The chameleon’s skin-changing system relies on hormones, which have to be manufactured in the brain and then distributed around the body in the bloodstream. The cephalopod’s system is under direct nervous control. Each spot of color (of which there can be more than two hundred in a square millimeter of skin) is controlled by tiny nerves that connect straight back to the brain. “Rapid” color change in chameleons takes a couple of minutes;12 changes in squid skin have been clocked at up to four per second.13
Not even close!
