At three hundred feet, we are profoundly changed. The pressure at these depths is nine times that of the surface. The organs collapse. The heart beats at a quarter of its normal rate, slower than the rate of a person in a coma. Senses disappear. The brain enters a dream state. At six hundred feet down, the ocean’s pressure—some eighteen times that

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The very same qualities that have made the “domestic fishes” famous in China have made them infamous in the United States. A well-fed grass carp can weigh more than eighty pounds. In a single day it can eat almost half of its body weight, and it lays hundreds of thousands of eggs at a time. Bigheads can, on occasion, weigh as much as a hundred

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