Friday Cephalopod to DIE For

Posted by Greg Laden on July 28, 2011
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I know, I know, PZ Myers at Pharyngula does a Friday Cephalopod thing, and I’m totally ripping him off here and it’s not even friday yet, but still ..

(Below the fold. Not work safe if you work, say, in a Japanese resturant.)

Click here if you want to know the science behind this neat trick. Hint: The creature is NOT alive. And there are no strings attached.

Am I a bad person because this makes me hungry?

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Comments

  1. #1 StevoR
    July 29, 2011

    Nup.

    That’s the coolest demonstartion of exactly how fresh the “Catch of the Day” is, I’ve yet seen.

    .. Or so ‘twould appear! ;-)

    [Highly recommends the marinated octopus at the local Greek restaurant.]

  2. #2 hoary puccoon
    July 29, 2011

    Ooh, yes, octopus Greek-style in lemon, herbs and olive oil. One of the best dishes ever.

  3. #3 Calli Arcale
    July 29, 2011

    Cooooooool! Now I want to try to do that, except that involves having meat that is very very VERY fresh, and that might be impractical for me….

  4. #4 Doug Alder
    July 29, 2011

    Num num – Zombies – neuronz – brainz – must eat ;)

  5. #5 WMDKitty
    July 29, 2011

    Bad news, Greg — PZ featured that video a couple of weeks ago. But it’s still creepy/awesome/gross/fascinating.

  6. #6 Malek
    July 30, 2011

    I think it’s not quite dead for the following reasons.

    * Look up the anatomy of a squid. Only the upper part of the squid is cut off, which only amounts to a disemboweling, as PZ described it.

    * In another video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jmur-9Ahcgg) we see the squid still moving around after it gets disemboweled. Therefore we cannot say for sure when it actually dies.

    * In the same video, even though soy sauce is applied to just one side, the squid launches itself directly upward. Thus some of the unsauced tentacles pushed downward.

    * All tentacles are moving around at the end, even the unsauced ones.

    * Salt produces a twitching effect on frog legs, not a “frog-like” motion. When the soy sauce poured, the tentacles move in a “squid-like” motion. (This is a minor point which might be explained by a squid’s neural wiring.)