How should human researchers respond to the first dolphin who has asked why sane humans do not stop crazy humans from polluting their environment?
While it is interesting to imagine such exchanges, we aren’t there yet. With AI help, however, we might get to the point of having meaningful conversations with dolphins.
A human language focused artificial intelligence has been working on decoding dolphin communication, attempting to build a dictionary of dolphin language.
After mastering 40 human languages, a Swedish startup has turned to dolphins, hoping to use its language-analysis software to unlock the secrets of communication employed by the aquatic mammals. Using technology from artificial intelligence language-analysis company Gavagai AB, researchers from Sweden’s KTH Royal Institute of Technology will begin compiling a dolphin-language dictionary. The software will monitor captive bottlenose dolphins at a wildlife park about 90 miles south of Stockholm, the company said in an emailed statement Wednesday.
via Bloom
In a Bloomberg interview Jussi Karlgren, KTH professor and Gavagai co-founder, said:
“We hope to be able to understand dolphins with the help of artificial intelligence technology […] We know that dolphins have a complex communication system, but we don’t know what they are talking about yet.”
Via Steemit
Scientists at the KTH Royal Institute of Technology will use Gavagai’s AI software to unlock the secrets of dolphins’ language, according to Bloomberg. The software will be used to monitor captive bottlenose dolphins at a wildlife park just south of Stockholm, and the project is expected to span four years. It’s long been known that dolphins use distinct sounds, and even ‘signature whistles’ to communicate with their peers and identify particular individuals. …
But, much about their language remains a mystery.
Gavagai’s software has already taken on 40 human languages, and it’s hoped that these efforts will reveal new insight on the mysterious communication methods of dolphins. Signature whistles are sounds made by dolphins, used to identify different individuals. Dolphin calves will eventually make their own individual whistle, but in the first stages of life, they use their mother’s. …
Just last fall, scientists recorded dolphins having a ‘conversation’ for the first time, and even noted the use of sentence-like patterns. A pair of Black Sea bottlenose dolphins named Yasha and Yana were observed using clicks and pulses to create ‘words’ in back-and-forth exchanges – and, they were even observed waiting for the other to finish their ‘sentence’ before replying.[1]
According to the scientists at the Karadag Nature Reserve, in Feodosia, Russia said that, the find suggests that, dolphins, like humans, are able to communicate certain emotions such as stress or happiness. Dolphins have larger brains than many mammals – 1,800g …
If aliens came to earth and used brain weight as the measure of intelligence, humans would be lower on the list than many other animals to contact. This may be why we haven’t heard much from aliens. They have been making deals with the Sperm whales and Fin whales first.
Species (brain weight in grams)
- Sperm whale (7,800)
- Fin whale (6,930)
- Killer whale (5,620)
- Elephant (4,783)
- Humpback whale (4,675)
- Gray whale (4,317)
- Bowhead whale (2,738)
- Pilot whale (2,670)
- Bottle Nosed Dolphin (1,500-1,600)
- Adult human (1,300 – 1,400)
We’re number ten. Number ten? Are whales smarter than humans? Intelligence, the abilities that allow survival, innovation and adaptation to unpredictable environments, may be a function of smart wiring more than just the number of brain cells. Some ants can, after all, pass the mirror self awareness test while many animals with much larger brains cannot.
I look forward to a dolphin language being decoded. What do you suppose they talk about mostly with those interesting clicks and whistles?
Oceanic dolphins or Delphinidae are a widely distributed family of dolphins that live in the sea. Thirty extant species are described. They include several big species whose common names contain “whale” rather than “dolphin”, such as the killer whale and the pilot whales. {Wikipedia}
I hope artificial intelligence will decode the intricate language of dolphins. A dolphin-language dictionary would be cool. If we could have conversations with dolphins, what would you ask about? For me, it would be the experience they have of being always 1/2 awake and 1/2 asleep. Do they have a concept of sleep?
CITATIONS
[1] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3784135/Scientists-record-two-dolphins-talking-time.html
