Discussing Inkling/Octoling Biology

Dolphoshi

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you also are saying that every single adult will mate there are going to be some inklings (all be it rare) that aren't going to be able to find a mate this will always

happen regardless of species so the adult who mate may die but there will be those who weren't able to find a mate (maybe thats what happened to cuddlefish) so

inklings may not see their biological parent but those who didn't get to mate will likely watch out for them (we do this) the amount of them are just rare as most

living things want to reproduce, and their wouldn't be enough of them (or they may not be fresh enough) to have them run government or they have to keep tending

the newborns to keep inkling society going so they don't have time to be parents between all the new borns

The octolings probable will be parents as most of the sunken scrolls are from them so they have better records and they have nurturing points (they have larger breasts then the inklings) so they are very likely to take care of their young over the inklings as well as being much more aggressive then the inklings (super weapons powered by cute things SOMEONE CALL EGGMAN!)


and no your pictures aren't showing
 

BlackZero

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Well, this professorship and teaching of society as a whole stems from the concept that Humanity as a species is a group, and that each individual can benefit themselves by giving to the species as a whole... In other words, social behavior
To quote this Wikipedia article: "the Humboldt squid hunts schools of fish, showing extraordinary cooperation and communication in its hunting techniques. This is the first observation of such behavior (sic) in invertebrates."

I think this demonstrates social behavior.

The same article also says:

Another example of cephalopod intelligence is the communication that takes place between the more social species of squid.[6] Some cephalopods are capable of rapid changes in skin color and pattern through nervous control of chromatophores.[7] This ability almost certainly evolved primarily for camouflage, but squid use color, patterns, and flashing to communicate with one another in various courtship rituals.[6] Caribbean reef squid can send one message via color patterns to a squid on their right, while they send another message to a squid on their left.
This article is talking about squids today, not the highly evolved Inklings of tomorrow. They've managed to devise a method of communication by using a self defense mechanism without parents to guide their development. Furthermore, this is more evidence of social behavior.

Which leaves me with the "baby inklings can't move effectively on land" argument, which is technically only a problem if you assume that baby inklings are as helpless in water as their adult counterparts.
Since inklings do have a squid form, however, which is similar to a baby inkling, I still find it unlikely that inklings would lose the ability to swim...
I don't think it's problematic. Squids today can't survive on land. They lay their eggs in a place where they aren't likely to encounter dry land. Squids also don't seem to need parents to tell them to stay in water, despite some species of squid being capable of jumping into the air. If they evolved such that they die in water, it would be a simple inversion of squids today: they lay eggs in a place where baby Inklings are far away from water and babies have an instinctual fear water that makes them stay away from it. Furthermore, if splatting is a survival reflex as discussed earlier in the thread, babies may not be in as much danger as we think.

I'm beginning to think that this is going to lead to a second "agree to disagree" event.
Could be. I know parenting is vital for human development, but I'm not convinced that it has the same importance in a species that has evolved to survive and thrive without parental influence. This is why I always caution that what worked for humans isn't a set of criteria animals must meet to evolve into a dominant species. Squids are dramatically different from us, and objective analysis has to take that into consideration. I'm not an evolutionary biologist; I'm simply basing my assessment on my observations and objective analysis of those observations in the context of how squids work today.

If new information appears, I'll re-assess my opinion. Until then, I consider following: squids evolved without parenting, have demonstrated sufficient ability to communicate that language development is feasible, and that cephalopods today demonstrate considerable intelligence and learning capabilities. They aren't reliant on parental care for early development, and are capable of learning through experience. They have demonstrated social behavior and a means of communication. Thus they can learn, they have a means of sharing what they've learned, and exhibit collaborative behavior that suggests they would be willing to share with other squids/Inklings. I really don't see where a lack of parenting would have a crippling effect on Inkling society, especially since squids today developed intelligence without it.

have octopi been observed hunting cooperatively? if not, does this mean that the probability of being able to survive mating differs between the inklings and the octarians?
Afaik, octoposes are solitary and the "death after reproduction" phenomena is universal to cephalopods.

And once again, without some form of direct verbal/chromatophoric/sign-based communication, I do not believe that the other means of transmitting culture you mentioned could have come to exist in the first place.
Squids have demonstrated this as indicated above, in this blog, and by this NatGeo article.
 

Globin347

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To quote this Wikipedia article: "the Humboldt squidhunts schools of fish, showing extraordinary cooperation and communication in its hunting techniques. This is the first observation of such behavior (sic) in invertebrates."

I think this demonstrates social behavior.

The same article also says:

[6] Some cephalopods are capable of rapid changes in skin color and pattern through nervous control of chromatophores.[7] This ability almost certainly evolved primarily for camouflage, but squid use color, patterns, and flashing to communicate with one another in various courtship rituals.[6] Caribbean reef squid can send one message via color patterns to a squid on their right, while they send another message to a squid on their left.
Click to expand...
This article is talking about squids today, not the highly evolved Inklings of tomorrow. They've managed to devise a method of communication by using a self defense mechanism without parents to guide their development. Furthermore, this is more evidence of social behavior.
...to be fair, I did mention the humbolt squid, although I did seem to forget about them...

I guess the last remnant of the argument is that the humbolt squid have only been seen talking to other adults, rather than the next generation.

I don't think it's problematic. Squids today can't survive on land. They lay their eggs in a place where they aren't likely to encounter dry land. Squids also don't seem to need parents to tell them to stay in water, despite some species of squid being capable of jumping into the air. If they evolved such that they die in water, it would be a simple inversion of squids today: they lay eggs in a place where baby Inklings are far away from water and babies have an instinctual fear water that makes them stay away from it. Furthermore, if splatting is a survival reflex as discussed earlier in the thread, babies may not be in as much danger as we think.
You forget that we concluded that splatting without a respawn point is extremely dangerous, and a last ditch effort. If the babies had to re-build their bodies every time a flock of seagulls (or Spyke) noticed them, they'd have trouble getting along.

...however, I am beginning to think that inklings may act independently at a much earlier age than humans.
 

BlackZero

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I guess the last remnant of the argument is that the humbolt squid have only been seen talking to other adults, rather than the next generation.
That wouldn't matter if Inklings developed a form of written communication (which they clearly have in the game). They also have developed video recording/projection technology. They have plenty of methods for leaving information behind for the next generation's benefit.

You forget that we concluded that splatting without a respawn point is extremely dangerous, and a last ditch effort. If the babies had to re-build their bodies every time a flock of seagulls (or Spyke) noticed them, they'd have trouble getting along.
Hence the importance of laying eggs in a safe location as previously mentioned. I suspect Inklings would lay their eggs in a location where baby Inklings could grow in relative safety with respawn points just in case. This is what actual squids do (minus the respawn points). I don't think it's unreasonable to assume Inklings built secured locations to keep predators away from their hatchlings.
 

Globin347

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Hence the importance of laying eggs in a safe location as previously mentioned. I suspect Inklings would lay their eggs in a location where baby Inklings could grow in relative safety with respawn points just in case. This is what actual squids do (minus the respawn points). I don't think it's unreasonable to assume Inklings built secured locations to keep predators away from their hatchlings.
...you do realize that this implies Inklings evolved alongside respawn points, right?
...I suppose the argument still has merit, but real squids are able to move effectively right after hatching. In this scenario, inklings would be largely immobile until they grew legs.

That wouldn't matter if Inklings developed a form of written communication (which they clearly have in the game). They also have developed video recording/projection technology. They have plenty of methods for leaving information behind for the next generation's benefit.
I am not disputing that writing and video could pass information on to the next generation. I am disputing that these things could have come to exist in the first place.
Due to the social behavior observed in herds of humboldt squid, It is plausible that one herd of squid could develop writing. However, unless they actively passed this knowledge to someone else, no other herds or juveniles would realize that the characters being written down had meaning. It is impossible to pass information through writing unless the recipient understands that writing is a way of conveying information, which is not something most creatures instinctually understand.

I suppose the counter to this is one of the following:

One herd of squid taught other herds what writing was. This is extremely unlikely, because at such a primitive stage of development, the inkling's social behavior would extend only to their own herd.

After one squid mates and dies, it's herd mates teach the offspring what writing is. Once again, at such a primitive stage in development, the inklings would only do this if they expected something in return, such as that offspring growing up to become a part of that same herd... which essentially means that the squids have parental care, just not by the parents.

The inklings first learned writing from other species, which is not implausible. I guess this would mean that inklings are effectively raised by Splatoon's society as a whole, rather than by other inklings... or at least, as such under this assumption.



Anyway, I have one more argument in favor of inklings being able to at least survive mating, if not necessarily care for their offspring:
their longevity. Cuttlefish is well over 100 years old, and while he may be among the longest lived, that still implies that inklings can live as long as we can.
Here's how this forms my argument: if inklings die after mating, they have no biological incentive to be able to live so long.

I'm fairly certain that even if they do not mate, real squids die after just a year or two. This is because, well, if they're going to die anyway, there's no point in being able to live past this point. Natural selection does not prefer long-lived squids.

If inklings can survive the process, then being long-lived does have a significant advantage: you can have more kids.
Even if we assume that inklings do not usually mate until a few decades into life, there is still no incentive to be able to live as long as cuttlefish can unless they can survive the process.

...Either that, or Captain Cuttlefish is immortal.


Similarly, Cuttlefish seems to have lived past the age where he is capable of reproduction. We humans, too, live long after we are actually able to procreate. At first glance, this seems pointless- natural selection selects for those who can pass on their genetic line. Once you can no longer bear children, you can't increase your genetic line's chances of continuing to exist, so why keep living? The answer is parental care. The elderly cannot create more children, but they can care for their children and grandchildren, thus increasing their offspring's chance of survival.


And on the subject of longevity, Inklings seem to have very long childhoods, like we do. If inklings were left to themselves at birth, they would be pressured to grow up as quickly as possible, much like real animals that do not care for their offspring past hatching (and for that matter, animals that do raise offspring to adulthood, but are low on the food chain.)
Given that squids now grow up in less than one year, I find it likely that the inklings have some benefit found in delaying adulthood. I cannot imagine such a benefit existing unless the inklings had some form of parental care.
 

Globin347

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For the record, we humans have such long childhoods because we apparently have a much more complex set of social behavior expectations than most other animals.

...Or at least, that's the best explanation I can think of.
 

BlackZero

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ou do realize that this implies Inklings evolved alongside respawn points, right?
No, it means they developed technology to expedite the reformation process after centuries of tedious "manual" reformation. By this logic, man evolved alongside automobiles. It's not technically wrong as cars have evolved, but it's not accurate either.

Unless you mean to say that humans developed respawn pads and Inklings discovered them and started using them.

I am disputing that these things could have come to exist in the first place.
Due to the social behavior observed in herds of humboldt squid, It is plausible that one herd of squid could develop writing. However, unless they actively passed this knowledge to someone else, no other herds or juveniles would realize that the characters being written down had meaning. It is impossible to pass information through writing unless the recipient understands that writing is a way of conveying information, which is not something most creatures instinctually understand.
How is this a problem? Humanity had no trouble overcoming this obstacle. By this logic, we shouldn't be able to learn foreign languages without face-to-face interaction. Pimsleur and Tae-Kim, two very successful "on your own" language programs that rely on pre-recorded material beg to differ. It may not be native-speaker level proficiency, but it is enough to allow for a general understanding of what others are saying.

which essentially means that the squids have parental care, just not by the parents.
I already mentioned possibility this with my "master tradesman taking on an apprentice" statement. I'm not saying older Inklings do not take younger ones under their wing. It's very possible that older adolescents/teenagers mentor younger ones. However, this does not address the lack of mature adult influence on Inkling society presented in the game, which prompted this whole discussion. Even if we establish that some entity somewhere in the Inkling's world acts as a parent, it doesn't change my observations on the lack of adult influence on Inkling society. It also doesn't change the fact that, the way squid life-cycles work, Inklings would die shortly after reproduction. So, a genetic predisposition to die shortly after sexual maturity combined with a society that is suspiciously devoid of adults still supports the idea that Inklings are not dependent on parental care. Older adolescents may mentor babies, but they do not require parental care.

Cuttlefish is well over 100 years old, and while he may be among the longest lived, that still implies that inklings can live as long as we can.
Here's how this forms my argument: if inklings die after mating, they have no biological incentive to be able to live so long.
Again, this assumes that evolution has some end goal or objective. Animal life spans are dictated more by the rate at which their internal organs and tissue deteriorate rather than some reason to live longer. Turtles are not mammals, nor do they show any signs of parenting or raising the next generation of turtles. That hasn't kept them from being one of the longest lived animals on Earth. Rather, they live longer because their muscle, tissue and organs deteriorate much slower than those of other animals. It's possible that Inklings developed longer life spans naturally or, like humans, healthcare innovation has increased their lifespan artificially. Either way, this doesn't suggest they can survive mating. It's more plausible that they have the same life cycle, merely increased proportionally to a longer period of time.

Similarly, Cuttlefish seems to have lived past the age where he is capable of reproduction. We humans, too, live long after we are actually able to procreate. At first glance, this seems pointless- natural selection selects for those who can pass on their genetic line. Once you can no longer bear children, you can't increase your genetic line's chances of continuing to exist, so why keep living? The answer is parental care. The elderly cannot create more children, but they can care for their children and grandchildren, thus increasing their offspring's chance of survival.
Second verse same as the first. There's no grand scheme at work with evolution or natural selection. I cannot emphasize this point enough. These things are decided entirely by what genes are passed on to the next generation. If people with who are high risk for heart disease and cancer started having more children and people who were lo risk for both stopped having kids over the course of several generations, humanity would evolve to have a high risk of very serious health problems. This would not aid survival in the slightest, but would become an evolved trait because those genes were passed on while the others weren't.

"Evolution" and "natural selection" do not imply some genetic march towards becoming the ultimate life form. They describe the process where genetic mutations become standard traits.

And on the subject of longevity, Inklings seem to have very long childhoods, like we do. If inklings were left to themselves at birth, they would be pressured to grow up as quickly as possible, much like real animals that do not care for their offspring past hatching (and for that matter, animals that do raise offspring to adulthood, but are low on the food chain.)
Given that squids now grow up in less than one year, I find it likely that the inklings have some benefit found in delaying adulthood. I cannot imagine such a benefit existing unless the inklings had some form of parental care.
This assumes they are under the same pressure in a society where they seem rather safe. I doubt they'd be under the same pressure to mature quickly if they lived in a society where they did not have to worry about finding food or escaping predators. Furthermore, parental care doesn't have anything to do with offspring being pressured to mature as far as I can see. These things are determined by the rate at which a species matures mentally and anatomically.

Even with all of that, you still haven't offered any refutation on my observations. What type of adult who provides parental care would leave the defense of Inkopolis up to children? What type of adult who cares for baby Inklings would leave them to earn their own living by competing Splat-games? I don't recall any shops offering to send a bill to your parents for any clothing you buy nor do I recall the point in the game where your parents give you a credit card to go shopping. Even if I give you the full benefit of the doubt in terms of Inkling biology allowing for parenting, this does not address any of the observations of how Inkling society functions without any noticeable influence from parents wanting to make sure their children are cared for.
 

Globin347

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hmmm...

How is this a problem? Humanity had no trouble overcoming this obstacle. By this logic, we shouldn't be able to learn foreign languages without face-to-face interaction. Pimsleur and Tae-Kim, two very successful "on your own" language programs that rely on pre-recorded material beg to differ. It may not be native-speaker level proficiency, but it is enough to allow for a general understanding of what others are saying.
Well, these "on-your-own" language programs rely on the assumption that you understand the concept that what you are learning is in fact a language. When I say "develop writing", I am not saying "learn the language". When I say "develop writing", I mean "Understand the concept that pictures can convey meaning". In order for the squids to learn to write, they have to understand that writing is in fact language at all, and that when they write something down.

Humanity was able to generally spread the idea that the funny pictures on the paper actually meant something because the people who decided that they could use pictures to represent words had contact with the people who were supposed to learn to write (and even then, writing didn't become a thing among the general public until well into human civilization- before then, it was just a fancy mechanism for politically important people to keep track of things.)

Again, this assumes that evolution has some end goal or objective. Animal life spans are dictated more by the rate at which their internal organs and tissue deteriorate rather than some reason to live longer. Turtles are not mammals, nor do they show any signs of parenting or raising the next generation of turtles. That hasn't kept them from being one of the longest lived animals on Earth. Rather, they live longer because their muscle, tissue and organs deteriorate much slower than those of other animals. It's possible that Inklings developed longer life spans naturally or, like humans, healthcare innovation has increased their lifespan artificially. Either way, this doesn't suggest they can survive mating. It's more plausible that they have the same life cycle, merely increased proportionally to a longer period of time.
Well, no, but simply due to probability of survival, certain traits are more likely to be passed on to the next generation, and thus become more prominent.
While individuals which can live for a long time have no advantage in this case (this case being when they die after mating), they have no disadvantage either, so if inklings were to die after reproduction, there would be no pressure to lengthen or shorten lifespans. If that were the case, the squids lifespan would probably remain about as long as it is now- which is only a few years.
However, inklings apparently did increase in typical lifespan- by nearly a century. Because evolution does not have any inherent goal, it isn't plausible that the lifespan of the inkling would change so drastically unless there was some outside pressure that gave inklings which lived longer more opportunity to successfully continue their own genetic traits. If inklings died after mating, I am unsure of how such an outside pressure could come to exist, unless inklings frequently had to go for long periods of time without the opportunity to procreate. I don't see any reason to believe that this is the case, because we have established that inklings are social animals.

Second verse same as the first. There's no grand scheme at work with evolution or natural selection. I cannot emphasize this point enough. These things are decided entirely by what genes are passed on to the next generation. If people with who are high risk for heart disease and cancer started having more children and people who were lo risk for both stopped having kids over the course of several generations, humanity would evolve to have a high risk of very serious health problems. This would not aid survival in the slightest, but would become an evolved trait because those genes were passed on while the others weren't.

"Evolution" and "natural selection" do not imply some genetic march towards becoming the ultimate life form. They describe the process where genetic mutations become standard traits.
Once again, I did not mean to imply that evolution actively attempted to achieve certain results.
And because evolution does not have a goal, any given trait is not likely to noticeably change in a population, as both individuals who strongly demonstrate this trait and those who weakly demonstrate this trait have an equal chance of reproductive success- unless, of course, there is some environmental factor which causes individuals with a certain trait to have a better chance of reproductive success.

Anyway, we see that Cuttlefish is presumably able to live long past the age where he could reproduce. This is drastically different from the lives of modern squids, which, I believe, die after a few years whether they mate or not. Because evolution does not have goals, it is unlikely that such a change in lifespan would have occurred randomly, as long-lived inklings would not be more successful in reproduction than short-lived inklings.

So, the fact that inklings are very long lived suggests that there must have been some outside pressure which caused long-lived inklings to reproduce successfully more often than short-lived inklings, because without this outside pressure, the lifespan of the inkling would most likely have remained relatively constant.

Once again, I can only think of two environmental conditions which would have given long-lived inklings an advantage over short-lived inklings- either the inklings frequently had to live for long periods in which reproduction was not possible, or inklings did come to be able to survive mating, and were thus able to either have more children, or actively protect the ones they did have.

As for how inklings would have developed the ability to reproduce multiple times...
Well, I would guess that the reason squids today still die after mating is because, as time goes on, the probability that an individual squid has been eaten increases due to more time for that squid to be eaten. Because of this, very few squids which did survive mating would live long enough to mate again anyway.
As such, were evolution to randomly create a squid that could survive mating, it would have a low chance of living into the next mating season anyway.
This is my best explanation.

Perhaps when inklings moved onto land, they encountered fewer predators, and thus the chance that any given inkling has been eaten after a certain amount of time decreased. Because of this, those few squids that were randomly able to survive mating did have a significant chance of living long enough to mate again.
Those particular squids, as a result, had more offspring, which gave them proportionally greater representation in the next generation. As this trend continued, the percentage of squids that were able to survive mating became larger and larger, until it approached 100%- not because evolution wanted inklings to have more children, but because inklings who did have more children had a greater probability of their own offspring successfully growing up and reproducing on their own.

...This argument disagrees with some of my other arguments... doesn't it?
Ok, I guess the squid babies, in this low-predator environment, would be able to survive relatively independently.
The bigger question might be the specific biological pressure which forced inkling birth rates to drop to a sustainable level... but I'm sure it's happened before.

This assumes they are under the same pressure in a society where they seem rather safe. I doubt they'd be under the same pressure to mature quickly if they lived in a society where they did not have to worry about finding food or escaping predators. Furthermore, parental care doesn't have anything to do with offspring being pressured to mature as far as I can see. These things are determined by the rate at which a species matures mentally and anatomically.
Let's see...
Parental care is related to how quickly animals grow up because animals under parental care have a fully-grown individual protecting them, so the probability that they are eaten lowers. Let us remember that because adult animals are larger, stronger, and more experienced than children, a juvenile animal which has an adult animal protecting it has more chance to survive than a juvenile animal which must fend for itself. Even if the babies are born self-sufficient, they still don't have the experience or sheer size of an adult.

I guess it's hard to name a specific pressure that would cause inklings to have longer childhoods. Of course, if no such pressure existed, then humans would probably have short childhoods, because, as you said, evolution has no goals, so any given factor, such as the length of childhood, would likely remain the way it was originally, because individuals which had longer childhoods would have the same chance of survival than individuals with shorter childhoods.

Evolution does not have goals, but this also means that it does not change things on it's own. Whenever there is a significant change in a population, this is almost certainly because some change in the environment led to a situation in which individuals with this new trait had a greater chance of survival and reproductive success than individuals without this trait.

Even with all of that, you still haven't offered any refutation on my observations. What type of adult who provides parental care would leave the defense of Inkopolis up to children? What type of adult who cares for baby Inklings would leave them to earn their own living by competing Splat-games? I don't recall any shops offering to send a bill to your parents for any clothing you buy nor do I recall the point in the game where your parents give you a credit card to go shopping. Even if I give you the full benefit of the doubt in terms of Inkling biology allowing for parenting, this does not address any of the observations of how Inkling society functions without any noticeable influence from parents wanting to make sure their children are cared for.
You're right. Let's see what I can do.

Perhaps the reason that a child is part of the new Squidbeak Splatoon is because Cuttlefish's judgement had been softened by age, or maybe he was just not inclined to think about the consequences of his actions.
Given that you only see a few enemies each stage in the single player campaign, I think it might be safe to assume that this isn't the entire octarian invasion force. It's possible that the majority of the force was occupied by an actual military. Perhaps the military decided to send a small team into enemy territory to steal the zapfish back, because they couldn't afford to send their entire military. They chose Cuttlefish because he was a war hero in the past, because he had already been watching the octarians, and because they didn't realize how bad Cuttlefish's judgement was. Callie and Marie never challenged him because they respected him, and because they were pop stars who had no real military experience.

Of course, this is still a rather shaky explanation, but Inklings do seem to be more hedonistic and careless than humans.

As for the living... well, there are a few options here.
Firstly, while inklings do seem to earn all their money though turf wars, they are never seen spending that money on food or housing. This could probably be adequately justified by "story and gameplay segregation", as no player wants to be forced to spend their money on virtual food. However, there could also be another explanation- combined with the game design issues.

Housing is expensive. While inklings can earn a great deal of money, Do you really think that this is enough to pay for housing? and if so, inklings probably wouldn't have much left over for clothing and weaponry. There are a few possible explanations.

1: Inklings are all homeless. This is probably the least likely situation, as society at large generally tends to think of homelessness as a problem.
2: Inklings don't have to provide for themselves- they only need to buy clothing and weapons (and maybe some food). The person paying for the inklings housing would probably be their parent or caretaker.
3: Inklings all live in some kind of communal housing set up entirely for turf war battlers. The money to support this housing would probably come from the economic entity responsible for the turf wars (or at least paying the winners). I find this to be relatively unlikely, because of the sheer magnitude of inklings turf warring. While professional sports players often make a lot of money, I doubt that the sports industry could support an entire species.

Of course, once could assume that only a small proportion of inkling children actually participate in turf wars, and that the rest all have some kind of job, but even then... well, actually, that might be a sustainable system.

As for why the inklings are able to run amok as they are...

either you are right, and inklings do die after mating, or...
Well, perhaps inklings simply do not practice the same level of parental care that humans do. Rather than truly watching over their offspring, inkling parents simply provide food and shelter.
Also, notice that we never see inklings under the age of 14 in the plaza. This is probably because those inklings stay at home with the parents/other guardians most of the time.

And also... While it is true that inklings live much longer than any squids we know, There is nothing to guarantee that they grow at the same rate we do, or that they view growth in the same way. Maybe all the 14-year-old inklings in the plaza are legally considered adults in their own right. Or, maybe inkling society considers 14 to be an age where inklings are mature enough to spend most of their time on their own, but still don't need to pay for their own housing. either way, inklings of age 14 to 18 would be far more independent than humans of the same age.

If you can say that "grandchildren" is a cultural translation from inklings to humans, I can say the same thing about the word "kid".
 

BlackZero

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Well, these "on-your-own" language programs rely on the assumption that you understand the concept that what you are learning is in fact a language. When I say "develop writing", I am not saying "learn the language". When I say "develop writing", I mean "Understand the concept that pictures can convey meaning". In order for the squids to learn to write, they have to understand that writing is in fact language at all, and that when they write something down.

Humanity was able to generally spread the idea that the funny pictures on the paper actually meant something because the people who decided that they could use pictures to represent words had contact with the people who were supposed to learn to write (and even then, writing didn't become a thing among the general public until well into human civilization- before then, it was just a fancy mechanism for politically important people to keep track of things.)
I still don't understand the problem here and I'm beginning to smell a false dilemma. Iconography, the earliest form of writing, used shapes and figures that humans recognized. These symbols depicted physical objects. From that point, language became a matter of associating figures with ideas just as squids could associate color patterns with ideas, or how humans associate certain sounds with ideas (after all, speech is simply a series of tones arranged in a patterns). This doesn't take parental care. It takes basic intelligence, memorization skills, and interaction with others that use the language. I don't think it's a stretch to think that baby inklings interact with other inklings that are literate. Again, this doesn't require parenting. It requires simple exposure and the ability to associate ideas with colors or symbols.

Parental care is related to how quickly animals grow up because animals under parental care have a fully-grown individual protecting them, so the probability that they are eaten lowers.
You seem to be confusing animal parenting habits with those of humans. Some animal parents are good and others aren't. Some animal parents defend their offspring, other's don't. It depends on the species.


Perhaps the reason that a child is part of the new Squidbeak Splatoon is because Cuttlefish's judgement had been softened by age, or maybe he was just not inclined to think about the consequences of his actions.
Given that you only see a few enemies each stage in the single player campaign, I think it might be safe to assume that this isn't the entire octarian invasion force. It's possible that the majority of the force was occupied by an actual military. Perhaps the military decided to send a small team into enemy territory to steal the zapfish back, because they couldn't afford to send their entire military. They chose Cuttlefish because he was a war hero in the past, because he had already been watching the octarians, and because they didn't realize how bad Cuttlefish's judgement was. Callie and Marie never challenged him because they respected him, and because they were pop stars who had no real military experience.

Of course, this is still a rather shaky explanation, but Inklings do seem to be more hedonistic and careless than humans.
Iirc, the game is quite unambiguously clear that no one else paid any attention to the Octarians or their stealing the Great Zapfish. If Inkling society possessed parental instincts, I do not see them being blase with sending a 14 year old child by themselves up against a military armed with mechanized super weapons.

Housing is expensive. While inklings can earn a great deal of money, Do you really think that this is enough to pay for housing? and if so, inklings probably wouldn't have much left over for clothing and weaponry. There are a few possible explanations.
This would depend heavily on how Inklings viewed money. The only individuals who are implied to know how to handle money are the shopkeepers, because they run businesses. Inklings get prize money from turf wars, but can very easily burn through all of it on clothing and weapons. This could suggest that Inklings don't use money very much in their own society, merely for dealing with non-Inkling merchants. After all, who would pay $800 for a t-shirt? Someone who has no understanding of monetary value.

Well, perhaps inklings simply do not practice the same level of parental care that humans do. Rather than truly watching over their offspring, inkling parents simply provide food and shelter.
Also, notice that we never see inklings under the age of 14 in the plaza. This is probably because those inklings stay at home with the parents/other guardians most of the time.
Their growth chart shows that younger Inklings exist. That growth chart doesn't have Inklings older than the player character on it even though Callie and Marie are older (and more physically developed) and Cpt. Cuttlefish. This is a very strong indicator that the player character Inkling is at an early stage of its life, and, for some reason, the Inkling growth chart didn't consider it worthwhile to include Inklings older than 14 even though they are capable of living well beyond that and Cpt. Cuttlefish's appearance is proof that they don't spend the rest of their lives looking like a pre-teen.

Maybe all the 14-year-old inklings in the plaza are legally considered adults in their own right. Or, maybe inkling society considers 14 to be an age where inklings are mature enough to spend most of their time on their own, but still don't need to pay for their own housing. either way, inklings of age 14 to 18 would be far more independent than humans of the same age.
Exactly my point: like squids, they are born fairly independent compared to humans and do not require parenting. They may need education/tutoring, but not parental care. There is a difference between the two.
 

Dolphoshi

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well then I think we can agree to disagree i am in the middle since we humans are very different then other species but something that most living things share is the will to live nothing wants to die the baby inkling may not be the best suited for it's envorment but I doubt it's going to be picking fights with many things and will probable eat large micro organisms until it can hunt better and move it's way up by the looks of it i'm sure it can produce ink which (as we all know) is very good for traps so it could trap things wait until they die and then eat them, I doubt that inklings could over come dying after birth in such a small time seeing how a lot of squids do this and they still have all the appendages that modern day squids have

but I do think that there would be some left over inklings because we don't randomly mate we look for things we like in a person, animals do this as well because certain traits will have a higher amount of survivablity so the unlucky inklings would likely look after the baby inklings (if you find a baby at your doorstep would you let it die?) making survival much higher this would explain cuttlefish during the great turf war he simply lost the ability to reproduce as for species that raise the young in their community Judd, Judd is a CURRENT day cat as seen by the last sunken scroll modern day cats do care for their young and seen by other sunken scroll (don't remember which) Judd and cuttlefish were very close (as they knew each other)

So Cuttlfish could have learned to raise children that way and pre modern (or pre post modern if we are getting technical) inklings don't want the babies to die because it lowers the chance of finding a mate (remember they don't know they can't reproduce)

so I doubt there is no parenting involved in inkling life but they would be few in number (how many want to admit they never mated) and would be very unlikey to go for public offices besides there is camptriggerfish we are forgetting about, so I do think they still die after birth simply because there isn't enough time to have that evolve out and the lack of adult inklings (expect for maybe Callie and Marie and Cuttlfish) this makes sense

anyway time for a new question how do the clothes help the inklings (like giving them the ability to recharge ink faster, or the ability to mark one for death)
and can they echoloacte
 

Globin347

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...Ok, I'm just about out of ideas. I guess the only points I care to reiterate are these:

Modern day squids live only a few years, even if they don't mate. Inklings, on the other hand, are able to live for well over a century. Because evolution has no inherent goals, it is unlikely that this drastic change in lifespan would have occurred unless there was some way in which inklings that lived longer were more likely to successfully reproduce.

If inklings were to die upon mating, I am not sure what this benefit would be. If inklings could survive mating, the benefit becomes obvious: longer-lived inklings could mate more times. As such, I feel that the fact that there is evidence that inklings do not die when they mate.

Note- while rabbits and mice can mate multiple times, they also have short lives. This is because these animals are low on the food chain, and thus have a high probability of being eaten, which increases as time goes on, simply because there is more time in which said mouse/rabbit can be eaten. This negates the advantage of long natural lives, as most rabbits won't be able to live out those lives anyway.
The long lives of inklings suggest that they have few natural predators, which may or may not negate my argument of inkling babies being unable to defend themselves.

...Admittedly, I must admit that I am no longer sure what we were arguing over. Was it about whether inklings have parental care, or inklings dying when they mate? ...Or have I just now realized that these are separate arguments?

well then I think we can agree to disagree i am in the middle since we humans are very different then other species but something that most living things share is the will to live nothing wants to die the baby inkling may not be the best suited for it's envorment but I doubt it's going to be picking fights with many things and will probable eat large micro organisms until it can hunt better and move it's way up by the looks of it i'm sure it can produce ink which (as we all know) is very good for traps so it could trap things wait until they die and then eat them, I doubt that inklings could over come dying after birth in such a small time seeing how a lot of squids do this and they still have all the appendages that modern day squids have
Well, to be fair, there's no real plausible way of inklings evolving into land living animals in the first place in such a small time. This suggests that some unusual factor sped up inkling evolution. I earlier mentioned the possibility that it was a combination of nuclear waste and writers who don't understand how nuclear radiation works.

anyway time for a new question how do the clothes help the inklings (like giving them the ability to recharge ink faster, or the ability to mark one for death)
and can they echo-locate
...Placebo effect?


Anyway, Since we don't see inklings under the age of 14 in Inkopolis, perhaps 14 is the age where inklings consider themselves independent?
...perhaps inklings are raised by their older siblings?

Their growth chart shows that younger Inklings exist. That growth chart doesn't have Inklings older than the player character on it even though Callie and Marie are older (and more physically developed) and Cpt. Cuttlefish. This is a very strong indicator that the player character Inkling is at an early stage of its life, and, for some reason, the Inkling growth chart didn't consider it worthwhile to include Inklings older than 14 even though they are capable of living well beyond that and Cpt. Cuttlefish's appearance is proof that they don't spend the rest of their lives looking like a pre-teen.
Well, that doesn't mean that they look like a pre-teen only during their late childhood. Let's not forget that inklings are a separate species from humans, and that their stages of bodily growth don't need to mirror ours. It could be that young-adult inklings just happen to resemble human preteens... I'm not sure I like where this is going, so i'll bring up the other counterpoint.

Anime and cartoon characters often look much younger than they really are, and to be fair, the bodily structures of the inklings in-game are clearly stylized. I think it's fair to say that young inklings probably don't have a head wider than their shoulders. The inklings in-game may look younger than a "real" inkling of the same age would.

Regardless of that situation, I think I have a new explanation for Inkopolis' apparent lack of concern about the stolen zapfish: game design.

See, the thing is, if Inkopolis were to go in to a realistic panic-based lock down until the single-player campaign were finished, players wouldn't be able to access the online play, which is what the game is truly based around. Also, since the single-player campaign is supposed to be an experience that players can complete at their leisure, it would be bad game design to constantly remind the player to complete the single-player campaign. As a result, Inkopolis remains calm in the face of power shortage and anarchy just so that the player can have a more upbeat, pleasant experience.

Also, I'm sure Inkopolis had some kind of backup power. If inklings were too short-sided to create one, then it's likely that one of the other races would have.

Iirc, the game is quite unambiguously clear that no one else paid any attention to the Octarians or their stealing the Great Zapfish. If Inkling society possessed parental instincts, I do not see them being blase with sending a 14 year old child by themselves up against a military armed with mechanized super weapons.
As for the child soldier:
either their childhood was considered at it's end, or...
given the nature of Callie and Marie's newscast upon the return of the zapfish, it seems that Inkopolis as a whole never learned exactly who was fighting the octarians, so they had no idea it was a kid.

This would depend heavily on how Inklings viewed money. The only individuals who are implied to know how to handle money are the shopkeepers, because they run businesses. Inklings get prize money from turf wars, but can very easily burn through all of it on clothing and weapons. This could suggest that Inklings don't use money very much in their own society, merely for dealing with non-Inkling merchants. After all, who would pay $800 for a t-shirt? Someone who has no understanding of monetary value.
...You know, I'm pretty sure that the "cash" in Splatoon is far less valuable than our dollars. Perhaps more equivalent to nickels or pennies, in which case those shirts are... well, they might still be overpriced, but not ridiculously so. Anyway, this even further leaves it implausible that inklings pay for housing with the turf war money, so that leaves the same three options.

Inklings are all homeless, which is unlikely.
Inklings have some caretaker paying for food and housing.
The turf-warring inklings represent a relatively small proportion of society, and they presumably work for some sports industry which pays for their housing. (in this scenario, the sheer number of inklings is justified by the fact that it would be incredibly stupid to limit the number of players playing the game.)

...Actually, it seems I had a great deal of ideas left.
 

Paragon-Yoshi

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Has nothing to do with Biology though.


And let me turn this topic into a different direction:
I see you people constantly come back to Real-Life Squid and Octopi.
But what about us humans?

So I propose that instead of saying what is in common with Squids/Octopi, we talk about what is in common with us humans.
I mean, COME ON!
Clearly Nintendo didn't just have Squids and Octopi in mind, when they designed these fine critters.

There obviously is a human-side to the Inklings and Octolings.
Which seems commonly neglected here.

Since no matter what, you guys always come back to real-life Squids and Octopi.
As if that is all there is to them...
 

Globin347

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...Well, It's already highly unlikely that a squid would evolve to resemble a kid on the outside. That it would evolve to resemble a human on the inside would be ludicrous.

These are not human-squid hybrids we are talking about- they are squids that just happen to resemble humans.

(unless explicitly stated by word of Nintendo, of course).

And of course, I was already arguing that inklings had things in common with humans- namely, that they don't die after having children.
 

Globin347

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...I have this figured out now.

We WERE arguing over whether inklings exhibit parental care. Now, we are arguing over whether they can survive mating at all.
 

Globin347

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...Does anyone else know what the little dot that appears in the top left corner of some people's profile pictures but not others means?
 

Dolphoshi

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that means we are currently staring into the webb site

but we humans are so stuipd and boring but
the only common ground I can use is that that they have Eukaryotic cells and so do we but as globin said just because we look similar doesn't mean we are similar that's crazy we would be lucky if we had the same chorosme number
 

Paragon-Yoshi

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Whatever the case, the parallels to humans can't be denied.
I mean if you look at their kid-form, how can you not think of humans?
You can't possibly argue that Ink-/Octolings have nothing in common with humans at all.
The "hair" in their kid-form might be from Squids or Octopi.
But everything else about them, screams "human".

Therefore, I think we shouldn't compare everything of them with Squids/Octopi only.

It could very well be possible that Inklings and Octolings have become mammals, exhibit parental care, etc.
Just one example.

And the fact that a big city and society exist, should also speak for their "humanity".

And we do know for a fact that adult Inklings and Octolings do exist.
Captain Cuttlefish aside, various Sunken Scrolls show adults.

Cuttlefish may be the only adult to appear in the flesh.
But that doesn't mean he is the only one.
 

Dolphoshi

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As i have said before not every living thing will find a mate so their will be some adults

just because they look similar doesn't mean they share a lot of traits a bear look similar to a cat but they share very few of the same traits, so we can't guess things just because we look similar

If you shook hands with an Inkling, would you end up with inky palms?
not when they are in kid form squid form yes definitely a they only leave ink prints in kid form after they step in ink but the squid form can leave some left over ink
 

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