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Dolphins Call Each Other By Name

news.discovery.com

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Re: Dolphins Call Each Other By Name

#31

Post by mtrimpe »

bitwize wrote: post #24
mtrimpe wrote: post #3

Dolphins are exactly why I feel SETI is such a misguided (in a sweet way) effort. Here we are, searching for extraterrestrial intelligence while we can't even communicate with the other intelligent species on our own planet. Glad to see we're making progress though!

SETI is not misguided. We've known for a long time that Earth was hospitable to intelligent life (us). That there are other species with similar levels of intelligent just makes Earth more awesome. But it would be a complete mindfuck if we found other intelligent life in space, where before there were mainly only stars, rocks, and interesting formations of liquid and gas somewhere in between. It would change everythi…

I'd say having a meaningful conversation with a dolphin would be a much bigger mindfuck.

For all we know we could be discussing how the transition to Kantian philosophy played out slightly different for them in a few years.

Re: Dolphins Call Each Other By Name

#32

Post by mxfh »

The full paper is available for free from the Royal Society B:

Vocal copying of individually distinctive signature whistles in bottlenose dolphins

http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/280/1757/2013...

The orginal press release is here: http://www.smru.st-and.ac.uk/newsItem.aspx?ni=1611

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-21...

Re: Dolphins Call Each Other By Name

#33

Post by seldo »

bitwize wrote: post #24
mtrimpe wrote: post #3

Dolphins are exactly why I feel SETI is such a misguided (in a sweet way) effort. Here we are, searching for extraterrestrial intelligence while we can't even communicate with the other intelligent species on our own planet. Glad to see we're making progress though!

SETI is not misguided. We've known for a long time that Earth was hospitable to intelligent life (us). That there are other species with similar levels of intelligent just makes Earth more awesome. But it would be a complete mindfuck if we found other intelligent life in space, where before there were mainly only stars, rocks, and interesting formations of liquid and gas somewhere in between. It would change everythi…

The thing about SETI is that it is not really a search for intelligent life, it's a search for "intelligent life that broadcasts radio waves of a frequency and power that we can detect in a pattern and on a timescale similar enough to our own communications that we can recognize it".

Fermi's paradox basically boils down to: if intelligent life is at all common, it should be everywhere we look, and yet we don't see any. The traditional position is that therefore if we don't see intelligent life, it must be because it's too rare, or communication across interstellar distances is impossible. But the other possible answer is that intelligent life is everywhere, and we just don't understand or even recognize it as such.

The fact that we've been living with dolphins for millions of years and actively studying them for decades and have only just worked out a pretty basic fact -- they have names for each other -- despite the fact that they share most of their genes with us and live under the same environmental conditions exactly, suggests that we are probably really really bad at recognizing intelligent life that isn't exactly like our own.

Re: Dolphins Call Each Other By Name

#34

Post by crucialfelix »

maxharris wrote: post #27

I think it's a mistake to say that they call each other by "name," because that implies the ability to form concepts/speak a language, and there is absolutely zero evidence for that. Even the article is careful to point that out: While researchers often hesitate to apply the “l word” -- language -- to non-human communications, bottlenose dolphins and possibly other dolphin species clearly have a very complex and soph…

Very true. Its an anthropomorphism. Its much more interesting to learn what cultural and communication structures they do use. Not to try to turn them into cartoons or easily human-digestible concepts.

Re: Dolphins Call Each Other By Name

#35

Post by WiseWeasel »

rwhitman wrote: post #28

I bet there would be economic opportunity in developing commercial dolphin-human communication software and interfaces. Imagine how much benefit to deep sea construction and exploration there would be if training and employing dolphins using natural language was possible. Or to shipping, fishing etc.

Dolphin-based sitcoms where the dolphin says "it's a living" and shrugs his dolphin shoulders.

Re: Dolphins Call Each Other By Name

#36

Post by tsieling »

mtrimpe wrote: post #3

Dolphins are exactly why I feel SETI is such a misguided (in a sweet way) effort. Here we are, searching for extraterrestrial intelligence while we can't even communicate with the other intelligent species on our own planet. Glad to see we're making progress though!

SETI isn't about communicating with alien lifeforms, it's about detecting signs of other intelligences than ourselves. Studying these aspects of dolphins is actually the same endeavour, just looking in different places.

Re: Dolphins Call Each Other By Name

#37

Post by tsieling »

Viruptc wrote: post #20

Unbelievable that humans still kill these amazing animals http://www.seashepherd.org/cove-guardians/

Well, people kill people, too. But I agree with the underlying sentiment that we should be taking their place in the world much more seriously than we do most other animals.

Re: Dolphins Call Each Other By Name

#38

Post by yesbabyyes »

weavejester wrote: post #17
mtrimpe wrote: post #3

Dolphins are exactly why I feel SETI is such a misguided (in a sweet way) effort. Here we are, searching for extraterrestrial intelligence while we can't even communicate with the other intelligent species on our own planet. Glad to see we're making progress though!

SETI is about finding alien signals, not necessarily understanding them. However, it's likely that any extraterrestrial intelligence capable of sending out signals powerful enough to reach us, will have an understanding of science and mathematics, which is more than we have in common with dolphins.

That sounds very intriguing. However, it's likely that any extraterrestrial intelligence capable of maintaining life on it's home planet, will have an understanding of their fellow life forms, which is more than we have.

Re: Dolphins Call Each Other By Name

#39

Post by yareally »

Catalina wrote: post #19
yareally wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Parrots call each other by names as well[1] and crows have been shown to speak in two different dialects depending if they are with a group or among individuals[2]. In the same link about crows, they have also been seen using tools in the wild and in experiments using "meta tools", something that only primates have been observed doing (using one tool to reach another tool that will be used for their end goal [general…

Modern culture is filled with prejudices towards non-human forms of life. Not only are animals taken for granted and exploited for the well-being of the human species, which is wrongfully considered a "superior" life form, but life itself is taken for granted. Realizing just "now" that non-human life forms are more complex than we thought is simply because our ability to even be open minded about that possibility was…

Indeed. I'd say a mixture of people having more time to study such things as well as people getting over the idea that we have nothing to learn from animals. I study animal intelligence as sort of a hobby in my free time and have focused on birds lately since they seem to get less recognition for intelligence than mammals or other animals that dominate television shows. Everyone knows parrots can mimic, but little mainstream news goes beyond that. Corvids (jays[1], crows[2], starlings, etc) can actually mimic in a similar manner. Birds in general are quite misrepresented and phrases like "eat like a bird" or "bird brained" are quite incorrect.

We all come from the same basic building blocks through evolution, so it would be quite weird to say that we don't share traits with our fellow animals.

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3T6pUxthClw

[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgTCoTD3BWI

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