Yes, and octopuses are oviparous- they lay eggs. Humans are vivaporous. They find interesting places to lay their eggs, like beer cans and beer bottles. Some species carry their eggs with them - The Argonaut, named after the Greek mythological hero Jason. The beauty of Godfrey-Smith’s book lies in the clarity of his writing; his empathy, if you will. He takes us through those early stirrings in the seas of deep time, from bacteria that sense light and can taste, to cnidarian jellyfish, the first organisms to exhibit nervous systems, which he describes wonderfully: “Picture a filmy lightbulb in which the rhythms of nervous activity first began.” The ocean itself became the conduit for evolution; we feel a magnetic attraction to the vast waters that gave us birth because we still carry the sea inside us. “The chemistry of life is an aquatic chemistry. We can get by on land only by carrying a huge amount of salt water around with us.”

can exhibit “play like behaviour” and exhibit signs of learning from visual and tactile stimuli (for example learning to drill a hole “into snail and clam shells at particular places, and that these are the right places for the toxin they are going to inject to have the most effect on the prey’s muscle”).The bliss of stroking an octopus’s head is difficult to convey to most people, even to animal lovers. Despite many years of reading everything I could about Cephalopods in general and Octopus in particular, and despite have read a fair few papers by two of the authors, this book charmed me. Within the covers, Mathers, Anderson and Wood give us the story of The Octopus from the egg to the end of its life which, often, is the egg laying. There is a final chapter touching upon the rest of the Cephalopods and a Postscript with useful information for anyone who would like to keep an aquarium with an Octopus. Fast-forward again… after living in a dark 50 gallon barrel for roughly six months, Kali has finally been transferred to a new, temporary enclosure. The first night she escapes and dies; somewhat reminiscent of an only slightly less tragic escape scene at the end of Finding Nemo. Of the incident Montgomery and aquarium staff says: The people in the book were amazing too. I don't agree with everything but these were people that did the best they could for their animals and family members. There is even a little girl in the book who is helped by the Octopuses with her Autism and her suicide attempt.

I suppose that's my major problem here: this whole book feels self-indulgent on the part of the authors. They write about themselves as if they are messiahs of octopus knowledge. The way they ended the book made me roll my eyes til they hurt, then throw the book with disgust into a pile for Goodwill.Montgomery's love of octopuses was so intense that it even got to me. I didn't think I could tear-up reading about the death of an octopus but these eight armed molluscs have so much personality and alien intelligence they seem rather like ET in the movie. Unfortunately there are rather a lot of octopus deaths in the book since they only live about 3 or 4 years.

Uh, I was saying...about octopuses? Um, here's something you might be interested in. The plural of octopus isn't octopi because that would be slapping a Latin suffix on a Greek root. The Greek plural would be octopodes. But the writers of the book call them octopuses. Not that we should believe anything they're saying.

This is because the author read it herself and it's purpleness, it's fruitiness was increased by her emphasis on meaningless similes, one after the other. Her favourite word is, 'like' as in the egg trails of the octopus are like a wedding veil but more beautiful than any.... Simile on the next line too, about gossamer cobwebs, diamond air bubbles and golden... AFAIR. Why write one when two can fill the space? There are also details about other residents from the Aquarium: Myrtle the turtle, the Sunflower starfish (I don’t recall the name, if it has one) and various other fish. There are a lot of details too about the stuff and volunteers working at the Aquarium; if I were them, I would have mind so many personal details to be used in the book. But that’s just me. Clarity and empathy … Peter Godfrey-Smith. Photograph: Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard University News Office