BRF Episode 10: “Octopus”
This being our tenth episode of Barely Researched Facts, we wanted to start with a big shout-out to all our listeners. Without tooting our horn(s?) too much, we have received such enthusiastic, positive feedback for the episodes so far and we want to thank you for it! Please keep giving us your feedback and please rate us on iTunes, Spotify or Google Podcasts because it really does help. :)
We chose a listener-submitted word to dissect this episode and boy, did it deliver! Thank you to Akshai for suggesting “Octopus”. We have to admit – at first, it didn’t seem very promising but that’ll just teach us to trust in our listeners from now on, eh? Because it was quite the opposite in the end! So, thank you Akshai!
Ragini started off with a grammatical correction that unsettled Shar and brought out the rebel in her and with that, we dove straight into the action-packed lives, interesting histories and honestly quite tragic deaths of Octopuses! What we’ve covered in this episode reads like a love letter to this fascinating species and its longevity and that’s because it sort of turned into exactly that! You’ll understand when you hear the episode but suffice to say that we have a newfound respect for these tentacled teddy bears!
As is usual with Barely Researched Facts, you learn a lot about a LOT – we find it is our podcasting duty to ram these episodes full of … stuff! This episode had the bonus of confounding us with periods of time difficult to comprehend by human beings. Nothing like the mention of a few hundred million years to confound mere mortals!
From jetting to a period 540 million years ago to properly explain what the Cambrian Explosion is to discovering Ammonites, who were the mysterious ancestors to octopuses who were interesting beyond belief but kept it that way by leaving little to no trace of themselves!
We learned some interesting and mostly horrifying truths about Octopus sex (Is THAT where it goes!? Is THAT what it does?!) that made us have new respect for a quick post-coital demise as opposed to a long-drawn-out one. It also made us coin this cute, totally accurate phrase - “The longer the arm, the deader you could get”. We also learned a little more about the social mores of octopuses that we can guarantee you didn’t know either (disclaimer: we do not and cannot provide guarantees).
All we know is – whether they’re having weird sex, taking pictures of schoolchildren, taking drugs, or being the subject of fetishes, octopuses deserve our respect, love and admiration. Too bad our (human beings and octopuses’) evolutionary journeys split over 700 million years ago. We’re still a bit butthurt about that.
Links of Interest:
Now stop trawling through this blog post for more info and listen to the episode!
Episode edited by: Mohit Shandilya
Music for the episode: Charita Arora
Listen to the episode for all the details!
