There are fish that can survive on dry(-ish) land for extended periods of time.
And don't get me started on the utterly bizarre slime mold.
The number of species that defy our expectations is countless.
Bluntly, there's a lot of arrogance in the claim that anyone should be able to easily and automatically rule out the existence of some species based on their personal knowledge, and that anyone who fails to do so is "gullible".
some, certainly yes.
i don't think anyone would disagree that some claims are more plainly ridiculous than others. i'm replying to someone who let themselves be convinced the tree octopus was real by a page picturing an octopus climbing a tree. let's not abdicate our regard for common sense.
For example, why is a tree octopus any less likely than the platypus, a venomous aquatic mammal that has a beak, lays eggs, and detects prey by sensing electric fields like a shark?
1) obviously photoshopped -- a real octopus on a tree branch would look totally different, it would sag in some places, it would affect the pine bristles underneath, it wouldn't have a shadow that makes it look like it's hovering an inch above the branch, etc. Also, that octopus image looks totally out of proportion, but I can't pin down why -- I _think_ it's because the level of detail is higher than for the branches.
2) It looks exactly like a regular octopus. Not only should an animal the size of a small bird have different proportions from a regular octopus (compare e.g. bats and fruit bats, or cats and tigers), but it should also look only distantly related to a regular octopus because it's adapted to a totally different biome.
All that leads me to the following conclusion: Common sense, in the sense of broadly understanding how the world works, really is what prevents you from getting fooled, and the more things you understand, the less likely you are to get fooled. Also, the more information a hoax has, the more likely it is to get exposed, because just one sufficiently glaring inconsistency can sink it.
do i think i'm as intelligent as anyone, or that everyone is as intelligent as me? of course not. but i do think your standard for gullibility is too high if you don't think believing the linked article satisfies it.
I suppose that's enough to make my point for me.
the difference between people who initially believed this and those who didn't is gullibility, and this is a great example of gullibility because of how outlandish the claim is and appears to be. that's all i'm arguing. the counteraguments i see boil down to "but if someone is gullible enough, they'll think it's actually not outlandish and accept it on face value" which is not contrary to what i'm saying.
if you were one of the gullible ones, sorry! sucks to be more deficient than others in some way, but we all have deficiencies.
But I suppose you have your deficiencies too, same as those who thought it to be real (however briefly).
- Tree lobster - Tree crab - Tree clam - Tree fish