Slashdot Mirror
A Dolphin By Any Other Name
SloppyElvis writes "CNN is reporting that scientists have proven that Dolphins can communicate with each other by name. From the article: 'researchers synthesized signature whistles with the caller's voice features removed and played them to dolphins through an underwater speaker' to which the mammals responded. This form of identification in language was previously only known to exist in the human world." Thankfully they still haven't evolved opposable thumbs.
they all call each other Flipper!
-Sj53
He tells me he never did like that name, but then he thanked me for all the fish and quickly left.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
Squeek-Whistle, disagrees.
Since it says "Dolphins" and not "dolphins" (or "porpoises", even) can we assume that this is in reference to the Miami Dolphins? Truly astounding if true...
Baby Dolphin goes downstairs and sits on her little seashell at the table. She looks into her little bowl. It is empty.
"Who's been eating my sardines?!!" she squeaks.
Daddy Dolphin arrives at the table and sits on his big seashell. He looks into his big bowl and it is also empty.
"Who's been eating my sardines?!!" he roars.
Mummy Dolphin puts her head through the serving hatch from the kitchen and yells
"How many times do we have to go through this with you idiots? It was Mummy Dolphin who got up first, it was Mummy Dolphin who woke everyone in the house, it was Mummy Dolphin who made the coffee, it was Mummy Dolphin who unloaded the dishwasher from last night, and put everything away, it was Mummy Dolphin who went out in the cold early morning water to fetch the newspaper, it was Mummy Dolphin who set the damn table, it was Mummy Dolphin who put the friggin catfish out, cleaned the litter box and filled the catfish's water and food dish, and now that you've decided to drag your sorry dolphin-asses downstairs and grace Mummy Dolphin's kitchen with your grumpy presence, listen good, cause I'm only going to say this one more time...
I HAVEN'T MADE THE DAMN SARDINES YET !!"
Personally, I find it far more likely that the dolphins are referring to each other by their slashdot IDs.
1) They'd kill us all if they had thumbs
2) They love NASCAR
This
Squeak squeak click squeak click click squeak ee-oo ee-oo click
Translation: I for one welcome our dolphin overlords.
Never give in--never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to conviction
Who knew?
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
Apparently, the Dolphins only managed to respond to their name 9 out of 14 times.
paintball
"Look, those stupid pink animals with the low voices are finally learning how to talk!"
Would be called "Gamecube"
In other words, your dogs have accepted their African Grey Parrot overlords.
Gary Larson would proud of them all.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
If you saw two guys named Hambone and Flippy, which one would you
think liked dolphins the most? I'd say Flippy, wouldn't you? You'd be
wrong, though. It's Hambone.
-Jack Handy
"If you put butter and salt on it, it tastes like salty butter." -Terry Pratchet, on Popcorn.
"they all call each other Flipper!"
"G'day, Flipper... Hello Flipper... how are you, Flipper? Gentlemen, I'd like to introduce a chap from pommie land... Michael Baldwin - this is Flipper. Michael Baldwin - this is Flipper... and Michael Baldwin - this is Flipper."
"Is your name not Flipper, then?"
"No, it's Michael."
"That's going to cause a little confusion. Mind if we call you 'Flipper' to keep it clear?"
who needs thumbs when you can bend spoons with your mind?
there is no human.
A statistician could never really agree 100%. :-)
I'd certainly like to know the answer to that question... we have flocks of wild parrots living around here (Southern California) and they are very noisy: it's hard to miss them when they fly by, it sounds like several dozen 300 baud modems all transmitting at once. Which makes me wonder if the modem-like audio might not actually contain a fair amount of encoded data in it...
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
Beautiful plumage
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
"Hmm, Bottlenose bruises. Blowhole burns. Flipper prints. This looks like the work of rowdy teens."
Those aren't names, they are packet headers.
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.