In many ways, the octopus is as close to alien life as we may ever see. Few creatures in the world are as remarkable and bizarre. A part of a class of animals called cephalopods, they are among the most intelligent and most mobile of all the invertebrates. They live in every ocean in the world, in the deep sea, in kelp forests, in coral reefs along the rocky shorelines, and they are as diverse as the habitats they live in. They can be massive or absolutely tiny. Some species are venomous and some are just downright strange. In any given moment they can appear spiky or they can appear smooth. They are so different from us that most of their 500 million neurons are not in their brain, but in their arms, which can smell and taste and even think, and so intelligent that their cognitive ability matches that of many large brain vertebrates. They have left scientist stunned about how a creature so far from us on the evolutionary tree could evolve such complex behaviors. Their intelligence emerging in an entirely novel and independent way from our own. So, how did the octopus become so biologically complicated, an island of complexity in the sea of invertebrate animals? Just how intelligent are they and how can studying them reveal information about our own minds?
Credits: Writer/Narrator/Editor: Stephanie Sammann
Editor: Dylan Hennessy (https://www.behance.net/dylanhennessy1)
Illustrator/Animator: Kirtan Patel (https://kpatart.com/illustrations)
Animator: Mike Ridolfi (https://www.moboxgraphics.com/)
Sound: Graham Haerther (https://haerther.net)
Thumbnail: Simon Buckmaster (https://twitter.com/forgottentowel)
Producer: Brian McManus (https://www.youtube.com/c/realenginee…)
Imagery courtesy of Getty Images
References:
Cephalopod Camouflage: Cells and Organs of the Skin
Oddballs with high-level intelligence: a Q & A with Roger Hanlon about the amazing octopus
Cephalopods sense light with skin
List of animals by number of neurons
Researchers model how octopus arms make decisions (+ video)
Alien intelligence: the extraordinary minds of octopuses and other cephalopods
Grow Smart and Die Young: Why Did Cephalopods Evolve Intelligence?
How Play is Identified in Nonhuman Animals
