What’s an Octopus Fossil Look Like?

Zooillogix

As boneless, gelatinous bags, octopuses rarely find themselves preserved as fossils but just this week it was announced in the journal Palaeontology that three new 95,000,000 year old octopus fossils have been discovered. These are the oldest on record. So what does an octopus fossil look like? Apparently, like something your elementary school child would create in art class when asked to create an octopus fossil.

The precursors to modern octopuses had fins that ran alongside their bodies but these fossils do not. “These are sensational fossils, extraordinarily well preserved’ says Dirk Fuchs of the Freie University Berlin, lead author of the report. But what surprised the scientists most was how similar the specimens are to modern octopus: “these things are 95 million years old, yet one of the fossils is almost indistinguishable from living species.” All of this raises an obvious question: if octopuses were so sophisticated 95 million years ago, why aren’t they running things right now?! Clearly god did not favor the octopus.

As this is “cephalopod” and “science” related, it stands to reason that PZ Meyers beat us to it, which he did. Get your fix for buccal masses and gladial vestiges over there.

Comments

#1 kelebek
March 19, 2009

güselmiş
#2 the_heckle
March 19, 2009

What’s to say that this isn’t a fossil of some kid’s art project from 95,000,000 years ago?

I mean, apart from science.
#3 ym
March 19, 2009

neat!!
#4 kelebek
March 20, 2009

annaaaa güsel bişe
#5 aşk şiirleri
March 20, 2009

thanks.
#6 Myles
March 20, 2009

Andrew, you’re a smashing biologist, but if you don’t remember the Cephalopod Revolutions, you need to brush up on your history. We don’t want to give them ideas and see a repeat of the Tentacly Massacre of ’67.
#7 Arthur
March 21, 2009

I thought the plural of octopus was octopi or something like that.
#8 Andrew Milner
March 22, 2009

Very cool fossils! Unfortunately, your link above doesn’t take you to the recent paper in the journal “Palaeontology”, it take you to “Journal of Paleontology”. Thought I should let you know.
#9 strangetruther
March 23, 2009

‘…if octopuses were so sophisticated 95 million years ago, why aren’t they running things right now?! Clearly god did not favor the octopus.’

Perhaps having a throat that goes through your brain is a sign of not being favoured by god.

‘I thought the plural of octopus was octopi or something like that. ‘

Something vaguely like that, but not that since it’s from the Greek, so ‘us’ doesn’t pluralise to ‘i’; I think the proper Greek pluralisation sounds so bizarre even ‘…uses’ sounds better. Same with platypodes.
#10 peterK
March 25, 2009

Awesome. Really cool. Cheers for sharing.
#11 neon
April 2, 2009

teşekkürler bilgi / thanks web mastr.
#12 oyun
April 4, 2009

I mean, apart from science.
#13 neon
April 5, 2009

very good. thank.
#14 kamil
June 19, 2009

Very cool fossils! Unfortunately, your link above doesn’t take you to the recent paper in the journal “Palaeontology”, it take you to “Journal of Paleontology”. Thought I should let you know.
#15 Kodes
June 19, 2009

Very cool fossils! Unfortunately, your link above doesn’t take you to the recent paper in the journal “Palaeontology”, it take you to “Journal of Paleontology”. Thought I should let you know.
#16 aziz
June 19, 2009

Andrew, you’re a smashing biologist, but if you don’t remember the Cephalopod Revolutions, you need to brush up on your history. We don’t want to give them ideas and see a repeat of the Tentacly Massacre of ’67.
#17 Lnau
October 13, 2009

Thanks.
#18 LiderPaylasim
November 15, 2009

Thnk you…
#19 Chaikhe
December 9, 2009

Why aren’t octopuses running things right now? Because they *are* smart! Much happier as they are. But if we keep up the global warming, perhaps they’ll step (squidge?) in…
#20 Charlott Tereska
July 2, 2012

Scary now i’ll hardly ever get 1 again
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July 5, 2012

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July 6, 2012

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