News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:How the octopus got its smarts by Razengan on Thursday September 20, 2018 @08:46PM (#18036438)
Regarding intelligent life in the cosmos:

If [most] life begins at the microscopic scale, wouldn't there be a higher chance of intelligence developing at much smaller sizes than the average human body?

Have we even learned if there's a minimum body size required for sapient intelligence to develop?

We can already see different types of intelligence in comparatively-small creatures like octopuses, but even overlooked organisms as tiny as the ant show forms of intelligence! Social communication, tool usage, agriculture, even domestication of other species (e.g. aphids.)

Re:How the octopus got its smarts by Griffinsauce on Friday September 21, 2018 @12:42PM (#18040913)
Well, our massive brain needs a pretty massive support system. There's probably a lower threshold to how efficient you can be at achieving the same level of intelligence.
Re:How the octopus got its smarts by Razengan on Friday September 21, 2018 @06:21PM (#18043109)
Intelligence could be distributed across multiple, smaller bodies. Again, taking ants as an example.