Octopus-James Bond of Nature

Extra arms. Extra hearts.

Extra brains. Extra abilities.

Extra surprises.

The Octopus is the 007 of all sea life with gadgets, tricks and deception and intelligence in exotic ways. Even though there are 300 species of octopus, they generally all have these features … and more.

Octopus have 9 brains: Beside their head, 2/3 of their total brains are in their 8 arms
Strong arms can break the spines of prey or squeeze them to death, including 4 foot sharks (I saw a video)
Every arm has about 200 suction cups that can not only grip with force but can feel and taste
They can detach their arms in the same manner as lizards detach their tails, except octopus arms actually have the independent brain that keeps reacting to danger after detached
Octopus can regenerate (regrow) a missing arm
Octopus have 3 hearts
All octopus have venomous, paralyzing saliva
Their famous ink squirt not only distracts their predator and provides the octopus a smokescreen, but that chemical (tyrosinase) also stings the eyes and confuses taste and smell. Reminds me of teargas. In fact, an octopus can accidentally kill itself if it doesn't escape its own ink cloud.
No matter what position the octopus is, its eyes (with a rectangular pupil) remain horizontal, parallel with the earth
Its Houdini ability to go through tiny holes is only limited by its parrot-like beak
It has numerous methods of movement including walking, crawling, swimming and jet propulsion.It can move on land
Can change skin color like chameleons but in addition to that they can also change the texture of their skin to blend in better with the texture of a rock or algae

WHO’S SMART?

Wait a minute! Did the octopus invent all of this? Umm, according to evolutionary theory God did not and there was no intelligence involved in the design of the octopus biology or abilities.

You can steer away from God if you want and say it was aliens who designed the octopus, which scientifically speaking, is more in line with what we observe than say accidents are better engineers that the smartest humans, either that or ancient “less evolved” octopus are smarter than humans. When we see some smart engineering, our knee-jerk response is not “Gee, that didn’t take any brains at all.”

Scientists constantly share their amazement at how clever and fantastic the inventions, engineering, efficiency every species is while finding its own food and interacting with its surrounding.

In addition to this entire array of multiple and diverse abilities, the octopus already has impressive intelligence that has been tested and monitored. One common test you can see online is observing an octopus learning how to open a jar that contains prey that it wants to get. Another is getting through a maze of obstacles to get to its prey. Then it does it faster the 2nd time.

Testing an octopus for intelligence was prompted by stories of fishing boats claiming octopus would come aboard, figure out how to unlock cages on the boat to eat caught crabs and other fish. The octopus detect the captured food from underwater.

Octopus make poor pets because of their uncanny ability to escape. Octopus have also shown the ability to use tools.

NATURE’S LAW OF COMPENSATION

Any one of these extra abilities provide an advantage to the octopus but having 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and more than that, almost seems unfair compared to other species. However, something I have noticed in nature would almost read like a fairness clause for all species, or a “Compensation Clause” if I can name it that. A dominant species would tip the balance.

I see a compensation to offset both advantages and disadvantages.

The disproportionate number of so many special abilities for the octopus is a very short lifespan. The longest lifespan of all the 300 species of octopus is 5 years and the shortest is only 6 months.

MORE FASCINATING FACTS

I assume the longest living octopus is the Graneledone boreopacifica. This deep-sea octopus observed brooding her eggs for 53 months - that's nearly four and a half years. It's the longest brooding period known for any animal on earth.
Most mate only once and most die after mating and caring for their young.
While the largest octopus is the Giant Pacific Octopus with a 14-foot arm span on average with the largest documented find having a 30 foot arm only the tiny Blue-Ringed Octopus is poisonous enough to kill a human.
My favorite is the Mimic Octopus because he should be in show business. Besides having skin changing colors and textures, he can also blend in with patterns, like a chessboard. He does impersonations. When a Mimic Octopus was being attacked by territorial damselfish, he suddenly changed his shape and not only reconfigured itself in the shape and colors of a banded sea snake, but began swimming and moving like a snake instead of an octopus.

YOU CHOOSE

Now I must ask you who made all these clever inventions? Here are 3 options:

The ancient Octopus worked strategically to increase the species’ ability to flourish?
Nature accidentally bequeathed gifts to the octopus selecting randomly and which to reject and which to make permanent, building an evolved version of the octopus over millions of years?
Without religion, would you say intelligence greater than man (since we can’t make one of these) consciously and deliberately engineered these features?

SCIENTIFIC METHOD

The scientific method is an unbiased process, not of choosing, but deducing based on observation. So what do we observe?

In simpler terms, the scientific method asks, “What did you see?” rather than “What do you believe?” The scientific method does not ask “What do you think?” WHAT DO YOU OBSERVE?

IN A COURT OF LAW

That’s a good thing. In a courtroom, the judge does not want the witness to say who he thinks is guilty or innocent, the judge only wants to know “What did the witness see?” Unbiased testimony and the scientific method is never interested in majority opinion or belief but rather “What did you see?”

With this in mind, what inventions have you seen any animal or insect invent? In the news? Has anyone seen this ever?

3-ARMED MAMA

OK, people? As busy as moms are, if a mother thinks she needs 3 arms to work and hold the baby, how many generations do you think it will take for her desire to turn into molecular changes transferred to the eggs or sperm of descendants, so eventually her descendants have 3 arms and her sons carry that 3-armed gene for her granddaughters? And why do you not think that is likely? OK that’s your opinion, but you can really testify you have never ever seen a human think of a species improvement and pass this on genetically to the next generation. In fact, no one on earth knows how to turn a new biological idea into a DNA change that will embrace a mutation and pass on an idea as a biological reality.

Octopus are smart but not that smart. Not smarter than all of humanity’s scientists. Ancient octopus are supposed to be less intelligent, less developed than their ancestors according to evolutionary thinking.

HUH?

illustration from Samuel J Alibrando's book "Nature is Always Talking" available at Amazon.com

Is nature randomly proving luck is smarter than genius or is nature highly intelligent without a brain?

Nature cannot be both unintelligent luck and simultaneously a driving GENIUS force with a conscious purpose of consistently improving species over millions of years not losing that focus.

Either way, we don’t see species inventing new features, but we certainly hear about it . . . a lot.

When I have asked about the lack of observable evidence I have always been told that it is impossible because it takes millions of years and we cannot observe that.

?????

That’s science? We cannot observe it? So we make conclusions contrary to what we observe?

So with that sweeping explanation, we have just trashed the scientific method by claiming we have a scientific theory that is not observable.

I don’t need 9 brains to know something worse than a weak theory, but I am incredibly fascinated with the octopus.