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Science

Scientists Demonstrate Self-Awareness In Fish (phys.org) 85

Posted by BeauHD from the fish-brains dept.
Researchers from the Graduate School of Science, Osaka City University, have provided evidence to suggest that fish have the capacity for MSR, a behavioral test to determine whether an animal possesses the ability of visual self-recognition. As Phys.Org explains, an animal's capacity for MSR is determined when they "touch or scrape a mark placed on their body in a location that can only be indirectly viewed in a mirror." From the report: Professor [Masanori Kohda] says, "Previously, using a brown marking on the throat area of [cleaner fish Labroides dimidiatus], we had shown three out of four cleaner fish to scrape their throats several times after swimming in front of a mirror, a number on par with similar studies done on other animals like elephants, dolphins, and magpies." However, one of the criticisms laid against this result was sample size and the need for repeated studies showing positive results. Teaming up with researchers from the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior in Germany and the University of Neuchatel in Switzerland, this study increased the sample size to 18 cleaner fish, with a 94% positive result of 17 of them demonstrating the same behavior from the previous study.
[...]
Prof. Kohda says, "Our previous study demonstrated MSR in L. dimidiatus; however, studies with other animals have shown that simply moving a mirror reignites aggressive behavior, suggesting the animal has only learned a spatial contingency, not MSR." To address this, the team transferred mirror-trained cleaner fish to a tank with a mirror on one side of the tank and then three days later to a tank with a mirror on the other side, and saw the fish show no aggression toward their mirror image in both tanks. Also, to ensure the L. dimidiatus that passed the mark test truly are recognizing themselves, they placed mirror-trained fish in adjacent tanks that were separated by transparent glass. After two to three days, when fish largely reduced their aggressive behavior towards each other, they were marked the standard way the following night. None of the fish scraped their throat during the 120 mins of exposure to each other the following morning. This new experiment was recently published in PLOS Biology.
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Scientists Demonstrate Self-Awareness In Fish More

Scientists Demonstrate Self-Awareness In Fish

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  • a Beowulf cluster of fish.

  • If you thought meat came from the grocery store, magically materialized straight into the packaging, you've been fooling yourself. Whether the source is from plants or animals, we kill to eat. We could discover tomorrow that cows have their own language, with a moderate vocabulary and regional dialects, and it won't stop me from eating them. Same goes for plants. They're all food, just like the fish. If this all makes you squeamish, feel free to subside yourself on veggies and pills - or save yourself the m

    • The capacity to care about the suffering of others is very clearly a sliding scale. Some people have such a strong expression of it that they guilt over micro-animals that they might kill when taking a shower. And others have so little of it that they merrily perpetuate genocide whenever they benefit from doing so.

      It sounds like you might be on the "low" end of the empathy scale. Whether that makes you a monster, or selfishly-enlightened, is a matter of opinion. But one thing that is not a matter of opi

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by znrt ( 2424692 )

        Rejecting one's humanity doesn't seem justified by this.

        this is not about rejecting "humanity", it is about us humans not being anything special unless we can actually behave like we are, e.g.:

        Accepting practical realities as morally acceptable seems much more justified.

        i can accept no problem the practical reality of my immune system killing bacteria, i could even accept killing an animal to feed myself if in need, but rather not the senseless daily torture and onslaught of millions of conscious animals at industrial scale and in miserable conditions, just so a bunch of oblivions humans can munch on their crispy bacon every day (and prob

        • An eternal Treblinka. (Score:5, Insightful)

          by I am Jack's username ( 528712 ) on Saturday February 19, 2022 @03:25AM (#62282713)
          Not millions, but billions of animals [businessinsider.com] are enslaved in torturous conditions on factory farms every year.

          As for industrial fishing, it could be about 2 trillion fish [forbes.com] that they tortured [sciencefocus.com] to death every year.

          Factory farming and industrial fishing causes more pain and suffering than all other atrocities ever committed, combined.

          • Factory farming and industrial fishing causes more pain and suffering than all other atrocities ever committed, combined.

            And the hecatomb is repeated year-on-year, while most human-on-human atrocities are not repeated, often.

        • What's more special than being at the top of the food chain?

          What's special about deciding to cut yourself off from the highest value food available?

          • The "special" bit is that humans can exercise restraint in their eating habits out of moral or compassionate reasons, whereas other animals don't do this. Our special capacity for morality extends to other domains of life as well, of course, but eating is the focus on this thread.

      • Re:Sorry, I won't apologize for the food chain (Score:5, Insightful)

        by OngelooflijkHaribo ( 7706194 ) on Friday February 18, 2022 @11:18PM (#62282391)

        People do not care about the suffering of others; they care about the suffering of things that look sufficiently similar to them, and cute.

        All science indicates that octopodes are quite intelligent and self-aware compared to seals, but they look quite otherwordly to a man, who sees in the seal the cute expression of a mancub, and consequently cares more for the seal than for the octopus.

    • The film "Sausage Party" comes to mind. Conscious food. :-)

      Re that last sentence in the first paragraph, I think you forgot to add "(...) but it's your own moral choice so don't try to force it onto others. Let everyone eat what they want."

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Powercntrl ( 458442 )

      They're all food, just like the fish. If this all makes you squeamish, feel free to subside yourself on veggies and pills

      Before I tried Impossible Burger, I was fully expecting to write an expletive-laden rant about what a disastrous direction human civilization has taken if we're actually expected to willingly consume the results of someone's glorified science experiment. It was available at Epcot and I figured it was worth trying just from a "know the enemy" perspective.

      I went back for seconds. It was actually pretty tasty, imagine that. So, if it ever turns out that "moo" actually means something besides "I am a cow, ea

      • Having also tried the impossible burger - or burger king/hungry jacks version of - I can say that you sound like a paid shill. Not saying you are, just what it sounds like.

        It tasted like excessively salted smoked dirt. And that's the kind description. Three of us tried it and none took a second bite. All reports were the same.

        In my opinion, the only people who think the impossible burger tastes like meat are people who have not eaten meat in a very long time and have some vague memory or once heard a descri

        • I'm not crazy about the Impossible, but Beyond has continued to improve their taste and texture. For me, I think it's all the flavors and textures I liked about meat without the stuff that grossed me out(and I don't mean the eating a dead animal part). Give it a try, you might like it. If not eventually there will be a plant based meat you do like.
        • You just described beef. All positive experiences come from nostalgic memories not flavor. There is a reason A1 is so popular.

        • burger king/hungry jacks version of

          Found the problem. Burger King chars both the real and fake stuff until it tastes like a piece of burnt tire. I've tried the Impossible Whopper too and I don't much care for it either, it is far too overcooked.

          Epcot's preparation method was cooking the patties on a griddle, then they were served on a slider bun with "Asian slaw" (fancy lettuce, basically) and wasabi mayo.

      • I finally had an impossible burger not too long ago. It tasted just like a burger... a really low-grade one. Like, something that Burger King cooked all the life out of and delivered in beyond-well-done condition. Those of us who actually like the flavor of meat have nothing of substance to enjoy there. You are apparently not one of those people, so by all means, enjoy your saltburger. Far be it from me to tell you not to eat that little plant puck that is actually less healthy for you than an actual burger

    • /. used to be cool (Score:5, Insightful)

      by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Friday February 18, 2022 @11:15PM (#62282385)
      Instead of manly men talking about how you could have their meat when you pry it from their cold dead hands we'd look forward to a time when we didn't have to kill to eat because we'd advanced enough as a species it wasn't necessary.

      When did we get so lame?

      • lame

        To eat you need to kill. Fruit and vegetables are alive for some definition of.

        Everything needs to kill to eat. It's just the nature of life. What separates humans from everything else is we at least kill quickly and don't butcher the animal while it's still alive, so it's suffering is at least less.

        • Humans kill extremely slowly. I'm a vegetarian, but I had a roommate that would hunt and fish for all his meat with a bow and arrow or fishing line. I could respect that somewhat as it semi-resembles nature. The animal got to do its animal thing with its animal friends. But industrial farming forces an animal to live in suffering to be killed in its youth.
        • No imagination whatsoever. You can't even imagine a world where you don't kill to eat. You just can't even fathom anything outside your immediate experiences let alone futurism.

          I mean for God's sakes just Star Trek replicators making food from Atoms would be enough to have a civilization that can eat without killing. Or how about pure energy people if you want to go all the way out. For the whole new humans or new types.

          It's all just so lame. A whole bunch of old men sitting around annoyed that thing

      • When did we get so lame?

        We got old, and as people get old, they tend to get more conservative and so reactionary.

      • When did we get so lame?

        You got lame when you wrote a comment suggesting that being a meat-eater is that without any reasoning behind it. Why should I want to stop eating other creatures? Some appeal to morality? Pass.

        I'd rather be a beast than a prey animal. You be whatever you want, though.

        • Go read The uplift books. That's all I'm going to say. Sorry man but you're exactly as lame as I said you are. You don't have to be just go read some more. It's good for you.

          • I'm pretty sure I've read all of them. You think because some fictional alien morality looks down on eating animals that it's wrong? That's ludicrous.

        • Wow that's just lame. This thing where you have so little imagination left in your head that you can't even conceive of a third option. It wallows in lameless. And you're so lame you don't even know where that's from. I miss when nerds were cool.

          • You miss when you were cool, when you could imagine that someone else could have a different view from yours, and still be right. And I miss that time, too.

            You made an appeal to sci-fi as if that was supposed to be meaningful in any way, and while ignoring that the counterargument to your opinion is also present in sci-fi. I'd rather be a Kzin than Soylent Man.

            Even in a world of replicators there's still people who want to eat real food. They still have people gardening in Star Trek (which involves causing

      • When it started shilling cryptocurrency and didn't give two shits about dupes. Oh you meant society and not /. in general. /s

        I don't think there is an exact date for the when men turned into wussies but I'd say around 2010 give or take a few years. i.e. People see something "offensive" on TV, movies, social media, etc. and instead of changing the channel they whine about a non-issue that no one gives a fuck about.

        Technically Stupid Juvenile Whinners have been around for 150 years [amazon.com] however "The Message" is

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by gadb2 ( 7465360 )
      If you have to kill to survive then that's life. If it's discretionary, then we're back at "my wants trump your needs", which seems to be pretty much the definition of lack of empathy. Everyone who eats meat should be required to work - at least for a day - in an abattoir, to look straight in the eye the things they fund and make happen. To see the stress of the animals, pregnant cows opened up and all the other horrors, horrors that cause sky high rates of depression and suicide among those who work in s

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      I don't think self awareness has much to do with how humans feel towards other animals. Cats don't recognize themselves in the mirror but most people would feel quite bad about hurting a cat.

      Whatever the criteria is (to be honest I'm not entirely sure), self awareness can only be a small part of it.

      • Humans can end up with mirror agnosia as the result of a brain injury. It often comes with substantial other side effects on cognition due to, well, being a brain injury, but there are certainly cases where the afflicted person still exhibits human level of intelligence. Based on that I've always found it odd that self-recognition in a mirror is considered a very important sign of intelligence.

        • Head injury can decrease intelligence, film at eleven... right after the big boxing match

          • Head injury can decrease intelligence, film at eleven...

            Yeah but like I already said while there's generally some other cognitive impairment people still have human level intelligence. They can still talk, read, write, etc. In other words it seems possible to knock out the bit of the brain that's ultimately responsible for self-recognition in a mirror.

            Having a very cursory look at the case studies it looks like it often came with cognitive visual impairment, so self recognition might be connected to advance

            • I get what you're saying, I think that the best answer I have on tap is that while there are different kinds of intelligence, they tend to be exhibited together. This suggests that by and large they require the same hardware. When we characterize a species we have to look at multiple examples thereof or else we risk creating an incomplete or otherwise inaccurate definition.

              There are definitely some animals where some examples will recognize themselves in a mirror and some won't. If you wanted to characteriz

      • Depends on the cat.

        And "self aware", has many levels. Just because a cat does not recognize himself in a mirrors imho does not mean she is not self aware.

        We have many cats on my farm in Thailand, one died. The others started searching for her a day later, when they figured something had happened, they did not eat for three days. Not the same as "self aware", but certainly not a dumb robot.

        Yes, and all know their name, and come if you call them - most of the time.

    • You seem pretty defensive about this finding. Why? Or are you just shilling for soylent somehow.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by gweihir ( 88907 )

      Well, anyways. This is pretty much how it goes in nature: Most animals get eaten and predators not so rarely get killed by their prey. Predators also generally do not have a choice. Eventually we may have the ability to feed ourselves reasonably without killing animals, but that is way off.

      But there is another aspect: If we stop farming for meat, there will be a lot less of those animals. Now, does that mean they simply will never exist? Or does it mean they will have to wait longer for a reincarnation? In

  • Fish can learn how to drive [slashdot.org] and are self-aware. You're next Uber driver may have gills, and not in the Kevin Costner Water World sense.

  • What if they played a video of itself would it recognize that it wasn't a mirror and ignore it?

  • Now fish will become a protected species and we won't be able to eat them.

    • Now fish will become a protected species and we won't be able to eat them.

      That's where the Japanese come in with their 'scientific research'.

  • Feeling the marker? (Score:3)

    by ugen ( 93902 ) on Saturday February 19, 2022 @12:12AM (#62282473)

    Could it be that fish are feeling the marker on their skin?
    How many of marked fish scrape their marked areas when not exposed to a mirror?

    • Could it be that fish are feeling the marker on their skin? How many of marked fish scrape their marked areas when not exposed to a mirror?

      they were marked the standard way the following night. None of the fish scraped their throat during the 120 mins of exposure to each other the following morning.

      Well the summary already shows they don't to any meaningful extent.

  • Real intelligence that adapts to a novel situation. These creatures, like all others including humans, are pre-programmed for certain functions. When birds migrate or bears hibernate, it's not because they are very clever or intelligent. But many creatures innovate individually. These fish are very surprising in their understanding of the mirror. Does your pet understand the mirror or recognize the image on the TV?

    What is continually touted as 'AI' is a shameful parody of intelligence. I hope to see compute

  • MSR (Score:5, Informative)

    by dohzer ( 867770 ) on Saturday February 19, 2022 @02:10AM (#62282641)

    MSR == Mirror Self-Recognition

  • I took my fish head
    Out to see a mirror
    Fish Heads Fish Heads
    Eat them up, yum!

  • As is typical with the non-science that is biology, a new observation that another species might have something like human sentience that is a surprise to no average person but contentious and new to biologists.

    CONSIDER: What if you lived in a world without mirrors? Somewhere where reflection was a not a thing? And then such a mirror, an alien inconceivable thing, was put in an artificial environment you were being kept in. Would you expect your intelligence to be measured by how you dealt with your r

  • What if the fish thought the mirror was another fish and figured they better buff up if they want to win the girl? This sounds extremely bogus. Even cats can't figure out it's them in the mirror.

  • Think of the confusion it must be causing to the fish !

    What if some super intelligent beings were to keep randomly renaming your servers / AWS/Azure instances & duplicating problems of one server into another while you go crazy ssh'ing into them trying to be "aware" which is which ?? :)

    Oh the horror !

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