Dolphin language : a scientific evidence !

Whistles and clicks here combined in some kind of « picture words »

The text which will follow is maybe of the most important ever written in this end of the Century and could be compared to a Copernical revolution. For the first time in its history, Humankind must cope with the
evidence a of a perfectly elaborated non-human language, endowed with its own syntax and open vocabulary.

It seems now proved that dolphins, belugas, orcas, whales, spermwhales and all other cetaceans are speaking to each other by the means of local dialects that they learned during their childhood.

Of course, we still don’t know WHAT cetaceans are telling but one fact is sure : their language is able to carry concepts and abstract informations and could even be more sophisticated – in the case of bottlenose dolphins – than any known human language. (For this particular question, read : Alexander Zanin and Vladimir Markov’s
study : « The ability of bottlenose dolphins trusiops truncatus to report arbitrary information » in the below mentionned NATO volume)

We choosed to publish only few pages of the global study with some of tables and impressive illustrations, so we engage our readers to go back to the source, which is a quite interesting collective research book issued by
the NATO scientific services and Harderwijck dolfinarium.

You’ll find in it a lot of other quite interesting studies, like : « Acoustic behavior of Mysticete whales »(C.Clark) or « Non-acoustic communication in small cetaceans : glance, touch, position, gesture and bubbles » by Karen W. Pryor.

To know more about dolphin language and its ethical consequences :

Dolphin Intelligence and Captivity Issue

Orca’s language

Dolphin language : a complete file in French 

Now please enter the fascinating dolphin language’s world….

ORGANISATION OF COMMUNICATION
SYSTEM IN TURSIOPS TRUNCATUS MONTAGU

By
Vladimir I. Markov and Vera M. Ostrovskaya
A. N. Severtsov Institute of Evolutionary Morphology and Ecology of Animals,
USSR Academy of Sciences,
33 Leninsky Prospect, Moscow 117071,
USSR

From
« Sensory Abilities of Cetaceans : Laboratory and Field Evidence »
Edited by Jeanette A. Thomas and Ronald Kastelein (Harderwijck Dolfinarium)
NATO ASI Series
Series A : Life sciences Vol.196

Dolphin grammar

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