Other Minds; Chapter 1-3

 A couple weeks ago I wrote a preliminary blog post talking about a book review on Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness. I skimmed through the book and wrote a rough draft last week. I was originally planning to write a simple summary of the first couple of chapters but the goal is for readers to read the actual book, not my interpretation. Therefore I’ll just use the first three chapters to highlight why you should read the first three chapters and hopefully more.

Meeting Across the Tree of Life

The first chapter of this book clarifies most importantly, that the author is foremost a philosopher by trade, while there is a level of depth to the explanations of evolution, neurology and the like it is not inaccessible. The way the author, Peter Godfrey-Smith writes is informative, interesting, and thought provoking. The chapter begins by sharing two fascinating accounts of curious interactions between cephalopods (subgroup of mollusks including octopi, squids, and cuttlefish) and then stating the usefulness of having other independently developed models of intelligence to fully understand what it is to be conscious.

A History of Animals

In this chapter we are led through the evolution of intelligent life from the simplest organism to a fork, that fork being the distant relative to both octopi and ourselves. This chapter really sets up a good foundation for the rest of the book. It details the conditions at each and every turn of the changing eras where octopi developed and how it shaped their adaptations through evolution.

Mischief and Craft

While performing poorly in standardized conditioning tests, octopi continue to exhibit strange and complex behavior, pointing clearly to signs of intelligence. As shown in the first chapter, stories about octopi behaving strangely accumulate and show us a more complete picture of the octopi experience. Octopi have been shown to be fickle; they quickly adapt to new environments and conditions, but may not want to cooperate in lab tasks. Much of this chapter talks about multiple instances where octopi take control of their environment to make it more convenient, which includes squirting jets of water and everything they don’t like, and escaping when no one is looking.

I look forward to reading through Other Minds more thoroughly when I have time later this week, but I hope I’ve managed to convince a few people to read the book.