(Image: Pixabay CC0)
(Image: Pixabay CC0) Gone are the days when the octopus was, in the collective imagination, a frightening sea monster attacking Jules Verne's Nautilus. The image of the octopus has now changed. For example, the cephalopod took on the pseudonym Paul during the 2010 soccer World Cup, and made predictions about the outcomes of games (more or less successfully. More recently, in My Octopus Teacher , a multi award-winning documentary film (including the Oscar for best documentary film in 2021), we discover an animal that is not only endearing, but endowed with exceptional abilities. To find out more, we spoke with Laure Bonnaud-Ponticelli, professor at the MNHN, biologist and cephalopod specialist. Why do we say that the octopus is intelligent? Laure Bonnaud-Ponticelli : I'm not sure if the term "intelligent" is appropriate, as it's a very anthropocentric notion. I'd prefer to say that it has good cognitive, behavioral and learning capacities.
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