Octopus vs Shark
by Connor
Who do you think would win this death match? If you guessed shark, you’re wrong. An octopus in the Seattle aquarium was put in a bigger tank full of sharks and other big fish. The marine biologists thought that the octopus would be fine with its camouflage, and if the sharks attacked, then the octopus could handle it. But, a little while after they put the octopus in the tank, dead bodies of sharks kept appearing in the tank. The biologists were puzzled, and decided to investigate, but what they found amazed them. They caught this footage of the octopus attacking the shark! After seeing that video, I’m not as scared of sharks anymore. But octopi are another story entirely.
The Octopus is really an amazing animal. According to one source they are strong enough to rip the tail off a shark (that is what was wrong with all the dead sharks- their tails were ripped off and their insides were gone)! Also, they are able to open jars and solve mazes and puzzles (and they taste good to boot!). If you want to know more then read here.
According to one article, the octopus has the most complicated brain of all the invertebrates. The octopus brain is estimated to have 300,000,000 neurons. These neurons are arranged in lobes and tracts that are more specialized than simple ganglia. An octopus has a “good” memory and can also learn (source). On the other hand, the shark’s nervous systems consist of a simple brain, spinal column and a network of nerves (source). Before researching this, I had no idea that octopi were this complex, but now I know the truth. It’s pretty amazing that these creatures are that smart, but you learn something new everyday. It makes me wonder what other animals are that smart. Only time will tell.
Do you think there are other animals out there with this level of intelligence? Do you think it is possible for an animal’s intelligence to evolve to a point where it can learn and understand our language? Would that be a good thing? Bad thing?
April 9th, 2008 at 4:27 pm
That footage was really cool; I had no idea that octopi could actually beat a shark in a match! It was also really cool how they can complete mazes and puzzles because I’ve never really though of an octopus to be that smart.
I don’t think that there will be any animals to compare to our level of intelligence. I think that would be bad if any other species could do that because humans wouldn’t be on top of the food chain anymore, but it could also be beneficial because we could share information with each other and work together to improve out enviornment and our knowledge.
April 9th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
I do think animals can evolve to understand the human languages. In fact National Geographic has a photo of a Bonobo. This bonobo’s name is Kanzi and he can use more than 360 keyboard symbols and understands thousands of spoken words. He can even create grammatically correct sentences. Also the Border Collie is another animal with a grasp on our language. So far a study on a dog by the name of Betsy shows that she can connect human words with objects. She only knows 360 words but she is still learning. The article or paragraph says that her vocab is better than a toddlers. Do I think this is good? Well, I think this could go either way. I think it depends on how humans will use this knowledge or if we will use it to our advantage. It has been used to help handicaped people. http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/03/animal-minds/musi-photography
April 10th, 2008 at 1:03 pm
I did a little research on the octupus. The octopus is an intelligent creature. In laboratory tests and aquariums, it has been able to solve mazes very quickly, unscrew jar lids to retrieve food inside the jar, and even mimic another octopus in a different tank. Octopuses generally do not live more than one or two years. The giant Pacific octopus lives longer than most octopus species. Males live about 4 years and females about 3.5 years. They usually die after breeding. At rest, the octopus’s skin is smooth and a light brownish color. But when excited, the octopus can change colors by contracting skin cells filled with pigment. This ability also allows it to camouflage itself when hunting for prey, such as shrimp, crabs, scallops, abalones, clams, and fish. The octopus can also rapidly force water out of its body, propelling itself backwards. It uses this ability to escape prey quickly. It can also squirt ink at an attacker and escape while hidden by the ink cloud.
Website: http://www.npca.org/marine_and_coastal/marine_wildlife/octopus.html
April 10th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
this is very interesting post. i always thought shark is smarter than the little fish or octopus. because he is big.
http://discovermagazine.com/2003/oct/feateye
in this article they explained the other octopus which can solve the puzzle or other octopus which is learned by experience or human.
Scientists have discovered that octopus have about the same intelligence as a mouse or a rat or certain birds.
http://www.eurofish.dk/indexSub.php?id=3061&easysitestatid=1632336606
that would be a good thing if the animal can learn and understand language. and i have one question is the size of the brain affect alot to their intelligence?
April 10th, 2008 at 7:23 pm
I think there are other animals out there with an extremely high level of intellegence. Miss Baker showed us that video of that bird that had an unbeleivable memory. He understood alot of our language and was able to understand what his trainers were telling him. He knew math too and was able to understand the concept of zero. I actually think it would not hurt the human race to have another species of animal that can understand our language.
April 10th, 2008 at 7:43 pm
This is truly amazing Connor. I used to think that the sharks were the kings of the ocean, but now I know that it is really a lot of smarts that go into the killing. I watched the video and after reading your post, I can still not get over the strength of the octopus. Imagine if that octopus was able to do that to a shark, what if a human had gotten got in that death strangle. But I am not going to say that it is impossible for animal’s to evolve to a point where they could understand our language, because everything is possible. But I don’t think animals have the need to evolve that much. It would be a good thing because humans would better be able to understand what the animals need, but it might be a bad thing, because if the animals were able to understand our language then it might result it something awful. The octopus is only one of many animals with the level of intelligence though. I did some research and found another animal with this level of intelligence. Chimps are our closest living relatives, sharing at least 98% of our genes. This website gives a list of some of the intelligent animals that are on our planet today.
April 10th, 2008 at 8:11 pm
Sweet post Connor! I definitely think that there are other animals out there that are as or more intelligent than octopi. Some examples would be humans, primates, crows, and some other birds. I remembered crows because Miss Baker showed us the video in class of the crow in China that went onto the wire holding the traffic light up and dropped a nut down onto the crosswalk. Then a car ran over the nut smashing it into tiny pieces. The crow had learned from previous experience, and when the crosswalk sign turned to walk, it hopped to the nut, ate some of the pieces and flew away when the sign changed. That video just blew me away because I had no idea that there was anything remotely close to that intelligent besides humans and primates. On youtube, I found the actual video.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=1P8Nwl7FAJk
Check it out!
April 10th, 2008 at 8:17 pm
If i didnt see this video, i thought sharks won this battle. Thank you connor! Right now i cant ignored the octopus. In video octopus look like the ninja! It hid in the rocks. And they are legs really scare look like the snack. No! it was more scarer than snacks. Becaus it have sucker, so sharks didnt escape in the battle. And they could change the color similair to background around them. Also, we knew that octopus had good intelligent. So, they made the nest itself.
Now a day, many fisherman used this to octopus. Fishermans droped jars in the sea bottom. Then octopus thought that this jar is nest itself.
Anyway, did you heard or saw the Architeuthis harveyi? This is huge squid. I watched in TV in korea. As they are really scared to me, they were hunted the whales! They live in Pacfic ocean.
Finally, it is really interesting story. Thank you very much Connor!
April 10th, 2008 at 9:56 pm
Cool post Connor! Who would have thought? However, people have been talking about how smart octopi are for a while. The story that came to my mind was the one that Ms. Baker told us about. In this one aquarium the fish in a few of the tanks were disappearing overnight. The biologists then put up a camera to see what was happening. It turns out that the octopi were climbing out of their tanks, eating the fish from the other ones, and then climbing back into their own tanks the next morning. Not that long ago, in biology, we talked about the characteristics of intelligence. The list that our class put together is:
1.Quick response
2.The ability to solve problems
3.A good memory (can plan)
4.The ability to understand symbols
5.The ability to empathize
6.Self-awareness
7.Deceit, sneaky
8.Play
9.Creativity (new communication, making tools)
10.Imitation
(Does anyone have anything to add? Does anyone disagree?)
I’d say the first, second, third, and seventh apply very well to this situation between the octopus and sharks. Do I think there are other animals with this level of intelligence? Yes. When we were talking about intelligence on biology, Ms. Baker showed us a site that listed a few individuals and species with high intelligence. (Do you still have that link, Ms. Baker?) There was a parrot named Alex that even understood the concept of zero! Consider how long it took humans to figure it out. Alex could also understand quite a bit of English. I’ve always thought it would be cool to know what animals are thinking. Lately, though, I’ve been wondering if we really want to know what they have to say. A lot of animals seem so innocent, even animals the majority of people don’t think of as innocent, like lions. Would exposing them to our way of life if they could understand it ruin that? Besides, even if we can make excuses for what we do to the environment, would they understand? Do we want them to?
April 10th, 2008 at 10:37 pm
Now I do not believe that this animal is as strong or scary as octopus but I do belive the African Grey Parrrot is an amazing and intellegent creature. Now the African Greys have learned an amazing ability which is mind blowwing to most scientist; the ability to show or recognize emotion. MOst African greys are actually very shy! Also they have th ability to udnerstand languages and even the concept of 0! AFrican Greys keep on inspiring scientist to look more into research. I believe this is a good thing so we can understand animals and help them more in understanding their way of life.
April 10th, 2008 at 10:37 pm
http://www.wingscc.com/aps/ag1.htm
April 10th, 2008 at 11:15 pm
WOW! connor this post has really made me think alot! Thats a little scary to think about. What if one day, some animal can understand us? I found this website about animal intelligence..
http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Thorndike/Animal/
i found the section on the evolution of human intelect the most interesting!
April 10th, 2008 at 11:43 pm
Well Connor, I think that it’s incredible that the octopus killed those sharks. The question now is what were the motives behind this act of violence… just a common killer perhaps, or maybe its’ caretakers did not feed it enough. I don’t know, but that’s still really cool.
Anyways, I remember learning in class about all of the intelligent animals that do amazing things. One animal that stood out to me in particular was the crows that can solve problems. I think that’s just plain cool and it seems so unexpected of such a common bird. Here’s a clip, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03ykewnc0oE&feature=related
To answer your other question, most animals do not have the proper vocal cords to speak like us, therefore making it impossible for most animals to do this. But some parrots can mimic us very well.
Watch this bird named Einstein, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSDFzg8_Wfg
I doubt this bird understands what the owner means, but it is responding to familiar sounds that the woman is making. It is still fun to watch though
April 11th, 2008 at 9:44 am
I definately think animals are smater than we give them credit for and thre a repossibly some animals that are much more intelligent that we thoguht possible. Birds and primates are great at interacting with humans and picking up on their actions. Some birds can talk like us and some birds canunderstand what we are saying. I know danielle taught her bird to say step up whenever she wants him to step on her finger, and eventually he learned the word. He also luaghs when people around him laugh, which is a lot. Primates can understand body language and use body language to communicate with us. They also solve problems on their own which shows they have a complex mind like the octopus. It is potentially a good think toat this is possible begause they can sense danger and if something is coming we can be “informed” throught the anilmals that are able to comminicate with us. We can also understand their actions better. we will be able to tell their emotions better and what animals they can tollerate better and wwhich andimals tollerate them. Understanding our language doesnt have to be just talking but body language and emotions too. And animals around the worly have already begun to interpret our languages.
April 11th, 2008 at 11:21 am
I think that there are certain animals that can understand our language. Just like the parriot we learned about. However i dont think that it is dangerous because i dont believe they could do it at such a level that they could learn how to harm us with it. I think that alot of animals are very underestimated for their intelligence. The octupus, rats and animals like that i think that people just automatically asume they are not intelligent.
However i think we have to understand that they may have different intelligence than us. They dont need to know how to do certain things that we need to know because they dont face the same problems. But they can know how to do different things that we may not. However i believe The Lord created animals this way on purpose, so that they couldnt control people.
April 11th, 2008 at 11:33 am
This is truly amazing! I still am amazed that an animal like this is able to kill one of the most feared animals on earth, a shark. I definatly think there are more animals with a level of intelligence that surpasses others. For example, Jane Goodall and her chimpanzee study. She was able to study these animals and realize that they are truly very intelligent, even enough to communicate with us humans is incredible. It turns out also that chimpanzees and us humans have 98% of the same genetic code! Here is more about Jane Goodall and her studies: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/goodall/story.html
I don’t know if it’d be possible for an animals intelligence could evolve to understand our language. In a way I think that would be for the best. Animals can communicate between themselves with different sounds, noises, songs etc. For them to be able to understand and maybe even LEARN our language seems out of the question to me. But hey, you never know..
April 11th, 2008 at 12:59 pm
Wow! connor very cool post! An shark killing octupus now thats creepy! I had no idea that octupi where that feirce, they seemed smart i suppose but i never knew that were that intelligent! The idea that an animal could learn our language and be smart enough to comprehend what we were actually saying is to say the least astonishing! There would be negative and positive things to being able to communicate with other animals. We could learn alot of new information about their world that we never knew before. It would be alright if they could communicate but if they had the capacity to reason and think problems through then we might have a competitor to the human race (though that’s not very likely). They may see that we as humans are damaging the natural world and want to stop it, this would mean they would have emotions comparable to us, Does anyone know of any animals that are said to behave somewhat like humans in their manor of living?
April 11th, 2008 at 3:06 pm
wow, this is an eye-opener to me. I never knew octopuses were so intelligent, much less smart enough and strong enough to take down sharks! They really are smart and sophisticated. I always thought that they were lazy and stupid! I tried to research some of the smartest animals out there and I found a list of the top ten by a behavioral biologist Edward O. Wilson.
1. Chimpanzee (two species)
2. Gorilla
3. Orangutan
4. Baboon (seven species, including drill and mandrill)
5. Gibbon (seven species)
6. Monkey (many species, especially the macaques, the patas, and the Celebes black ape)
7. Smaller-toothed whale (several species, especially killer whale)
8. Dolphin (many of the approximately eighty species)
9. Elephant (two species)
10. Pig
I imagine that there are many smart animals out there that people would not know about. I never knew that pigs were considered smart until i saw this biologist’s list. PBS also did a special on pigs(The Joy of Pigs) that explains how smart they are. http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/pigs/smart.html
I don’t think it would be possible for an animal to have the brain capacity to understand a language. However, if they could i would find it to be a bad thing because they would know what we we’re doing and if they didn’t like it they might harm us and consequences could result.
Great post Connor!
April 11th, 2008 at 4:33 pm
Wow that video was really cool! I am scared to death of sharks and after seeing that it makes me scared to death of octopi! One thing I’m curious about is if octopi would eat an even bigger shark if presented with it. The sharks that they ate were only 3-4 feet. For instance a great white shark is 12-16 feet long, would they eat that? It was also amazing to know that octopi have the most complicated brains of all the other invertebrates. I remember when we were learning about the different phylums in class and we learned about the experiment they did with octopi and the jar with a treat. I was amazed that the octopi were able to open it. I’m sure that there are many other animals out there that may have not even been discovered that have the very complex brains like the octopus. I think that it is very likely that animal intelligence could evolve to learn our language too. The thing is though they might not be able to speak it because of their range of vocal chords compared to ours. Cool post Connor!
April 11th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Interesting post Connor! I thought it was pretty amazing how smart the octopus is! When I was looking up smart animals, I found this article http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/05/0502_dolphinvanity.htm about a study that was done awhile ago that involved dolphins. In this study scientists wanted to see if dolphins could recognize themselves and changes in their apperance.First they showed the dolphins to a mirror a few and they evetually recoginzed themselves. After that they put a black spot on the dolphin and showed them to the mirror. When the dolphins went back to the mirror they noticed the spot and examined it. The reason this study is so amazing is because before it only higher primates and humans could recognize themselves and changes in their apperance in a mirror. Even if animals like the dolphin or the octopus are as smart as they are I don’t think they would be able to learn or understand our language. The reason for this is that they would really have no way to communicate. They couldn’t talk or use sign language, so there really is no other way to communicate. If we could though, it might be a good thing. Scientists could learn more things about the animals which would be very helpful.
April 11th, 2008 at 7:45 pm
Wow that is really amazing that the invertebrate octopus was able to attack and kill sharks like that! I did not know that octopi are the smartest of the invertebrates. I bet the marine biologists at the Seattle aquarium regretted moving the octopus to the sharks’ tank! But I am wondering if the octopus killed the sharks to eat them, or did they do it for no reason?
Here is a video of another amazing octopus that escaped from a box through a one inch hole:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4007016107763801953
And here is another that shows an octopus opening a jar:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4470831559926267392&q=octopus&total=11191&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=4&hl=en
I like the question Connor asked about animals understanding our language. I think this could have negative and positive effects, though I am not sure that is possible. Dogs learn to sit when we tell them, but they don’t actually know what the word “sit” means.
April 11th, 2008 at 10:11 pm
thats amazing how the octopus was able to kill the sharks. I had no idea that they were that strong. its actually pretty scary to think that a shark is second to an octopus. Also its really impressive that octopus are really smart and have such complex nervous systems and brains. i never thought that they were stupid but i didnt think they were smart. there are definantly other animals that are equally or more inteeligent and some can learn languages and some have begun already. An animal learning the english language completely may be a good thing but it would be an extremely profound and odd achivement that all possible effects probably have not been considered. Either way i think its very possible and would be really awesome and probably beneifcial if animals could learn adn understand our language.
April 11th, 2008 at 11:55 pm
Wow! good post, that is soo cool. I never would have imagined that an octopus could kill a shark so easily. And i also didnt know how smart octopi really are. Also i do think that there are plenty of other animals with this level of intellegence. Many other animals have the ability to solve problems and to remember things. Such as the crows in that video we saw in class, when they dropped nuts onto the road so the cars would crack them open. And as for animals being able to learn our language, i think it is possible. For example, apes have learned to use sighn language, even though it is not a spoken language it is still a form of human communication that apes were able to use. And, even animals such as dogs have been able to learn certain commands. I think this is a good thing for animals to be able to understand our language. The better we can communicate with animals the better we can figure out how they think and why they do some of the things they do. Good post connor.
April 12th, 2008 at 11:59 am
To answer your questions Conner, yes i think there are other animals out there that currently have a very high intelligence that resembles this octopus’s intelligence. Remember all those animals that Mrs. Baker showed us? Like the crows that could use cars to crack open nuts, and the parrot that could could understand numbers and knew the concept of zero? I personally think that parrot possesses an even higher level of intelligence than this octopuss to be honest.
As for your second question, i think yes. Because as with the parrot, it could pronounce words and talk to people with understanding. Same with the monkeys that we talked about in class. They were able to understand our language and comunicate in sign language to us. I think this is a wonderful thing, because now we can understand what some animals are thinking and what emotions they can show. Even better, with the monkeys if i remember correctly, Mrs. Baker said that they teach their offspring the sign language, so that creates a whole group of monkeys that can communicate with humans.
April 12th, 2008 at 12:00 pm
Wow, that suprised me a lot! I never new that an octapi was capable of hunting a shark! That video was really interesting. This got me thinking, if that octupi could eat a 4 foot long shark, could it eat humans? It’s a little crazy to think of, but I guess that octupus wouldn’t be in such shallow water were humans swim so there is probly no recorded deaths.
Also, I’ve heard that dolphins are pretty smart, I went searching, and I found this amazing article on dolphins and their ability to react to humans and even sentances and sign language! http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/animals/features/299feature1.shtml
Dolphins might even be smarter than the octupus.
I believe if animals understood our language it would have good effects and bad effects. Good effects would be something like being able to tell your pet “Don’t use the bathroom in the house…” bad effects would be they could know what we planning to do to them or something like that.
April 12th, 2008 at 1:38 pm
We humans are certainly an intelligent species. Another intelligent species are elephants. An elephants’ brain weighs about 11 pounds, some 3 times bigger than that of humans! No other land animals have such a brain and more importantly, an elephant can use objects (with purpose) that it didn’t see in its life before. Something that a human cannot do. I found a really cool video of an elephant that learned how to use a paintbrush and paint to create an amazing work of art!
Just go here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=He7Ge7Sogrk&feature=email
April 12th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
I did some research and I found that humans with bigger brains than other humans are smarter. But I was unable to find a clear answer on if brain size affects intelligence in animals. Some websites said that it does not, and other websites have said that it affects intelligence with certain animals and not with others. But this website http://www.news-medical.net/?id=11121 did talk about the affect of brain size in humans. “For all age and sex groups, it is now very clear that brain volume and intelligence are related,” said lead researcher Michael A. McDaniel, Ph.D.
April 12th, 2008 at 4:31 pm
What i am so shocked about is that a animal that clearly most humans don’t think is harmless can take down one of the most feared. When i went to hawaii when i was little i remember our tour guide caught a octopus and clearly it didn’t look that harmless. and he told us that when octopus get scared or try and warn other predators off, they ink a dark black ink. and he held up the octopus and put its head in his mouth! and the tentacles were all around his face (good thing it was just a baby octopi) and then he took it out and put in back in the tank and you just saw a massive black spot around it. i was surprised that an octopus wouldn’t do that when attacking a shark cause they look so much stronger then they are so they would be intimidated. If octopus’ learned our nature and how we are able to act I’m pretty sure if they can take down a shark, they could eat a human as well. let’s just hope that doesn’t come to happen. :]
April 12th, 2008 at 5:30 pm
Great post Connor! I think that there is most definatly more kinds of intelligent animals in the wild that we have discovered and that we have yet to discover. This website lists some of the intelligent species
www.enotes.com/science-facts-we/animal-world/besides-humans-which-animals-most-intelligent
I also think that it is possible that animals will learn our lunguage one day. Actually if you think about it some animals have already learned our language. Some types of primapes have learned to understand sign language after being taught be humans. I think that it would be a good think and a bad thing. The good part would be that you would be able to reason with them. The bad part would be that they might start to act and think more like humans, thus causing them to have human characteristics and might start to hurt others to get what they wanted.
April 12th, 2008 at 5:58 pm
Thats really interesting, I never knew that an Octopus was so smart. I knew that we had talked about them in class and that they belonged to the Mollusca class. Which is the most intelligent invertebrate out off all the classes. I was reading in ‘NAT GEO’ that octopus will collect crustaceans and build little ‘fortresses’ or ‘gardens’ around their homes. When octapi are being attacked by a predator they have two ways of escaping. Either spraying ink to disorientate the predator or just like a lizard it can loose an arm and can grow a new one back later. When you see a octapus swimming along the sea bed it almost looks as if it is running across the floor with it’s tenticles. Yes, I think that there are other animals out there with the same or greater intelligence. For one there is the parrot which is able to do simple math and grasp the idea of zero. then there is chimpanzees which use sticks to dig termites out of their nests and they use sticks for weapons too. It may be possible in the future, but right now it would be very hard to. you would have to be able to communicate with them and with out a common language or way of communicating it would be next to impossible. And it would depend on the use of the animal if it is either for science purposes, yes, but for fighting wars ,no. I think that would be awesome to be able to communicate with another species though.
April 12th, 2008 at 8:00 pm
Hei guys, i wrote again. Then we missed the one part. Octapus also has another weapon.
Octapus could be change the colors itself. This video shows the change color about the Octapus. http://youtube.com/watchv=IAGxTsEmGek&feature=related
Also Octapus have also one more weapon. It is a black water(?). Actually, i dont know well in English this vocab. If octapuses was danger, they sprays the black water and they could be run away from the danger.
This video is show the black water(?)
http://youtube.com/watch?v=7NwmEEPSwr8&feature=related
April 12th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
Oh! , First video error so i wrote again
http://youtube.com/watch?v=IAGxTsEmGek&feature=related
April 12th, 2008 at 11:21 pm
I think it would be amazing if an animal grew to understand and speak the human language. We could learn about their lives and feelings. It would help to make scientists a lot smarter and more understanding of how animals think. Then again, it could also have its negative effects as well. I mean, they could grow to eventually outsmart us and that wouldn’t be a very good thing. It would be hard to undo what we did. A current example, global warming. Connors post was very interesting. I was aware that the octopus is a pretty smart animal and can do neat things but I never thought about how it would do in a fight with a shark. I thought surely the shark would win. But, I was wrong after I watched the clip.
April 13th, 2008 at 1:22 am
Great post Connor! This really shows that animals can learn and do have intelligence. I do not agree that it would be right if animals became as smart as humans. As humans we are the have highest level of brain development and ability to reason in all of creation. We were given this ability with a purpose to take care of those creatures who are less adapt. However I don’t believe we given enough credit to animals for their ability to learn and reason. A good example was the video we saw in class of the bird that in order to fulfill its biological goal which is to survive to reproduce it had to learn how to use its surroundings to get food. All creatures learn because of their ultimate biological goal: survive to reproduce. This is seen in the way man has evolved over centuries going from hunting and gathering all the way to industry and mass production.
Over all I think it would be a bad thing if animals became as smart as humans because it is a major factor that separates the two species. We have different languages for a reason, we do not need to talk to animals because there is no need for us to have interactions at that level with another species. It would lead to a possible takeover by the animals. A good thing that could come out of it would be for scientist and that is that they would not have to do as much studying of animals because they could just ask “Hey, why do you do…..?” Here is a video i found on YouTube that is funny but is also pretty cool in that it shows some quite intelligent things animals can do.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCJiY1rVUGo&feature=related
April 13th, 2008 at 7:56 am
Wow! Connor very cool post! A shark killing octopus now that’s creepy! I had no idea that octopi where that fierce, they seemed smart I suppose but I never knew that were that intelligent! The idea that an animal could learn our language and be smart enough to comprehend what we were actually saying is to say the least astonishing! There would be negative and positive things to being able to communicate with other animals. We could learn a lot of new information about their world that we never knew before. Though they may see that we as humans are damaging the natural world and want to stop it, this would mean they would have emotions and feelings comparable to us, Does anyone know of any animals that are said to behave somewhat like humans in their manor of living?
I found this national geographic video about octopi and it has a clip of it attacking the shark:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_6jQ6b-Tqg&feature=related
April 13th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
Great post connor! I was really fascinated by this post about animal inteligence. I was looking on mr. bryds blog and saw a great post on a cat that can predict when people are going to die. The cat lives in a nursing home and every time a person is about to die the cat will go into that persons room about 4 hours prior. Here is the link to his blog it is a very good post.
http://biologyblog.edublogs.org/
April 13th, 2008 at 3:05 pm
I agree with what richie has said above. To start, this was an amazing post connor and a pretty sweet video. Second i believe parrots are extremely intelegent, as well as dolphins. Richie mentioned the parrot that miss baker had told us about in class above. That parrot came to understand our language, but also was able to form an emotional connection with humans. I mean, after that parrot’s death its owner had to get counceling, so thats pretty extreme. I feel that for a animal to connect with humans on an emotional level is greater than mastering our languages.
April 13th, 2008 at 3:41 pm
Wow connor, this is pretty wonderful. It helps us learn how amazing animals can be and we can learn so much more now. I would never have thought that an octupus could have killed a shark but i did believe that it could harm one. When me and my family were in Hawaii my dad was coming back from snorkling and got to see one. But it wasn’t a big one. Now to answer your questions i really do believe that there are animals that level of intelligence and that they may be able to understand our language. It is a very scary thought but I believe one day it could happen. If an animal could understand our language i believe it can be a good thing because then we can teach it more things and it may be able to help us all do something in our societies. Great post Connor
April 13th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
I remember talking about animal intelligence in class. That day we had to discuss what defined animal intelligence to us. I think animal intelligence is really interesting. I think animals are more capable than we think they are. Like Connor said, we talked about how the Octopus can open a jar with its tenticles. I have always thought sharks were the most dangerous animals because you really only hear about their attacks. I have never thought of an Octopus as a really strong animal. After watching that video, I think differently. However, I don’t think that animal intelligence can evolve to understand our language anytime soon. Here are ten facts about Octopi!
http://animals.about.com/b/2006/12/17/ten-facts-about-octopi.htm
April 13th, 2008 at 10:52 pm
That is absolutely incredible that an invertebrate is strong enough to rip off a shark’s tail. i guess I always thought that they were generally weak since they had no solid bones. That’s also neat that they are so smart. I had no idea that an octopus could do that much. That was also a great video, it was kind of fun to watch the shark lose. It felt similar to watching a tiny little person destroy Jaws. I had no idea that a quiet little octopus was capable of so much. I knew that they could squeeze through tiny spots, but that really is incredible. I actually think it could be really bad if animals could learn our language. If they could learn to speak our language, i imagine they could eventually learn to reason with us aw well. They could also probably learn to outsmart us and talk us intp giving us something they want. I may be letting my mind get carried away here, but if the animals could learn our language, they might even be able to understand our society as well. They could (possibly) understand us enough to need jobs and educations and housing. Imagine losing your job to a monkey or pig or something.
April 13th, 2008 at 11:09 pm
I found a video where it is sort of the same concept. deer are usually skiddish and run away from things that scare them, but when it comes to defending their lives, animals will go to extremes and do the unexpected. It was very unexpected that the octopus killed those sharks, but I think it was just defending its life like the deer in this video. in this case, the deer was saving its baby from a monkey. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUQZ0QrqxdM&NR=1
April 13th, 2008 at 11:10 pm
Wow i thought that if a shark and an octopus were to fight then a shark would win easily, but this was not the case in fact it was the exact opposite! The Octopus won without any difficulty what so ever! It was amazing because i did nit reakize that Octopi were capable of such feats! Then as I read on in the post I began to see why and how the Octopus was able to beat the shark the way it did! I believe that there are animals out there that have just a high intelligenece or even higher because there are still animals that have not even been discovered yet let alone tested on their intlelligence! I do not believe that any animal will ever elvolve to understand our language because it just cant happen. Some animals might be able to mimic our language like the parrot, but the parrot certainly does not understand it! If by some incredible amazing and spectacular event were to occur and an animal was able to understand our language I think that it would be a good thing because then we could communicate with that species and ask them questions that we dont understand and probobly never would unless this were to happen, but that will never happen!
April 13th, 2008 at 11:44 pm
I did a little research on elephants since I kept seeing them in the top smartest animal lists, and my findings were quite interesting. It turns out that elephants have a rather complex system of communication. It is different from human communication though. (we use an acoustic system of communication - language ) It turns out elephants use chemical, tactile signals, and visual displays for communication. There are three main reasons why elephants have evovled to such a complex system of communication. One is that elephants have a very distinct social system therefore they need to be able to communicate with each other. Another reason that their communication is so complex is that since they live so long, they have learned a vast amount of knowlege about social and ecological things. Lastly they simply have a large brain that can retain complex thoughts and have a rather good amount of memory. If you want to know more about this subject here is the website I found this information on - http://www.elephantvoices.org/index.php?topic=why_comm&http://www.elephantvoices.org/why_comm/large_brained.html
April 14th, 2008 at 12:02 am
Before seeing this video i would never have thought that an octopus could kill or even seriously harm a shark. In response to your first question, yes i definantly think that there are other animals out there with this level of intellegence, like all of those animals that Miss Baker showed us that day in class. Many of those animals could communicate or at least understand human language to some degree. And who would have thought that a crow would be able to comprehend the concept of zero, something that took humans thousands of years to figure out. In response to your second question i do not think that animals can evolve to where they can learn and understand an entire human language. There have been many animals that can understand many words in our language but i do not think they could learn the entire language. But if they could i do think there would be benifits to it. We could better understand animals behaviors and we could also see how smart some animals actually are. Cool post Conner.
April 17th, 2008 at 1:25 pm
I did a little research on the shark. Here is what I found.
Sharks have a variety of body shapes. Most sharks have streamlined, torpedo-shaped bodies that glide easily through the water. Some bottom-dwelling sharks (e.g. the angelshark) have flattened bodies that allow them to hide in the sand of the ocean bed. Some sharks have an elongated body shape (e.g., cookiecutter sharks and wobbegongs). Sawsharks have elongated snouts, thresher sharks have a tremendously elongated upper tail fin which they use to stun prey, and hammerheads have extraordinarily wide heads. The goblin shark has a large, pointed protuberance on its head; its purpose is unknown. Sharks may have up to 3,000 teeth at one time. Most sharks do not chew their food, but gulp it down whole it in large pieces. The teeth are arranged in rows; when one tooth is damaged or lost, it is replaced by another. Most sharks have about 5 rows of teeth at any time. The front set is the largest and does most of the work. Most of them eat fish, squid, other sharks, and marine mammals. Occasionally, a group of sharks will attack a food source (for example, a school of fish) in a maniacal fashion. They will wildly attack the food and anything in the area, even each other, sometimes wounding or eating fellow sharks.
Website: http://www.enchantedlearning.com/subjects/sharks/
May 2nd, 2008 at 5:22 pm
Thanks guys for commenting. I really apreciate it. Mark in English we refer to the black water as ink, like from a pen. I really thought it was cool that you guys were all suprised at that video. I was too. Please keep commenting on here and if you have found anything else that ia new, please post it here.