Scientists had a groundbreaking conversation with a humpback whale in her own language and it could help humans chat wit

[WhiteTara]

Scientists had a groundbreaking conversation with a humpback whale in her own language and it could help humans chat with aliens one day

https://www.yahoo.com/news/whales-teaching-scientists-communicating-aliens-194914681.html

The scientists sailed a boat off the coast of Alaska and played what's called a "contact call" into the ocean to see if any whales would respond.

snip

Sure enough, Twain swam up to the boat and circled it. For the next 20 minutes, the scientists emitted the same contact call 36 different times at varying intervals, and Twain responded to the call each time, even closely matching the intervals.

Meaning, if the scientists waited 10 seconds before playing a call back to Twain, she would in turn wait 10 seconds before responding, McCowan said. This type of interval matching suggests Twain was engaged in an intentional exchange, she added.

"It certainly felt like we had been heard," Sharpe told BI, emphasizing that their work is done with a permit from the National Marine Fisheries Service and readers should not try this at home (or sea). "And we hope that she felt the same way, too."

"We believe this is the first such communicative exchange between humans and humpback whales in the humpback 'language,'" McCowan said in a statement.

[dweller]

1. I am so totally

going to try this at home …
🐋 🎤



✌🏻

[WhiteTara]

2. let me know how it goes!

how magical that you are close enough to the ocean to even be able to think about talking to whales.

[dweller]

4. Oh, I'm not close to the ocean

but I want to practice for the aliens
🎤 👽





✌🏻

[WhiteTara]

5. ...

that was hilarious.

Seriously, I am so happy I wasn't drinking anything, my screen would have needed to be cleaned.

[alfredo]

31. Start with guppies

Avoid contact with goldfish. They are total jerks.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

3. .

emphasizing that their work is done with a permit from the National Marine Fisheries Service and readers should not try this at home (or sea)

[dweller]

6. I'll do what I want

https://m.

✌🏻

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

8. So what did they talk about??

[Hassin Bin Sober]

9. An extended warranty for the whale's car

[WhiteTara]

13. mostly just hello

I talk to the birds in our neighborhood in the same way. I have no idea what we say, but we all enjoy the communication.

[Attilatheblond]

21. Around my 'hood, way inland, I gronk with the ravens

They love to communicate. But I know they are laughing at my syntax and grammar.

[WhiteTara]

32. but they are all graciously still

chatting it up with us.

[Attilatheblond]

47. Yes, they are ALWAYS polite.

My daughter misses her old horse and the way the raven parents would bring their young to watch at feeding time. They would chatter softly among themselves, likely studying the big golden horse creature and the tiny human servant he had.

[Hugin]

48. Ravens and sparrows here.

I would mention Blue Jays too. But, they’re mostly yelling at me. So angry!

[sakabatou]

10. How long until the hear, "So long and thanks for all the fish"?

[RussellCattle]

23. Lovely reference. "Dolphins, Mr. Dent, thanks for all the dolphins." They needed the bypass and saved....

…..the more sentient species was my understanding of it all.

[Baitball Blogger]

11. This is a translation of the first human to whale communication:

"A month's supply of free krill to the whale that turns in the killer whales that are capsizing our boats."

[Igel]

12. I can call my cats.

I have 4. Three answer consistently--one has an identity problem but whenever any cat gets attention, it means *he* should get attention.

One my son's watched me hold "conversations" with. I miao. He miaos. We alternate. The miaos change. At some point he rubs up against me. For a given miao.

They also get other "words". When I express displeasure, 'not now--go away' and 'food?'

It's called a 'communication system.'

There's no way I could ever communicate, "Four score and seven years ago" because they can't. But "you're there", "I like you", "f**k off", "busy" or "yum-yums"? They like being acknowledged and if I don't call them by name when I get home and they show up and then pet them I get this annoying quasi-spitting sound that says, "me! now! pissed!"

It's more attitude than proposition.

That they "believe" is fine, but their beliefs are beliefs. Got science?

[Hermit-The-Prog]

34. A little counting and arithmetic would be nice.

[mopinko]

14. i'm sorta surprised no one ever tried that.

long, long ago, i got cassette tapes of bird calls, and the 1st thing i did was play them for birds.
seems obvious, no?

[WhiteTara]

15. yes. We had a book of bird calls and

a redtail hawk landed on the roof next door when we played his call.

We also feed the crows and 5 caws brings them in. Apparently that's the dinner bell call.

[dweller]

17. I use this

https://m.

✌🏻

[mopinko]

38. i found owls and woodpeckers were the most responsive.

1st camping trip w took w our pop-up we went to the south tip of il, place called horseshoe lake, w our (them) 3 kids.
sitting around the campfire, i got a reply from a barred owl. then another, then another.
then silence. for about 5 min or so.
next thing we knew there were a doz in the trees right above us. hooting all at once, pretty sure the translation was- take that intruder owl and go HOME!

over 30 yrs ago, and i still get goosebumps every time i tell the story.

[ecstatic]

40. Omg! Nt

[moonscape]

41. Very cool!

[swong19104]

16. This is where AI can really help

Have it hear a bunch of humpback speech, and then learn how to say them. Then say some "sentences" to humpbacks and see how they respond.

[JoseBalow]

18. A whale mimics some sounds

[Skittles]

24. I laugh every time I see that guy

[alfredo]

33. Some cats mimmic birds.

https://www.google.com/search?q=cats+mimmicing+birds&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-us&client=safari#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:13549a51,vid:0ulu7XVtnpw,st:0

[LudwigPastorius]

19. If they said the humpback equivalent of "Hello" to her for 20 minutes,...

she was probably saying back, "Are you okay? You're not making any sense".

[RussellCattle]

20. "Exasperated with the thoughtless mimicry, the female humpback took a page from relatives in the.....

…..Mediterranean and rammed the researchers boat”.

[LudwigPastorius]

27. Yep, them's fighting' words.

[yardwork]

45. lol!

[Skittles]

22. I'm reminded of the Jack Handey quote

"our dreams that one day we will communicate with dolphins; our fears they will cuss like sailors"

[xocetaceans]

25. That is pretty neat stuff. Here is the paper linked to in the OP's article....

Interactive bioacoustic playback as a tool for detecting and exploring nonhuman intelligence: “conversing” with an Alaskan humpback whale

Brenda McCowan (1), Josephine Hubbard (2), Lisa Walker (3), Fred Sharpe (4), Jodi Frediani (5), Laurance Doyle (6)

Published November 29, 2023

Abstract

Here we report on a rare and opportunistic acoustic turn-taking with an adult female humpback whale, known as Twain, in Southeast Alaska. Post hoc acoustic and statistical analyses of a 20-min acoustic exchange between the broadcast of a recorded contact call, known as a ‘whup/throp’, with call responses by Twain revealed an intentional human-whale acoustic (and behavioral) interaction. Our results show that Twain participated both physically and acoustically in three phases of interaction (Phase 1: Engagement, Phase 2: Agitation, Phase 3: Disengagement), independently determined by blind observers reporting on surface behavior and respiratory activity of the interacting whale. A close examination of both changes to the latency between Twain’s calls and the temporal matching to the latency of the exemplar across phases indicated that Twain was actively engaged in the exchange during Phase 1 (Engagement), less so during Phase 2 (Agitation), and disengaged during Phase 3 (Disengagement). These results, while preliminary, point to several key considerations for effective playback design, namely the importance of salient, dynamic and adaptive playbacks, that should be utilized in experimentation with whales and other interactive nonhuman species.

...

https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.16349

[scipan]

30. My older brother used to do that to me when I was a kid

"Twain was actively engaged in the exchange during Phase 1 (Engagement), less so during Phase 2 (Agitation), and disengaged during Phase 3 (Disengagement). "

Whale was like, you called me, what do you want?

[xocetaceans]

35. Too funny. It seems like there should also be an annoyance phase. n/t

[chouchou]

26. It's amazing what they said.

"The wind turbines are hurting us."

[AllaN01Bear]

28. i have imitated birds all my life and got results. good results .

[Emile]

36. I have a cd of loon calls that I play very loud from my boat.

It doesn't take long and if the lake has loons on it, they are calling back and swimming around my boat.

[mopinko]

39. i talk to them, too.

i made a lot of jokes about ppl thinking i was a witch when i started my urban farm.
talking to the crows was among the evidence.
but it’s 1 of my fave mom memories. we had a big murder on the block b4 west nile blew through. primo and i wd yell back and forth w them. it was great fun.

[AllaN01Bear]

43. my fav birds to talk to are raven, california scrub jays , and woodpeckers .

i heard a red tail calling once and i went tweeeet. and then all of a sudden i heard it calling over head. so i went tweeet back this went on for several minutes . there was a humming bird that lived in my apartment complex grounds that we named chatterbox. chater box would do its normal call and if i didnt answer back it would do its territorial call. 1 day chatter box flew into a tree and sang for me. wow.

[mopinko]

44. ❤️❤️

i feel super sorry for ppl who dont talk to birds, or even notice them.
must suck to b them.

[shrike3]

46. I was just going to say the same thing.

Can remember as a kid being out in the yard and imitating the cardinals' song and hearing responses.

Husband has imitated chattering by squirrels and gotten a response.

[AllaN01Bear]

29. play the five tones . if they are out there . so far , nada.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

37. Acoustic contact, not a conversation. They should be able to do much better

I was expecting a some AI and some actual conversation, but no. I'm surprised I haven't read about AI being applied to cetacean "language".

"Hello", "hello to you too" is hardly a "conversation". Well, big things have small beginnings, even in science.

[ecstatic]

42. I kind of agree. Time to take it up a notch

and utilize some universal concepts. What do whales eat? Maybe offer some food and see what the whale calls it. Or perhaps the researchers could call it what they want to (using acoustic tones) and come up with a new language that the whale can learn.