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Orcas are genuinely amazing creatures. We have observed evidence for culture within them, and witnessed them engage in social learning behavior identical to hum
by areoform 3y ago
Orcas are genuinely amazing creatures. We have observed evidence for culture within them, and witnessed them engage in social learning behavior identical to humans. So much so that it's important to consider their culture when we consider conservation w.r.t. orcas, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0006320704001338?via%3Dihub https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00063...
One of my favorite examples is that, in the 1980s, an orca started wearing a dead salmon on her nose. Others soon followed. They copied the pioneer until everyone was doing it. They then subsequently got bored, abandoned the trend & forgot about it.
Alder or A99 rediscovered the trend in 2019 and it became cool to balance salmon on your nose again, https://www.instagram.com/p/CZkhP0fvhXn/ https://www.instagram.com/p/CZkhP0fvhXn/
In this case, it's very likely that someone hurt one of them and they're now trying to make the world safer for themselves. They've figured out a way to deal with the entity they see as a threat and they've spread that knowledge.
It's all very human.
I suspect that it might actually be possible to try diplomacy in this case. I may be wrong, but I suspect that they could be reasoned with. This moment in time could lead to a breakthrough in inter-species communication.
- ben_w 3y agoI love ideas like that, but I'd expect us to learn North Sentinelese from passive remote drone observations before we can manage a different species.
- blinding-streak 3y agoDisagree. Animal training and behavior is a vast field of research humans have studied for hundreds of years. We're not starting from scratch. And we already interact with orcas constantly, based on these reports. It would be straightforward to experiment. Interacting in any way with the North Sentinel folks is forbidden.
- 2000UltraDeluxe 3y agoI mean, apart from a few kidnapped ones in the 1800's, few Sentinelese have ever interacted with the rest of us. Human-Orca contact, on the other hand, is relatively common.
- RajT88 3y agoAnd the main way the Sentinelese prefer to interact with the rest of the world is with hails of arrows.
- ben_w 3y agoQuite possibly for the same reason as the orcas…
- AlecSchueler 3y agoSo why would we expect to learn to communicate with the Sentinelese first, rather than the species we're already in contact with?
- bmitc 3y agoContact is not the same as communication and understanding of language, which is what the original commenter was referring to.
- AlecSchueler 3y agoYes, but we already communicate with orcas, and with the Sentinelese we can't communicate with them because we can't contact them. Communication and understanding of language are two different things. I have great communication with my dog, both ways.
- bmitc 3y ago> but we already communicate with orcas Not really. And again, the person was referring to Sentinelese the language and not the people and thus was referring to orcas' languages.
- marcosdumay 3y agoI'm pretty sure the orcas can understand a message of "not here" or "not boats like this".
- moffkalast 3y agoApparently humans do not understand a message of "stop taking our food or the boat gets it".
- saltwatercowboy 3y agoI don’t know. I’m very much waiting for the Cetacean Translation Initiative (CETI) to release their first set of results.
- boffinAudio 3y agoYou reminded me of this absolutely adorable story of a wild dolphin named Dusty going off to find its own fashion flipper to wear, having observed a diver lose theirs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOXZYvDg1ck https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOXZYvDg1ck Just makes me want to hang out with them so much more .. look at Dusty wearing that thing, what a player!
- dylan604 3y agoI'm curious what the swimmer is trying to hide from with that camo
- boffinAudio 3y agoSharks.
- bandyaboot 3y agoPerhaps if we were to approach them while balancing salmon on our noses…
- ethbr0 3y agoPretty sure that would result in juvenile orcas rolling their eyes and telling us "That's so last year."
- belter 3y agoMaybe they are trying to warns us about something ? "Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home" - https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Star_Trek_IV:_The_Voyage_Home https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Star_Trek_IV:_The_Voyag...
- moltude 3y agoWhat I immediately jump to when reading these stories. The movie rates as one of my favorite Star Trek movies because of all the "colorful metaphors"
- belter 3y ago"... Spock says that the probe signifies aliens of great intelligence that somehow, are unaware of the signal's destructive nature and that he thinks it illogical that the probe's intention is hostile. When McCoy asks if this is the probe's way of saying hello to the people of the Earth, Spock points out that only Human arrogance assumes the message must be meant for them..." "...In the Bounty's lab, Spock discovers that it is in fact a whale song, specifically that of the humpback whale. McCoy at first wonders who would send a probe across the galaxy to speak to whales, but Kirk and Spock recognize that whales were on Earth ten million years before Humans. Humpback whales, Spock points out, have been extinct since the 21st century, and so it is possible an alien intelligence sent the probe to establish why they lost contact..."
- bmitc 3y ago> In this case, it's very likely that someone hurt one of them and they're now trying to make the world safer for themselves. The orcas doing this are tuna eaters, and we are depleting the tuna population. Specifically, they eat blue fin tuna migrating through the Strait of Gibraltar in the spring and summer. They're hungry and don't appreciate the overfishing. This has been escalating for a few years now. Reports of boat attacks were happening several years ago. > It's all very human. They have their own intelligence and culture and behavior, and it need not relate to human culture. Although, I do suspect their raw intelligence to be approximately equal to humans.
- canadianfella 3y ago[dead]
- twelve40 3y agodoing nothing your entire life but killing fish to eat (and carrying dead salmon on your nose!) sounds like a massive hyperbole for "approximately human-equal intelligence"
- jasonzemos 3y agoDoing nothing your entire life but killing grazing animals and wearing their fur on your shoulders and teeth around your neck is just man a few thousand years removed.
- AYBABTME 3y ago> In this case, it's very likely that someone hurt one of them and they're now trying to make the world safer for themselves. They've figured out a way to deal with the entity they see as a threat and they've spread that knowledge. They seems to target only sailboats' rudders, which are arguably the most innoffensive of boats out there, but also the easiest prays. What I heard is that it seems like one orca decided it was fun (who actually knows their intent) and then the fashion spread. It seems more likely to me that some kids are having a good time messing with sailboats, than some sort of revenge or something.
- jna_sh 3y agoI saw conjecture on twitter (unfortunately I didn’t save the tweet) that they were targeting rudders because of the similarity to tuna fins. They hunt tuna by removing the fins, to prevent the fish fleeing, and the tweeter’s hypothesis was that they are using the sailboats as practice
- tessierashpool 3y ago> one orca decided it was fun (who actually knows their intent) and then the fashion spread. there's also been speculation that an orca discovered the method after being injured by a boat. Researchers aren’t sure why the orcas are going after the watercraft. There are two hypotheses, according to López. One is that the killer whales have invented a new fad, something that subpopulations of these members of the dolphin family are known to do. Much as in humans, orca fads are often spearheaded by juveniles, López says. Alternatively, the attacks may be a response to a bad past experience involving a boat. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-has-a-group-of-orcas-suddenly-started-attacking-boats/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-has-a-group-o...
- AYBABTME 3y agoIf it was past experience involving a boat, you'd think they'd attack powerboats. I really doubt a sailboat would have likely been involved into hurting orcas to the point where they would have learned to attack sailboats. Sailboats have keels in front of small propellers, and the propellers are usually purposefully not "exposed" or the first thing to be hit when colliding with an underwater object. On the other hand, power boats have very shallow draft, basically no keel, and much larger and exposed propellers. And yet, it's sailboats that are attacked. Hence to me it's quite obvious that the orcas are taking on the sailboats because sailboats are easy, slow and vulnerable targets. It's more likely that a bunch of young orcas are being jerks, like teenage humans are to vulnerable people. Also I don't buy that somehow orcas would be this pure, unable to do evil, species that is merely induced to be angry as a whole group because of the big bad humans. If they have a social structure, they have members of society that are jerks. One way or another it's a problem if they target vulnerable boats.
- belter 3y ago"Our delivery Yacht had a serious interaction with a large pod of Orcas" - https://youtu.be/iEpvQKxz5JU https://youtu.be/iEpvQKxz5JU
- spullara 3y agoWasn't this in the plot of Avatar: The Way of Water?
- danjoredd 3y ago>I suspect that it might actually be possible to try diplomacy in this case When we learn the language of Killer Whales that can be an option. However, there currently isn't a way to communicate with them in the same manner humans communicate with other humans.
- nonethewiser 3y ago> > In this case, it's very likely that someone hurt one of them and they're now trying to make the world safer for themselves. They've figured out a way to deal with the entity they see as a threat and they've spread that knowledge. Maybe. Or maybe marine biologist Dr. Renaud de Stephanis is right and they are playing. > “From what I’m seeing, it’s mainly two of those guys [the Gladises] in particular that are just going crazy. They just play, play and play. . . . It just seems to be something they really like and that’s it.” > “I’ve seen them hunting,” the biologist added. “When they hunt, you don’t hear or see them. They are stealthy, they sneak up on their prey. I’ve seen them attacking sperm whales - that’s aggressive....but these guys, they are playing." https://people.com/traumatized-orca-may-have-taught-whales-to-sink-boats-some-experts-say-theyre-just-playing-7504067 https://people.com/traumatized-orca-may-have-taught-whales-t...
- gerdesj 3y agoI agree with you, they are absolutely lovely creatures, however we have to be so careful that we don't anf ... enthrop ... oh FFS ... anthropomorphize them. Taking your dead salmon on the nose anecdote: that is fascinating but is it "culture" or a potential survival trait. I suspect that copied behaviour is in anticipation of a reward that will enhance survival. However it might be a form of embellishment, which would imply culture, as we know it. Orcas are mammals, like us, that live in the sea (unlike us). They breathe air, which is rather scant in their environment - that means they are tied to the air/sea interface and they have to fall upwards to survive some problems they might encounter. I'll bet their at rest buoyancy is slightly less than seawater and their body shape favours turning them upright and putting their blowhole slightly out of the water. They live in a very unforgiving environment and are also apex predators living off other creatures. They are bigger than most sharks which are at least able to always live submerged. They often end up in the Arctic and that means ice too to worry about to obscure the air/sea boundary. No wonder they have invented some cunning behaviour. For me the salmon thing was an epic fail, survival-wise but could be considered a form of "cargo cult". I think an example of a win is getting the pod to make a wave that washes a seal off an ice flow, so that they can pick it off. That needs a lot more research. If nothing else we need a formal description of what "culture" actually means when we generalise across the entirety of life.
- drewmol 3y agoI always found this story[1] of orcas helping whalers pull whales by biting the harpoon ropes with their teeth truly fascinating. [1] https://www.australiangeographic.com.au/topics/history-culture/2012/10/edens-killer-whales-helping-human-hunters/ https://www.australiangeographic.com.au/topics/history-cultu...
- Andy_G11 3y agoWhat are the tool available to interspecies negotiators - stick / carrot diplomacy? Unfortunately the risks for anyone in control of budget to find solutions to these types of problems make brute force solutions seem quite palatable. Finding a way to create orca free zones or inventing orca deterrents to scare them away from boats is the more likely course of action. Maybe there is something that can be learned from cases where rural populations in India and Africa coexist with elephants or other wildlife that is large, intelligent and potentially dangerous?