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Daily Speculations The Web Site of Victor Niederhoffer & Laurel Kenner Dedicated to the scientific method, free markets, deflating ballyhoo, creating value, and laughter; a forum for us to use our meager abilities to make the world of specinvestments a better place. |
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01/19/2005
Deception: Mistress or Master
The following article forwarded to us by "Mr. Market", James Arvanetakis, shows
that in nature there is no end to the levels of deception employed to gain
prey. The subject is treated in detail in EdSpec and PracSpec. This should give
any speculator pause as to applying fixed and inflexible systems. If the humble fangblenny fish can turn its disguise on and off at will, think how much more
versatile the humans can be in employing deception to lure us into excess. Things
are seldom what they seem.
Dishonesty the Best Policy, Cuttlefish Study Concludes by Sarah Graham
All is fair in love and war, but some animals take it to the extreme by
temporarily turning themselves into something they're not. Findings
published today in the journal Nature provide two new examples of how these
mimics can get ahead.
The mating scene for Giant Australian
Cuttlefish is rife with fighting and
deception. Small males often scoop their much larger counterparts by
pretending to be female themselves, which allows the runts to get closer to
females of reproductive age. "In the blink of an eye they can pull out of it
and go back to being a male," observes lead author Roger Hanlon of the
Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass. But although researchers
had observed this behavior in the wild, it was unclear how successful the
male mimics were at actually fertilizing females. Hanlon and his colleagues
studied the creatures in their natural habitat and used DNA fingerprinting
to analyze eggs and calculate the mimics' success rates. According to the
report, the female impersonators fertilized female fish in 60 percent of
their attempts, a success rate about twice that of honest male cuttlefish.
A second report by researchers at the University of East Anglia in Norwich,
U.K., details a new example of mimicry in vertebrates, which usually lack
the ability to switch appearances. Isabelle M. Cote and Karen L. Cheney
found that the bluestriped fangblenny fish (Plagiotremus rhinorhynchos) is
an exception and can turn its disguise on and off at will. By pretending to
be a bluestreak cleaner fish--an animal that helps other species by removing
parasites--the fangblenny then ambushes its prey. Although the physiological
basis of the animals' color changes is not yet understood, the scientists
found that rapid shifts in hue are possible and that the fish can maintain
the different appearance for several hours. This flexibility is beneficial
because if there are no cleaner fish to impersonate the fangblenny fish can
revert to its signature blue stripe, which allows the creature to blend in
better with the surroundings.