Comments on: Dolphin Rescues Beached Whales

By: Lune

Lune — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 15:55:00 +0000

Does this mean that Moko is bilingual? Or that whales and dolphins share a common enough language as to be interchangeable?

There was an interesting story a while ago that whales in different regions of the oceans had slightly different "dialects" (i.e. slightly different pitch to their notes, variations in the specific songs they sang, etc.)

IIRC, dolphins are also the only other animal outside the great apes that can recognize its image in a mirror as him/herself rather than another dolphin.

By: Yves Smith

Yves Smith — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 04:21:00 +0000

The best bosses I ever had were smart and lazy. Dolphins appear to like having a good time, so they probably wouldn’t be overly interventionist.

Oh, I can see it now: “The Wisdom of Dolphins.” “10 Dolphin Secrets of Management.” And just think, you’d have to hang out at beaches in order to develop sufficient dolphin expertise to sell their revealed wisdom.

By: Chris

Chris — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 03:35:00 +0000

I, for one, would welcome our dolphin overlords.

By: bZb

bZb — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 02:51:00 +0000

We sure can use the guidance of a dolphin like that to lead us out of this financial mess; the humans in charge don’t quite know what to do anymore, as in that story.

By: Francois

Francois — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 00:42:00 +0000

Very cute story!

One comment struck me as odd: ""I shouldn't do this I know, we are meant to remain scientific," Mr Smith said, "but I actually went into the water with the dolphin and gave it a pat afterwards because she really did save the day.""

Remain scientific? What he did was quite "scientific" IMO. It's called positive reinforcement. B.F. Skinner studied that for decades in a very scientific manner and it works. (he he)