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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
This form of identification in language was previously only known to exist in the human world ... except for the hundreds of thousands of parrot owners througout the world. My african greys call each other by name when asking for anything.
Maybe we deserve this world ?
But that's just because they're in the water.
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
On a related note, what the heck does "clinically proven" mean?
It usually means that a randomized clinical trial was performed and the null hypothesis was rejected. If you haven't had any statistics yet, that means that you hypothesize two treatments have the same effect and run a trial. If the results observed would be highly improbable under the equal effect hypothesis (and this probability is very clearly defined), then you have 'clinically proven' treatment A superior, for instance. Statistical hypothesis testing is basically applying the same principle as a reductio ad absurdum from logic. In general, you usually don't 'prove' things in science like you do in math, but that's another topic.
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
...it can be proven beyond reasonable doubt.
"reasonable doubt" is a legal term, not a scientific one.
:wq
My parents own a pet store, and move a pair of African Grey Parrots between work and home every day, along with two dogs. The birds not only recognize their own names, but they appropriatly name the dogs when they encounter them. In addition, they can tell them to sit by name and even will give the dogs bits of food in exchange for treats - they appear to do this appropriatly when they want to either cause mischief or gain obedience from the dogs when the dogs are frightening them. The birds also use eachother's names appropriatly - and at the pet store seem to know the difference between these specific dogs and the other similar dogs that they encounter.
Intelligence and symbol identification/use definitely seems to me to be a general phenomenon larger than mammalian life.
It would be interesting to repeat similar experiments with intelligent species of wild birds to see if they generate unique sound identification that they may use to identify third-"persons" non-visually in some way. Most likely birds would use such ability to immitate eachother for social manipulation - but the conclusions of the use of such symbolic proto-language would still be meaningful.
Ryan Fenton
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. . . .
This is worthwile research, but it seems well short of supporting the claim that dolphins are using names. My summary would be that each dolphin has a signature call, they react to the signature calls of friends/relations, and (the new bit in this research) they react to calls which are similar but not identical to the signature calls of friends/relations.
To support a claim of using names, I'd want evidence of dolphin Alice vocalizing dolphin Bob's signature call to gain Bob's attention.
I suppose it comes down to an argument about what constitutes a "name". But the small step from the reacting to signature calls to the reacting to sythesized signature calls seems a strange place to draw the line between "name" and "not name".
Quattuor res in hoc mundo sanctae sunt: libri, liberi, libertas et liberalitas.
"Thankfully they still haven't evolved opposable thumbs"
It is interesting to note that whales/dophin have hand bone structure. These mammals evolved from those that were once land animals. As a result the flipper is actually a modified hand structure.
/
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.
While whale-watching in the North Pacific ocean around San Juan Island, the whale expert explained how whales make a unique sound before and after their other phrases, and that these sounds are often accompanied by a reply for a different whale. The unique sounds were most often unique to the whale that responded. As such, experts believed these to be used like names.
Such a conversation would go something like this:
"Saying dolphins have names implies they are self aware. If this is true, then much of our biological science is in error."
Hunh? What biological science supports the position that dolphins are not self-aware? They seem to be as self-aware as apes, and are certainly much more self-aware than even human infants.
"Nevertheless, the equation that dolphins make noise + response to that noise = names, then any animal that makes a noise to communicate to other like animals probably is using names."
No, you missed the point. The point is that the noises are NOT the same. They can be reproduced back in all sorts of different tones and inflections that makes them different "noises," but there is a core structure of sorts, that apparently defines the meaning apart from the noise. That's not proof of any sort complex grammatical structure, sure, but it's far more like language than cats, dogs, parrots, and so forth, which respond to and repeat noises, without any particular regard to some subtle, abstract structure.
Furthermore, I'm not sure I know of any other social animal that acts like this: individuals called specifically as individuals by other members of the same species in the wild. That's pretty amazing.
Why do you think that names necessarily implies self awareness? It's a pretty heavy term, and I'm not exactly sure what it implies. I do think that it probably has to involve being able to name things. However, I think it also implies, in humans at least, a concept of time, and of one's self as having a duration in that time. I can imagine, at least, a creature using names without that concept of itself time. I would also think that self-awareness implies ethical self awareness as well, which use of a name also doesn't necessarily imply. I'm neither a philosopher nor a psychologist though :-)
A statistician could never really agree 100%. :-)
In nine out of 14 cases, the dolphin would turn more often toward the speaker if it heard a whistle that sounded like a close relative's.
7 out of 14 would be expected if it were random...9 out of 14 is nothing more than a statistical fluke. They should have done more tests...this study sounds like nothing more than a coincidence.
I'm sorry. The number you have reached is imaginary. Please rotate your phone 90 degrees and try again.
Dolphins communicate by "speaking" their name before every communication, as a way of telling the recipient who said what. Every dolphin has their own name and researchers have known this for ages. I'm surprised that this is "news."
Dolphins can ALSO create rings using their blowhole. They create what is essentially a vortex with perfect buyoncy (sp?). They can be tossed around like toys without "popping" due to the physics of the rings. I've tried to do this with my nose, and I fail every time. This is not a conspiracy.
Dolphins are smart. That's why the Navy hires them.
Bubble ring link: http://www.earthtrust.org/delrings.html
There's evidence that dolphins ARE actually self-aware; this is easily proven by putting a mirror in front of them. If they attack the mirror or run away from it, they think it's another animal. If they stare at it, and then turn about and inspect parts of their bodies not normally visible to them, they're aware that the thing in the mirror is them.
Most of what my macaw and my parents' african grey falls into this catagory. Obviously, they learned "Hello" and "good morning" because those things are said to them. It is even clear that their understanding of these sounds is different from the literal meaning; our birds will use these comments any time they want to greet you or initiate contact.
What is more interesting is the novel constructions and novel useage; i.e. the new uses they find for an existing word or phrase and the entirely new phrases make by combining words in new ways. Examples:
"Weapons should be hardy rather than decorative" - Miyamoto Musashi
I think that goes for OS's too
"Hmm, Bottlenose bruises. Blowhole burns. Flipper prints. This looks like the work of rowdy teens."
I think I read something of his once (Broca's Brain?) that said the dolphins would have evolved a lot further up the chain of intelligence if they had been able to discover fire.
Makes you wonder how many times they tried before they gave up.
And also why the chimps don't have it yet.
"The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes" - Winston Churchill
Who needs opposable thumbs when you've got prehensile genitalia?