Other Minds: The Octopus and the Evolution of Intelligent Life
Godfrey-Smith (Peter)
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Notes

  1. I came across this book via "Godfrey-Smith (Peter) - Philosophers and other animals". I’ve read it on Kindle while walking Bertie the dog, so not with 100% attention. I‘ve bought a hard copy for closer attention ‘one of these days’.
  2. While the title refers to octopuses, a lot of space is given to other cephalopods – in particular cuttlefish. So, including decapods. The explanation of the cuttlefish’s colour displays is enlightening.
  3. The distributed nature of the octopus nervous system is a warning against simplistic ideas of ‘brain transplants1’. Even in humans the nervous system is somewhat distributed.
  4. I found Chapter 6 (‘Our Minds and Others’) somewhat confusing. I got the impression that the author was prepared to consider language2 essential for thought3. The reference to Lev Vygotsky was interesting. The author argues rightly that octopuses are intelligent, but I got the impression that he might think they are not even sentient. Am I muddled? I need to re-read this Chapter at my desk.
  5. For further enlightenment and background, see:-
    → Wikipedia: Octopus
    → Wikipedia: Cuttlefish
    → Wikipedia: Cephalopod

Back Cover Blurb
  1. What if intelligent life on Earth evolved not once, but twice? The octopus is the closest we will come to meeting an intelligent alien. What can we learn from the encounter?
  2. In Other Minds, Peter Godfrey-Smith, a distinguished philosopher of science and a skilled scuba diver, tells a bold new story of how nature became aware of itself – a story that largely occurs in the ocean, where animals first appeared.
  3. Tracking the mind’s fitful development from unruly clumps of seaborne cells to the first evolved nervous systems in ancient relatives of jellyfish, he explores the incredible evolutionary journey of the cephalopods, which began as inconspicuous mollusks who would later abandon their shells to rise above the ocean floor, searching for prey and acquiring the greater intelligence needed to do so – a journey completely independent from the route that mammals and birds would later take.
  4. But what kind of intelligence do cephalopods possess? How did the octopus, a solitary creature with little social life, become so smart? What is it like to have eight tentacles that are so packed with neurons that they virtually ‘think for themselves’? By tracing the question of inner life back to its roots and comparing human beings with our most remarkable animal relatives, Godfrey-Smith casts crucial new light on the octopus mind – and on our own.
  5. Peter Godfrey-Smith is a distinguished professor of history and the philosophy of science at the University of Sydney. He is the author of four books, including Darwinian Populations and Natural Selection, which won the 2010 Lakatos Award for an outstanding work on the philosophy of science. His underwater videos of octopuses have been featured in National Geographic and New Scientist. Peter Godfrey-Smith's book 'Other Minds' was a Sunday Times bestseller w/c 10-05-2021.

Contents
  1. Meetings Across the Tree of Life – 3
    → Two Meetings and a Departure – Outlines
  2. A History of Animals – 15
    → Beginnings – Living Together – Neurons and Nervous Systems – The Garden – Senses – The Fork
  3. Mischief and Craft – 43
    → In a Sponge Garden – Evolution of the Cephalopods – Puzzles of Octopus Intelligence – Visiting Octopolis – Nervous Evolution – Body and Control – Convergence and Divergence
  4. From White Noise to Consciousness – 77
    → What It's Like – Evolution of Experience – Latecomer versus Transformation – The Case of the Octopus
  5. Making Colors – 107
    → The Giant Cuttlefish – Making Colors – Seeing Colors – Being Seen – Baboon and Squid – Symphony
  6. Our Minds and Others – 137
    → From Hume to Vygotsky – Word Made Flesh – Conscious Experience – Full Circle
  7. Experience Compressed – 159
    → Decline – Life and Death – A Swarm of Motorcycles – Long and Short Lives – Ghosts
  8. Octopolis – 179
    → An Armful of Octopuses – Origins of Octopolis – Parallel Lines – The Oceans
  9. Notes – 205
    Acknowledgments – 239
    Index – 241
Book Comment

William Collins (8 Mar. 2018); also 'borrowed' from Kindle


Text Colour Conventions (see disclaimer)
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  2. Mauve: Text by correspondent(s) or other author(s); © the author(s)


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