Octopuses Like to Punch Fish

[dmix]

Gizmodo is an ad riddled mess on mobile. Is there a better link for this?

Edit: found two original sources, no good summary article yet though https://twitter.com/octoeduardo/status/1340076579108646913?s...

https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ecy....

Edit 2: the original study PDF is only 8 pages and is an easy read; dunno the policy on linking to scihub here but here you go, I’ll delete if needed https://sci-hub.se/downloads/2020-12-19/fd/[email protected]....

[baxtr]

It’s absurd how some pages can’t be consumed any more, because of the insane number of ads.

[wizzwizz4]

It's open-access, mate. Sci-Hub isn't even needed: https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002...

(That being said, it's a good opportunity to update my list of Sci-Hub domains – just to make sure I don't accidentally use any, of course.)

[hyperpallium2]

The reader button on firefox (at least on android) also removes ads.

[GoblinSlayer]

All those ads are shown by scripts. No scripts - no ads.

[semi-extrinsic]

Check out the supporting information on your second link, some very nice videos there, freely available.

[1vuio0pswjnm7]

"Gizmodo is an ad-riddled mess on mobile."

Make a mobile-friendly, text-only version with no ads:

   x=$(echo y|tr y '\004');
   z="<p class=.sc-77";
   curl  https://gizmodo.com/octopuses-like-to-punch-fish-new-research-suggests-1845929379/amp \
   |sed "s/$z/$x&/g"|tr '\004' '\n'|sed -n "s/<\/p>.*/<\/p>/;/^$z/p" > 1.htm

   firefox ./1.htm

[cercatrova]

It's amazing that people don't use adblockers. uBlock Origin on desktop, also works on mobile such as Firefox Android, Kiwi browser, etc. On iOS you can use AdGuard, Edge with adblockers, Wipr, etc.

Also, SponsorBlock for YouTube to block sponsors inside videos, and even uMatrix if you want to globally disable JS and select which sites do use JS.

[LilBytes]

It's a lot better using a DNS based ad blocker but we still see large pieces of white space where ads should be.

[christophilus]

I use the DuckDuckGo browser on iPhone and Brave on desktop, and Gizmodo (along with most of the web) is not bad. Occasionally, I have to do something from my wife’s computer, and it’s astounding how crippled the web experience is without a decent browser.

[ornornor]

Nextdns + Firefox reader mode makes it ok. Couldn’t find any other way to get rid of this “what’s new in macOS” video that was taking up half the page otherwise.

[pmontra]

Blockada on Android and Firefox uBlock origin's DOM element hiding to remove the sticky video. That's on Android too.

[C19is20]

Blokada app works on Android.

[akudha]

Octopus is a super interesting animal. There is a beautiful movie on Netflix called My Octopus Teacher, well worth your time.

[tcbawo]

I was surprised to learn that as intelligent and resourceful as they are, common octopuses only live a couple years.

[anonymfus]

Not everybody thinks that this movie is beautiful:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24788275

[rembicilious]

If these videos are real-time and not slowed down, I think the word “punch” is a little hyperbolic. It’s more like a push or a nudge. Saying that “octopuses punch fish” makes it sound violent, but it doesn’t look like the octopus intends to harm the fish at all.

[867-5309]

agreed. they don't even have fists. it's more like a human involuntarily batting a fly out of its field of view

[dade_]

These videos may be out of context. Some fish behave perfectly nice while eating, but are obnoxious most other times. The person recording this may have never seen the fish before, but an octopus has incredible memory and may have a hate on for something it did before. They certainly remember humans.

[sitkack]

So you are saying that octopus wasn't just punch some fish, but it was punching Jeff, that guy that won't stop doing that one thing.

[dukeofdoom]

These punches are thrown to “prevent exploitation and ensure collaboration." Best quote from from the article. Reminded me of "The Three Stooges" The world would be a better place if you could slap a selfish idiot when they are doing something idiotic. Or maybe not.

[goatherders]

Octopuses are the best animal. Punching fish out of spite is hilarious.

[makz]

I’ve kept ornamental fish for many years and certainly octopuses are not fish but it looks to me that it’s only keeping others away from its territory like many fish do.

[Finnucane]

Sure, who hasn’t wanted to punch a fish from time to time?

[dghughes]

This is the best thing I've seen all year.

[joshxyz]

Do we call it octopunch

[cheaprentalyeti]

All octupi are bastards!

[tdy721]

A chance to use the word Octopi squandered...

punches fish

[agurk]

I'm not sure if there is a deeper meaning in your comment I'm missing, but octopi, whilst being a word that people use, is strictly speaking wrong (in a prescriptive sense).

Octopus is a 3rd declension noun in Latin coming from Greek. If one believes nouns should be pluralised according to their origin - which someone using the second declension latin -i plural would likely be - then it follows that one should say octopodes. [0]

Of course this can be solved in a rational way by using the English plurals as they used in the article to both avoid unusual sounding words and technical incorrectness.

[0] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/octopus

[graderjs]

I heard of an octopus in a marine biology lab that was able to work out that the feeder was controlled by an app on the postdoc's phone, and the cephalopod was able to sneak the phone out of the postdocs pocket, unlock it, and activate the feeder, then place the phone back, multiple times before the postdocs wised up.

[thatguy0900]

This doesn't even make sense. Even if it connected the phone and the food it also figured out how to navigate an unfamiliar operating system? A good portion of humans get stuck on that

[luma]

That sounds pretty fantastical. Any chance you have a source?

[slyfocks]

And then everyone stood up and clapped.

[webmobdev]

I saw that in a cartoon.

[mistersquid]

Knocking at door

Woman, alone, at door: Who’s there?

Voice, behind door: Candygram…

[graderjs]

Alright people, i admit, i made this up for this thread for fun. Interesting to see everybody's reactions....wow, fascinating!

Honestly tho, I do believe an octopus could learn to do this.

[hackeraccount]

I'm not super experienced with cephalopods but I've me a postdoc or two and so I can say this seems believable to me.