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Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Sign Stuff production of iHeartRadio. I'm Hoar

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Speaker 1: hit Cham and today we're asking the question, can we

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Speaker 1: talk to dolphins? They're one of the most intelligent animals

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Speaker 1: out there. Is it possible to decode what they're saying

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Speaker 1: to each other? We're gonna talk to two dolphin experts

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Speaker 1: who have been observing and listening in on our poor

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Speaker 1: boys friends for decades, and they're gonna tell us what

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Speaker 1: we know about dolphines and whether we can use it

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Speaker 1: to have a conversation with them. So get ready to

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Speaker 1: take the plunge as we dive into clear blue waters

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Speaker 1: to answer the question can we talk to dolphins?

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Speaker 2: Enjoy?

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Speaker 1: Hey everyone, If you ask a bunch of kids what

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Speaker 1: their favorite animal is, the chances are more than a

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Speaker 1: few of them will say it's dolphins. And I was

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Speaker 1: one of those kids. I love to swim and I

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Speaker 1: scuba and so to this day, if anyone asked me

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Speaker 1: if I could be any animal, which one would it be,

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Speaker 1: I'll still answer a dolphin. So I was excited to

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Speaker 1: talk to our experts today. I had a lot of questions,

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Speaker 1: what are dolphins like, what do we know about their language?

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Speaker 1: And could we ever actually communicate with them. We'll start

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Speaker 1: with our first expert, doctor Denise Hersing. Doctor Hearsing is

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Speaker 1: well known in the marine biology community, and she's often

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Speaker 1: called the Jane Goodle of the sea for her decades

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Speaker 1: long work trying to understand how dolphins behave and talk

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Speaker 1: to each other. First question I had for doctor Hersing

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Speaker 1: was what are dolphins like? Well, thank you so much,

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Speaker 1: doctor Heusing for joining us.

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Speaker 2: Great to be here. Thank you.

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Speaker 1: Can you please tell us who you are and what

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Speaker 1: you do?

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Speaker 3: Sure? I'm doctor Denise Hersing.

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Speaker 2: I am a marine mammalogist and I specialize in dolphin

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Speaker 2: acoustic and behavioral communication. And I'm the head of the

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Speaker 2: Wild Dolphin Project, which is a nonprofit I've been running

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Speaker 2: for forty plus years and we go out in the

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Speaker 2: Bahamas in the summer study while dolphins, and we've been

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Speaker 2: doing it ever summer since nineteen eighty five.

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Speaker 1: What kind of animal are dolphins like? How would you

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Speaker 1: describe what they're like?

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Speaker 2: Dolphins are an aquatic social mammal. They have a lot

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Speaker 2: of parallels to terrestrial mammals like primates and elephants, in

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Speaker 2: the sense that they have tight societies that are based

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Speaker 2: on mother cap relationships. They have long term friendships. They

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Speaker 2: learn and develop through the years, so everything they do

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Speaker 2: is not instinct, you know. They learn the social rules,

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Speaker 2: they learn who their friends are and who their enemies are,

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Speaker 2: and they survive in the wild. So they're really a

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Speaker 2: complicated social mammal that has just evolved for a aquatic existence.

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Speaker 2: Partly why they're so difficult to study, to get time

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Speaker 2: with them on the water and or under the water.

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Speaker 1: What do I mean? Just the water is a difficult

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Speaker 1: place to do studies.

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Speaker 2: The ocean is a large place. It's a big area

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Speaker 2: that they're resident in, right, So we can spend days

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Speaker 2: looking for them. We kind of know where they hang

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Speaker 2: out sometimes, but their mobile they move around, they chase fish,

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Speaker 2: so getting observation time is harder I think than many

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Speaker 2: terrestrial animals.

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Speaker 1: Oh wow, I had thought about that. Yeah, you have

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Speaker 1: to swim after them basically to study them. So you

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Speaker 1: mentioned that it's a resident pod. How about how many

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Speaker 1: dolphins are you talking about?

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Speaker 2: So historically it's been about one hundred animals every summer,

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Speaker 2: so it's a small community. They're considered a coastal species,

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Speaker 2: so they don't live in these big open ocean schools.

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Speaker 1: Oh, I see. Is there a sense of what kind

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Speaker 1: of social structure they have? Do these hundred dolphins organize

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Speaker 1: themselves in any way or are they just sort of

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Speaker 1: hanging out?

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Speaker 2: No, they have their own organization. We call it fission fusion,

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Speaker 2: which means that they come together and split apart, come

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Speaker 2: together and split apart. For example, a typical group size

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Speaker 2: for us would be eight to ten dolphins, like females

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Speaker 2: would forage with other females, or it might be a

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Speaker 2: big group of males looking for females. Or it might

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Speaker 2: be a mixed up group.

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Speaker 1: Interesting and it's flexible. I guess they'll switch groups and

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Speaker 1: form different groups at different times.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, but you know they have friends. They have their

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Speaker 2: best friends, and they have their alliances. They might form

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Speaker 2: to fight off predators that sort of thing. But yeah,

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Speaker 2: it's pretty organized. The strong bonds between mothers and cats,

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Speaker 2: in between male groups and the juveniles are the teenagers, right,

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Speaker 2: They're getting in trouble and learning the hard way.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes, whoa how does the dolphin get into trouble? Oh?

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Speaker 2: There are many ways of dolphin cann't get to trouble.

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Speaker 2: They can think they know more than they do, so

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Speaker 2: they could challenge like an adult that's older than them.

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Speaker 3: They'll get slapped around. For example, they can.

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Speaker 2: Get a little too bold with sharks and they get eaten,

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Speaker 2: you know, or injured.

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Speaker 3: Again, they think they know everything when they're teenagers.

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Speaker 1: Sounds familiar, huh, it does? Yeah. Did they also call

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Speaker 1: their parents broke like my kids did these days?

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Speaker 2: I don't know, We don't know.

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Speaker 1: The other dolphin scientist I talked to was doctor Layla Sayik,

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Speaker 1: a scientist that's been involved in the longest running study

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Speaker 1: of a dolphin population in history.

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Speaker 3: My name is Leila Sayek, and I'm a scientist at

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Speaker 3: the Woodsville Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts and the United States,

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Speaker 3: and I study dolphin communication.

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Speaker 1: Amazing. How long have you been working with dolphins?

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Speaker 3: About forty years? Hard to willing.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, Oh my goodness. Can you tell me about this study?

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Speaker 1: What do you mean it's been the longest running study

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Speaker 1: on a group of dolphins.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's amazing because this resident population of dolphins in

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Speaker 3: Sarasota was first sort of discovered and study began back

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Speaker 3: in nineteen seventy, so fifty five years ago at this point,

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Speaker 3: and they did some research seeing where the animals go

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Speaker 3: and actually discovered pretty quickly that these animals live there, like,

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Speaker 3: not migrating up and down the coast. They are living

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Speaker 3: in this one area in the waters in and around Sarasota, Florida.

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Speaker 1: How many dolphins are there?

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Speaker 3: There's about one hundred and seventy and.

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Speaker 1: So you've tracked these dolphins through multiple generations by at

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Speaker 1: this point, I imagine.

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Speaker 3: Yes, yes, there are six generations known to researchers. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: so that's just amazing to be able to know an

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Speaker 3: animal's mother and grandmother and great grandmother and great great grandmother,

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Speaker 3: and not to mention all their siblings and aunts and

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Speaker 3: uncles and you know, you name it. It's really an amazing

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Speaker 3: data set.

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Speaker 1: How would you describe what kind of animal they are?

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Speaker 3: They definitely are very intelligent animals. I mean if they

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Speaker 3: are very curious and really interesting to study because they're complicated.

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Speaker 3: They kind of like us. They live long lives and

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Speaker 3: they have a lot of different relationships with other dolphins.

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Speaker 1: It's interesting to hear you say the word relationship. What

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Speaker 1: do you mean what kinds of relationships the dolphins have?

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Speaker 3: Well, they have really long lasting I don't know if

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Speaker 3: you want to call them friendships or I don't you know,

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Speaker 3: I don't know what the right word is, but they

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Speaker 3: definitely hang out with certain other dolphins very predictably. And

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Speaker 3: so that's seen especially in the adult males in the

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Speaker 3: population that I study. And so when the males reach adulthood,

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Speaker 3: they have this partner, their alliance partner who they are

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Speaker 3: with really virtually all of the time. I mean, it's

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Speaker 3: it's really the strongest bond that we see in the population.

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Speaker 1: Maybe we can call them friendships. Sorry, interesting, So males

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Speaker 1: and para kind of for life almost.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, it can be for life. And I

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Speaker 3: should also point out that I am talking about this

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Speaker 3: one population of dolphins that I work with in Sarasota, Florida,

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Speaker 3: but there are plenty of other populations of dolphins out there.

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Speaker 3: We don't even know if a lot of them have

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Speaker 3: these same types of social relationships.

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Speaker 1: Oh wow, we don't know.

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Speaker 3: We don't know. There is one other long term research

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Speaker 3: site in Australia in an area called Shark Bay, and

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Speaker 3: there the males actually much more typically form trios rather

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Speaker 3: than pairs.

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Speaker 1: What that's fascinating. It's almost like they have a local culture.

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Speaker 3: I feel like you're saying, yeah, potentially that's right. I mean, yeah,

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Speaker 3: that different populations do different things. They're certainly not in

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Speaker 3: any way kind of hardwired to behave in certain ways,

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Speaker 3: at least at that level.

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Speaker 1: How would you describe this group of dolphins. Is it

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Speaker 1: like a village, Is it like a pack? Is it

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Speaker 1: like a family?

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Speaker 3: Well, the word that my colleagues are run the project

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Speaker 3: down there at the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program, they call

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Speaker 3: it a community. That's the word that they typically use

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Speaker 3: to describe it. So, you know, that sort of probably

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Speaker 3: brings to mind, you know, sort of the idea that

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Speaker 3: these animals are connected in ways, you know, the way

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Speaker 3: we think of a community, that they probably almost certainly

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Speaker 3: all know each other. They probably even know whose mom

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Speaker 3: and sister and things like that. I wouldn't be surprised.

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Speaker 1: Yes, there's a lot we don't know about dolphins. We

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Speaker 1: know they have complex societies and that their behavior is

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Speaker 1: not necessarily hardwired, which means they learn from each other.

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Speaker 1: And that brings us to the main question of the episode,

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Speaker 1: which is how do dolphins communicate? And could we ever

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Speaker 1: talk to them? So when we come back, I'll ask

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Speaker 1: our two experts these questions. So don't flip out, stay

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Speaker 1: with us, We'll be right back. Hi, welcome back. We're

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Speaker 1: talking about whether we can ever talk to dolphins, and hey,

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Speaker 1: if you're interested in the general topic of animal communication,

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Speaker 1: check out our December tenth episode in which we talk

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Speaker 1: about the history of humans trying to talk to all

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Speaker 1: kinds of animals, from gorillas and parrots, cats and dogs.

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Speaker 1: But today we're focusing on dolphins. And so far we've

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Speaker 1: talked about how complex the social structure of dolphins is.

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Speaker 1: Now the question is what do we know about how

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Speaker 1: they talk to each other. Here's more of my conversations

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Speaker 1: with doctor Denise Herzing and doctor Layla Seig. Well, I

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Speaker 1: guess that's prett to the question what kind of language

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Speaker 1: do dolphins have or what do we know about how

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Speaker 1: the way that they talk to each other?

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Speaker 2: Sure, well, I think most scientists would probably first of all,

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Speaker 2: say we don't know if they have a language, because

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Speaker 2: that infers a lot of things. As far as you know,

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Speaker 2: what we know of human language, so we know they

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Speaker 2: have complicated communication.

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Speaker 1: For sure. We do know some things.

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Speaker 2: We know a couple really important things I could tell

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Speaker 2: you right now. We can identify certain behavioral states like

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Speaker 2: courtship or fighting by the types of sounds that are

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Speaker 2: within that activity. You know, certain types of sounds we

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Speaker 2: hear in aggression. Yeah, I mean, you know, it's like

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Speaker 2: I could do it by ear too. But we kind

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Speaker 2: of know that they do change sound types for different activities.

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Speaker 1: Huh.

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Speaker 2: What we don't know is are there repeated patterns structure

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Speaker 2: and order to some of these sound sequences that would

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Speaker 2: suggest they have language like structure, because any language has

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Speaker 2: to have some structure, right. So we're just starting, I think,

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Speaker 2: to look at this and some reasearers might say, well,

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Speaker 2: we've looked at all of it, and they don't. But

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Speaker 2: you know, honestly, we haven't had the tools.

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Speaker 1: I don't think.

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Speaker 2: Now we have machine learning and AI, and these tools

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Speaker 2: are going to at least help us identify some of

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Speaker 2: these patterns and structures.

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Speaker 1: It just a curmed I guess there's sort of three things, right.

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Speaker 1: There's a certain pattern of behavior in terms of the

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Speaker 1: calls they make during certain activities. There's the idea of vocabulary,

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Speaker 1: like do certain sounds correspond to certain things or concepts?

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Speaker 1: And then there's the concept book language, which is like

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Speaker 1: are these words arranged in specific orders? I guess you're

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Speaker 1: saying that we're not quite sure where in that spectrum

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Speaker 1: dolphins are yet.

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Speaker 3: That's correct.

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Speaker 2: So imagine going into your friend's house and having dinner

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Speaker 2: at the dinner table and recording the conversation with the

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Speaker 2: larger family structure, and you play it later. Would you

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Speaker 2: know if they're talking about the mashed potatoes or are

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Speaker 2: they talking about what the kids did in school today?

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Speaker 3: Right?

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Speaker 2: Or what are your plans for tomorrow? So we can say, yeah,

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Speaker 2: the dolphins make these sounds when they're forging, but are

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Speaker 2: they just hunting sounds and this helps them find their prey?

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Speaker 2: Are they saying, hey, Stubby, there's a big fish over here,

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Speaker 2: or let's go yesterday to that same place where we

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Speaker 2: found the good fish. We don't know, right, And that's

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Speaker 2: part of the key to language, right. So that's what

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Speaker 2: we don't know.

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Speaker 1: So there's a lot we don't know about how dolphins communicate.

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Speaker 1: But one thing we do know that it's very rare

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Speaker 1: in the animal kingdom, is that dolphins have names for

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Speaker 1: each other.

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Speaker 3: One thing that we know about their communication that is

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Speaker 3: very cool is that they produce in individually specific sounds

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Speaker 3: that are called signature whistles, and these are the closest

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Speaker 3: analog to our names in the animal world. So each

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Speaker 3: dolphin has their own specific whistle. That's why it's called signature,

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Speaker 3: you know, kind of like our signature is our own thing,

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Speaker 3: and so that's individual identifiers. And so that's been something

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Speaker 3: that's been really interesting to study. And they use them

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Speaker 3: in some ways like we do, in other ways not

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Speaker 3: so for example, they will often produce their own signature whistle,

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Speaker 3: which is not something that we typically do because we

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Speaker 3: don't usually walk around saying our own names a lot.

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Speaker 3: But we also usually can see each other, whereas they

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Speaker 3: usually can't see each other. So because the water is

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Speaker 3: very murky, if they're sort of spread out feeding, that

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Speaker 3: what we might often hear them sort of calling out

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Speaker 3: occasionally I'm over here, I'm over here, I'm over here,

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Speaker 3: just by using their own signature whistle, or maybe they're

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Speaker 3: meeting another group as they travel and they want to,

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Speaker 3: you know, say who they are something like that.

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Speaker 1: Is it sort of like if we humans we're all

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Speaker 1: living in the dark or in a giant cave we

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Speaker 1: can't see, we would be basically doing the same thing

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Speaker 1: all the time, saying like, hey, I'm here. It's hoorheyge

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Speaker 1: or hey here hey kind of is that what you mean?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I think we would have to all be saying

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Speaker 3: our names periodically because we couldn't see each other, and

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Speaker 3: you know, we normally rely on site. But they don't

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Speaker 3: have that. Wow, I mean, they don't have that capacity

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Speaker 3: just because the water is generally very muky.

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Speaker 1: It's just like you said, it's about checking in with

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Speaker 1: the rest of the group. Yeah, So dolphins have names.

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Speaker 1: Each dolphin has a sound that identifies them and they

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Speaker 1: say it a lot. About fifty percent of all the

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Speaker 1: calls of dolphin makes is their signature whistle. As doctor

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Speaker 1: Saying mentioned, it's hard to see underwater dolphins of sonar,

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Speaker 1: so they can tell where other dolphins are, but they

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Speaker 1: can't visually recognize each other. So one reason for having

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Speaker 1: these names and saying them that so they can keep

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Speaker 1: track of each other. And actually, we've thought about these

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Speaker 1: names since the nineteen sixties. I guess at what age

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Speaker 1: does that name get cemented or generated.

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Speaker 3: It's certainly usually within the first three months. That's been

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Speaker 3: documented through actually studies of animals held in captivity by

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Speaker 3: the people who discovered signature whistles. Melba and David Caldwell.

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Speaker 3: They discovered signatre whistles actually back in the nineteen sixties,

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Speaker 3: and in that work they sampled more than one hundred

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Speaker 3: dolphins that were held in different facilities at the time,

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Speaker 3: and they would record them in isolation, so just you know,

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Speaker 3: briefly put a dolphin in one place outside of other dolphins,

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Speaker 3: so that they were able to say, Okay, this whistle

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Speaker 3: is definitely coming from this dolphins And in that context,

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Speaker 3: they tend to make a lot of signature whistles because

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Speaker 3: they're probably trying to contact their groupmates, saying hey, I'm

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Speaker 3: over here, I'm over here, I'm over here. So usually

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Speaker 3: if you isolate a dolphin, you will pretty quickly be

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Speaker 3: able to identify it's signature whistle.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. I guess if I get separated from a group

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Speaker 1: in a giant dark cave, I would be like, hey,

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Speaker 1: I'm here, I'm here, I'm here, or here trying to

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Speaker 1: get back right.

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Speaker 3: I mean, they're very social animals, So.

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Speaker 1: Each dolphin has their own signature whistle. Do dolphins ever

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Speaker 1: say the signature whistle of another dolphin?

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Speaker 3: Yes, they do. They copy each other's signature whistles. We've

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Speaker 3: seen that quite commonly so there's maybe two animals that

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Speaker 3: we're recording, and sometimes we'll see one of them make

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Speaker 3: the other dolphin signature whistle, which is probably sort of

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Speaker 3: a way of being like, hey, you over there or whatever,

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Speaker 3: something like that, come on over my way, or who

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Speaker 3: knows what you know, something along those lines. But we

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Speaker 3: are super interested in trying to see whether dolphins actually

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Speaker 3: make signature whistles of animals that aren't with them. That

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Speaker 3: would be, you know, something pretty exciting because that would

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Speaker 3: really suggest that they have sort of a representation of

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Speaker 3: that animal in their head. You know. It's different from

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Speaker 3: if you're with another animal and they're making their whistle

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Speaker 3: and you make their whistle back at some point to them,

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Speaker 3: you're hearing it, you're sort of copying it. That's really

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Speaker 3: different than like being swimming around and maybe thinking like, oh,

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Speaker 3: I wonder if you know Bob's here, and then making

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Speaker 3: Bob's whistle or something like that. It's a bit of

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Speaker 3: a holy grail, honestly, and studying animal communication is this

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Speaker 3: idea of whether animals have these abstract representations for things

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Speaker 3: or other animals interesting.

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Speaker 1: It's sort of like if you and I are in

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Speaker 1: a dark cave together, I might be like Orte here,

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Speaker 1: Jorge and Hoorte, and you might be saying Leayla here,

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Speaker 1: Layla here, here, Leila, and then I might start saying

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Speaker 1: Laila Leila also just to sort of like maybe echo

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Speaker 1: or connect with you. Yeah, like right, But if you're

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Speaker 1: not there and I say your name, that could be

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Speaker 1: maybe a sign that I'm thinking of you and that

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Speaker 1: I know that you're an individual person and I'm wondering

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Speaker 1: where you are.

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Speaker 3: Maybe right exactly, or even potentially talking about me to

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Speaker 3: somebody else, although that's getting a whole other layer further.

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Speaker 1: Down that I'm not dolphin gossip, yeah exactly.

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Speaker 3: I'm not trying to imply that that's happening yet to anyway.

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Speaker 3: Who knows. We might yet discover that, but yeah, that

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Speaker 3: would be a pretty cool thing if we were able

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Speaker 3: to document that.

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Speaker 1: So those are signature whistles. Another cool thing we've learned

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Speaker 1: about how dolphins talk to each other is that they

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Speaker 1: can have an accent.

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Speaker 3: Although there is one other thing about signature whistles. I

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Speaker 3: might just mention quickly because it's so fascinating. But just

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Speaker 3: a couple of years ago, we did a study where

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Speaker 3: we found that mother dolphins use something similar to what

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Speaker 3: we call mother eaves, where they will modify their signature

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Speaker 3: whistles when they're communicating with their calves by raising the

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Speaker 3: highest frequency of their whistles. So it's kind of like

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Speaker 3: what we do when we're talking with like infants or children.

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Speaker 3: Human caregivers tend to talk and kind of a more

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Speaker 3: sing songy voice. I pitch sing songy voice, and so

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Speaker 3: it really seems like dolphins do a similar thing.

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Speaker 1: It's sort of like if I was with a group

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Speaker 1: of fans, that'd be like, or here a porge, this

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Speaker 1: is Orge. But if I was trying to get to

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Speaker 1: my kid to see, like here's daddy, Daddy's here, Daddy's here?

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Speaker 1: Is that kind of you? What do you mean to

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Speaker 1: make that?

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Speaker 3: I think? I mean, they're still saying the same name,

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Speaker 3: but they are inflecting it differently, And it's potentially like

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Speaker 3: with human mother ease, it seems like there's something about

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Speaker 3: that kind of more inflected speech that engages the children

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Speaker 3: in some way, you know, to sort of be like,

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Speaker 3: maybe it's that they know, Okay, they're talking to me now,

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Speaker 3: you know that this sound is directed to me rather

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Speaker 3: than to somebody else. I mean, that's one possible hypothesis.

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Speaker 3: When mom makes her whistle a little bit higher, the

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Speaker 3: calf is like, Okay, she's she's telling me something now,

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Speaker 3: you know, rather than maybe to one of the other

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Speaker 3: dolphins that's around here. But that's just a hypothesis. I mean,

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Speaker 3: we really don't know how it might funk him for dolphins,

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Speaker 3: but it was just really cool to find that they

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Speaker 3: do something similar to what we do.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's fascinating. So when the kid was around, they

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Speaker 1: would have this.

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Speaker 3: They would increase the frequency of highest frequency of their

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Speaker 3: whistles so it would go up to a higher pitch

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Speaker 3: when they were communicating with their calf versus when they

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Speaker 3: were not communicating with a calf.

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Speaker 1: Yes, it seems that dolphins also baby talk when talking

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Speaker 1: to babies. Okay, so that's what we know about how

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Speaker 1: dolphins talk to each other. Now the question is can

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Speaker 1: we use what we know to talk to them? Could

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Speaker 1: we use AI to decode the words they use or

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Speaker 1: try to teach them new words, or what would happen

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Speaker 1: to be said their names back to them. As it

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Speaker 1: turns out, both our experts have tried to do this.

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Speaker 1: So when we come back, we'll talk about actually talking

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Speaker 1: to dolphins, and I don't want to oversell it, but

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Speaker 1: it's going to be fantastic. Okay, that was a dull

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Speaker 1: fin joke. The point is, stay with us, give you

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Speaker 1: right back, Hey, welcome back. We're talking about talking to dolphins,

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Speaker 1: and so far we've learned about the social structure they

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Speaker 1: have and what we know about how they communicate with

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Speaker 1: each other. Now the question is could we use any

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Speaker 1: of this to have a conversation with them as it happens.

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Speaker 1: The two dolphin experts in our show today have tried

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Speaker 1: to do this in two very different ways, and they

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Speaker 1: both sort of work. The first approach is to play

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Speaker 1: back to dolphins' words we think we've learned from them first,

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Speaker 1: how doctor Lei la Seig describes it.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, So that's and being focused. If I worked for

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Speaker 3: the last couple of years, and it was only maybe

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Speaker 3: about ten years ago or so that we were doing

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Speaker 3: some experiments where we playback sounds to dolphins, and I

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Speaker 3: noticed multiple different dolphins making a similar whistle in response

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Speaker 3: to those playbacks, and I remember being like, what's going

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Speaker 3: on here? Like this is so crazy, Like I didn't

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Speaker 3: expect anything like that, And I remember being really blown

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Speaker 3: away and actually like contacting my colleague and saying, you know,

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Speaker 3: you're not gonna believe this, but I'm seeing like multiple

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Speaker 3: dolphins making a really similar response here, and so that

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Speaker 3: kind of launched this whole direction of my research focused

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Speaker 3: on what we call shared non signature whistles. So these

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Speaker 3: are not signature whistles, but there are types of whistles

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Speaker 3: that are produced by multiple dolphins. So it's not just

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Speaker 3: some random whistle. There's like these different whistle that lots

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Speaker 3: and lots of different dolphins make. And so we now

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Speaker 3: are really trying to understand what do those mean? Do

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Speaker 3: those have you know, specific meanings the way potentially a

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Speaker 3: phrase or a word might for us. You know, we

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Speaker 3: don't know the answer to that, but that's what we're

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Speaker 3: trying to find out through playbacks. By playing back these

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Speaker 3: sounds of dolphins and observing how they respond.

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Speaker 1: I see fascinating. Can you describe your experiment in a

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Speaker 1: little bit more detail. You played bad non signature whistled

435
00:23:01,720 --> 00:23:04,760
Speaker 1: sound that you recorded, but you don't know what it means.

436
00:23:04,760 --> 00:23:06,400
Speaker 1: You just recorded a sound.

437
00:23:06,440 --> 00:23:09,720
Speaker 3: Right, There's one particular whistle type that I have like

438
00:23:09,760 --> 00:23:13,159
Speaker 3: a hunch that it's produced in response to kind of

439
00:23:13,200 --> 00:23:21,080
Speaker 3: a surprising sound. So it seems like that could be

440
00:23:21,160 --> 00:23:23,919
Speaker 3: some kind of like a what was that sort of sound.

441
00:23:24,400 --> 00:23:26,440
Speaker 3: It's not so much that we think that that whistle

442
00:23:26,520 --> 00:23:30,200
Speaker 3: probably represents something, you know, the way like the word

443
00:23:30,280 --> 00:23:33,000
Speaker 3: chair means a chair, but it might be more like

444
00:23:33,080 --> 00:23:35,320
Speaker 3: something like a dolphin going wait, what was that?

445
00:23:35,760 --> 00:23:40,240
Speaker 1: Oh? Yes, doctor Sayik thinks she might have decoded the

446
00:23:40,280 --> 00:23:44,080
Speaker 1: first ever dolphin word in history, and that word could

447
00:23:44,119 --> 00:23:48,280
Speaker 1: be the dolphin equivalent of what the F, which kind

448
00:23:48,280 --> 00:23:51,480
Speaker 1: of makes sense. Actually, if a dolphin scientist suddenly jumped

449
00:23:51,520 --> 00:23:54,360
Speaker 1: out of the water and started saying strange sounds to us,

450
00:23:54,680 --> 00:23:57,119
Speaker 1: what the F would probably be the most common thing

451
00:23:57,160 --> 00:24:00,720
Speaker 1: you would hear back from humans. Okay, what really intreagued

452
00:24:00,720 --> 00:24:03,600
Speaker 1: Suctor's Ayeek about this particular whistle is that she's heard

453
00:24:03,640 --> 00:24:07,840
Speaker 1: it from lots of dolphins in the community. And you

454
00:24:07,880 --> 00:24:10,920
Speaker 1: find that dolphins say that this word across a community.

455
00:24:10,960 --> 00:24:12,919
Speaker 1: It's like each time you go back, you're not pulling

456
00:24:12,920 --> 00:24:15,399
Speaker 1: the same group of dolphins, You're pulling a totally different

457
00:24:15,440 --> 00:24:16,240
Speaker 1: group and they.

458
00:24:16,240 --> 00:24:18,479
Speaker 3: I mean, it's all the same one hundred and seventy dolphins.

459
00:24:18,480 --> 00:24:21,800
Speaker 3: But I think I've seen at least thirty five different

460
00:24:21,840 --> 00:24:25,080
Speaker 3: dolphins doing it at some point. There's one feature of

461
00:24:25,160 --> 00:24:28,440
Speaker 3: the whistle that's very consistent, which is this flat, constant

462
00:24:28,440 --> 00:24:31,800
Speaker 3: frequency part at the end of the whistle. And that's

463
00:24:31,800 --> 00:24:35,000
Speaker 3: something very unusual because dolphins in Sara's to almost never

464
00:24:35,080 --> 00:24:37,560
Speaker 3: make constant frequency whistles. And I was like, what is

465
00:24:37,600 --> 00:24:41,000
Speaker 3: going on here when I first discovered it. And so

466
00:24:41,160 --> 00:24:43,880
Speaker 3: it's not a totally like slam dunk.

467
00:24:44,080 --> 00:24:45,800
Speaker 1: Maybe could be like a question mark at the end

468
00:24:45,880 --> 00:24:46,800
Speaker 1: of their word.

469
00:24:47,040 --> 00:24:50,040
Speaker 3: It could be it could be that that flat component

470
00:24:50,359 --> 00:24:53,040
Speaker 3: it just adds that. But anyway, we have a lot

471
00:24:53,040 --> 00:24:55,640
Speaker 3: of work to do to figure this out.

472
00:24:57,280 --> 00:24:59,439
Speaker 1: What do you think of the idea of using AI?

473
00:25:00,080 --> 00:25:02,560
Speaker 1: Seen that a lot in using AI and computers to

474
00:25:02,600 --> 00:25:04,800
Speaker 1: try to feed it all this data and have it

475
00:25:04,920 --> 00:25:07,119
Speaker 1: figure out how dolphins talk. What do you think about that?

476
00:25:07,440 --> 00:25:09,320
Speaker 3: So a lot of people ask me about that. I

477
00:25:09,400 --> 00:25:13,000
Speaker 3: don't personally feel that AI, at least where it stands

478
00:25:13,080 --> 00:25:17,440
Speaker 3: right now, is in a place to interpret dolphin sounds.

479
00:25:17,720 --> 00:25:21,359
Speaker 3: If we want to interpret what these sounds mean, I

480
00:25:21,440 --> 00:25:23,680
Speaker 3: just don't see any other way to do that than

481
00:25:23,800 --> 00:25:27,000
Speaker 3: to actually observe how the dolphins are using them or

482
00:25:27,080 --> 00:25:29,040
Speaker 3: responding to them, Like I just don't see how an

483
00:25:29,040 --> 00:25:35,520
Speaker 3: AI could interpret those sounds without that additional contextual.

484
00:25:34,880 --> 00:25:37,840
Speaker 1: Data, because I guess you need to tie to the

485
00:25:37,960 --> 00:25:41,320
Speaker 1: animal's behavior to be able to make those confusions. But

486
00:25:41,440 --> 00:25:44,879
Speaker 1: right now the data is not connected to behavior or

487
00:25:44,960 --> 00:25:46,280
Speaker 1: observations exactly.

488
00:25:46,600 --> 00:25:48,520
Speaker 3: Most of the uses that I know of of AI

489
00:25:48,680 --> 00:25:51,720
Speaker 3: on a large scale with animal vocalizations has involved so

490
00:25:52,040 --> 00:25:54,960
Speaker 3: just feeding the vocalizations into an AI, having it spit

491
00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:58,760
Speaker 3: out patterns, which could be super interesting, but that's what

492
00:25:58,800 --> 00:26:01,159
Speaker 3: they are at this point. They are patterns, and we

493
00:26:01,200 --> 00:26:04,399
Speaker 3: don't know if they mean anything to the animals. So

494
00:26:04,480 --> 00:26:06,480
Speaker 3: you have to get out there and watch them while

495
00:26:06,480 --> 00:26:09,200
Speaker 3: they're producing them and see are they doing something different

496
00:26:09,240 --> 00:26:11,239
Speaker 3: when they make it this way versus that way. But

497
00:26:11,840 --> 00:26:14,440
Speaker 3: without that information, to me, it could just be random.

498
00:26:14,480 --> 00:26:16,280
Speaker 3: It could just be noise. It could be like us

499
00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:19,359
Speaker 3: clearing our throat, you know, or something like that. We

500
00:26:19,520 --> 00:26:20,120
Speaker 3: just don't know.

501
00:26:20,400 --> 00:26:23,160
Speaker 1: I see. It'd be like trying to understand human language

502
00:26:23,480 --> 00:26:27,520
Speaker 1: just from recordings of us talking without any context of

503
00:26:27,600 --> 00:26:30,120
Speaker 1: whether we were in pairs or in a group, or

504
00:26:30,560 --> 00:26:33,719
Speaker 1: distress or having fun or eating or anything.

505
00:26:33,920 --> 00:26:38,600
Speaker 3: Right, It's really lacking that context, which is really crucial

506
00:26:38,640 --> 00:26:40,680
Speaker 3: when you want to understand what sounds mean.

507
00:26:41,040 --> 00:26:43,480
Speaker 1: I'll make it bad joke. It's almost like you need

508
00:26:43,520 --> 00:26:45,640
Speaker 1: to know the poor poise of the word.

509
00:26:48,240 --> 00:26:49,480
Speaker 3: That's very true though.

510
00:26:50,000 --> 00:26:53,479
Speaker 1: That's a good one, all right. The second way that

511
00:26:53,560 --> 00:26:56,280
Speaker 1: scientists have tried to talk to dolphins has been to

512
00:26:56,320 --> 00:27:00,119
Speaker 1: try to teach dolphins you words to them. Here's for

513
00:27:00,240 --> 00:27:04,240
Speaker 1: Denise Herzing. Okay, so there's the idea of trying to

514
00:27:04,320 --> 00:27:07,679
Speaker 1: understand how dolphins communicate. But then a part of your

515
00:27:07,680 --> 00:27:10,359
Speaker 1: work has been on maybe another approach. Can you tell

516
00:27:10,440 --> 00:27:12,439
Speaker 1: us a little bit about that? Sure, well, we do

517
00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:13,359
Speaker 1: a little bit of both.

518
00:27:13,520 --> 00:27:18,840
Speaker 2: Two way communication is about interacting actively to try to communicate,

519
00:27:19,040 --> 00:27:22,359
Speaker 2: versus just standing by and observing, recording and trying to

520
00:27:22,640 --> 00:27:25,159
Speaker 2: decode what you see in here and not interacting.

521
00:27:25,320 --> 00:27:28,200
Speaker 1: So in this case with the dolphins, what's the scenario, Capain,

522
00:27:28,280 --> 00:27:29,680
Speaker 1: it's a picture of what's involved.

523
00:27:29,920 --> 00:27:33,439
Speaker 2: Well, our two way system involves underwater computers. So they

524
00:27:33,480 --> 00:27:37,600
Speaker 2: are little aloneum casings we wear on our torso well,

525
00:27:37,680 --> 00:27:40,440
Speaker 2: right now it actually has a pixel phone in it.

526
00:27:40,440 --> 00:27:44,439
Speaker 2: It's really off the shelf now, but it's got preprogrammed

527
00:27:44,640 --> 00:27:48,240
Speaker 2: sounds that we have labeled for different toys. The dolphins

528
00:27:48,280 --> 00:27:51,119
Speaker 2: like to play with for example, and it's got a

529
00:27:51,160 --> 00:27:54,560
Speaker 2: powerful real time recognition program. So when a dolphin might

530
00:27:54,720 --> 00:27:58,840
Speaker 2: mimic that whistle, then the computer would tell the human researcher,

531
00:27:58,840 --> 00:28:01,720
Speaker 2: who's wearing also a head, said it hurt a match,

532
00:28:02,080 --> 00:28:04,639
Speaker 2: And so a dolphin is trying pretty hard to mimic

533
00:28:04,720 --> 00:28:05,359
Speaker 2: that sound.

534
00:28:06,119 --> 00:28:09,080
Speaker 1: So the scenario is that a scientist a diver will

535
00:28:09,160 --> 00:28:11,960
Speaker 1: dive down with this device and then they'll sort of

536
00:28:12,000 --> 00:28:15,399
Speaker 1: wave a toy around. What does that particle look like?

537
00:28:15,680 --> 00:28:17,880
Speaker 2: So our normal protocol would we get in the water

538
00:28:18,400 --> 00:28:20,560
Speaker 2: and we might have this device on, but we're not

539
00:28:20,600 --> 00:28:23,080
Speaker 2: going to use it unless the dolphins want to interact

540
00:28:23,119 --> 00:28:25,720
Speaker 2: with us. Now, if the dolphins start playing with us,

541
00:28:25,840 --> 00:28:28,639
Speaker 2: they offer us a toy, they start interacting, then we

542
00:28:28,760 --> 00:28:32,440
Speaker 2: might go into our play protocol. So let's try to

543
00:28:32,520 --> 00:28:34,040
Speaker 2: label this toy they brought over.

544
00:28:34,520 --> 00:28:36,880
Speaker 1: Then they'll do that. They'll like bring up and say

545
00:28:37,160 --> 00:28:39,360
Speaker 1: sort of like a dog like here, ball here, let's

546
00:28:39,360 --> 00:28:40,200
Speaker 1: play really.

547
00:28:40,440 --> 00:28:43,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, so they'll offer us piece of sarcasm or seagras.

548
00:28:43,720 --> 00:28:47,320
Speaker 2: Sarcasm is a piece of algae basically, Okay, so I

549
00:28:47,360 --> 00:28:50,920
Speaker 2: can push my little keypad on my box playing the

550
00:28:50,920 --> 00:28:53,720
Speaker 2: whistle for sarcasm. I can ask them for it, or

551
00:28:53,760 --> 00:28:56,480
Speaker 2: I can wave it and say sarcasm while I'm playing

552
00:28:56,480 --> 00:28:56,960
Speaker 2: the whistle.

553
00:28:57,200 --> 00:28:58,960
Speaker 3: And the idea is to expose.

554
00:28:58,520 --> 00:29:01,720
Speaker 1: Them to it. Okay, So the idea here is to

555
00:29:01,880 --> 00:29:05,080
Speaker 1: basically teach dolphins' words the same way you might teach

556
00:29:05,120 --> 00:29:09,240
Speaker 1: your dog the word ball or sin or water. Scientists

557
00:29:09,240 --> 00:29:11,560
Speaker 1: would play with dolphins and try to get them to

558
00:29:11,680 --> 00:29:15,480
Speaker 1: learn that a certain whistle means sea grass or algae,

559
00:29:15,800 --> 00:29:17,560
Speaker 1: and then they would try to get the animals to

560
00:29:17,600 --> 00:29:20,240
Speaker 1: say the whistle back to them when the dolphins wanted

561
00:29:20,280 --> 00:29:24,320
Speaker 1: to refer to seagrass or culture. And it sort of worked.

562
00:29:29,080 --> 00:29:33,840
Speaker 2: So we had some interesting reactions and some suggestive data,

563
00:29:34,360 --> 00:29:38,080
Speaker 2: but nothing earth shattering and nothing to really show that

564
00:29:38,160 --> 00:29:41,240
Speaker 2: they would see the functionality of these different sounds. Now,

565
00:29:41,280 --> 00:29:43,600
Speaker 2: I think in captive studies they've gotten a little further

566
00:29:43,640 --> 00:29:45,680
Speaker 2: with that because they have more time with the animals.

567
00:29:46,600 --> 00:29:49,360
Speaker 1: I don't think it's gone very far, but at least you.

568
00:29:49,240 --> 00:29:52,160
Speaker 2: Can see maybe they understand the different function of these

569
00:29:52,200 --> 00:29:55,720
Speaker 2: signals and objects. So part of the big debate I

570
00:29:55,760 --> 00:29:59,400
Speaker 2: think among scientists is that if they a dolphin in captivity,

571
00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:04,040
Speaker 2: darts being able to understand semantics and syntax, which they

572
00:30:04,040 --> 00:30:07,440
Speaker 2: have especially in Hawaii at lu Herman's old lab there.

573
00:30:07,840 --> 00:30:10,440
Speaker 2: The question is, Okay, so we know they have the

574
00:30:10,560 --> 00:30:14,080
Speaker 2: flexibility to do that in their brains, but we still

575
00:30:14,080 --> 00:30:16,680
Speaker 2: don't know if they use it in their own system, right,

576
00:30:17,400 --> 00:30:20,200
Speaker 2: I see. So you could have an animal that's exposed

577
00:30:20,240 --> 00:30:22,680
Speaker 2: to human culture and to these kinds of things and

578
00:30:22,720 --> 00:30:25,280
Speaker 2: they learn they're like, oh, I'm flexible, I can figure

579
00:30:25,320 --> 00:30:28,040
Speaker 2: this out. But that doesn't mean they have a language

580
00:30:28,080 --> 00:30:31,640
Speaker 2: in their own communications system. So that's a big debate

581
00:30:31,720 --> 00:30:34,200
Speaker 2: as well. So lots of things we don't know.

582
00:30:35,680 --> 00:30:37,720
Speaker 1: Okay, So that's kind of the state of the art

583
00:30:37,840 --> 00:30:41,360
Speaker 1: of talking to dolphins. You're starting to catalog all the

584
00:30:41,440 --> 00:30:45,200
Speaker 1: sounds they make, and there are possible breakthroughs with some sounds.

585
00:30:45,600 --> 00:30:48,240
Speaker 1: And we also know dolphins could learn sounds from us,

586
00:30:48,600 --> 00:30:52,920
Speaker 1: but it wouldn't necessarily tell us how they communicate among themselves.

587
00:30:53,440 --> 00:30:56,200
Speaker 1: Of course, the bigger question is if we could talk

588
00:30:56,240 --> 00:31:00,520
Speaker 1: to dolphins, what will we say to them? What would

589
00:31:00,520 --> 00:31:03,120
Speaker 1: it mean for us people to understand dolphins and what

590
00:31:03,160 --> 00:31:04,040
Speaker 1: they're saying to each other.

591
00:31:04,360 --> 00:31:07,520
Speaker 3: I mean, I think that would be amazing. I mean

592
00:31:07,600 --> 00:31:10,840
Speaker 3: that's because I just feel like the possibility is for

593
00:31:11,480 --> 00:31:14,520
Speaker 3: complexity in their communication system, given that they do learn

594
00:31:14,760 --> 00:31:18,520
Speaker 3: and have this flexible communication system. I just think it's

595
00:31:19,360 --> 00:31:23,080
Speaker 3: just super exciting and I think it'll be really eye opening.

596
00:31:23,200 --> 00:31:26,479
Speaker 1: Just kind of understanding how this animal, what it's like

597
00:31:26,520 --> 00:31:27,240
Speaker 1: to be this animal.

598
00:31:27,440 --> 00:31:31,200
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, exactly, like how they interact with each other

599
00:31:31,320 --> 00:31:34,080
Speaker 3: and what kinds of things they do and kind of

600
00:31:34,120 --> 00:31:35,240
Speaker 3: communicate with each other.

601
00:31:35,640 --> 00:31:39,400
Speaker 1: It's fascinating how they see and hear the world.

602
00:31:39,760 --> 00:31:41,160
Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely.

603
00:31:42,360 --> 00:31:45,560
Speaker 1: The last question here, if we figure out how they communicate,

604
00:31:45,840 --> 00:31:48,920
Speaker 1: what would you want to tell or ask a dolphin

605
00:31:49,480 --> 00:31:50,600
Speaker 1: or a group of dolphins.

606
00:31:51,240 --> 00:31:54,280
Speaker 2: So that's my question. I always ask people that question really,

607
00:31:55,880 --> 00:31:58,640
Speaker 2: So for me, it would just be more about learning, Like,

608
00:31:58,920 --> 00:32:00,920
Speaker 2: you know, what do you think about It's important to you?

609
00:32:01,320 --> 00:32:04,120
Speaker 2: And I'm sure there's all sort of secrets if we

610
00:32:04,120 --> 00:32:06,720
Speaker 2: could ever ask them in detail about the ocean, I

611
00:32:06,800 --> 00:32:08,720
Speaker 2: can tell us all sorts of things about the ocean,

612
00:32:09,400 --> 00:32:09,560
Speaker 2: you know.

613
00:32:09,680 --> 00:32:10,400
Speaker 1: I think it.

614
00:32:10,360 --> 00:32:13,280
Speaker 2: Could just be as simple as finding common ground. I

615
00:32:13,400 --> 00:32:16,360
Speaker 2: think what it could do for us is give us

616
00:32:16,400 --> 00:32:19,440
Speaker 2: a fuller respect of other species and that hey, we

617
00:32:19,480 --> 00:32:21,440
Speaker 2: all have a right to be here. They have their

618
00:32:21,440 --> 00:32:24,120
Speaker 2: own lives, they have full interesting lives. You know, I

619
00:32:24,120 --> 00:32:26,640
Speaker 2: think as humans we have to be careful. Is it

620
00:32:26,720 --> 00:32:29,200
Speaker 2: about us or is it about them?

621
00:32:29,800 --> 00:32:32,560
Speaker 1: Right? Yeah, it sounds like maybe the question is not

622
00:32:32,880 --> 00:32:36,560
Speaker 1: can we talk to dolphins, but whether dolphins want to

623
00:32:36,600 --> 00:32:37,200
Speaker 1: talk to us?

624
00:32:37,600 --> 00:32:39,360
Speaker 2: There you go, it's a good way of stating it.

625
00:32:39,680 --> 00:32:39,960
Speaker 3: Yep.

626
00:32:42,320 --> 00:32:45,560
Speaker 1: All right, Well it sounds like we might be able

627
00:32:45,600 --> 00:32:48,080
Speaker 1: to talk to dolphins in the future, in which case

628
00:32:48,160 --> 00:32:51,000
Speaker 1: we should probably figure out if we are a species

629
00:32:51,320 --> 00:32:54,880
Speaker 1: worth talking to. Thanks for joining us, See you next

630
00:32:54,880 --> 00:33:01,640
Speaker 1: time you've been listening to Science Stuff. Production of iHeartRadio,

631
00:33:02,400 --> 00:33:05,320
Speaker 1: written and produced by me or Y Cham, edited by

632
00:33:05,440 --> 00:33:09,320
Speaker 1: Rose Seguda, executive producer Jerry Rowland, and audio engineer and

633
00:33:09,360 --> 00:33:12,720
Speaker 1: mixer Jasey Pegram And you can follow me on social media.

634
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635
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636
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637
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00:33:25,520 --> 00:33:39,000
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639
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640
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