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+--- Thread: How intelligent are living beings? (/topic-how-intelligent-are-living-beings)
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RE: How intelligent are living beings? - Polar - 08-03-2016
For one, I actually prefer life in the Stone Age/Pleistocene.
RE: How intelligent are living beings? - chaos - 08-03-2016
(08-03-2016, 05:46 PM)Polar Wrote: For one, I actually prefer life in the Stone Age/Pleistocene.
In that scenario, only the strong survive.
RE: How intelligent are living beings? - Polar - 04-23-2018
More evidence of octopus intelligence? Reminds me of grizzly moms who, in Scandinavia, chose to live closer to human habitats in order to avoid cannibalistic male grizzlies during the fall months.
Deepest Octopus Nursery Discovered, Holds Dark Secret
"April 20, 2018 - Reviewing underwater footage from the waters off Costa Rica, marine biologists discovered something unusual—hundreds of octopus moms, incubating their eggs. The location, 1.2 miles below the surface, is much deeper than expected to find an octopus nursery. They normally seek out cooler waters to sit with their eggs, but this rocky outcrop is crisscrossed with hot thermal vents. The large gathering is also unusual—these octopuses are normally solitary, and occasionally cannibalistic. None of the eggs were found to be developing, and the octopuses were observed to be under great stress. Scientists think the crevices in the rock offer attractive real estate for the cephalopods.
By Carrie Arnold
PUBLISHED APRIL 20, 2018
Nothing about the hundreds of octopus moms on the video feed from the submersible Alvin looked right.
"Those octopus shouldn't be there," Janet Voight, a marine biologist at the Field Museum in Chicago, said when she saw the footage.
The research vessel was exploring a rocky outcrop about 1.2 miles deep and 150 miles off Costa Rica's Pacific coast—far deeper than any other known octopus nursery, and (in theory) too warm.
"It was jaw-dropping," says Anne Hartwell, a research assistant at the University of Akron in Ohio, who led a new study on the 2014 footage of the octomoms guarding their precious eggs. (See our most beautiful octopus pictures.)
With Voigt's help, Hartwell identified the plentiful cephalopods as part of the genus Muusoctopus—and possibly even a species new to science. These octopuses are solitary and occasionally cannibalistic.
But first, she had to figure out why they were there—and why had so many of them gathered in such a small area.
ROCKY REAL ESTATE
It's likely because the Dorado Outcrop is valuable egg-laying real estate, Hartwell discovered.
Most of the ocean bottom is covered with soft muck called marine snow, a collection of organic debris that drifts down to the bottom. Octopi can't brood in those conditions.
Although much of the ocean water around the outcrop is colder than normal, hot hydrothermal vents crisscross the region—and it's these warmer spots that attracted the octopi. (Read about another deep-sea creature that lays its eggs on hydrothermal vents.)
"There were so many of them there that at first I thought they were all really happy," Hartwell says.
As Hartwell and Voight scrutinized the Alvin footage, however, they noticed something strange. None of the eggs were developing, and all the mothers showed signs of severe stress.
LONG-SUFFERING MOMS
According to octopus expert Jennifer Mather, who wasn't involved in the study, the water in the crevices is likely just too hot for the deep-sea invertebrates.
But with so few places to lay their eggs, the mothers have little choice but to endure the sweltering conditions, Hartwell and colleagues conclude in their study, published recently in the journal Deep-Sea Research Part I.
"This study reminds us that the deep sea is not a uniform environment. There are lots of different microhabitats for life to exploit," says Mather, of Alberta's University of Lethbridge.
It's also possibly not that surprising, considering making sacrifices is nothing new to octopuses. (Read about fierce animal moms that go to extremes for their babies.)
In 2011, researchers began keeping tabs on a Graneledone boreopacificafemale off central California that guarded her eggs for an astonishing 4.5 years. That's the longest known developmental period for any animal.
RE: How intelligent are living beings? - Wolverine - 10-13-2018
RE: How intelligent are living beings? - Spalea - 10-13-2018
@Wolverine :
About #17: what must I think of that ? If the elephant really paints itself, it's wonderful, incredible ! If not, it's a case of animal abuse, an act under duress, and one more time again, this is the man who is quite despicable. I don't know. I learnt it's a jung female elephant, 4 years old...
I don't know how to react. Embarassment... What's your personal opinion ?
RE: How intelligent are living beings? - Polar - 11-23-2018
It's definitely a case of animal abuse. Elephants must have been forced many times behind the scenes to paint that, and I have a suspicion that her trainer is slightly guiding her trunk (to the right of elephant out of camera's view).
RE: How intelligent are living beings? - Spalea - 11-23-2018
(11-23-2018, 07:07 AM)Polar Wrote: It's definitely a case of animal abuse. Elephants must have been forced many times behind the scenes to paint that, and I have a suspicion that her trainer is slightly guiding her trunk (to the right of elephant out of camera's view).
Thank you for your opinion... I fully agree with you. This elephant is their livelihood, a good one certainly.
RE: How intelligent are living beings? - Smilodon-Rex - 11-28-2018
Chinese Scientist Claims to Use Crispr to Make First Genetically Edited Babies
Ever since scientists created the powerful gene editing technique Crispr, they have braced apprehensively for the day when it would be used to create a genetically altered human being. Many nations banned such work, fearing it could be misused to alter everything from eye color to I.Q.
Now, the moment they feared may have come. On Monday, a scientist in China announced that he had created the world’s first genetically edited babies, twin girls who were born this month.
The researcher, He Jiankui, said that he had altered a gene in the embryos, before having them implanted in the mother’s womb, with the goal of making the babies resistant to infection with H.I.V. He has not published the research in any journal and did not share any evidence or data that definitively proved he had done it.
But his previous work is known to many experts in the field, who said — many with alarm — that it was entirely possible he had.
“It’s scary,” said Dr. Alexander Marson, a gene editing expert at the University of California in San Francisco.
While the United States and many other countries have made it illegal to deliberately alter the genes of human embryos, it is not against the law to do so in China, but the practice is opposed by many researchers there. A group of 122 Chinese scientists issued a statement calling Dr. He’s actions “crazy” and his claims “a huge blow to the global reputation and development of Chinese science.”
If human embryos can be routinely edited, many scientists, ethicists and policymakers fear a slippery slope to a futurein which babies are genetically engineered for traits — like athletic or intellectual prowess — that have nothing to do with preventing devastating medical conditions.
While those possibilities might seem far in the future, a different concern is urgent and immediate: safety. The methods used for gene editing can inadvertently alter other genes in unpredictable ways. Dr. He said that did not happen in this case, but it is a worry that looms over the field.
Dr. He made his announcement on the eve of the Second International Summit on Human Genome Editing in Hong Kong, saying that he had recruited several couples in which the man had H.I.V. and then used in vitro fertilization to create human embryos that were resistant to the virus that causes AIDS. He said he did it by directing Crispr-Cas9 to deliberately disable a gene, known as CCR₅, that is used to make a protein H.I.V. needs to enter cells.
Dr. He said the experiment worked for a couple whose twin girls were born in November. He said there were no adverse effects on other genes.
Copied by The New York Times
It's a global news that genetic power has making human being becoming crazy in no doubt
RE: How intelligent are living beings? - Charan Singh - 08-07-2019
This post is not about intelligence but then probably it is.
Intelligence in animals is just another survival tool, definitely, animals use all other skill sets and help each other out.
We, humans, on the other hand, tend to think that intelligence can only be measured in human terms.