Why dolphins are deep thinkers

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2003/jul/03/research.science/print

by chaostheory • 17 years ago

86 28 17 years ago

guardian.co.uk

jhancock2• 17 years ago

Here's a story I was told by a dolphin researcher about 20 years ago. They had a man pretend to be drowning in the open ocean near some dolphins. A dolphin came to rescue the drowning man. They repeated the experiment. After the third or so repetition, the dolphin, instead of saving the man, smacked him around and bruised him up pretty good.

xenophanes3• 17 years ago

And then they did a repeatable, controlled experiment to confirm that dolphins can learn about humans faking drowning. Then they published it. Cite?

Or they didn't. If it's real, why not prove if it's real?

jhancock2• 17 years ago

Well, I did start my narrative by saying I was told this story 20 years ago. I was told this by the researcher that was part of the experiment. I had no reason to doubt his words.

radu_floricica• 17 years ago

I'd guess they stayed away from experiments which end in bruising when successful.

frig• 17 years ago

If dolphins have that much personality there's not much guarantee any two dolphins would act the same way in the same scenario.

Additionally, given that dolphins can apparently teach each other behaviors the entire batch of dolphins they've got in their research tank is contaminated by the first dolphin.

Designing experiments to determine if your test subjects are smart enough to mess with you is hard and it's harder if they all live together and gossip between sessions.

wendroid• 17 years ago

From the (2003) article

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2003/jul/03/research.scien...

"The ability to recognise themselves [dolphins] in the mirror suggests self-awareness, a quality previously only seen in people and great apes."

Fast forward to 2008

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/080818220557.ht...

The researchers subjected the magpies to a mark test, wherein a mark is placed on the subject's body in such a way that it can only be seen in a mirror. When the magpies engaged in activity that was directed towards the mark (e.g. scratching at it), the researchers were able to conclude that these birds recognized the image in the mirror as themselves, and not another animal.

spoiledtechie• 17 years ago

Extremely interesting article. I would hope maybe one day, true communication could happen with another creature on this earth.

Its interesting to see that we try to use our language to communicate. Have we tried to understand their language or hear their sounds compared to what our words are? I could only imagine a dolphin language could/might be made....

gord9• 17 years ago

Do dolphins try to mimic our language?

gord9• 17 years ago

op anecdote :

"Not only do the dolphins understand the meaning of individual words, they also understand the significance of word order in a sentence. ... learned a vocabulary of more than 60 words and can understand more than 2,000 sentences"

gord9• 17 years ago

Assuming for a moment that psychology is pap, not science...

And assuming EQ is based on some objective anatomical comparison of the brain...

Then Dolphins are 5.6/7.4 as smart as Man.

A rational society would be bound to protect the dolphins '75% human'-rights.

gord9• 17 years ago

With anonymous downvoting comes an ethical responsibility : clarify your position with counter argument.

My position is that psychology is not [yet] a science.

Falling back on what we actually objectively know about dolphin anatomy [and subjective behaviour which does not contradict that] you would have to admit dolphins are possibly 75% as intelligent as humans, accounting for the huge difference in environment.

Does it not follow that they should have some form of protection under law as semi-intelligent beings?

colanderman• 17 years ago

I think the downvote (not mine) came from your implicit suggestion that less-intelligent humans should be afforded fewer rights. Unless you're being satirical, which isn't entirely clear without more context.

gord9• 17 years ago

related [ previous post? ] : dolphins blowing bubble rings - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMCf7SNUb-Q

_ck_• 17 years ago

So given this acknowledgment, when will there be a formal protest by governments to Japan to stop their dolphin slaughters? Shouldn't killing dolphins be an international crime?

rudin• 17 years ago

I have always admired my government (NZ) for its anti whaling and dolphin hunting stance but I suspect it gets all the government support due to our tourism interests. I see this problem being solved, among others, with PETA's (artificial) meat in a vat idea.

techiferous2• 17 years ago

The same argument could be made for cows. They're not as smart as dolphins, but they're smart enough to feel pain, have emotions, and have social relationships.

jackchristopher• 17 years ago

Dolphins are supposedly known to gang rape, but I can't find a good source.

Best articles on dolphin intelligence: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cetacean_intelligence

And analysis: http://multiverseaccordingtoben.blogspot.com/2009/04/cetacea...

theblackbox• 17 years ago

Found this really interesting, although I was never really in much doubt at the "intelligence" of these increadible animals. Wendroid is right to point out the magpie example of self awareness, although I would like to know the relative brain mass index of these birds. I have heard of very similar things with that whole family, with Miner birds being notorious for having mastered a small vocabulary.

Had a quick look around for some info on this topic and came accros a great resource : http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/geopedia/Animal_Minds

I was looking for the study conducted on elephants (Payne, Katherine. National Geographic: "Elephant Talk." National Geographic: USA. August 1989) where they studied the infrasound communications of wild elephant herds. This one always struck me as significant, because it whispers to us of a vast and efficient network that would have spanned large areas of the African continent. I always thought of it like whale song, although being propogated through a denser medium it would travel faster and further (?). So maybe at some point during their ancient past, the elephant herds were in constant communication, following signs of water and congregating on grazing grounds and to mate/socialise.... I think this (like the dolphin superpods that have only recently been described in any great detail) shows of a formidable intelligence.

Why dolphins are deep thinkers

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