through color changes that seem as telling as huma…

Semi-related: "Arrival" was a terrific movie adaptation of "Story of Your Life", an even better short story by Ted Chiang, featuring attempts at communication with advanced alien intelligence. Highest recommendation for both.

"Terrific" is not the word I'd use to describe the adaptation. Arrival was entertaining and had, to me, impressive visual and auditory direction, but it completely missed the point of "Story of Your Life" in the way it changed the ending.

Re: What's it like to be an Octopus? (2017)

#152

Post by shostack »

gooseus wrote: post #108

Does anyone know if there has ever been experimentation with training octopuses to use some kind of user interface (buttons, dials, sliders, joysticks) with a grayscale screen or some other kind of modulated output to solve problems for rewards? Could an octopus learn to play Super Mario Bros or Pac-Man to beat levels for crab? If we could find a reliable way to teach an input language to an octopus we could start pr…

The second book in the Children of Time series touches on this in the path of how octopodes get hyper evolved.

Re: What's it like to be an Octopus? (2017)

#153

Post by jgwil2 »

0_____0 wrote: post #117
jgwil2 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Incorrect. It's erotic art, but art nonetheless. Otherwise we wouldn't be discussing it.

Maybe I have a only a loose grasp of how those words are defined but in my interpretation 'art' and 'smut' are not mutually exclusive

Fair enough. In my understanding "smut" is typically a synonym for pornography, and pornography is generally only valued for its ability to arouse or titillate.

Re: What's it like to be an Octopus? (2017)

#154

Post by chrisweekly »

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #151
chrisweekly wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Semi-related: "Arrival" was a terrific movie adaptation of "Story of Your Life", an even better short story by Ted Chiang, featuring attempts at communication with advanced alien intelligence. Highest recommendation for both.

"Terrific" is not the word I'd use to describe the adaptation. Arrival was entertaining and had, to me, impressive visual and auditory direction, but it completely missed the point of "Story of Your Life" in the way it changed the ending.

fair point; shouldve worded it "terrific movie, based on the even better book"

Re: What's it like to be an Octopus? (2017)

#155

Post by hermitcrab »

iguy wrote: post #54
nabla9 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Answer to both of your questions is that there was no evolutionary path. Evolution is blind and path dependent. It only responds to differential pressures affecting just now. Evolution is like greedy search https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greedy_algorithm They didn't develop longevity because intelligence + longlivety does not provide immediate advantage. They didn't develop collective strategies because they the path…

Yes. But I'd reverse these questions: why so much intelligence, with seemingly few opportunities to use it?

They live in complex environments. Often on the boundary between water and land. And some octopuses, do seem to make good use their intelligence - for example the mimic octopus.

Re: What's it like to be an Octopus? (2017)

#156

Post by echlebek »

TedDoesntTalk wrote: post #87
0_____0 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny enough, there is a text description on the woodcut itself. If you click through to the photo on Wikipedia I believe there's a translation in the description. For the lazy: it's pure, unadulterated smut

Rhetorical question to make you think: where do we draw the line between smut and art?

That's something for parents to do for their children, and for me to not care about.

Re: What's it like to be an Octopus? (2017)

#159

Post by muthdra »

chrisweekly wrote: post #114
sradman wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cephalopods are magnificent. I knew they were smart and curious but I was caught off guard the first time I realized that a curious cuttlefish was making eye contact with me. No other reef animals exhibit anything like this kind of intelligence; the dissimilarity is striking. When you start to doubt your interpretation they quite literally flash their emotional state through color changes that seem as telling as huma…

Semi-related: "Arrival" was a terrific movie adaptation of "Story of Your Life", an even better short story by Ted Chiang, featuring attempts at communication with advanced alien intelligence. Highest recommendation for both.

That story is not about aliens at all. It's about the subconscious.
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