Work
Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness
Overview
Other Minds is a 2016 book by the Australian philosopher Peter Godfrey-Smith on the evolution and nature of consciousness. It compares the situation in cephalopods, especially octopuses and cuttlefish, with that in mammals and birds. Complex active bodies that enable and perhaps require a measure of intelligence have evolved three times, in arthropods, cephalopods, and vertebrates. The book reflects on the nature of cephalopod intelligence in particular, constrained by their short lifespan, and embodied in large part in their partly autonomous arms, which contain more nerve cells than their brains.
The book has been praised by reviewers, who have found it delightfully written, undogmatic but incisive in its analysis, and its account of intelligence as a subjective embodied experience elegantly told. The author's octopus subjects come across as "uncannily personable without being at all human".
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
Philosophers who discussed Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness
Related ideas
- Philosophy of biology
- The Guardian
- Samuel Taylor Coleridge
- The New York Times
- University of Sydney
- Philosophy of science
- The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
- Consciousness
- Stanislas Dehaene
- Neuroscientist
- Philosophy of mind
- Peter Godfrey-Smith
Place in the tradition
Part of Australian philosophy.