“My Octopus Teacher” defied convention • Hacker News Board

Re: “My Octopus Teacher” defied convention

#91

Post by chimpansteve » Sat, Apr 17, 2021, 3:52 AM UTC

shuntress wrote: post #78

lm28469 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should go out and take a deep breath of reality. People in real life, especially outside of the US, aren't obsessed with talking about their or other people's privileges every time you put a microphone in front of their face.

You should go out and take a deep breath of reality. People in real life, especially outside of the US, care how they present themselves to other people and about their impact on society and culture. People always tend to acknowledge their privilege or advantages. Here in the US we even have a national holiday for just that [0]. Don't try to twist this into some culture war bullshit. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki…

I'm not from the US, though I have spent probably a quarter of my post university life over there. There is a hell of a lot to love about your country and your people. I've never felt more welcome in any other country anywhere.

However.

Saying that Thanksgiving "acknowledges your privileges" is possibly the strangest and most disconnected thing I've ever heard an American say. And that's a pretty high bar.

Re: “My Octopus Teacher” defied convention

#92

Post by sneak » Sat, Apr 17, 2021, 5:09 AM UTC

sneak wrote: post #86

ghawr wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I understand your sentiment, I think the primary objective of the filmmaker is to make a good film. Sometimes that means doing something to simply get an emotional response out of it. If it’s effective in giving people a deeper appreciation of the animal and that ecosystem, then I'd argue it was a good choice and not at all misguided as you're portraying it.

Just because a film can make a large positive emotional response doesn't mean it was a good film, just as a film that can make a large negative emotional response is a bad film. I think GP was criticizing the cheap, low-hanging feelgood duct taped onto the end. It doesn't make the film better.

edit: *is not a bad film

Re: “My Octopus Teacher” defied convention

#93

Post by SideburnsOfDoom » Sat, Apr 17, 2021, 10:07 AM UTC

awb wrote: post #90

shuntress wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Really? Yes. I do not doubt given the choice that many people would choose to dedicate a year to daily cold water swimming and filmmaking. > And we have no idea about the financial arrangements. Maybe it could be anything. But the story as presented in the movie is: a burnt-out white guy (who lives in an ocean-view villa in South Africa) spends every day filming an octopus. > I don’t need all my characters to be fu…

> I do not doubt given the choice that many people would choose to dedicate a year to daily cold water swimming and filmmaking. No way. Most people don't like swimming, the ocean, free diving or being cold. The subset that likes all 4 and has enough dedication to do it every day for an entire year regardless rain, wind or injury and has a passion for filmmaking is very, very small. That's why this documentary is so i…

> We have no idea how much his house is worth or how desirable that location is.

In case you care to know:

https://www.property24.com/for-sale/simons-town/western-cape...

https://www.greeff.co.za/results/residential/for-sale/simons...

Re: “My Octopus Teacher” defied convention

#94

Post by scotty79 » Sat, Apr 17, 2021, 3:38 PM UTC

taneq wrote: post #74

scotty79 wrote: post #4

What's weird is that octopuses are not a social species. So it's a bit of a mystery how they evolved so high intelligence without having to outsmart other individuals of their own species constantly. It's theorethized that they have very rich environments and have to work very hard to hunt and to stay alive as they have no armor. But the puzzle still remains why their intelligence is similar at all to the one that ev…

> So it's a bit of a mystery how they evolved so high intelligence without having to outsmart other individuals of their own species constantly. It's not like they don't have myriad other creatures to outsmart in their daily lives. > But the puzzle still remains why their intelligence is similar at all to the one that evolved through forced social interactions. Is it? Every time I see 'octopus' and 'intelligence' in…

> It's not like they don't have myriad other creatures to outsmart in their daily lives.

Intelligence of competing species doesn't seem to evolve together very often. Various strategies are developed but they are pretty much hardcored in instincts and bodies. Intelligence is rarely that useful in interspecies competition.

It seems that all highly intelligent species got their intelligence to compete with individuals of the same species because intelligence is way more useful in social context than in others.

Re: “My Octopus Teacher” defied convention

#95

Post by meristohm » Sat, Apr 17, 2021, 4:04 PM UTC

js2 wrote: post #37

Avalaxy wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really found the way Craig injected himself into the story to be a distraction and wish this had been more like Sir David Attenborough documentary Can you already see this 94 years old guy jumping into the water to build a personal relationship with an octopus? ;) I think the whole point of the movie was not capturing the life of the octopus, but showing the relationship between human and octopus. This would not…

Sure, but I didn't need to hear CF's life story. He could've presented the octopus and his interaction with it without all that. Almost everyone I've talked to found it to detract from the documentary.

I appreciated the window into his struggles, not only because I continue to work towards better mental health, but because so many other people do, too.

Art is for the artist. That relationship gets more difficult when a production team gets involved, and will rarely (never?) please everybody.

Re: “My Octopus Teacher” defied convention

#96

Post by meristohm » Sat, Apr 17, 2021, 4:12 PM UTC

trhway wrote: post #72

>The scientist you interacted with was probably a very nice person—but just didn’t seem to think that the animals they experimented on were very sentient and probably in enormous distress. just a bit more than 100 years ago they were cutting dogs and cats alive without anesthesia. and that is one of the popular calf castration methods which is still done without anesthesia even today - as described it is painful "onl…

Growing up in a rural area I witnessed a “stovepipe castration” of a cat, and heard that rubber bands were commonly used for castrating other farm animals (sheep, cows, goats). I don’t remember seeing it, though.

Re: “My Octopus Teacher” defied convention

#97

Post by QuantumGood » Sat, Apr 17, 2021, 4:36 PM UTC

js2 wrote: post #37

Avalaxy wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really found the way Craig injected himself into the story to be a distraction and wish this had been more like Sir David Attenborough documentary Can you already see this 94 years old guy jumping into the water to build a personal relationship with an octopus? ;) I think the whole point of the movie was not capturing the life of the octopus, but showing the relationship between human and octopus. This would not…

Sure, but I didn't need to hear CF's life story. He could've presented the octopus and his interaction with it without all that. Almost everyone I've talked to found it to detract from the documentary.

Did not detract for me.

Re: “My Octopus Teacher” defied convention

#98

Post by meristohm » Sat, Apr 17, 2021, 4:40 PM UTC

> If we wish to continue living and if we wish to continue living healthily, we should be doing everything in our power to sustain and regenerate that biodiversity.

While one person’s efforts are a drop in the ocean, they at least matter to that person. I’d heard the benefits of cold showers extolled since a guest speaker, an elderly maybe-Finnish guy, visited my elementary school classroom, and I’d dabbled a bit, but the practice didn’t stick until five months ago after I got a vasectomy. I didn’t want the incision point to open up, so I ran the cold water enough to get wet, washed with a soapy cloth, and turned on the cold water again to rinse. I haven’t strayed from that since, and sometimes extend rinse time for the perceived mental and physical benefits. It does very little to mitigate climate change, but our electricity bill is lower, and the act of turning on the cold water helps cut the groove of being better-able to face something I don’t want to do.

I thank Craig Foster for his notes about swimming in the cold ocean and its possible effect on his health.

For more impact, I’m regularly contacting my elected officials to lobby for regulations that effect all of us and promote a healthier and more resilient ecosystem. Will you do that too, please?

Edit to ask: In the spirit of intellectual humility, what else (either to add to or replace lobbying) might be a good use of my free time towards this same ecological goal?

Re: “My Octopus Teacher” defied convention

#99

Post by canadianfella » Sat, Apr 17, 2021, 5:46 PM UTC

meristohm wrote: post #98

> If we wish to continue living and if we wish to continue living healthily, we should be doing everything in our power to sustain and regenerate that biodiversity. While one person’s efforts are a drop in the ocean, they at least matter to that person. I’d heard the benefits of cold showers extolled since a guest speaker, an elderly maybe-Finnish guy, visited my elementary school classroom, and I’d dabbled a bit, bu…

What regulations? Give a few examples.

Re: “My Octopus Teacher” defied convention

#100

Post by HKH2 » Sun, Apr 18, 2021, 7:40 AM UTC

freewilly1040 wrote: post #61

The thing I didn't much like about this movie was that the ending tried to put an activist spin on what the filmmaker was doing. One of the last shots is of him and a bunch of his friends going out on a dive (as opposed to just him), as if this will help the octopus somehow. In fact, the relationship between him and the octopus only works because the filmmaker has a large patch of pristine coast seemingly to himself.…

Any documentary with added music already has spin. I don't see how making it a bit more contrived will make much of a difference.