A team of researchers in the US decided to give a group of octopuses MDMA, often referred to as ecstasy or Molly to see how it would alter their behaviour.
After being dosed, the sea creatures become much more social, friendly and interested in others.
It made the animals — normally anti-social creatures — want to gather together, hug, and touch each other in a curious fashion.
Remarkably, they exhibited much the same behaviour as humans do when taking the drug that produces feeling of euphoria and a desire for social connection. And that’s the surprising part.
As the researchers pointed out, human and octopus lineages are separated by over 500 million years of evolution and show divergent anatomical patterns of brain organisation. In terms of our nervous system, we could hardly be more different.
The purpose of the study was for scientists at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Massachusetts to work out if octopuses and humans shared any genetic links.
