Tab Article

Ratings: ★★★★★ (4.9 / 5)
Genre: Popular Science, Zoology, Philosophy, Evolutionary Biology, Neuroscience

Book Review:
Winner of the 2017 Science Book Prize, Other Minds is a brilliant and mind-expanding journey into the evolution of consciousness—and into the alien world of the octopus.

Peter Godfrey-Smith is the perfect guide for this journey. A philosopher of science and an avid scuba diver, he brings together his two passions to explore one of the deepest questions we can ask: What is it like to be another kind of mind? And what if intelligent life on Earth evolved not once, but twice?

The octopus is the closest we will ever come to meeting an intelligent alien. With its eight tentacles packed with neurons that virtually ''think for themselves,'' its ability to solve problems, use tools, and change color and shape in an instant, the octopus represents an independent experiment in the evolution of intelligence. It is a mind organized so differently from our own that it challenges everything we think we know about consciousness.

Godfrey-Smith takes us on a fascinating journey, tracking the mind's fitful development from unruly clumps of seaborne cells to the first evolved nervous systems in ancient relatives of jellyfish, and finally to the remarkable cephalopods. He dives into the waters where octopuses live, observing them in their natural habitat and bringing us face-to-face with these extraordinary creatures.