Lesson 2 Explore Wildlife Wonders
The Mind of an Octopus
Here is an animal with poison like a snake, a ____ and pointed mouth like a bird, and ink like a pen.
It can ____ as much as an adult human and stretch as long as a car.
Yet it can put its ____ body through a hole the size of an orange.
It ____ change color and shape, and it can taste with its skin.
This animal is called an octopus.
The octopus looks so alien to the people of the West that it has caused ____ or even horror in them.
The ____ or horror helped create the image of an octopus as an evil creature living in the deep sea.
For example, the ____, a sea monster in old Icelandic tales, looks just like an enormous octopus.
Another ____ is Ursula, the sea witch featured in the famous tale, The Little Mermaid.
To this day, it is difficult for us to ____ that octopuses and humans share any meaningful similarities.
During the past few decades, however, scientists have begun to find ____ and more similarities between octopuses and humans.
____ of the most interesting ones is intelligence. Octopuses are smart.
The best evidence is their ability to camouflage ____.
An octopus can change its ____, pattern, and texture, and the changes are carried out almost instantly.
In terms of ____ and the diversity of change, no other animal can rival octopuses.
____ chameleons can utilize only a handful of fixed patterns.
The main ____ of these changes is to avoid detection by their hunters or their prey.
When an octopus encounters its hunter or prey, it must decide very quickly which color, pattern, and ____ to choose.
Such a decision implies that it has gained sufficient knowledge of the ____ animals and applies it to survive.
To acquire knowledge and apply it for a particular purpose is a sure ____ of intelligence.
Another sign of the intelligence
____ sign of the intelligence of the octopus is its use of tools.
In the ____, octopuses use tools to get food rewards.
In the wild, they use stones to ____ walls to protect the entrances to their homes.
They use not only stones but anything they ____ find to protect themselves.
The most impressive example of octopuses using ____ came in 2009 in Indonesia.
A few octopuses were found to ____ coconut shells.
They cleaned the ____ with bursts of water, carried them to a new location, and piled them as a shelter.
____ with the shells under their bodies forced them to walk slowly along the sea floor.
This made the octopuses more exposed to ____.
But it seems that they were ____ to take that risk for greater future protection.
The scientists who discovered the behavior argue that this is clear ____ of octopuses using tools.
Octopuses’ ____ of tools can be found in their love of toys and puzzles, too.
They are curious about new objects, and do not like ____ bored.
That is why aquariums try to come up with ideas to keep their octopuses ____.
Some aquariums hide ____ inside a big doll and let the octopus break up the toy to get the food.
Others ____ plastic building blocks for their octopuses to play with.
Our knowledge about the octopus
Our knowledge about the octopus is ____ very limited.
Thanks to the efforts of scientists, however, it is expanding year by ____.
One of the most impressive new findings about the octopus is that it ____ to have feelings.
Of course, it is impossible for us to know exactly what they feel, but a few of their changes in skin color seem to be linked to their ____.
For example, a giant Pacific octopus that turns red seems to be excited, while it is white ____ it is relaxed.
An octopus presented with a difficult puzzle often undergoes several rapid changes in ____.
The octopus seems to be worried that it may ____ solve the problem.
____ scientists today deny that octopuses are intelligent animals.
Perhaps it is time that we stopped thinking of them as alien creatures and acknowledged them as intelligent animals ____ us.
There is ____ so much we do not know about the octopus.
Aren’t you ____ about what is inside their mind?