Can Sponges “Think” Using Light?

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  • Опубліковано 22 гру 2024

КОМЕНТАРІ • 251

  • @SciShow
    @SciShow  Рік тому +15

    Head to linode.com/scishow to get a $100 60-day credit on a new Linode account. Linode offers simple, affordable, and accessible Linux cloud solutions and services.

  • @hotshot619
    @hotshot619 Рік тому +262

    That's a cool idea of an made up alien species. One with a nervous system made up of fiber optics which are super fast. That would be a cool writing prompt

    • @ashleelarsen5002
      @ashleelarsen5002 Рік тому +9

      Tell chat gpt about it

    • @DragonlordVindi
      @DragonlordVindi Рік тому +19

      An alien based on a sea invertebrate, that also communicates with light waves across its massive body?
      So, the Scub Coral from Eureka Seven?

    • @TheMarshmellowLife
      @TheMarshmellowLife Рік тому +2

      ​@@DragonlordVindithe what now?

    • @thumper5555
      @thumper5555 Рік тому

      So use it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    • @clippedwings225
      @clippedwings225 Рік тому +6

      Reminds me of the Eridians from Project Hail Mary - they don't talk about it in the book but Weir had a document floating around explaining that an Eridian brain is basically fiber optic

  • @olivefernando7879
    @olivefernando7879 Рік тому +20

    there's a video by 'the octopus lady' about how sponges constantly rearrange their internal structure, so on a microscopic level they are complicated, so they have plenty to think about in terms of for example optimising those structure's locations for particular conditions ,ocean currents etc

    • @naturegirl1999
      @naturegirl1999 Рік тому +1

      I’ve had dreams where I could shapeshifter, I did it by moving cells and tissues around, I remember wishing I could set states and turn into specific shapes like a switch, didn’t happen though. I get lots of dreams about either shapeshifting, being incorporeal, or not human, sometimes being stuck in someone else’s body.
      I guess my point is is having to think about where to move your cells sounds mentally exhausting

  • @i.am.not.herbert
    @i.am.not.herbert Рік тому +51

    They can at least think well enough in order to make Krabby Patties.

  • @guilerms
    @guilerms Рік тому +19

    this is very mind-blowing
    science fiction can rarely match science when it comes to pure awe

  • @indigofenix00
    @indigofenix00 Рік тому +31

    The crazy thing about a light-based nervous system is that you can theoretically pack a lot more complexity into a small space than with an electrical one. Two light rays can pass through each other without interfering, so you can have multiple light "wires" facing different directions through the same space, while wires would have to navigate around each other.

    • @alejotassile6441
      @alejotassile6441 Рік тому +5

      You can still have destructive interference tho

    • @DrDeuteron
      @DrDeuteron Рік тому +4

      @@alejotassile6441op is using interference to mean the solutions are linear, so when they pass through each other, there is no interaction, even if they are interfering. Which they are not, because that requires coherence ….which they probably don’t have

    • @anonymousstacker2044
      @anonymousstacker2044 Рік тому +2

      ​@@DrDeuteronso constructive interference won't apply here, then?

    • @DrDeuteron
      @DrDeuteron Рік тому +3

      @@anonymousstacker2044 the two signals will add together regardless of amplitude or phase and pass through each other, like light does everyday….say two people on adjacent walls of a room looking across to their opposite wall. They light each sees passes through the same point at the same time in the middle of the room with absolutely zero effect. Interference in when two signals add together with the same frequency and phase difference, so a persistent pattern forms

    • @CrochetIsLife54
      @CrochetIsLife54 Рік тому

      Wouldn’t this depend upon the wavelengths created by the bioluminescence? Most such light in the ocean tends to be blue. I suspect that this is due to how light interacts with water. Perhaps under different gravity, these interactions are different?
      Also, suppose that, instead of water, life develops in oceans of methane? These frozen worlds tend to be farther from the star, and have less light in the environment. Bioluminescence might be critical to the development of animal life in such an ecosystem.
      There are very interesting possibilities here.

  • @1.4142
    @1.4142 Рік тому +116

    Wonder if it evolved before the electrical nervous system. They were billions of years ahead of us in terms of optical computing.

    • @veraruda4174
      @veraruda4174 Рік тому +11

      Exactly! We are a "knockoff," not them ;)

    • @demoman1596sh
      @demoman1596sh Рік тому +14

      To be fair, sponges are only known to have existed for around 800 million years, though the first well-preserved fossil sponges (based on what I've read) seem to be only around 580 million years old. And it is likely that the electrical central nervous system we're familiar with evolved prior to the Cambrian Explosion over 540 million years ago, since most of the animals that existed at that time already had it.
      It would be cool if we could figure out from the ancient fossil sponges that they had this "optical" nervous system all the way back then!

    • @eabradley1108
      @eabradley1108 Рік тому +6

      The book series The Three Body Problem includes a species that thinks visually with light/em-radiation, and also uses that to communicate. They developed a computer system where each individual person works as a logic gate.

    • @aaronperelmuter8433
      @aaronperelmuter8433 Рік тому

      @@eabradley1108Hmmm, wonder how well that computer would work if it’s logic gates have psychiatric issues or illnesses? 🤔 I mean, how well can a logic gate operate if it isn’t actually using logic? 🤓 Mental health issues are very well known for the lack of logic and rational reasoning which occurs in people with such afflictions. Sure wouldn’t want my pc acting up and giving me gibberish results because some of its logic gates are now irrational gates instead. 😱😳

    • @MadScientist267
      @MadScientist267 Рік тому

      ​@@veraruda4174who the hell said otherwise 🙄

  • @CoriSparx
    @CoriSparx Рік тому +51

    So Spongebob isn't dumb, he just thinks differently. That tracks 😆

    • @jaschabull2365
      @jaschabull2365 Рік тому +9

      I suspect Squidward would say that with him, the lights aren't all on upstairs ;P

  • @peter4210
    @peter4210 Рік тому +6

    Humans: ahah, I invested fiber optics.
    Nature: *discovered

  • @patlee8539
    @patlee8539 Рік тому +147

    Wait, but since sponges are so old, aren't *our* nervous systems the knock-offs?

    • @nathanieldodson6429
      @nathanieldodson6429 Рік тому +17

      i get what ur saying but i see it as they got the ps2 and we got a ps5 yk

    • @andredepadua8799
      @andredepadua8799 Рік тому +33

      Not necessarily. Sponge-like organisms could have evolved this "fiber optics nerve-system" both before or after creatures with real nerves having first appeared.

    • @McStealy
      @McStealy Рік тому

      This looks like Ego's seed from GOTG Vol 2

    • @patlee8539
      @patlee8539 Рік тому +1

      @@andredepadua8799 yeah, but before seems way more probable to me.

    • @samuelaraujomedeiros6682
      @samuelaraujomedeiros6682 Рік тому +5

      @@andredepadua8799 Considering that only one species that we know has it, it's more likely that it evolved relatively recently. In geological time, of course.

  • @hollish196
    @hollish196 Рік тому +1

    Had to share this one! Off Topic: Those are some seriously dang cool earrings!!

  • @fuferito
    @fuferito Рік тому +50

    "How much deeper would the ocean be if there were no sponges?"
    -Prof Emeritus Steven Wright

    • @vaughnordakowski8774
      @vaughnordakowski8774 Рік тому +5

      I know it's a joke but if we get technical the ocean would be shallower without sponges because of displacement

  • @Master_Therion
    @Master_Therion Рік тому +491

    Using light to "think" is a bright idea.

    • @xpndblhero5170
      @xpndblhero5170 Рік тому +23

      This is dad joke material.... LoL

    • @SnarkNSass
      @SnarkNSass Рік тому +9

      😯So-Oh Bright 🌞

    • @cbob213
      @cbob213 Рік тому +5

      Isn’t reddit back open now?

    • @cbob213
      @cbob213 Рік тому +4

      @@SnarkNSassshouldn’t that be oh-so bright? Or Oh, so bright. ;)

    • @braulionekomimi
      @braulionekomimi Рік тому +13

      Badum tsss… 🥁

  • @TomsBackyardWorkshop
    @TomsBackyardWorkshop Рік тому +15

    "Groups of cells packed together that preform different functions." You just described organs.

    • @ParadoxProblems
      @ParadoxProblems Рік тому

      Haha, I guess biologists are a bit elitist when it comes to the 2d-ness of tissues or organs

    • @emmas5456
      @emmas5456 Рік тому +14

      They aren't described as organs because sponges don't have true tissues--partially because they do not have basement membranes!

    • @josequiles7430
      @josequiles7430 Рік тому +3

      It's a definition thing. They have like three different layers of cells but they're not counted as tissue

    • @anguishedcarpet
      @anguishedcarpet Рік тому

      You're wrong and right tbh lol

    • @MadScientist267
      @MadScientist267 Рік тому +4

      Organs have distinct boundaries that allow them to be physically independent of each other... Your stomach and your liver are both right next to each other, serve a common system (digestive), and are completely and readily separated from each other.
      The structure within the sponge is more like the brain (only less the thinking part lol) - groups of cells that are all "the same" but doing different things depending where they are located within the brain, and these areas are not succinct and cannot be separated from each other as modular units the way the liver and stomach can.

  • @galloe8933
    @galloe8933 Рік тому +1

    I remember hearing part of a conversation, back when I was a young teen about how certain things in the deep ocean may have come from silicon.
    That was the last I heard of it, and I stopped brining what I heard up, decades ago.
    After awhile, I figured I must have confused something that I didn’t understand. I guess I did, however, I probably heard some college kids talking about, or just me not understanding what I had heard, what was a lifetime ago.
    This was likely the root of my “Silicon based life” story, from all that time ago… It was never about deep sea critters evolving from silicone but, maybe a passing conversation about deep sea sponges using it to do something.
    This, I think, happened around 02, or 03 so the timeframe seems to work. I do feel like an old, confused, childhood memory just got an answer after all these years.

  • @blaketracy4377
    @blaketracy4377 Рік тому +2

    Their reaction time must be incredible

  • @nasonguy
    @nasonguy Рік тому +41

    Been many years since I’ve read any Asimov, but doesn’t the positronic brain in his robots/foundation universe use light instead of nerves/chemeichal-electrical impulses? I thought that was how he explained it’s extreme speed and power…..

    • @briseboy
      @briseboy Рік тому

      Tat tvam asimov.

    • @such_a_dork
      @such_a_dork Рік тому +1

      They use positrons (anti-electrons).

    • @nasonguy
      @nasonguy Рік тому +3

      @@such_a_dork Oh, duh. It's even in the name... Like I said, it's been a couple decades since I've read any Asimov.
      Guess it's time for me to fix that, haha.

  • @CrochetIsLife54
    @CrochetIsLife54 Рік тому +1

    This is so fascinating! I wonder if an ecosystem on an exoplanet might refine this into a “nervous system” that works for more complex, multicellular animals.
    In a different video, sponges were shown to be constantly rearranging their cells to adapt to conditions changing in the environment. Do these spicules also move around?

  • @capt.bart.roberts4975
    @capt.bart.roberts4975 Рік тому +1

    Well that's very cool. I've always loved the glass sponges.

  • @Soraviel
    @Soraviel Рік тому +1

    Sponges are so interesting whenever I see them and learn more about them, especially the sponge sea Cucumber

  • @KCFreitag
    @KCFreitag Рік тому +1

    Mind. Blown. Again.

  • @iLLadelph267
    @iLLadelph267 Рік тому +1

    I read the the title and couldn't help but think of the Family Guy reference, "coming up next: can bees think?? a new study confirms that... no they cannot." 😂

  • @allwright4020
    @allwright4020 Рік тому +14

    Wouldn't our nervous system be the knock off since sponges came first?😮😂😊

    • @MadScientist267
      @MadScientist267 Рік тому

      Ok yeah way too many mentions of this. Someone is confused.

  • @erikarussell1142
    @erikarussell1142 Рік тому

    That is just so amazing. Life is such a curious oddity of beauty.

  • @carlstevenson709
    @carlstevenson709 Рік тому +5

    Oh haven't seen a SciShow in forever

  • @zephyr733
    @zephyr733 Рік тому

    0:30 did them so dirty

  • @NikkiTrudelle
    @NikkiTrudelle Рік тому +2

    They have to think some so they know when to flip the crabby Patties

  • @_andrewvia
    @_andrewvia Рік тому

    Yay Rose!

  • @catatonicbug7522
    @catatonicbug7522 Рік тому +4

    Thank you for calming down the voice! Much easier to listen to!

  • @RandyJames22
    @RandyJames22 Рік тому

    Fascinating!

  • @josequiles7430
    @josequiles7430 Рік тому +1

    What about placozoans? They're also animals without a nervous system but, unlike sponges, they also need to move around to look for food

  • @clydefrosch
    @clydefrosch Рік тому +1

    They think at lightspeed, rationalize that nothing matters and sponge out.

  • @gideonpaulalcaide
    @gideonpaulalcaide Рік тому +1

    This is still a theory but I'm already mind blown

  • @regifisher779
    @regifisher779 Рік тому

    Theres a Channel called The Octopus Lady(?) who has a lot of videos like these, specific looks at different ocean creatures.

  • @thumper5555
    @thumper5555 Рік тому +1

    Love it when Rose hosts!

  • @kiddfpv
    @kiddfpv Рік тому +1

    If they use light to think…how would they react to light being shined on them ? Like from when the deep sea probe is using a flash light to look at them, were they like 🤯

  • @madLphnt
    @madLphnt Рік тому +1

    Lacey Skeleton is a great band name

  • @jensonee
    @jensonee Рік тому

    that rates a WOW!!!

  • @Late4dinner1
    @Late4dinner1 Рік тому +1

    Could foliage like trees and plants potentially have started out similar to a sponge and "picked up" an ancestor to algae or lichen creating the chloroplast?

    • @josequiles7430
      @josequiles7430 Рік тому +1

      I don't think so because the first plants and their ancestors would have been unicellular

    • @Late4dinner1
      @Late4dinner1 Рік тому

      @@josequiles7430 I'm thinking the photosynthetic unicellular bacterium being "picked up" would in a sense create the first plants.

  • @WizardClipAudio
    @WizardClipAudio Рік тому +1

    Enlightened SpongeBob should be a meme. 😂

  • @briseboy
    @briseboy Рік тому

    I am not sure that metabolism requires kicking.
    Stimuli can be pleasurable, or merely molecular, and, though kicking may appeal to the abusive, teaching the organism to pre-emptively move away, or like myself, spew toxins in response.

  • @omegahaxors9-11
    @omegahaxors9-11 Рік тому +1

    DIYEHAHAHAHA!! GOOD ONE, SQUIDWARD!

  • @williamkuhns2387
    @williamkuhns2387 4 місяці тому

    The Venus' Flower Basket glass sponges have a symbiotic relationship with a shrimp. The sponges provide shrimp with protection and surplus food and shrimp clean inside of sponges.The scientific name for this shrimp is Spongicola venusta. A male and female adult shrimp live trapped inside sponge skeleton. In Japan the dried sponges have been traditionally given as a wedding gift symbolic of "till death do us part" as shrimp "couple" live and die inside these sponges.

  • @joshchu
    @joshchu Рік тому

    This man wishes to be accorded the same privilege as a sponge, he wishes to think!

  • @J242D
    @J242D Рік тому +1

    Using light to think w no brilliant sponsor is a dropped ball

  • @MagentaMauve
    @MagentaMauve 2 місяці тому

    What is the difference between a hormone and a "hormone like molecule"?

  • @kray3883
    @kray3883 Рік тому

    That never really... *dramatic pause*
    Me: Oh lawd, it's coming...
    ...took off.
    🤦

  • @the22ndday
    @the22ndday Рік тому

    Just wanted to hit the 👍🏼
    And commenting for the UA-cam gods😉

  • @Ms421twilightgirl
    @Ms421twilightgirl Рік тому +2

    Can’t take a sponge lightly anymore (Cue Spongebob)

  • @UGNAvalon
    @UGNAvalon Рік тому

    So does that make this a literal “lightbulb” moment? 🤔💡

  • @2000sborton
    @2000sborton Рік тому +6

    I have a strange theory about what we typically call primitive organisms. It goes along the lines of they evolved first, so were capable of occupying niches where they didn't need a lot of complexity to survive. As evolution progressed these niches became filled. That forced later organisms to develop more complex forms just to survive. Kind of reverses the thinking that the more complex forms are "superior" to the more "primitive" life forms. Just a different way of looking at the same picture.

  • @mihaimoldo
    @mihaimoldo Рік тому

    Aren't we all? We process light and make decisions based on it.

  • @villager736
    @villager736 Рік тому

    You think it would be practical for a animal to have a fiber optic based nervous system?

  • @jmanj3917
    @jmanj3917 Рік тому

    That's cool

  • @amirclahar5983
    @amirclahar5983 Рік тому

    Our brains are regularly wired while, their brains using optical fiber that’s wild

  • @McStealy
    @McStealy Рік тому

    Imagine your nervous system shattering every time you fell or someone bumped into you. Yikes.

    • @shrimpbisque
      @shrimpbisque Рік тому +4

      If you've ever stubbed your toe, you don't have to imagine 😂

    • @McStealy
      @McStealy Рік тому

      @@shrimpbisque Fair point

  • @gsilcoful
    @gsilcoful Рік тому

    Wow. Cool.

  • @pauls5745
    @pauls5745 Рік тому

    wow. sponges are aware, in a sense

  • @rebokfleetfoot
    @rebokfleetfoot Рік тому +4

    what does it mean to think? maybe we are just sponges with a big ego?

    • @3nertia
      @3nertia Рік тому +3

      I think I still prefer the notion that we're just stomachs that grew a brain that then decided we needed limbs lol
      Your suggestion is a close second though

  • @waverod9275
    @waverod9275 Рік тому

    You know, the more I learn about sponges, the more I think evolving past them was a mistake. :-)

    • @kellydalstok8900
      @kellydalstok8900 Рік тому +1

      As Dougla Adams wrote in the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy:
      Many were increasingly of the opinion that they'd all made a big mistake coming down from the trees in the first place, and some said that even the trees had been a bad move, and that no-one should ever have left the oceans.

  • @platygetzkillz2144
    @platygetzkillz2144 Рік тому +1

    So if I point a 30,000 lumen flashlight at the sponge will it have a seizure

    • @massimookissed1023
      @massimookissed1023 Рік тому +1

      Either that, or it'll figure out how to unify quantum and relativistic physics, something that is beyond our best thinkers.

  • @lethauntic
    @lethauntic Рік тому +1

    Anyone else have a crazy urge to bite one of those sponges?

  • @storsolo
    @storsolo Рік тому

    Awesome

  • @jessicatymczak5852
    @jessicatymczak5852 Рік тому

    SpongeBob should have been our first clue 😂

  • @cdreNightshift
    @cdreNightshift Рік тому

    Any readers of the "Expanse" book series: "Nope nope nope nope!"

  • @herbertfawcett7213
    @herbertfawcett7213 Рік тому

    So sponges, polar bears, and finally man.

  • @lynnbusch621
    @lynnbusch621 Рік тому

    So you could say this is an early silica based lifeform? There are so many science fiction and fantasy stories out there that explore that possibility!

    • @andredepadua8799
      @andredepadua8799 Рік тому +6

      They are just as carbon-based as we are, as in their DNA and cellular structures are carbon-based

    • @letopizdetz
      @letopizdetz Рік тому +2

      they're carbon based, just like us, you don't say humans are calcium based just because of the bones.

  • @marcopohl4875
    @marcopohl4875 Рік тому +2

    But Spongebob taught me they think with smaller sponges

  • @saucedbutleaking6558
    @saucedbutleaking6558 Рік тому

    it reaches out

  • @turtle4llama
    @turtle4llama Рік тому

    Living the dream

  • @_Dearex_
    @_Dearex_ Рік тому

    Sponges having better internet prerequisites than germany 😂

  • @Prs321
    @Prs321 Рік тому

    Humans use to do super important things these days like share memes on the internet 😂

  • @theograice8080
    @theograice8080 Рік тому

    If sponges use light to process their environment and to react to it, it makes the choking out of our reefs by glitters even more grim 😢

    • @MadScientist267
      @MadScientist267 Рік тому

      You might have missed the idea that they are *producing* the light they are using. This changes things. Kinda like you being able to turn on your phone's flashlight in the dark. Doesn't matter that the sun isn't up.

  • @-Slinger-
    @-Slinger- Рік тому

    Sponges have been evolving for 800mln years, no wonder they developed fiber optics 😄

  • @jacobopstad5483
    @jacobopstad5483 Рік тому

    Holographic brains? That sounds like a great sci-fi story

  • @KhaoticDeterminism
    @KhaoticDeterminism Рік тому +2

    Our thoughts aren’t our own.
    They’re legit downloads through the Aether and that’s light.

  • @sudiptasaha8241
    @sudiptasaha8241 Рік тому

    So, is it a silicon based life?

  • @hherpdderp
    @hherpdderp Рік тому

    Lights from an ROV probably really mess with them.

  • @sanjuansteve
    @sanjuansteve Рік тому

    The deep ocean isn't 100% free of photons, right?

  • @paintballercali
    @paintballercali Рік тому

    Aliens!

  • @jhoughjr1
    @jhoughjr1 Рік тому

    OMG it’s the crystalline entity RUN!

  • @AundreiFrieght
    @AundreiFrieght Рік тому

    In terms of age we humans are the aliens. 😂😂

  • @backwoodsmodified
    @backwoodsmodified Рік тому

    Is that why I have a total of 42 sponges?

  • @beepboop204
    @beepboop204 Рік тому

  • @syn4441
    @syn4441 Рік тому

    👍

  • @HeiMiBR
    @HeiMiBR Рік тому

    sponge: we telightpath.

  • @TheStickCollector
    @TheStickCollector Рік тому +1

    We need more species like this, maybe.

  • @benedixtify
    @benedixtify Рік тому

    Fiber optic sponges

  • @MartinOlminkhof
    @MartinOlminkhof Рік тому

    Fibre optic nervous system? Sounds like something an android would have...

  • @rkozakand
    @rkozakand Рік тому

    You make it sound like all sponges would do this, and reinforce that impression by showing images of many different kinds of sponges. But obviously this would only apply to those sponges that have silica as their basic structures. That would be a definite minority.

  • @Waltyworld
    @Waltyworld Рік тому

    Wow

  • @viifaz
    @viifaz Рік тому +1

    interesting ☕

  • @EyesOfByes
    @EyesOfByes Рік тому

    So, they have "eyes"?

  • @samanthav563
    @samanthav563 Рік тому

    In French, sponge is éponge

  • @truthdevotee7561
    @truthdevotee7561 Рік тому

    02:35 to 02:39 "Human do super important thing these days, LIKE SHARE MEMES on the Internet. Do you mean like other channels uses their thumbnails to make a personalised video image meme to their least minority group targeted audience to arouse provocative attention memory trigger of their private interactive environmental behaviour?

  • @vebnew
    @vebnew Рік тому

    interesting

  • @markedis5902
    @markedis5902 Рік тому

    A lump of rock can react to light. See photodiode / led

  • @lisabarraclough5957
    @lisabarraclough5957 Рік тому

    life on our planet is amazing and we are doing a best to destroy it all...

  • @colorbugoriginals4457
    @colorbugoriginals4457 Рік тому +1

    is it a knock-off if it came first?

  • @avicohen2k
    @avicohen2k Рік тому

    This is just a theory at this point.