3 ms·

I find this article jarring. FTA - "it's important to be cautious even if there's not complete certainty these animals are sentient." Uh what? I am no zoologist

I find this article jarring. FTA - "it's important to be cautious even if there's not complete certainty these animals are sentient." Uh what? I am no zoologist or marine biologist (or whatever 'ologist) but this is ridiculous. Octopii are known to be very intelligent. Lobsters may not be as intelligent as octopii but they are big and complex creatures. To assume that they are not sentient and will not feel pain if you throw them alive in boiling water is arrogant and pretentious. If you don't know for sure, the assumption should be the opposite unless proven otherwise.

anothernewdude 5y ago
Trees are big too.
- hh3k0 5y ago
  What a knee-jerk response to a perfectly fine comment…
TaupeRanger 5y ago
I would agree to err on the side of caution, but the fact of the matter is we really don't know how different the qualia of other animals are from that of humans.
rwmj 5y ago
Off topic, but the correct plural of octopus is octopodes (or octopuses). From the classical Greek word for foot (πούς, plural πόδες). Only Latin 2nd declension nouns turn -us into -i. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/octopus#Noun https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/octopus#Noun
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- exo-pla-net 5y ago
  And to be even more precise, "octopuses" is the standard modern usage. Octopodes is increasingly antiquated.
- Peritract 5y ago
  There isn't a correct plural for 'octopus' because it's a Greek word filtered into English by way of Latin and so you can make a reasonable argument for basically any option. If language evolution followed strict deterministic rules, then it probably would be "octopodes", but that's not the case - language changes and grows in all sorts of different ways and words become valid despite their "pedigree". As your link says, "sources differ on which plurals are acceptable"; there's no single correct option and basically all of the suggested ones are in reasonably-common usage.
RunningDroid 5y ago
They may be confusing the difference between sentience and sapience.

anothernewdude 5y ago

Trees are big too.

hh3k0 5y ago
What a knee-jerk response to a perfectly fine comment…

TaupeRanger 5y ago

I would agree to err on the side of caution, but the fact of the matter is we really don't know how different the qualia of other animals are from that of humans.

rwmj 5y ago

Off topic, but the correct plural of octopus is octopodes (or octopuses). From the classical Greek word for foot (πούς, plural πόδες). Only Latin 2nd declension nouns turn -us into -i. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/octopus#Noun https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/octopus#Noun

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
exo-pla-net 5y ago
And to be even more precise, "octopuses" is the standard modern usage. Octopodes is increasingly antiquated.
Peritract 5y ago
There isn't a correct plural for 'octopus' because it's a Greek word filtered into English by way of Latin and so you can make a reasonable argument for basically any option. If language evolution followed strict deterministic rules, then it probably would be "octopodes", but that's not the case - language changes and grows in all sorts of different ways and words become valid despite their "pedigree". As your link says, "sources differ on which plurals are acceptable"; there's no single correct option and basically all of the suggested ones are in reasonably-common usage.

RunningDroid 5y ago

They may be confusing the difference between sentience and sapience.