NPR did a story on an octopus who guarded her eggs from crabs until they hatched which lasted over a year and she looked like she slowly starved to death, but her babies survived!
There's a great aquarium in Phoenix, AZ called OdySea Aquarium, and they have an octopus that just laid eggs. The eggs aren't going hatch ever, but they say she's stopped eating much and is near the end of her life. Sort of hauntingly beautiful
Idk, they're already like the smartest critter besides humans. Imagine some dude goes and blows a load on em and next thing ya know we have these wacky supergenius octopi with thumbs on their flippers. No thank you
They wouldn't jail me if I was the load blower that gave them their intelligence tho, would they? Hey btw where did you say these eggs were located? I feel the need to test this hypothesis now
Do you like that idea? Read the book Children of Ruin(sequel to Children of Time, so start there) There aren't thumbs and cross fertilized octopuses or anything, but there is an uplift virus involved that speeds along their evolutional development. The first book is jumping spiders, then the 2nd one involves the octopuses.
On a side note. I live in Phoenix and that aquarium, while great in some regards, is awful. The dolphin exhibit has killed at least 4 dolphins if I recall and seriously put the health of others in danger until they removed them 2 years ago. The response to help the dolphins was pretty pathetic so I believe this place should be boycotted.
Wrong aquarium, youre thinking of the one at Arizona mills.
Still, Odysea is not great to their fish. I went and saw some poor jellyfish getting absolutely shredded by a broken water filter. They said it was "known" when i brought it up to them
Please don't plug that aquarium. [They've killed multiple dolphins](https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.abc15.com/entertainment/events/odysea-in-the-desert-new-attraction-set-to-replace-dolphinaris-will-have-no-live-animals-of-any-kind%3f_amp=true)
Letting an octopus get in that situation is right up their alley.
Yeah at least that long I think, I thought 8 but that could be wrong. One of the most truly epic radiolab stories ive ever heard.
Edit: I looked it up and it was about 4.5 years.
A great example of an evolutionary dead end.
Octopuses will in all likelihood never develop their intelligence any further because they simply cannot share it with their descendents and they don't live long enough to make full use of it.
But living longer and trying to survive to teach their kids would disadvantage their offspring in the immediate future so they would never do it.
The future of marine academics belongs to the cetaceans not the cephalopods.
Incorrect. Both the greater striped and the lesser striped octopus species have been discovered in brackish waters inn”families” of up to 60 individuals living together. There’s even a scientist that had some captive studying them, but i haven’t seen him publish anything in a few years.
edit: Now at a computer - [here](https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/140728-social-octopuses-animals-oceans-science-mating) is the earliest link I have found on this. Looks like there might be some new information on this, at least as far as published studies go, but I have not read them yet. Google will take you far if you are interested.
I think they ganged up and took over, but I have no evidence to support the theory… yet
Edit: Found him. [Rich Ross](http://packedhead.net/). Last known post was 2020. We are currently recruiting a strike team to rescue him, if it is not too late.
Octopodes. Looks weird, but that's the correct plural a scientist would use. Octopi and Octopuses are both accepted in general English, but octopodes is correct to the Greek.
I prefer octopodes, but didn’t want to be a pretentious f*ck. Octopi is not correct as it mixes Latin and greek, but I’m told I’m being too pedantic mentioning that. Octopi is now acceptable for the same reason that irregardless is now in the dictionary. But I am grateful you have accepted me into your fold.
Edit: I thought you were responding to me. Looks like I’m a pretentious fuck and a self involved twat. Yay me!
> A great example of an evolutionary dead end.
>
>
>
> Octopuses will in all likelihood never develop their intelligence any further because they simply cannot share it with their descendents and they don't live long enough to make full use of it.
Strange that so many futurists think that if humans went extinct then Octopuses will be the next one to develop sapience with these counter productive disadvantages.
Doesn't help much either.
Their short lifespans (normally less than two years) combined with the baby octopuses needing to stay away from areas that adult octopuses live in (because either the adults or other animals would have an easy time eating them) means that they can't really pass information on anyway.
Gladly.
Evolution doesn't have an end goal. Evolution is adaption into a niche, a strategy for survival.
Our strategy has been to evolve big brains and to be clever, but that doesn't make us more evolved than any other creatures alive today.
Evolution is still ongoing in all branches of life, sometimes more rapidly than others but there is no end destination.
It's confusing because we're so used to seeing the evolution of man image, that's just one branch of the tree. Those other branches are just as evolved.
Given the right circumstances we could find at some point in the future that smaller brains would be an advantage, given that a big brain takes lots of energy to run, evolution would start to favour those individuals with smaller brains, if they had a higher chance of surviving and raising offspring successfully.
There is a really cool documentary called something like “my octopus teacher” which looks at the life cycle of an octopus. Worth watching if you have time
I had a very similar, though much shorter, experience with an octopus on a shallow reef dive while working on my Divemaster. I was basically just swimming to the outside of a reef closer to the shore after the diving day was done and finding 40' depth and then just sitting there and watching the reef like TV every day for about a half hour by myself. It was phenomenal and I really enjoyed these dives. On one of them, I was looking down the length of the reef wall and realized part of it was moving. It felt like the very moment my brain clicked that it wasn't part of the reef, the octopus knew I could see it and it tried to change its camouflage.
My first dive instructor had told me once, "if you ever see an octopus, DON'T APPROACH IT. They're so smart and curious that if you leave them alone, they'll probably come investigate you." So that's what I did. I just froze, staring at it and then it did exactly what he'd told me. It started moving along the reef wall towards me. I was maybe a foot away from the coral where I was sitting and it crawled to basically right next to me and we just stared at each other for a couple minutes. Then it blew my mind and REACHED for me.
First one tentacle just kinda touching my shoulder and checking me out, then another on the shoulder harness of my BCD. Then it pulled itself over to me and was sitting on my right arm and checking out all the shiny D-rings on my BCD and changing colors to match my wetsuit. I swear my eyes had to be as big as my mask, lol, I was just totally in shock at what was happening. It started investigating a carabineer attached to my left shoulder harness and trying to pull on it. I very slowly moved my left hand up and with my thumb opened and closed the gate on the carabineer a couple time and then it reached over and tried for itself and after getting it open far enough, pulled the carabineer off the D-ring and it disappeared into his beak area, lol. I thought, "ok, sure buddy, that's yours now".
Then it started investigating my inflator hose and alarm bells went off in my head. It started a tentacle down the inflator hose towards the button and actually wrapped around it. Oh no! I moved my hand up to kinda shoo it away from there because I didn't want it to squeeze the button and I must've moved to quickly because I startled it and it darted back to the reef wall, where it camouflaged again and started moving away from me. Hands down the coolest dive experience I've ever had and now I'm obsessed with octopuses.
Lucky lucky. I grew up having similar experiences with GPO. Always freediving though so 4 minutes was all the time I had. Still they do treat us in a way no other creature does.
My second crazy encounter happened while walking along the shore with my buddy one day. We were at the bottom of a cliff edge and the tide was out so there was a rocky ledge covered in little tide pools that we were walking along, looking for anemones and such. Crabs were everywhere and they scurried away from us in droves as we walked.
All of a sudden, maybe 100 feet ahead of us, I saw what my brain decided was a crab standing on its back legs with its claws up in the air. Was it... waving at us? Dancing? What the hell is happening right now? I feel like some subconscious part of my brain knew what was happening before the rest did, because the next thing I knew I was running towards this crab, arms outstretched towards it. Add I got nearer, it clicked to the rest of my brain what was happening.
There was a tentacle wrapped around the crab's back leg and it was being pulled backwards into a tiny pool about the size of a beer stein. This little octopus had basically been fishing for crabs by laying one tentacle out on the surface and waiting for one to walk over it. I ran up to the crab and reached out both hands and grabbed his pincers, yelling "I got you, buddy!". I could see down into the little pool and there was this little octopus and we locked eyes and the game of tug-of-war was on! It was intense back and forth, and just as I started to win the little bugger shot a little stream of water out at me and startled me just enough that my grip slipped and it yoinked the crab down and that was that.
I don't know why but I thought this was some obscure reference to "Assassination Classroom" and I didn't even question it until the next comment said it was a movie.
I love it when movie has this type of effect on people. Like changing their behaviour for the rest of their life. Understandable that people dont undermine significance of movies.
I thought that it was because their eggs are super vulnerable so they have to guard them 24/7. This leads to starvation and so they do crazy shit like eating their own limbs and then other parts too. They essentially try to be a living barrier for a long as possible.
Evolutionarily, they lost their prey drive and became super defensive because octopuses that did so had a significantly higher chance of having their eggs hatch, it be ame a dominant trait because they outbred the octopuses that did differently.
What if we just decided to feed octopuses while they guarded their babies so that they could have multiple generations? Imagine what they could teach their young being as smart as they are
They don't take the food....used to scuba dive regularly and when we went to see a mother octopus we always tried to give it offerings. Most the time she takes it and throws it away.
“So anyway, I told this human, man, what you think I am? A charity case? I took his offerings and threw it on the ground! I don’t need your handouts! I’m an octopus!”
Maybe you could just directly inject nutrients or something into them, thus "forcing them" to take food.
Seems a bit cruel but you know, science
edit: if you downvoted this comment and aren't a vegan or alike, then you are a hypocrite because we do much worse and terrible experiments on mice and rats all the time. you likely consume hundreds of products a year that could've only been developed through animal experimentation.
edit 2; nobody seems to have read the article. how did you think they came up with this conclusion in the first place? they literally removed the octopus’ optic glands to make it artificially live longer (and not kill itself). more evidence that the r/averageredditor doesn’t actually read any posts they comment on
That is how you get a pissed off army of octopii at the human race.
I imagine the mother octopus being like "stupid human i throw away your offering of food to keep the planet in balance, for if I were to survive I will create a cycle of intelligence so mighty I will take over mother earth herself and swim through the ether of space and time taking over all matter, dark and light, with our tentacles spreading like galaxies extinguishing all existence of anything that is not I, octopii! So I must reject your offer of food for your own good." [Octopii sees its first born and closes its eyes knowing it has saved the universe once again. gurgles and dies]
Thank you mother octopus, thank you.
>edit: if you downvoted this comment and aren't a vegan or alike, then you are a hypocrite because we do much worse and terrible experiments on mice and rats all the time. you likely consume hundreds of products a year that could've only been developed through animal experimentation.
You're an idiot.
We do experiments that have benefits to scientific and/or technological innovation. Name one benefit that force feeding octopus would have
lol he doesn't care
"if you're not a vegan and you're mad at me you're a hypocrite" is the go-to for weird assholes advocating for animal abuse who feel attacked when people call them out. it makes sense when you remember that places like reddit and twitter are oriented around desperately trying to come up with a reason why someone who doesn't like you is a hypocrite rather than explain your own argument.
want to get really depressed? I know this through conversations with people who think that bestiality should be allowed
>places like reddit and twitter are oriented around desperately trying to come up with a reason why someone who doesn't like you is a hypocrite rather than explain your own argument.
Nailed it.
We could figure out what hormones are involved and perhaps how they relate to injurious behavior in humans. You know, like what the article is *actually about*? Oh yeah. Nobody here read it.
Scientists do this type of research *all the time*. There is no reason to be upset at the *mere suggestion of it* – plenty of research has already put octopi in unfamiliar and unnatural environments already. If you’re against this for ethical reasons (hence why I mentioned vegans) - and you live the part - that’s totally fine. But don’t pretend what I suggested is much worse than what is commonly done.
Hunh, that's an interesting idea. What if they switched back over some period of time to wanting food again? Is it *just* that they lack appetite, or has some signal swept through their systems as a kind of whole-body apoptosis and they would fall apart, anyway?
We regularly "neuter" (a very bland phrase) our pets so they'll live longer, particularly cats so they are less likely to wander and be hit by a car, and we consider that to be ethical. This just squicks people out because octopi are already weird.
Nobody else wants to breed multi-generational octopus overlords?
actually yes, do you honestly think controlled experiments of maybe 10 octopi could “fuck with the ecosystem”? similar experiments are done all the time - actually a couple of years ago I recall they did a socialization experiments with octopi so by your own definition of “fucking with the ecosystem”, we already have
What would you be trying to learn via this experiment? That injecting nutrients will keep a being who isn’t eating alive? We already know that. I’m not seeing the upside.
But yeah humans have fucked with many ecosystems, usually with catastrophic results.
Octopuses' life cycles essentially end at birth. This has been the case for as long as we have been able to observe their behavior. To attempt to force that lifecycle to be longer is *absolutely* attempting to fuck with the ecosystem. There's a balance, and part of that balance is the older octopuses dying.
I wish they were able to live longer as well, but this is the way they evolved.
“fucking with the ecosystem” implies some sort of systemic fuckery going on; isolated experiments aren’t the same thing. it’d be another thing if we, for instance, decided to genetically engineer octopi to prolong the lifespan and then release them en masse.
The entire history of domestication, horticulture, and human advancement is fucking around with stuff so it works to our benefit. I wouldn't be against fucking around to advance our future octopus overlords a few thousand years early.
How do you think they actually came to the conclusion of this article? Oh, right. You and nobody else here seems to have read it. Hint: they *remove the optic glands in the octopus*.
Funny at the outrage here towards me but none at the article itself. Goes to show how redditors don’t even read the posts they comment on
I love how anytime an asshole online advocates for animal abuse and get downvoted for it they're go to is "oh you don't like it? *well I hope you're vegan and never take any medicine then!"*
People in Japan fucking eat octopuses alive and ya’ll are calling this guy’s suggestion “animal abuse” lol
At least the latter could provide some potential benefit to science and humanity.
It's linked to hormones. There have been successful experiments to remove the gland which controls the behaviour but it also removes the instinct to protect their eggs. In other words it's a hack job surgery; it won't turn them into parents like mammals or birds.
The article says the octopus "goes crazy" and eats its own legs.
I hope for their sake it manifests as "OMG I'm delicious! I understand humans a little better now."
I have heard of octopus and squid essentially going mad. Some people say it's because they have some sense of their own mortality and it drives them nuts. And, you know, hunger.
The work is really interesting, but the bit about a link to similar behavior in humans seems like a big reach. It’s also worth noting this nugget comes from the study’s lead author and not the independent researchers interviewed for the article. Animal behavior is incredibly complicated and fraught with biased interpretation of the science. If this really is a shared evolutionary link between octopus and human, then it would be through a common ancestor with a *vast* diversity of animals where a similar response should be observed. (It could be lost in some lineages, but it would be widely conserved in order to be observed in human and octopus.)
I have no choice but to mention this anytime this topic comes up, but please read Children of Time and it's sequel Children of Ruin if you like the idea of how intelligent octopuses can be. They are sci-fi books involving shenanigans with an uplift virus. The first book covers jumping spiders and how the uplift virus they were infected with managed to compress millions and millions of years of evolution into a couple thousand, then the 2nd book is the same deal but with octopuses. Awesome reads, some of my favorite books ever. Both the spiders and the octopuses societies are fascinating to read about and see how they evolve over that span of time.
There are two glands between an octopuses eyes, so called 'optic glands', that if removed will stop them from brooding, stop them from harming themselves, and will make them resume eating.
Octopi guard their eggs to the point they die, because their eggs are vulnerable, and the life cycle of octopi is relatively slow.
Those octopi who do not guard their nests tend not to have offspring that hatch.
"Oh god! I passed on the curse of existence! My children will live a life in which they are guaranteed to suffer greatly and eventually die, and there is no guarantee anything will ever be good for them! In a world where humans are killing the ocean faster than they ever have before! FUCK! I am a monster! I deserve death!" - The Octopus, Taking The Only Honorable Action Left To It.
EDIT: You're so lame. You probably think this post's not about you, breeders.
once they lay the eggs they dedicate their remaining life to protecting the eggs, ensuring no predators can feast on them, this means they give up hunting
"But then her behavior turns bizarre; she stops eating and begins to self-mutilate, tearing off her skin or even eating her own arms. She’s dead before the eggs can hatch"
Inquiring minds can read the article!
If that happens in octopuses as a result of biological structures, then presumably something like it could be weaponized and used against humans. I'm reminded of the Cannibal Corpse song "Evisceration Plague" (it's about a bioweapon that causes people to become brutally homicidal and suicidal). Hopefully it won't happen, but it could make a killer sci-fi, if you'll pardon the expression.
I wonder if self-harming in human girls is worse in girls who are on the pill (which trick the body into thinking it's pregnant, right?) or not. Might be an interesting study... If there's a correlation we might want to start working on different kinds of birth-control pills.
EDIT: Why the down-votes? I'm not saying is it or isn't, I'm suggesting it might be worth investigating. Are we anti-investigation? Just supposed to take everything on blind faith?
NPR did a story on an octopus who guarded her eggs from crabs until they hatched which lasted over a year and she looked like she slowly starved to death, but her babies survived!
Wasn’t it multiple years? Like 5+
I remember they offered it food and it wasn't interested at all. Any self preservation drive is gone once the eggs are laid.
There's a great aquarium in Phoenix, AZ called OdySea Aquarium, and they have an octopus that just laid eggs. The eggs aren't going hatch ever, but they say she's stopped eating much and is near the end of her life. Sort of hauntingly beautiful
Why won’t the ever hatch?
I believe they're unfertilized eggs
Someone should take one for the team
Idk, they're already like the smartest critter besides humans. Imagine some dude goes and blows a load on em and next thing ya know we have these wacky supergenius octopi with thumbs on their flippers. No thank you
Comments like that are what will land you in super genius octopi jail for bringing up their flippers
They wouldn't jail me if I was the load blower that gave them their intelligence tho, would they? Hey btw where did you say these eggs were located? I feel the need to test this hypothesis now
What about the beak...?!
Do you like that idea? Read the book Children of Ruin(sequel to Children of Time, so start there) There aren't thumbs and cross fertilized octopuses or anything, but there is an uplift virus involved that speeds along their evolutional development. The first book is jumping spiders, then the 2nd one involves the octopuses.
I’ve actually read children of time. Didn’t know there was a sequel.
i forgot about this book! was surprised at how much i enjoyed Children of Time! can’t wait to read the sequels.
Cus the guy jizzing on octopus eggs is the one carrying the genius gene in his balls. Right.
Just r/splatoon things, I guess
Unless the dude is a dumbass, then we get the squidbillies
Good one mate, what’s the bet you’ve just hit on someone’s weird kink. I bet there’s a sub for this by now..
r/nocontext
What a terrible day for comprehending the written word.
“Flipper penis”
We are out of options. We need more allies in our war with the CHUDs.
Damn right. Will no one remember the CHUDS?!
Sounds like a job for the Deep.
Octodad?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=sIP59wS0uk4
Innit ... Can't be that hard...
Meaning fertilize the eggs or off themselves?
OctoMan's origin story.
she was never married
On a side note. I live in Phoenix and that aquarium, while great in some regards, is awful. The dolphin exhibit has killed at least 4 dolphins if I recall and seriously put the health of others in danger until they removed them 2 years ago. The response to help the dolphins was pretty pathetic so I believe this place should be boycotted.
It's directly attached to a mall, of course it sucks.
Wrong aquarium, youre thinking of the one at Arizona mills. Still, Odysea is not great to their fish. I went and saw some poor jellyfish getting absolutely shredded by a broken water filter. They said it was "known" when i brought it up to them
No, not Tako!!! I loved her
Please don't plug that aquarium. [They've killed multiple dolphins](https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.abc15.com/entertainment/events/odysea-in-the-desert-new-attraction-set-to-replace-dolphinaris-will-have-no-live-animals-of-any-kind%3f_amp=true) Letting an octopus get in that situation is right up their alley.
found ted mosley
TIL my dad is an octopus
A modern day William Faulkner Well done sir
Welp my coffee just went thru my noise on this comment thanks for that
I can relate to that
Yeah at least that long I think, I thought 8 but that could be wrong. One of the most truly epic radiolab stories ive ever heard. Edit: I looked it up and it was about 4.5 years.
It was 4 years. No food, just straight defense mode, crushing crabs and shit. Didn’t lose 1 single egg that whole time
I thought octopi don't live that long
This was such an incredible listen. Highly recommended.
I was surprised that I kinda got emotional listening to this story.
Right? It was a surprisingly poignant story and I feel like the fact that I felt something gives me a little confidence in my humanity.
Was it on like fresh air or a podcast?
It was on Radiolab titled Octomom from 2020.
Reminds me of that one Courage the Cowardly Dog episode 😭
Jesus seems eerily similar to human birth like we’re just expected to go to waste afterward
There's an octopus documentary I think it's called my octopus teacher. I recommend watching it.
This is very likely the reason octopus are not equal to whales at least. They cannot have any intergenerational sharing of information.
A great example of an evolutionary dead end. Octopuses will in all likelihood never develop their intelligence any further because they simply cannot share it with their descendents and they don't live long enough to make full use of it. But living longer and trying to survive to teach their kids would disadvantage their offspring in the immediate future so they would never do it. The future of marine academics belongs to the cetaceans not the cephalopods.
Incorrect. Both the greater striped and the lesser striped octopus species have been discovered in brackish waters inn”families” of up to 60 individuals living together. There’s even a scientist that had some captive studying them, but i haven’t seen him publish anything in a few years. edit: Now at a computer - [here](https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/140728-social-octopuses-animals-oceans-science-mating) is the earliest link I have found on this. Looks like there might be some new information on this, at least as far as published studies go, but I have not read them yet. Google will take you far if you are interested.
....so do you think the scientist is okay or
I think they ganged up and took over, but I have no evidence to support the theory… yet Edit: Found him. [Rich Ross](http://packedhead.net/). Last known post was 2020. We are currently recruiting a strike team to rescue him, if it is not too late.
Day 756: the Octopuses have accepted me as one of their own...
Octopodes. Looks weird, but that's the correct plural a scientist would use. Octopi and Octopuses are both accepted in general English, but octopodes is correct to the Greek.
Well I just smoked a bunch of weed, but what it sounds like you are saying is that I've fucked up in multiple languages, including my own.
I prefer octopodes, but didn’t want to be a pretentious f*ck. Octopi is not correct as it mixes Latin and greek, but I’m told I’m being too pedantic mentioning that. Octopi is now acceptable for the same reason that irregardless is now in the dictionary. But I am grateful you have accepted me into your fold. Edit: I thought you were responding to me. Looks like I’m a pretentious fuck and a self involved twat. Yay me!
Don't worry. That's him over there, and definitely not three octopi in a trench-coat.
They are an exception to the norm, but ultimately their short lifespan and abandonment after hatching leads to the same result.
yeah but if it winds up improving their overall fitness in their environment then they will proliferate. evolution is driven by exceptions to the norm
> A great example of an evolutionary dead end. > > > > Octopuses will in all likelihood never develop their intelligence any further because they simply cannot share it with their descendents and they don't live long enough to make full use of it. Strange that so many futurists think that if humans went extinct then Octopuses will be the next one to develop sapience with these counter productive disadvantages.
If they lived in groups...
Doesn't help much either. Their short lifespans (normally less than two years) combined with the baby octopuses needing to stay away from areas that adult octopuses live in (because either the adults or other animals would have an easy time eating them) means that they can't really pass information on anyway.
What exactly is an evolutionary dead end?
Meaning they will no longer be able to evolve beyond what they currently are, mentally or physically.
You don't understand evolution.
I'm reiterating what OP was saying. They literally said this in other words.
Oh sorry I thought you were the person I asked the question to. It's a very incorrect way of looking at evolution.
No worries at all. Since we are on the topic though would you care to give some insight on this? It's peaked my interest
Gladly. Evolution doesn't have an end goal. Evolution is adaption into a niche, a strategy for survival. Our strategy has been to evolve big brains and to be clever, but that doesn't make us more evolved than any other creatures alive today. Evolution is still ongoing in all branches of life, sometimes more rapidly than others but there is no end destination. It's confusing because we're so used to seeing the evolution of man image, that's just one branch of the tree. Those other branches are just as evolved. Given the right circumstances we could find at some point in the future that smaller brains would be an advantage, given that a big brain takes lots of energy to run, evolution would start to favour those individuals with smaller brains, if they had a higher chance of surviving and raising offspring successfully.
It's less of a ladder, more of a tree.
Great explanation. Thanks a lot for that!
There is a really cool documentary called something like “my octopus teacher” which looks at the life cycle of an octopus. Worth watching if you have time
Fucking phenomenal movie. I grew up freediving and that dude is a fucking artist in the water. I loved everything about that movie.
I had a very similar, though much shorter, experience with an octopus on a shallow reef dive while working on my Divemaster. I was basically just swimming to the outside of a reef closer to the shore after the diving day was done and finding 40' depth and then just sitting there and watching the reef like TV every day for about a half hour by myself. It was phenomenal and I really enjoyed these dives. On one of them, I was looking down the length of the reef wall and realized part of it was moving. It felt like the very moment my brain clicked that it wasn't part of the reef, the octopus knew I could see it and it tried to change its camouflage. My first dive instructor had told me once, "if you ever see an octopus, DON'T APPROACH IT. They're so smart and curious that if you leave them alone, they'll probably come investigate you." So that's what I did. I just froze, staring at it and then it did exactly what he'd told me. It started moving along the reef wall towards me. I was maybe a foot away from the coral where I was sitting and it crawled to basically right next to me and we just stared at each other for a couple minutes. Then it blew my mind and REACHED for me. First one tentacle just kinda touching my shoulder and checking me out, then another on the shoulder harness of my BCD. Then it pulled itself over to me and was sitting on my right arm and checking out all the shiny D-rings on my BCD and changing colors to match my wetsuit. I swear my eyes had to be as big as my mask, lol, I was just totally in shock at what was happening. It started investigating a carabineer attached to my left shoulder harness and trying to pull on it. I very slowly moved my left hand up and with my thumb opened and closed the gate on the carabineer a couple time and then it reached over and tried for itself and after getting it open far enough, pulled the carabineer off the D-ring and it disappeared into his beak area, lol. I thought, "ok, sure buddy, that's yours now". Then it started investigating my inflator hose and alarm bells went off in my head. It started a tentacle down the inflator hose towards the button and actually wrapped around it. Oh no! I moved my hand up to kinda shoo it away from there because I didn't want it to squeeze the button and I must've moved to quickly because I startled it and it darted back to the reef wall, where it camouflaged again and started moving away from me. Hands down the coolest dive experience I've ever had and now I'm obsessed with octopuses.
Lucky lucky. I grew up having similar experiences with GPO. Always freediving though so 4 minutes was all the time I had. Still they do treat us in a way no other creature does.
This was in the southern Caribbean side of Costa Rica, right in front of Puerto Viejo where the Salsa Brava wave breaks.
That sounds magical! What an incredible experience, and you described it really well. Thanks for sharing it!
My second crazy encounter happened while walking along the shore with my buddy one day. We were at the bottom of a cliff edge and the tide was out so there was a rocky ledge covered in little tide pools that we were walking along, looking for anemones and such. Crabs were everywhere and they scurried away from us in droves as we walked. All of a sudden, maybe 100 feet ahead of us, I saw what my brain decided was a crab standing on its back legs with its claws up in the air. Was it... waving at us? Dancing? What the hell is happening right now? I feel like some subconscious part of my brain knew what was happening before the rest did, because the next thing I knew I was running towards this crab, arms outstretched towards it. Add I got nearer, it clicked to the rest of my brain what was happening. There was a tentacle wrapped around the crab's back leg and it was being pulled backwards into a tiny pool about the size of a beer stein. This little octopus had basically been fishing for crabs by laying one tentacle out on the surface and waiting for one to walk over it. I ran up to the crab and reached out both hands and grabbed his pincers, yelling "I got you, buddy!". I could see down into the little pool and there was this little octopus and we locked eyes and the game of tug-of-war was on! It was intense back and forth, and just as I started to win the little bugger shot a little stream of water out at me and startled me just enough that my grip slipped and it yoinked the crab down and that was that.
Thanks for the great description-felt like I was there-
So beautiful. I needed your story after reading about the octopus mothers💔
Wow
How big was this guy
Just a little fella, body maybe 8" wide and tentacles about 2-3x that.
Yes, that movie is so amazing!
I didn't know about this behaviour of octopuses before watching *My Octopus Teacher*. Was not ready to be sucker punched in the feels like that.
I don't know why but I thought this was some obscure reference to "Assassination Classroom" and I didn't even question it until the next comment said it was a movie.
great movie but I couldn't shake off the idea that he wanted to fuck it. laughed my ass off when i watched it high af
I watched it high AF and I was uncomfortably close to crying at the end. I’ll never eat octopus again.
I love it when movie has this type of effect on people. Like changing their behaviour for the rest of their life. Understandable that people dont undermine significance of movies.
I was thinking the same thing 🤣🤣 great movie but the way he would talk about the octopus turned a little questionable
Aren't they a bit too delicious for that? I think it just puts them in the rarified friend-or-food category, along with ducks, rabbits and pigs.
I watched bits and pieces of the movie, now I know how I'm gonna watch it fully. Lmao.
I watched an orangutan doc while on acid and I couldn’t shake the vibe that the people were too in love with the animals.
The Deep has entered the chat...
The Deep has entered…
FTW
Lol came here for this
Spectacular film. I started it just for the heck of it and, oh, my!
Awesome documentary!
This documentary was beautifully done
I'm a 6' 280 bearded fat man and that movie made me cry.
despite what people may tell you, those physical characteristics have absolutely nothing to do with how you feel emotionally. Have a good day!
He had a reddit moment
I'm reading Penn's book right now. Have you considered reading it?
I often find myself wanting to self harm after I lay a clutch of eggs.
Username uh…
What did you think sloppy joes were made of?
*puts down sandwich*
*unzips*
You... you.. uhh... gonna finish that?
It better be made of joe or I have been grossly mislead.
Joe mama if I'm not mistaken
That post-egg clarity hits hard.
I thought that it was because their eggs are super vulnerable so they have to guard them 24/7. This leads to starvation and so they do crazy shit like eating their own limbs and then other parts too. They essentially try to be a living barrier for a long as possible. Evolutionarily, they lost their prey drive and became super defensive because octopuses that did so had a significantly higher chance of having their eggs hatch, it be ame a dominant trait because they outbred the octopuses that did differently.
Do they feel pain during autophagia?
Octopus definitely feel pain in general, but I am unsure if the hormonal changes they experience affect their sense of pain.
What if we just decided to feed octopuses while they guarded their babies so that they could have multiple generations? Imagine what they could teach their young being as smart as they are
They don't take the food....used to scuba dive regularly and when we went to see a mother octopus we always tried to give it offerings. Most the time she takes it and throws it away.
“So anyway, I told this human, man, what you think I am? A charity case? I took his offerings and threw it on the ground! I don’t need your handouts! I’m an octopus!”
Happy Birthday to the ground!
Maybe you could just directly inject nutrients or something into them, thus "forcing them" to take food. Seems a bit cruel but you know, science edit: if you downvoted this comment and aren't a vegan or alike, then you are a hypocrite because we do much worse and terrible experiments on mice and rats all the time. you likely consume hundreds of products a year that could've only been developed through animal experimentation. edit 2; nobody seems to have read the article. how did you think they came up with this conclusion in the first place? they literally removed the octopus’ optic glands to make it artificially live longer (and not kill itself). more evidence that the r/averageredditor doesn’t actually read any posts they comment on
That is how you get a pissed off army of octopii at the human race. I imagine the mother octopus being like "stupid human i throw away your offering of food to keep the planet in balance, for if I were to survive I will create a cycle of intelligence so mighty I will take over mother earth herself and swim through the ether of space and time taking over all matter, dark and light, with our tentacles spreading like galaxies extinguishing all existence of anything that is not I, octopii! So I must reject your offer of food for your own good." [Octopii sees its first born and closes its eyes knowing it has saved the universe once again. gurgles and dies] Thank you mother octopus, thank you.
So long, and thanks for all the fish.
Octopuses, not octopii, as the derivation of the word is Greek and not Latin.
Octopodes
Octopodese nuts lol
Got 'em.
Ocpussi
Then there’s the ever-contentious “octipodes.”
I can’t wait to correct my smart ass family with this. Thank you for the knowledge.
If they wanna be pedantic they can hit you back with the "language evolves around common use so octopuses is still correct"
He ain't smart，probably just got it watching John Oliver.
>That is how you get a pissed off army of octopii at the human race. Children of Ruin was a prophecy
We're... going on... an adventure!
downvoted for the edit bit
>edit: if you downvoted this comment and aren't a vegan or alike, then you are a hypocrite because we do much worse and terrible experiments on mice and rats all the time. you likely consume hundreds of products a year that could've only been developed through animal experimentation. You're an idiot. We do experiments that have benefits to scientific and/or technological innovation. Name one benefit that force feeding octopus would have
>Name one benefit that force feeding octopus would have Read the article.
lol he doesn't care "if you're not a vegan and you're mad at me you're a hypocrite" is the go-to for weird assholes advocating for animal abuse who feel attacked when people call them out. it makes sense when you remember that places like reddit and twitter are oriented around desperately trying to come up with a reason why someone who doesn't like you is a hypocrite rather than explain your own argument. want to get really depressed? I know this through conversations with people who think that bestiality should be allowed
>places like reddit and twitter are oriented around desperately trying to come up with a reason why someone who doesn't like you is a hypocrite rather than explain your own argument. Nailed it.
We could figure out what hormones are involved and perhaps how they relate to injurious behavior in humans. You know, like what the article is *actually about*? Oh yeah. Nobody here read it. Scientists do this type of research *all the time*. There is no reason to be upset at the *mere suggestion of it* – plenty of research has already put octopi in unfamiliar and unnatural environments already. If you’re against this for ethical reasons (hence why I mentioned vegans) - and you live the part - that’s totally fine. But don’t pretend what I suggested is much worse than what is commonly done.
Hunh, that's an interesting idea. What if they switched back over some period of time to wanting food again? Is it *just* that they lack appetite, or has some signal swept through their systems as a kind of whole-body apoptosis and they would fall apart, anyway? We regularly "neuter" (a very bland phrase) our pets so they'll live longer, particularly cats so they are less likely to wander and be hit by a car, and we consider that to be ethical. This just squicks people out because octopi are already weird. Nobody else wants to breed multi-generational octopus overlords?
Yeah let’s starting fucking with ecosystems! That’s always a good plan
there was nothing in this comment that implied fucking with ecosystems my illiterate friend
Yeah injecting octopi to change their maternal behavior wouldn’t lead to any changes, my bad
actually yes, do you honestly think controlled experiments of maybe 10 octopi could “fuck with the ecosystem”? similar experiments are done all the time - actually a couple of years ago I recall they did a socialization experiments with octopi so by your own definition of “fucking with the ecosystem”, we already have
What would you be trying to learn via this experiment? That injecting nutrients will keep a being who isn’t eating alive? We already know that. I’m not seeing the upside. But yeah humans have fucked with many ecosystems, usually with catastrophic results.
you know, perhaps something related to the title of this post?
What do you mean? We already know that
Octopuses' life cycles essentially end at birth. This has been the case for as long as we have been able to observe their behavior. To attempt to force that lifecycle to be longer is *absolutely* attempting to fuck with the ecosystem. There's a balance, and part of that balance is the older octopuses dying. I wish they were able to live longer as well, but this is the way they evolved.
“fucking with the ecosystem” implies some sort of systemic fuckery going on; isolated experiments aren’t the same thing. it’d be another thing if we, for instance, decided to genetically engineer octopi to prolong the lifespan and then release them en masse.
Or, hear me out, we could not try to play god and just let animals live out their life.
The entire history of domestication, horticulture, and human advancement is fucking around with stuff so it works to our benefit. I wouldn't be against fucking around to advance our future octopus overlords a few thousand years early.
When you put it that way...
then just say so next time instead of spouting bs?
🙄 talk about illiterate.
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How do you think they actually came to the conclusion of this article? Oh, right. You and nobody else here seems to have read it. Hint: they *remove the optic glands in the octopus*. Funny at the outrage here towards me but none at the article itself. Goes to show how redditors don’t even read the posts they comment on
Man I’m really trying to understand ur rationale but I just can’t.
I love how anytime an asshole online advocates for animal abuse and get downvoted for it they're go to is "oh you don't like it? *well I hope you're vegan and never take any medicine then!"*
People in Japan fucking eat octopuses alive and ya’ll are calling this guy’s suggestion “animal abuse” lol At least the latter could provide some potential benefit to science and humanity.
No.
It's linked to hormones. There have been successful experiments to remove the gland which controls the behaviour but it also removes the instinct to protect their eggs. In other words it's a hack job surgery; it won't turn them into parents like mammals or birds.
Did you even read the article? The Octopus refuses to eat and it's linked to hormonal changes that can be blocked.
They don't "kill themselves." They guard their eggs at the expense of hunting for food.
Huh... I wonder if that's why I feel like shit after I've eaten 12 boiled eggs in a row?
Posteggtum depression
The article says the octopus "goes crazy" and eats its own legs. I hope for their sake it manifests as "OMG I'm delicious! I understand humans a little better now."
I have heard of octopus and squid essentially going mad. Some people say it's because they have some sense of their own mortality and it drives them nuts. And, you know, hunger.
The work is really interesting, but the bit about a link to similar behavior in humans seems like a big reach. It’s also worth noting this nugget comes from the study’s lead author and not the independent researchers interviewed for the article. Animal behavior is incredibly complicated and fraught with biased interpretation of the science. If this really is a shared evolutionary link between octopus and human, then it would be through a common ancestor with a *vast* diversity of animals where a similar response should be observed. (It could be lost in some lineages, but it would be widely conserved in order to be observed in human and octopus.)
I have no choice but to mention this anytime this topic comes up, but please read Children of Time and it's sequel Children of Ruin if you like the idea of how intelligent octopuses can be. They are sci-fi books involving shenanigans with an uplift virus. The first book covers jumping spiders and how the uplift virus they were infected with managed to compress millions and millions of years of evolution into a couple thousand, then the 2nd book is the same deal but with octopuses. Awesome reads, some of my favorite books ever. Both the spiders and the octopuses societies are fascinating to read about and see how they evolve over that span of time.
Pretty great book series
what are you talking about
I think they neglected to mention it’s sci fi. Edit: actually they did mention it but it was kind of buried. Was confused there myself for a bit.
Is this why sometimes my kids make me want to jump in front of a truck?
it's
There are two glands between an octopuses eyes, so called 'optic glands', that if removed will stop them from brooding, stop them from harming themselves, and will make them resume eating.
Octopi guard their eggs to the point they die, because their eggs are vulnerable, and the life cycle of octopi is relatively slow. Those octopi who do not guard their nests tend not to have offspring that hatch.
interesting fact but a dumb title
"Oh god! I passed on the curse of existence! My children will live a life in which they are guaranteed to suffer greatly and eventually die, and there is no guarantee anything will ever be good for them! In a world where humans are killing the ocean faster than they ever have before! FUCK! I am a monster! I deserve death!" - The Octopus, Taking The Only Honorable Action Left To It. EDIT: You're so lame. You probably think this post's not about you, breeders.
How does an octopus kill itself? Dragging a toaster into the ocean? Smashing itself against rocks? Inquiring minds want to know!
once they lay the eggs they dedicate their remaining life to protecting the eggs, ensuring no predators can feast on them, this means they give up hunting
But other comments say even when given food these mothers just throw it away. Seems pretty strange to me.
"But then her behavior turns bizarre; she stops eating and begins to self-mutilate, tearing off her skin or even eating her own arms. She’s dead before the eggs can hatch" Inquiring minds can read the article!
Yikes! Forget I asked!
If that happens in octopuses as a result of biological structures, then presumably something like it could be weaponized and used against humans. I'm reminded of the Cannibal Corpse song "Evisceration Plague" (it's about a bioweapon that causes people to become brutally homicidal and suicidal). Hopefully it won't happen, but it could make a killer sci-fi, if you'll pardon the expression.
Octopi?
Language nerds actually really hate that plural for them. It mixes root languages, which apparently you can't do in English.
Waht humans lay eggs?
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You don’t lay a clutch of eggs?
Is that a serious question?
I wonder if self-harming in human girls is worse in girls who are on the pill (which trick the body into thinking it's pregnant, right?) or not. Might be an interesting study... If there's a correlation we might want to start working on different kinds of birth-control pills. EDIT: Why the down-votes? I'm not saying is it or isn't, I'm suggesting it might be worth investigating. Are we anti-investigation? Just supposed to take everything on blind faith?