The whales are some of the deepest divers on the planet. For up to 80 minutes at a time, they spend 70% of their time in the dark ocean looking for squid. When they break through the ocean's skin, they form a circle around one another.
They are 18 metres long and have the largest brains on the planet. Scientists have been wondering what these mammals do with their brains for 200 years. Evidence suggests that the way we think about whales could be changed.
According to the authors of a new paper, the culture of sperm whales is marked by symbols.
Humans use symbolic marking such as clothing choice, hairstyle or tattoos to show who they are inside. It's implicit in how we look. Scientists have found that sperm whales emit loud clicks from their heads.
The morse code-like sequence that the scientists call "identity codas" are emitted by these sounds. Different clans of whales use these codas to identify themselves This is us, they are saying.
The paper believes that this is a social exchange. One of the authors told the Guardian that the signal can either be received by or directed at members of the same group.
New data suggests that the presence of other groups affects the symbols, and that social marking is not unique to humans.
Seven whale clans in the Pacific Ocean are identified in the paper as being similar to human music.
As much as human taste is expressed in fashion, hairstyle or piercings that advertise what group we identify with, whales' clicks represent whale taste. The whales are signalling their clanship to other people with tattoos.
The crustacean with eyes for a head was discovered in the deepest part of the ocean.
The paper's primary author said the work showed that identity codas were used in this way by whales. She said that if you see someone wearing a necklace with a cross on it or a star of David, you know they are a part of a group.
The most important conclusion is that these interactions are evolutionary. As cultural groups intersect more and more, we see more and more emphasis on these symbols. Hersh said the same thing about the sperm whales.
We could be about to find out what those clicks mean. In his new book, How to Speak Whale, the film-maker Tom Mustill discusses new advances that suggest we might be able to "translate" whale communication using a complex series of underwater listening systems to concentrate on a specific sperm whale.
The Cetacean Translation Initiative hopes to provide a comprehensive set of data by linking the sounds the whales make with what they are doing at the time.
In a science-fiction leap, Ceti will attempt to communicate with the whales by using whale chatbots. In 2001: A Space Odyssey, the alien whine of a black monolith was replaced by a grey leviathan.
The Save the Whales campaigns of the 70s and 80s were started by recordings of the song of the Humpback whale. The presence of a culture other than ours was brought to our attention by the whale song. Our relationship with the rest of the natural world may be changed by these revelations. The Doctor Dolittle moment is here.
We might be talking with whales. What will they say?
The sperm whales have a substance in their heads called spermaceti, which is part of the process of making clicking sounds. Early biologists thought the substance was the whales' semen.
Deep open waters are where they are found. The average temperature for females and males is 40 degrees south and 40 degrees north. The world's oceans are getting hotter.
They can collapse their lungs in order to survive at depths of about 800m.
The marguerite is a formation in which they form a wagon wheel shape with their heads. Their tails are used to attack their attackers.
Sper whales have been hunted for ambergris, a waxy substance that forms around squid beaks in the whales, and is used in perfumes.
All Rights Reserved © 2024
