I just wanna see what they could get up to if they had a forty year lifespan or something.
Wonderful, terrible things. It's best we wait for the ripples of strong AI settling out before trying to uplift invertebrates.
edit: Besides, aren't the dogs deserving of longer, better lives? I'd bet if you could make dogs that had the lifespans of parrots they'd be both incredibly popular and get a great deal of legal protection.
Now I'm wondering if submarine stoneknapping is doable..
I think you'd see different traits being key, temperature under water stays pretty constant and the key differences are at depths rather than seasonal. Plus very low barriers to movement.
I think you'd see more utilisation of biological resources and more trade - it's not like you're after relatively rare sites with the right kind of stone if you're hunting a specific species for your knives. And it's easier for those knives to spread.
Plus chances are you've done the sharp stuff already with your own beak. Writing is what uplifts Cephlapods, it's been recently shown that with HD videos they can see moving images (but struggled with earlier TV screens to recognise them as real) and they're starting to hunt in packs in Monaco due to excessive fishing rendering the area fairly barren for prey. Generational learning is something that's seemingly happened over the last couple of decades for the Octopus. And in that we have a niche in their world.
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Now I'm wondering if submarine stoneknapping is doable..
I think you'd see different traits being key, temperature under water stays pretty constant and the key differences are at depths rather than seasonal. Plus very low barriers to movement.
I think you'd see more utilisation of biological resources and more trade - it's not like you're after relatively rare sites with the right kind of stone if you're hunting a specific species for your knives. And it's easier for those knives to spread.
Plus chances are you've done the sharp stuff already with your own beak. Writing is what uplifts Cephlapods, it's been recently shown that with HD videos they can see moving images (but struggled with earlier TV screens to recognise them as real) and they're starting to hunt in packs in Monaco due to excessive fishing rendering the area fairly barren for prey. Generational learning is something that's seemingly happened over the last couple of decades for the Octopus. And in that we have a niche in their world.
So, what I'm hearing is; Nintendo were right all along and the nightmare future world of Splatoon is coming to splat us all…?
I just wanna see what they could get up to if they had a forty year lifespan or something.
Wonderful, terrible things. It's best we wait for the ripples of strong AI settling out before trying to uplift invertebrates.
edit: Besides, aren't the dogs deserving of longer, better lives? I'd bet if you could make dogs that had the lifespans of parrots they'd be both incredibly popular and get a great deal of legal protection.
It was probably less a case of "fuck this place" and more a case of "fuck, I need to get LAID!"
Luckily octopi short lifespans aren't conducive to creating civilization, otherwise they'd be serious competition for who gets to rule the world.
Given their intelligence and personalities, octopus lifespan has got to be one of the most profoundly unfair things I've come across in nature. I mean, sure, it probably works out for everything else in the oceans, but come on.
Then again, considering the whole alien intelligence thing (and opportunistic cannibalism) death may not really compute for them. The same goes for many of the very intelligent bird species, dogs too.
Crows absolutely understand death and sometimes even hold things akin to funerals where dozens will gather around a dead crow and appear to silently contemplate the body before leaving together. Which yeah, might not be for the dead crow so much as figuring how to stay live crows, but it still shows that they know they can die and want to avoid it.
I've always found it fascinating how dogs and cats ended up with completely different evolutionary strategies that enabled them to live with humans. Dog evolution led to dogs following and understanding human communication. Cats, on the other hand, evolved to make us pay more attention to them. Their facial structure changed. At first biologists thought that this was due to a change in diet: domestic cats no longer needed the big teeth and strong jaws of their wild ancestors. But early African and Middle-Eastern farm cats had a very similar diet as the wildcats, yet the flat-faced, big-eyed phenotype was already emerging. So the prevailing theory is that looking cute was an evolutionary advantage. Cats also became really talkative. They developed a plethora of vocalizations, all aimed to communicate with humans. The wavelength range? Same as the one sound humans are hard-wired to always notice: a human baby. Cats use these vocalizations almost exclusively at humans, being mostly quiet around one another.
(Cats also had to develop new social skills to deal with other cats. Their wild ancestors are solitary, territorial animals. The behaviors cats use to establish social order in groups are mostly novel, and evolved in a really short time on the evolutionary scale.)
It was probably less a case of "fuck this place" and more a case of "fuck, I need to get LAID!"
Luckily octopi short lifespans aren't conducive to creating civilization, otherwise they'd be serious competition for who gets to rule the world.
Given their intelligence and personalities, octopus lifespan has got to be one of the most profoundly unfair things I've come across in nature. I mean, sure, it probably works out for everything else in the oceans, but come on.
Then again, considering the whole alien intelligence thing (and opportunistic cannibalism) death may not really compute for them. The same goes for many of the very intelligent bird species, dogs too.
Crows absolutely understand death and sometimes even hold things akin to funerals where dozens will gather around a dead crow and appear to silently contemplate the body before leaving together. Which yeah, might not be for the dead crow so much as figuring how to stay live crows, but it still shows that they know they can die and want to avoid it.
Yeah, crows and a select cross section of parrots definitely understand death. A lot of the others we consider to be very clever don't though, it seems to be a cream-of-the crop kind of thing. Corvids, some parrots, elephants, great apes, dolphins and some whales understand death, along with some anecdotal reports for other animals. A certain threshold for a sense of self and empathy may be necessary to comprehend mortality.
Tangentially, there was an interesting article I read recently that explains why the very intelligent birds can express what to us seem extraordinary levels of comprehension relative to their brain volume. Their neuron densities are incredible compared to mammals, so their neuron counts are in the range of primates and ungulates. Plus, a lot of those neurons end up in the area of the brain that in humans is associated with spatial reasoning, language, and memory. A raven has more neurons in this area than a capuchin, and macaws more than a rhesus monkey.
edit: this could be extended to potential expectations for the body-size range for any intelligent life we may find elsewhere in the universe. It's entirely possible we could make contact with a species that's as smart as us but weighs no more than a cat, or comes in at half the weight of a sedan.
I assume that the two of the most significant factors in development of intelligence are long lifespans and social behavior. Cephalopods kind of screwed themselves over there.
I assume that the two of the most significant factors in development of intelligence are long lifespans and social behavior. Cephalopods kind of screwed themselves over there.
Yeah, I think cephalopods are interesting as a case of parallel evolution (in many respects [their eyes are better than ours, no blind spot]) but we should probably not give them a leg up. Until we encounter non-hostile invertebrate life in the universe, they can continue as-is.
Same question for who the first human was that decided oysters were food?
I imagine early humans were less picky about their food because it was considerably less abundant, so they'd try anything that could potentially be edible. Alternatively, starvation driving people to try just about anything to see if it's edible.
It's also a surprisingly abundant food source.
I was watching this show on Welsh Cuisine and at one point the host goes on this ... like, foraging picnic type outdoor meal with a bunch of locals. And they literally just head to the coast and walk down the coast line, picking stuff off the rocks and throwing it in a bag. And like an hour or two later they've got just this massive pile of edible seafood. (I mean, if you call that stuff edible anyway)
For old school humans, that's fucking jackpot.
the Tlingit of the Pacific Northwest believe (according to this Wikipedia page, accuracy of factoid not guaranteed) that only eating food off the beach makes you an idiot. it's so easy to gather that anyone who sustains themselves solely off it must be lazy or have something wrong with them
I... Actually totally forgot that underwater welding was a thing.
I feel real dumb now.
Underwater welding requires a lot of technical knowledge and prerequisite supporting technology. Without the ability to create or use fire, the only energy source capable of showing a primitive underwater society the concept of welding or metalworking in general would be an active lava flow. But building any type of primitive industry around such a random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use energy source would be extremely difficult and stunt the growth of said civilization. That's not to say cephalopods couldn't develop other technologies that allow them to progress along other avenues to become an advanced society , but if they develop metalworking at all, in my opinion it would come very late.
Just remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence.
I think the whole discussion is ignoring that the ocean is incredibly hostile to metal, and many early metals developed by man like copper and iron would simply not last very long.
If an intelligent cephalopod race was coming to power under the oceans, they'd probably get better results from using other lifeforms to do/get what they want. Like, engineering coral reefs, clams, or benthic/intertidal debris for homes or using urchins the way boxer crabs do.
I think the whole discussion is ignoring that the ocean is incredibly hostile to metal, and many early metals developed by man like copper and iron would simply not last very long.
If an intelligent cephalopod race was coming to power under the oceans, they'd probably get better results from using other lifeforms to do/get what they want. Like, engineering coral reefs, clams, or benthic/intertidal debris for homes or using urchins the way boxer crabs do.
I... Actually totally forgot that underwater welding was a thing.
I feel real dumb now.
Underwater welding requires a lot of technical knowledge and prerequisite supporting technology. Without the ability to create or use fire, the only energy source capable of showing a primitive underwater society the concept of welding or metalworking in general would be an active lava flow. But building any type of primitive industry around such a random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use energy source would be extremely difficult and stunt the growth of said civilization. That's not to say cephalopods couldn't develop other technologies that allow them to progress along other avenues to become an advanced society , but if they develop metalworking at all, in my opinion it would come very late.
High quality modern industrial welding requires a lot of technical knowledge and prerequisite supporting technology. Man developed welding techniques long before understanding the science behind doing so or having access to technology beyond fire and hammer. While modern welding involves things like electrical equipment (welding machine), filler metal (wire, usually coated in flux), and controlled conditions, this is a result of our need to have rapid high quality joining methods. Heating up two pieces of metal and bashing them until they are a single piece is also a welding method, it's just that smithing doesn't satisfy our current needs.
Magma vents at the ocean bottom provide more than enough energy and stability to allow for the development of a metalworking society. If anything, the reason that cephalopods will not develop metalworking isn't due to a lack of resources, but due to a lack of evolutionary demand. They are an apex predatory, and don't require tools to uplift them further.
I... Actually totally forgot that underwater welding was a thing.
I feel real dumb now.
Underwater welding requires a lot of technical knowledge and prerequisite supporting technology. Without the ability to create or use fire, the only energy source capable of showing a primitive underwater society the concept of welding or metalworking in general would be an active lava flow. But building any type of primitive industry around such a random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use energy source would be extremely difficult and stunt the growth of said civilization. That's not to say cephalopods couldn't develop other technologies that allow them to progress along other avenues to become an advanced society , but if they develop metalworking at all, in my opinion it would come very late.
High quality modern industrial welding requires a lot of technical knowledge and prerequisite supporting technology. Man developed welding techniques long before understanding the science behind doing so or having access to technology beyond fire and hammer. While modern welding involves things like electrical equipment (welding machine), filler metal (wire, usually coated in flux), and controlled conditions, this is a result of our need to have rapid high quality joining methods. Heating up two pieces of metal and bashing them until they are a single piece is also a welding method, it's just that smithing doesn't satisfy our current needs.
Magma vents at the ocean bottom provide more than enough energy and stability to allow for the development of a metalworking society. If anything, the reason that cephalopods will not develop metalworking isn't due to a lack of resources, but due to a lack of evolutionary demand. They are an apex predatory, and don't require tools to uplift them further.
I thought sharks and whales and larger bony fish ate Octopuses.
Most hypothetical conversations about a given species' rise to technological dominance always seems caged in by how humans did it. Like, sure, lava is random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use, but so was fire to humans at one point.
It seems similar, to me, to people looking at the laws of the universe and Earth's placement in our solar system and saying "of course there's a God who created the universe for us, look at how perfectly the laws of creation work to support our lives. If anything was even slightly off, we wouldn't exist." to which my response would be that if the universe worked differently, it would be equally likely that some sentient and unbelievably strange creature would be living on some alternate Earth thinking the same thing.
I... Actually totally forgot that underwater welding was a thing.
I feel real dumb now.
Underwater welding requires a lot of technical knowledge and prerequisite supporting technology. Without the ability to create or use fire, the only energy source capable of showing a primitive underwater society the concept of welding or metalworking in general would be an active lava flow. But building any type of primitive industry around such a random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use energy source would be extremely difficult and stunt the growth of said civilization. That's not to say cephalopods couldn't develop other technologies that allow them to progress along other avenues to become an advanced society , but if they develop metalworking at all, in my opinion it would come very late.
High quality modern industrial welding requires a lot of technical knowledge and prerequisite supporting technology. Man developed welding techniques long before understanding the science behind doing so or having access to technology beyond fire and hammer. While modern welding involves things like electrical equipment (welding machine), filler metal (wire, usually coated in flux), and controlled conditions, this is a result of our need to have rapid high quality joining methods. Heating up two pieces of metal and bashing them until they are a single piece is also a welding method, it's just that smithing doesn't satisfy our current needs.
Magma vents at the ocean bottom provide more than enough energy and stability to allow for the development of a metalworking society. If anything, the reason that cephalopods will not develop metalworking isn't due to a lack of resources, but due to a lack of evolutionary demand. They are an apex predatory, and don't require tools to uplift them further.
The temperature coming out of a hydrothermal vent is not near hot enough for forge welding. That's why I said they'd need actual open lava for it.
Just remember that half the people you meet are below average intelligence.
Most hypothetical conversations about a given species' rise to technological dominance always seems caged in by how humans did it. Like, sure, lava is random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use, but so was fire to humans at one point.
It seems similar, to me, to people looking at the laws of the universe and Earth's placement in our solar system and saying "of course there's a God who created the universe for us, look at how perfectly the laws of creation work to support our lives. If anything was even slightly off, we wouldn't exist." to which my response would be that if the universe worked differently, it would be equally likely that some sentient and unbelievably strange creature would be living on some alternate Earth thinking the same thing.
Until we see how somebody else does it, we're kinda stuck with that.
Most hypothetical conversations about a given species' rise to technological dominance always seems caged in by how humans did it. Like, sure, lava is random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use, but so was fire to humans at one point.
It seems similar, to me, to people looking at the laws of the universe and Earth's placement in our solar system and saying "of course there's a God who created the universe for us, look at how perfectly the laws of creation work to support our lives. If anything was even slightly off, we wouldn't exist." to which my response would be that if the universe worked differently, it would be equally likely that some sentient and unbelievably strange creature would be living on some alternate Earth thinking the same thing.
Until we see how somebody else does it, we're kinda stuck with that.
That's a very fair point, but I think it's important to at least try to keep our minds open when thinking about this stuff. Like the lava/fire example.
I've also read discussions where people mentioned that a sentient race would most likely walk upright and have hands and nurse their young for various reasons owing themselves to how humans became intelligent, sapient life forms, and I see that and think that this is going too far. We already have examples of animals becoming intelligent tool users or creative thinkers without any of those things.
I'm not saying necessarily that our understanding of ourselves and our own species' trajectory is useless information or isn't a great foundation to build hypothetical scenarios off of, but there comes a point where we use that foundation instead as an indication of the boundaries of what is possible, and that doesn't sit right with me.
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Most hypothetical conversations about a given species' rise to technological dominance always seems caged in by how humans did it. Like, sure, lava is random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use, but so was fire to humans at one point.
It seems similar, to me, to people looking at the laws of the universe and Earth's placement in our solar system and saying "of course there's a God who created the universe for us, look at how perfectly the laws of creation work to support our lives. If anything was even slightly off, we wouldn't exist." to which my response would be that if the universe worked differently, it would be equally likely that some sentient and unbelievably strange creature would be living on some alternate Earth thinking the same thing.
Until we see how somebody else does it, we're kinda stuck with that.
That's a very fair point, but I think it's important to at least try to keep our minds open when thinking about this stuff. Like the lava/fire example.
I've also read discussions where people mentioned that a sentient race would most likely walk upright and have hands and nurse their young for various reasons owing themselves to how humans became intelligent, sapient life forms, and I see that and think that this is going too far. We already have examples of animals becoming intelligent tool users or creative thinkers without any of those things.
I'm not saying necessarily that our understanding of ourselves and our own species' trajectory is useless information or isn't a great foundation to build hypothetical scenarios off of, but there comes a point where we use that foundation instead as an indication of the boundaries of what is possible, and that doesn't sit right with me.
Most hypothetical conversations about a given species' rise to technological dominance always seems caged in by how humans did it. Like, sure, lava is random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use, but so was fire to humans at one point.
It seems similar, to me, to people looking at the laws of the universe and Earth's placement in our solar system and saying "of course there's a God who created the universe for us, look at how perfectly the laws of creation work to support our lives. If anything was even slightly off, we wouldn't exist." to which my response would be that if the universe worked differently, it would be equally likely that some sentient and unbelievably strange creature would be living on some alternate Earth thinking the same thing.
Until we see how somebody else does it, we're kinda stuck with that.
That's a very fair point, but I think it's important to at least try to keep our minds open when thinking about this stuff. Like the lava/fire example.
I've also read discussions where people mentioned that a sentient race would most likely walk upright and have hands and nurse their young for various reasons owing themselves to how humans became intelligent, sapient life forms, and I see that and think that this is going too far. We already have examples of animals becoming intelligent tool users or creative thinkers without any of those things.
I'm not saying necessarily that our understanding of ourselves and our own species' trajectory is useless information or isn't a great foundation to build hypothetical scenarios off of, but there comes a point where we use that foundation instead as an indication of the boundaries of what is possible, and that doesn't sit right with me.
Nursing the young would probably be necessary just to transfer information from generation to generation.
Unless they have some other form of inheriting knowledge.
And they would need some manipulators to use tools, though that might come from a non sapient species they have managed to tame/breed/control.
Walking uprights not really a requirement though.
Most hypothetical conversations about a given species' rise to technological dominance always seems caged in by how humans did it. Like, sure, lava is random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use, but so was fire to humans at one point.
It seems similar, to me, to people looking at the laws of the universe and Earth's placement in our solar system and saying "of course there's a God who created the universe for us, look at how perfectly the laws of creation work to support our lives. If anything was even slightly off, we wouldn't exist." to which my response would be that if the universe worked differently, it would be equally likely that some sentient and unbelievably strange creature would be living on some alternate Earth thinking the same thing.
Magma vents and fire are both unpredictable in nature, but fire requires dry stuff and a spark to create. Magma vents would require some way of breaking or cutting stone to open when they're closed, and if there's nothing there at the time there's just nothing for it. It doesn't seem unreasonable to expect that an aquatic civilization would be forced to find technologies that don't require reliable heat sources until they're able to start working out of water somehow. Benthic organisms offer a lot of opportunities to substitute advanced husbandry for crafting.
Octopi specifically, lifespan might be their biggest obstacle. Creating a knife would be a generational project for octopi shaping coral to their needs.
Hydrothermal vents are terribly unstable, they suddenly collapse and stop venting and everything in the heat and nutrient oasis it had created dies very rapidly
This was also their first use of the automated safety system on the West Coast. Apparently on the east coast it lets them operate with something like 100 fewer various personnel and gives the rocket a slightly wider margin of error on its course because the rocket isn't waiting for human reaction times to notice the deviation and push the big red button. So it has a bit more time to correct itself if possible. It also has the important feature of being able to support multiple vehicles simultaneously, which will be nice to have for Falcon Heavy launches.
I'm aware that the footage for that drone rocket is sped up, but it always scares the hell out of me how quickly the transition from space to now we've landed always is.
I'm aware that the footage for that drone rocket is sped up, but it always scares the hell out of me how quickly the transition from space to now we've landed always is.
Space is only a 40-60 minute drive on the highway straight up, but for this launch dat low ceiling makes it seem really stark.
It feels like we're sitting right on a gravitational threshold where getting into space is difficult but not impossible. How much easier would it be if the Earth's gravity was even slightly lower? Then again, how low could Earth's gravity go while still maintaining our sort of atmosphere?
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I just wanna see what they could get up to if they had a forty year lifespan or something.
Wonderful, terrible things. It's best we wait for the ripples of strong AI settling out before trying to uplift invertebrates.
edit: Besides, aren't the dogs deserving of longer, better lives? I'd bet if you could make dogs that had the lifespans of parrots they'd be both incredibly popular and get a great deal of legal protection.
Imagine if all dolphins everywhere were instantly hostile to humans, and were about ten times as numerous.
Are you being sarcastic? Because hyperbaric welding is totally a thing.
I think you'd see different traits being key, temperature under water stays pretty constant and the key differences are at depths rather than seasonal. Plus very low barriers to movement.
I think you'd see more utilisation of biological resources and more trade - it's not like you're after relatively rare sites with the right kind of stone if you're hunting a specific species for your knives. And it's easier for those knives to spread.
Plus chances are you've done the sharp stuff already with your own beak. Writing is what uplifts Cephlapods, it's been recently shown that with HD videos they can see moving images (but struggled with earlier TV screens to recognise them as real) and they're starting to hunt in packs in Monaco due to excessive fishing rendering the area fairly barren for prey. Generational learning is something that's seemingly happened over the last couple of decades for the Octopus. And in that we have a niche in their world.
So, what I'm hearing is; Nintendo were right all along and the nightmare future world of Splatoon is coming to splat us all…?
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uplifting is a bad idea.
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Crows absolutely understand death and sometimes even hold things akin to funerals where dozens will gather around a dead crow and appear to silently contemplate the body before leaving together. Which yeah, might not be for the dead crow so much as figuring how to stay live crows, but it still shows that they know they can die and want to avoid it.
(Cats also had to develop new social skills to deal with other cats. Their wild ancestors are solitary, territorial animals. The behaviors cats use to establish social order in groups are mostly novel, and evolved in a really short time on the evolutionary scale.)
Yeah, crows and a select cross section of parrots definitely understand death. A lot of the others we consider to be very clever don't though, it seems to be a cream-of-the crop kind of thing. Corvids, some parrots, elephants, great apes, dolphins and some whales understand death, along with some anecdotal reports for other animals. A certain threshold for a sense of self and empathy may be necessary to comprehend mortality.
Tangentially, there was an interesting article I read recently that explains why the very intelligent birds can express what to us seem extraordinary levels of comprehension relative to their brain volume. Their neuron densities are incredible compared to mammals, so their neuron counts are in the range of primates and ungulates. Plus, a lot of those neurons end up in the area of the brain that in humans is associated with spatial reasoning, language, and memory. A raven has more neurons in this area than a capuchin, and macaws more than a rhesus monkey.
edit: this could be extended to potential expectations for the body-size range for any intelligent life we may find elsewhere in the universe. It's entirely possible we could make contact with a species that's as smart as us but weighs no more than a cat, or comes in at half the weight of a sedan.
They can recognize your face.
And carry grudges.
And they can communicate these grudges to other crows.
So, don't piss off any crows.
On the other hand, they may be smart enough to accept a peace offering if you had made such a mistake in the past, but it's best not to risk it.
Yeah, I think cephalopods are interesting as a case of parallel evolution (in many respects [their eyes are better than ours, no blind spot]) but we should probably not give them a leg up. Until we encounter non-hostile invertebrate life in the universe, they can continue as-is.
I... Actually totally forgot that underwater welding was a thing.
I feel real dumb now.
the Tlingit of the Pacific Northwest believe (according to this Wikipedia page, accuracy of factoid not guaranteed) that only eating food off the beach makes you an idiot. it's so easy to gather that anyone who sustains themselves solely off it must be lazy or have something wrong with them
On the flip side if you're nice to them, they've been known to collect shiny things and leave them by your door.
I bet they're just trying to frame people for theft or something.
Underwater welding requires a lot of technical knowledge and prerequisite supporting technology. Without the ability to create or use fire, the only energy source capable of showing a primitive underwater society the concept of welding or metalworking in general would be an active lava flow. But building any type of primitive industry around such a random, unpredictable, unreliable, and difficult to use energy source would be extremely difficult and stunt the growth of said civilization. That's not to say cephalopods couldn't develop other technologies that allow them to progress along other avenues to become an advanced society , but if they develop metalworking at all, in my opinion it would come very late.
If an intelligent cephalopod race was coming to power under the oceans, they'd probably get better results from using other lifeforms to do/get what they want. Like, engineering coral reefs, clams, or benthic/intertidal debris for homes or using urchins the way boxer crabs do.
So .... shoggoths?
High quality modern industrial welding requires a lot of technical knowledge and prerequisite supporting technology. Man developed welding techniques long before understanding the science behind doing so or having access to technology beyond fire and hammer. While modern welding involves things like electrical equipment (welding machine), filler metal (wire, usually coated in flux), and controlled conditions, this is a result of our need to have rapid high quality joining methods. Heating up two pieces of metal and bashing them until they are a single piece is also a welding method, it's just that smithing doesn't satisfy our current needs.
Magma vents at the ocean bottom provide more than enough energy and stability to allow for the development of a metalworking society. If anything, the reason that cephalopods will not develop metalworking isn't due to a lack of resources, but due to a lack of evolutionary demand. They are an apex predatory, and don't require tools to uplift them further.
I thought sharks and whales and larger bony fish ate Octopuses.
It seems similar, to me, to people looking at the laws of the universe and Earth's placement in our solar system and saying "of course there's a God who created the universe for us, look at how perfectly the laws of creation work to support our lives. If anything was even slightly off, we wouldn't exist." to which my response would be that if the universe worked differently, it would be equally likely that some sentient and unbelievably strange creature would be living on some alternate Earth thinking the same thing.
The temperature coming out of a hydrothermal vent is not near hot enough for forge welding. That's why I said they'd need actual open lava for it.
Until we see how somebody else does it, we're kinda stuck with that.
That's a very fair point, but I think it's important to at least try to keep our minds open when thinking about this stuff. Like the lava/fire example.
I've also read discussions where people mentioned that a sentient race would most likely walk upright and have hands and nurse their young for various reasons owing themselves to how humans became intelligent, sapient life forms, and I see that and think that this is going too far. We already have examples of animals becoming intelligent tool users or creative thinkers without any of those things.
I'm not saying necessarily that our understanding of ourselves and our own species' trajectory is useless information or isn't a great foundation to build hypothetical scenarios off of, but there comes a point where we use that foundation instead as an indication of the boundaries of what is possible, and that doesn't sit right with me.
this is how cthulu happens assholes
Nursing the young would probably be necessary just to transfer information from generation to generation.
Unless they have some other form of inheriting knowledge.
And they would need some manipulators to use tools, though that might come from a non sapient species they have managed to tame/breed/control.
Walking uprights not really a requirement though.
Magma vents and fire are both unpredictable in nature, but fire requires dry stuff and a spark to create. Magma vents would require some way of breaking or cutting stone to open when they're closed, and if there's nothing there at the time there's just nothing for it. It doesn't seem unreasonable to expect that an aquatic civilization would be forced to find technologies that don't require reliable heat sources until they're able to start working out of water somehow. Benthic organisms offer a lot of opportunities to substitute advanced husbandry for crafting.
Octopi specifically, lifespan might be their biggest obstacle. Creating a knife would be a generational project for octopi shaping coral to their needs.
(I ... may have once had a knife stolen from me by an octopus).
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This was also their first use of the automated safety system on the West Coast. Apparently on the east coast it lets them operate with something like 100 fewer various personnel and gives the rocket a slightly wider margin of error on its course because the rocket isn't waiting for human reaction times to notice the deviation and push the big red button. So it has a bit more time to correct itself if possible. It also has the important feature of being able to support multiple vehicles simultaneously, which will be nice to have for Falcon Heavy launches.
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Space is only a 40-60 minute drive on the highway straight up, but for this launch dat low ceiling makes it seem really stark.