The Real Systemic Risk: Cephalopods

by Johnny Debacle

While other research firms and investment shops getting their collective panties in a bunch about what Geithner does or doesn’t say (mostly doesn’t, in this case), we can only imagine how hard the true masters of earth are laughing: These stupid humans still don’t fucking get it.

Pull out $5.5 trillion from money market funds. Or stop it. It’s not going to matter.
Pass a mega-TARP. Or not. It’s not going to matter.
Bail something out, and then bail it out again a few months later, and then, yes a few months laterer, bail them out again. None of it matters.

You know what can be done to save the US economy long-term? Absolutely nothing, because within a short period of time, thanks to global warming and science, all that under-water real estate is going to be actual under-water real estate and its inhabitants are going to be a family of four…squids.

Over the last few years, we have meticulously detailed the likelihood that the Age of Man will soon give way to the Age of Cephalopod. They are much larger, they are much stronger, and have unique swivelling hooks on the clubs at the ends of their tentacles. More importantly, they are much smarter than we are as evidenced by the facts that they have avoided The Great Regression entirely, they have positioned themselves to benefit from Global Warming and now this TED report:

[Human imprisoners] gave [an octopus] a floating pill bottle (neutrally buoyant). Initially [our future under-overlord] grabbed it and brought it up to [her] mouth. After a while, the octopus would squirt a jet of water to the bottle to send it to the water intake, which would make it drift back to the octopus. [She then aimed the bottle, again squirted her ink into the bottle, creating such force that the bottle shattered the tank’s glass and struck dead her imprisoner. She could have escaped, but after having asserted her dominance, she decided it would be useful just to stay in place,] picking up info, storing it for the future [conquest of the Landed kingdoms].

Octopuses have big brains, but not a highly developed nervous system. They are quick to learn, [and have a high emotional intelligence that allows them the short memories they need to stay focused on any task]. [In a similar vein,] sexuality is relegated to end of life span, [so] it doesn’t get in the way of their intelligence [like it does for most male humans].

Not only do they continue to get bolder in their direct assaults on humanity, but we continue to learn more about the extensive strengths and abilities of these creatures. It is only a matter of time, given their array of powers, before they are the masters and we are the shareholders of Lehman Brothers (so to speak).

Recommendation: The Terminator series is so real, and so terrifying because it touches on themes that most people deal with on every day basis, namely, the destructive consequences of time travel and the ever-present fear that refrigerators and toaster ovens will become sentient and then use their cooling and heating powers to destroy humanity. Cephalopods incorporate the physical power of a Terminator, the neural networks of humans, and the swimming ability of themselves to form the dominant force in Earth’s constant interspecial war. This is why we reiterate our rating of Long on the Cephalopod Index. In this environment, cash is not king. Squid is king.

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Comments

  1. Pleb
    February 12th, 2009 | 11:50 am

    You know how we know octopuses are super intelligent? Because they never got involved in the securitized mortgage market. They didn’t buy all that Dow 36,000 bullshit either.

    This is why I have an octopus for a financial advisor. His latest tip? I’m buying a couple hundred pounds of whitefish and throwing it in the water down at Rehoboth. According to my advisor, the returns will be *huge*. It’s a can’t miss. He also says short lemon wedges and breading.

    I totally recommend getting an octopus financial advisor.

  2. February 12th, 2009 | 12:29 pm

    If you’re octopus had been putting you into whitefish futures early last year, you would have as much wealth as he has arms. You would have 8 wealth.

  3. a
    February 12th, 2009 | 5:42 pm

    Long…John Silvers

  4. Jim
    February 12th, 2009 | 11:12 pm

    Juggles, that’s true, but because the octopus has insider knowledge of the coming invasion, rule 10b-5 prohibits him from profiting from it.

    Say, would you happen to know where I can get some Red Wings tickets? My octopul overlord says he’s interested in going to a hockey game and I said I’d try to hook him up. I think the Joe is actually the seat of their government or something.

  5. February 13th, 2009 | 1:00 am

    I’m looking for a market-neutral cephalopod, zero-beta kinda strategy, any suggestions on particular means of achieving this end, either via direct securities or synthetic trades/transactions?

  6. jagorev
    February 13th, 2009 | 4:31 pm

    From the TED article:

    she witnessed an octopus build a wall of stone around its home

    A wall of stone. A fucking wall of stone. THEY’RE BUILDING WALLS OF STONE.

    Can siege engines be far away?

  7. Pleb
    February 13th, 2009 | 6:26 pm

    If they’re building walls of stone, it’s possible they’re seeking stimulus funds. I’d heard the human president say there were some tentacle-ready projects just waiting for funding.

  8. Steve in MI, Sfs/PZM
    February 13th, 2009 | 6:31 pm

    I, for one, welcome our new tentacled overlords.

  9. eliza_do_little
    February 18th, 2009 | 2:17 am

    Hoo-wee, our cephalopod overlords have talents we can’t even imagine!

    Even the giant ones can squeeze through openings no bigger than their beaks.
    Their metabolisms allow them to grow very, very fast: for every pound of food an octopus consumes, about half is added directly to its body mass. Talk about masters of return on investment…
    And, in a pinch, they can eat one of their own arms to survive, and presto! a new one will regenerate, just like that. (And we’re just starting to mess around with this stem cell stuff…?)

    Still more staggering than these trumps of tentacled technology is the cephalopod’s apparent mastery of a form of language that blows our piddly word-based human modes of expression out of the water. Octopi are operating on a waaay more advanced communications platform, people… they use what virtual reality research analyst Jaron Lanier dubbed “post-symbolic communication”.

    According to his description, “The octopus literally dances its thoughts through expression of a series of color changes and position changes that require no local linguistic conventions for understanding as do our words and sentences. In the world of the octopus, to behold is to understand. Octopi have a large repertoire of color changes, dots, blushes, and traveling bars that move across their surfaces; this ability in combination with the soft-bodied physique of the creature allows it to obscure and reveal its linguistic intent simply by rapidly folding and unfolding different parts of its body. The octopus does not transmit its linguistic intent, it becomes its linguistic intent. The mind and the body of the octopus are the same and are equally visible.”

    Whoa.

    So not only are they clearly using their insta-communications model to deceive us (um, what else would codified dot-and-dash messages indicate other than the planning of a hostile takeover?), but our entire self-help market will become these creatures’ bitch! They’ve got that whole “mind-body connection” thing in the bag!

    So there you have it: our subjugation by the cephalopod is pretty much a certainty. Invest – or perhaps divest yourself of? – your meager land-based assets accordingly.