So, to distract myself from negative thoughts, today I am going to talk about octopuses. Have you seen the Netflix documentary "My Octopus Teacher"? It is endearing. I am a sucker for underwater cinematography so for sure I enjoyed it. However, my son wasn't quite so enamored of it, he pointed out that the narrator seemed to count himself a friend to the octopus in question and yet he filmed a horrific scene of 'his friend' nearly being killed in a fight with a shark. He did not interfere. With friends like that…?
I just finished reading Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness, by Peter Godfrey-Smith. The author is a professor of philosophy and a scuba diver. He spent quite a bit of time observing octopuses off the coast of Australia, in a location he calls Octopolis. Octopuses are normally considered to be solitary creatures, only getting together for purposes of procreation. However, Octopolis is a kind of underwater city of octopuses. Since these creatures are not really evolved to be sociable, they do a lot of fighting amongst each other. The thing that is most notable about them though is their intelligence. They are comparable to some birds and mammals in that regard.
From an evolutionary perspective, it is highly unlikely that the common ancestor of birds, mammals and cephalopods (the animal group that octopuses belong to) was all that intelligent; the intelligence of cephalopods developed independently of that of birds and mammals. There are some common features but one interesting difference is that octopus "brains" are distributed over their bodies, an octopus tentacle is as brainy as an octopus head. Some people speculate that cephalopods are really descended from aliens, but Godfrey-Smith says that although their intelligence may seem alien, they are as much of the Earth as we are. Just different.
Another thing about them is their incredibly short life spans. We are used to intelligent species being long-lived, relatively speaking, but octopuses live two short years. In those two years they learn so much and exhibit so much craftiness and intelligence, and then they die. It seems such a waste.
In 2008 I went snorkelling in the coral reef off the coast of Belize and had my own encounter with an octopus (actually two). I won't say it was life-changing, but it was certainly one of the more amazing experiences I have had.
4 comments:
I loved that documentary and I did admire how the photographer did not interfere with the natural order of nature even though it must have been difficult.
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Personally, I find the whole idea of non-interference in the natural order problematic, but if one is going to stick to that as some kind of documentary ethic, then one shouldn’t go around churning up one’s viewers’ emotions about it. The narrator clearly wanted to emphasize some kind of “relationship” between himself and the octopus, I just don’t think it is ethical to have it both ways. I kind of agree with my son, a chip off the old block as it were ;-)
I highly recommend "Soul of an Octopus" by Sy Montgomery. I wrote about it on my blog last August on which Sabine's comment is interesting.
I guess for a "pure" scientific observation and understanding of nature we shouldn't interfere which alters a species reality and could adversely effect how we best help all of them. My human emotions might well get in the way for me, too.
Seems sorta like a journalist's credo in reporting their stories, to avoid getting caught up in their subject's issues, but sometimes they do. I think of the war scenes they cover and often they don't help those with whom they have built friend relationships.
I have no problem with journalists getting caught up in their subject’s issues, or with their efforts to remain objective. However I think that if you develop or perceive an emotional relationship with the subject and choose not to intervene in a life-threatening scenario, then I think it says something about how much or little you value the subject of your relationship. If I filmed a documentary on the intelligence of my dog and she got caught in a leg hold trap, I would not continue filming to see how she deals with it, I would intervene. Either you care or you don’t, you can’t really have it both ways.
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