Other Minds: Octopuses

 

"Other Minds

By Peter Godfrey-Smith (2016)

3. When we think of smart animals, we tend to think of chimpanzees, elephants or dolphins. They are similar to humans in that they are mammals but also in that they are social and long living. These two characteristics are related to their smarts. Living in a group incentivizes intelligence -- important if you want to manipulate others and get away with it. And smart animals tend to have a slow development that allows them to become smarter as they age. 

All of this makes the octopus a very puzzling animal.

As Peter Godfrey-Smith tells us in "Other Minds," octopuses are solitary and tend to live for around one year; yet research keeps demonstrating that they're surprisingly smart.

Because "our most recent common ancestor was so simple and lies so far back," Mr. Godfrey-Smith writes, octopuses are "an independent experiment in the evolution of large brains and complex behavior." Encountering one of these animals "is probably the closest we will come to meeting an intelligent alien." 

Scientifically precise and masterfully argued, "Other Minds" reads like a detective story meant to solve the mystery of the octopus's (and other cephalopods') intelligence." [1]

 1. REVIEW --- Books -- Five Best: On the Animal Kingdom: Susana Monso --- The author of 'Playing Possum: How Animals Understand Death'. Monso, Susana.  Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 19 Oct 2024: C.8.