Remarkably Bright Creatures and the Implications for AI

Mar 11, 2024

Brain to Brains

Over the past few weeks, I've embarked on an in-depth exploration of the interface between humans and machines. This journey has taken me from investigating enhancements such as extra senses and limbs, inspired by David Eagleman's LiveWire, to dissecting the extraordinary capabilities of top performers like Messi and Gretzky. This exploration is not just about augmenting human abilities but understanding the essence of mastery and what appears to be almost superhuman skills. This week, I venture into a territory I've hinted at before: the brain of the octopus. You may wonder, what does an octopus have to do with human-machine interfaces? My research approach typically involves exploring adjacent areas to comprehensively understand a topic, from the evolutionary history of intelligence to the dynamics within video games and the strategies behind superhero training montages and real-time business strategy games.

I am turning my attention to the octopus as the starting point for a series on multi-agent intelligence and collective intelligence. Up to now, our focus has been on augmenting human intelligence. Still, to avoid falling into a human-centric bias, I am expanding our horizons to explore how intelligence manifests in other creatures—from ant colonies and the echolocation abilities of bats and dolphins to the most enigmatic intelligence of all: the octopus. Some have described the octopus's intelligence as the closest thing to alien intelligence on our planet.

Are you curious about what makes their intelligence so alien?

Or how their brains could relate to the concept of multiple intelligent agents?

Join me as we dive deep into this fascinating subject!

Remarkably Bright Creatures

"Who am I, you ask? My name is Marcellus, but most humans do not call me that. Typically, they call me that guy. For example: Look at that guy—there he is—you can just see his tentacles behind the rock. I am a giant Pacific octopus. I know this from the plaque on the wall beside my enclosure. I know what you are thinking. Yes, I can read. I can do many things you would not expect. The plaque states other facts: my size, preferred diet, and where I might live were I not a prisoner here. It mentions my intellectual prowess and penchant for cleverness, which for some reason seems a surprise to humans: Octopuses are remarkably bright creatures, it says."
Van Pelt, Shelby. Remarkably Bright Creatures (p. 1). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

Octopuses are incredibly intelligent creatures. Countless stories of octopuses escaping their aquariums to explore, sneak into neighboring tanks for their preferred snacks, or just for the thrill.

Octopuses have demonstrated their ability to solve puzzles, navigate mazes, and even use objects for future purposes. Mark Rober, a former NASA engineer turned YouTube content creator, showcases these abilities in one of his videos, where he designs an obstacle course for his pet octopus. The video highlights the octopus's problem-solving skills:

Source: Octopus vs Underwater Maze

As previously noted, octopuses excel not only in solving puzzles to obtain their preferred foods but also demonstrate the ability to use tools—a characteristic uncommon among animals. A notable example is an octopus seen transporting a coconut shell, illustrating its inventive engagement with surrounding objects. In a related video, Jennifer Mather, a professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Lethbridge and scientific advisor for the film "My Octopus Teacher," delves into this unique behavior:

Source: The Insane Biology of: The Octopus

"...it is becoming clearer how cephalopods came to have their peculiar combination of features. Early cephalopods had protective external shells which they dragged along as they prowled the oceans. Then the shells were abandoned. This had several interlocking effects. First, it gave cephalopod bodies their outlandish, unbounded possibilities. The extreme case is the octopus, with almost no hard parts at all, and neurons spread through the body instead of bones. .. this open-endedness... was crucial to the evolution of their complex nervous systems. ...The possibilities inherent in this body create an opportunity for the evolution of finer behavioral control. And once you have a larger nervous system, this makes it worthwhile to further expand the body's possibilities—collecting all those sensors on the arms, creating the machinery of color change and a skin that can see.”
Godfrey-Smith, Peter. Other Minds (p. 173). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

Source: Bennett, Max. A Brief History of Intelligence (p. 45). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

The evolutionary journey of octopuses is as fascinating as their cognitive abilities. Unlike most intelligent creatures, which share a common ancestor dating back around 320 million years, octopuses diverged from a common ancestor with humans approximately 600 million years ago. This vast evolutionary gap has led to a form of intelligence nearly alien to our own. With around 500 million neurons, most located in their arms, octopuses possess a decentralized intelligence akin to nine brains.

Their unique intelligence was highlighted in experiments conducted by Peter Dews at Harvard. An octopus named Charles displayed innovative mischief, from breaking levers to squirting water at experimenters. These behaviors hint at their ability to recognize and distinguish between different humans, showcasing social awareness.

“...Dews trained three octopuses, and found that all three of them did learn to operate the lever to obtain food. When they pulled the lever, a light came on and a small piece of sardine was given as a reward. Two of the octopuses, named Albert and Bertram, did this in a “reasonably consistent” manner, Dews said. The behavior of the third octopus, named Charles, was different.
1. ...Charles anchored several tentacles on the side of the tank and others around the lever and applied great force. ... on the 11th day [the lever] was broken...
2. ...Charles repeatedly encircled the lamp with tentacles and applied considerable force, tending to carry the light into the tank.
3. Charles had a high tendency to direct jets of water out of the tank; specifically, they were in the direction of the experimenter. “
Godfrey-Smith, Peter. Other Minds (pp. 53-54). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

Octopuses also exhibit complex control over their bodies. Studies have shown how they can coordinate movements between their central brain and the independent "brains" in each arm. Their skin acts as an advanced sensory organ, capable of camouflage and even "seeing," thanks to neurons that extend from the brain throughout the body.

Researchers discovered a clever method in this experiment to explore whether the central brain can govern the arms. They designed the puzzle such that the arm's sensors, and thus the brain, could not independently solve it:

"... The best experimental work I know that bears on this topic comes out of Binyamin Hochner’s laboratory at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. A 2011 paper by Tamar Gutnick, Ruth Byrne, and Michael Kuba, along with Hochner, described a very clever experiment. They asked whether an octopus could learn to guide a single arm along a maze-like path to a specific place in order to obtain food. The task was set up in such a way that the arm’s own chemical sensors would not suffice to guide it to the food; the arm would have to leave the water at one point to reach the target location. But the maze walls were transparent, so the target location could be seen. ... The eyes can guide the arms. At the same time, the paper also noted that when octopuses are doing well with this task, the arm that’s finding the food appears to do its own local exploration as it goes, crawling and feeling around. So it seems that two forms of control are working in tandem: there is central control of the arm’s overall path, via the eyes, combined with a fine-tuning of the search by the arm itself.”
Godfrey-Smith, Peter. Other Minds (pp. 68-69). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Kindle Edition.

Intelligence Implications:

This article has explored one of the most distinctive minds on our planet. The octopus represents a unique evolutionary experiment in intelligence, sharing some features with other intelligences—such as neurons—while also exhibiting numerous peculiarities:

Nine Brains: The octopus possesses a central brain and an additional brain in each of its arms, each capable of independent thought.
Coordinated Intelligence: There's a sophisticated coordination between the central (top-down) brain and the eight independent arm (bottom-up) brains.
Neural Skin: Their skin contains neurons, functioning like an advanced LCD screen, directly controlled by the brain.
Playful and Perceptive: Despite not being social creatures, octopuses display an unconventional, playful nature and a remarkable ability to perceive social relationships.

As we explore the implications of octopus intelligence for AI and multi-agent systems, it becomes clear that centralized intelligence is not the only pathway to solving complex problems. The octopus's decentralized brain architecture offers insights into alternative forms of intelligence, suggesting that a "society of mind," as described by Marvin Minsky, might provide new avenues for human-machine interaction.

In the coming weeks, I will further explore the concept of collective intelligence and multi-agent systems, from the organizational structures of ant colonies and bees to the latest research in AI. This exploration aims to uncover how humans and machines can better coordinate and collaborate, opening up new possibilities for enhancing our understanding of intelligence in all its forms.

“Humans. For the most part, you are dull and blundering. But occasionally, you can be remarkably bright creatures.”
Van Pelt, Shelby. Remarkably Bright Creatures (p. 350). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

Next Week: Collective Intelligence

Next week, our exploration will cover these high-level topics:

Collective Intelligence: Examining systems ranging from hierarchies to democracies, markets, and communities.
Nature's Problem-Solvers: Investigating how ant colonies and bees tackle various challenges.
Multi-Agent Intelligence: Understanding how Multi-Agent intelligence operates with insights from OpenAI and other research entities.
Collaboration Dynamics: Exploring how humans and agents can coordinate and collaborate effectively.