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Scientists have 20-minute "conversation" with a humpback whale

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Re: Scientists have 20-minute "conversation" with a humpback whale

#11

Post by smt88 »

JohnMakin wrote: post #5

how is this different than me meowing at my cat and her meowing back? a “conversation” didn’t happen. Also, the scientific community is very resistant to the idea of categorizing any non-human communication as “language” (language is pretty much defined as being done only by humans) despite many cetaceans clearly showing signs of having this ability.

I read the article and can't come up with a way it is any different from you meowing back and forth with a cat.

This experiment teaches us basically nothing and has no bearing on talking to extraterrestrials. I can't believe it was written up this way.

Re: Scientists have 20-minute "conversation" with a humpback whale

#13

Post by JohnMakin »

jonplackett wrote: post #10
JohnMakin wrote: post #5

how is this different than me meowing at my cat and her meowing back? a “conversation” didn’t happen. Also, the scientific community is very resistant to the idea of categorizing any non-human communication as “language” (language is pretty much defined as being done only by humans) despite many cetaceans clearly showing signs of having this ability.

It’s interesting for sure but ‘conversation’ seems like an oversell here. That implies some sort of exchange of information at the least which doesn’t seem like what happened?

I’m extremely interested as well but the article talks about so much other stuff than the headline. In decades of whale communication research no one has thought to play whale sounds at whales to see what happened, or is this just the first time one has responded? What does “matching intervals” mean? He matched their greeting, I’m meant to assume, which I guess could qualify as “conversation” but the researchers still don’t really know what information was exchanged, right?

Re: Scientists have 20-minute "conversation" with a humpback whale

#14

Post by l8_to_catch_up »

JohnMakin wrote: post #5

how is this different than me meowing at my cat and her meowing back? a “conversation” didn’t happen. Also, the scientific community is very resistant to the idea of categorizing any non-human communication as “language” (language is pretty much defined as being done only by humans) despite many cetaceans clearly showing signs of having this ability.

Terrible article.

The crucial info that's missing from the article is that they used AI to translate whale language to human, and then from human to whale again.

So there was, in fact, a conversation, mediated by AI; a lot like using Google Translate to talk to a whale.

Wait for a better article on it.

Re: Scientists have 20-minute "conversation" with a humpback whale

#15

Post by JohnMakin »

l8_to_catch_up wrote: post #14
JohnMakin wrote: post #5

how is this different than me meowing at my cat and her meowing back? a “conversation” didn’t happen. Also, the scientific community is very resistant to the idea of categorizing any non-human communication as “language” (language is pretty much defined as being done only by humans) despite many cetaceans clearly showing signs of having this ability.

Terrible article. The crucial info that's missing from the article is that they used AI to translate whale language to human, and then from human to whale again. So there was, in fact, a conversation, mediated by AI; a lot like using Google Translate to talk to a whale. Wait for a better article on it.

Thank you, I was really hoping this was the case, this is a pet topic of interest of mine.

Re: Scientists have 20-minute "conversation" with a humpback whale

#16

Post by debo_ »

JohnMakin wrote: post #15
l8_to_catch_up wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Terrible article. The crucial info that's missing from the article is that they used AI to translate whale language to human, and then from human to whale again. So there was, in fact, a conversation, mediated by AI; a lot like using Google Translate to talk to a whale. Wait for a better article on it.

Thank you, I was really hoping this was the case, this is a pet topic of interest of mine.

A pet whale topic?

Re: Scientists have 20-minute "conversation" with a humpback whale

#19

Post by fsckboy »

l8_to_catch_up wrote: post #14
JohnMakin wrote: post #5

how is this different than me meowing at my cat and her meowing back? a “conversation” didn’t happen. Also, the scientific community is very resistant to the idea of categorizing any non-human communication as “language” (language is pretty much defined as being done only by humans) despite many cetaceans clearly showing signs of having this ability.

Terrible article. The crucial info that's missing from the article is that they used AI to translate whale language to human, and then from human to whale again. So there was, in fact, a conversation, mediated by AI; a lot like using Google Translate to talk to a whale. Wait for a better article on it.

interestingly, it puts us in a room adjacent to that of a famous thought experiment from philosophy, John Searle's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_room

Re: Scientists have 20-minute "conversation" with a humpback whale

#20

Post by Mizza »

l8_to_catch_up wrote: post #14
JohnMakin wrote: post #5

how is this different than me meowing at my cat and her meowing back? a “conversation” didn’t happen. Also, the scientific community is very resistant to the idea of categorizing any non-human communication as “language” (language is pretty much defined as being done only by humans) despite many cetaceans clearly showing signs of having this ability.

Terrible article. The crucial info that's missing from the article is that they used AI to translate whale language to human, and then from human to whale again. So there was, in fact, a conversation, mediated by AI; a lot like using Google Translate to talk to a whale. Wait for a better article on it.

The paper is linked in the article:

https://peerj.com/articles/16349/ (also has a PDF download)

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