MGP+Lisa

 ** Dolphin smiles- ** ** Genuine or Deceitful? **  **Key Question: Are dolphins really able to communicate with humans? **

Preface

The purpose of this wikispace page is to answer the question, "Are Dolphins really able to communicate with humans?" This wikispace page consists of three major genres: a research paper, a diary entry (including a poster), and a collage. All of these genres help answer the key question proposed above. To give a basic idea, dolphin communication with humans is not at all an impossible task. Throughout this wikispace, you will learn about the possible ways to communicate effectively with dolphins. = =

Genre # 1 Introduction:

This genre is clearly a research paper. This genre answers the key question most directly. It is simply a research paper that explains how dolphin interspecific and intraspecific communications work. This genre also talks about how humans can communicate better with dolphins, not through words, but rather through other methods such as body language and gestures.

Genre # 1 A Clicking Hello

"Click-click." This is a sound that can be heard commonly amongst dolphins. It almost sounds like they are smiling and shouting a friendly hello to us. However, are dolphins really "talking" to humans or are they just fooling around? Since dolphin communication signs with humans are quite subtle and ambiguous, people have differing opinions regarding whether or not dolphins are really capable of communicating with humans. However, research has shown that d olphins certainly understand humans, although not exactly through verbal communication, but rather through the immense varieties of body languages and other signs.

It is scientifically proven that inter-species communication within dolphins, mainly initiated by the bottle-nose dolphins, is done by a special communication skill known as signature whistle. This method of communication takes place when dolphins create unique patterns of sound waves to communicate to dolphins of other species under water (Marino Lori).

Even though dolphins have no problem expressing their thoughts “verbally” with other dolphins, they have a hard time expressing themselves through signature whistles to humans because the dolphins generate sound waves that are beyond the human hearing capacity. This is why some people claim that dolphins sometimes chitter or click above water. Dolphins also use echolocation underwater to track down submerged objects using sound waves. This, to a certain extent, can also be seen as a means of communication within dolphins and other ocean mammals as well (Marino Lori).

Although dolphins cannot directly communicate with humans, their vocal capacity do share some similarity with the human vocal abilities. Foxp2, a gene in charge of language and speech can be found in vocal mammals such as dolphins. However, dolphins do not have the human-like substitutions in their genes. The scientists are still proceeding on with their research to see whether or not the vocal cords of dolphins and other verbal mammals actually hold the potential to become something like those of humans (Corrigan, Laura).

Since dolphins cannot communicate with humans verbally, they were obliged to use another method of communication: signs and body languages. According to the research, it was stated that dolphins are capable of identifying human cues by the person’s way of looking and their facial expressions (Marino Lori). This may have been the hidden key element in the fascinating performances of dolphins in local dolphin shows.

In some cases, dolphins can also understand untrained communication signs without learning them beforehand (Corrigan, Laura). For instance, dolphins can sense that their trainer, or other people that are around them, are currently unhappy with the dolphin’s performance based on their facial expressions and the way the people act.

Research also shows, through statistics and experiments, that dolphins can actually imitate human speech and behaviors very well to the point where they are sometimes even better than the apes. Can't this mean that dolphins have somewhat of a similar method of vocal communication as the humans (Dolphin Communications)?

Although dolphins cannot speak verbally due to their lack of vocal cords, their means of communication have some aspects that actually go past the human capabilities. One significance is the immense, wide, variety of sound wave frequencies that are generated by echolocation. Dolphins can produce waves that range from 0.25 to 200 kHZ in wave frequency. This is almost even unthinkable for humans because humans naturally are not capable of producing such a wide variety of sound wave frequencies (Dolphin Communications).

To sum up, dolphins are definitely able to communicate with humans but their method of communication may be a little different from speaking. However, dolphins are competent in getting their message across to the humans and understanding some basic words and other expressions to understand the intention of the humans as well. Next time there is a "click-click" sound coming from a dolphin, pay a little more attention to understand what the dolphin is really trying to say.

Works Cited -"Dolphin Communications." Delaware Beaches, Ocean City Maryland Beaches Information on Beaches-Net. 8 Sep 2009  -Corrigan, Laura (Author);, Patricia (Joint Author):Feeney, and Kathy (Joint Author) Evert. Ocean Animals [Ocean Animals].usa:NorthwordPress2009 -Marino Lori, Richard Connor. "Cetaceans Have Complex Brains for Complex Cognition." __PCos Biology__ 5.5 (2007):all

Genre # 2 "It's All Uphill From Now" Genre # 2 Introduction:

//The following diary entry is written by a dolphin trainer at a dolphin training center that had an opportunity to train a dolphin personally for the first time. She just finished being taught how to train a dolphin but had no previous experience of training her own dolphin.//

Dear diary,

Last weekend, I was granted with an exciting opportunity to finally train a dolphin of my own. Being new to this field of animal training, I only helped train other people's dolphins. It was a memorable experience but I wished I was able to train my own dolphin from the start as well. Yesterday, my dream came true.

Toby arrived in vast wooden box a week ago. She was a bottle nose dolphin, about seven and a half feet long. She was a rather young dolphin that did not have any training experience before. I just knew that we were going to get a long great.

Five days ago was Toby's first training. A more experienced trainer helped me to train Toby. Since she was so young, we were obliged to make her first few training experience interesting and memorable. At first, I did not know how to start communicating and training her. It was rather disastrous: I was running all over the place trying to play catch-me-if-you-can with Toby. Toby did not seem much inspired by my training method. She put her head down and went back to waddling in the water. We were both exhausted.

After the first training day became such a tragedy, I dreaded to go train Toby on the second day. I tried to keep up my spirits high and straddled into Toby's cage with some treats for her. In the cage, Toby did not seem very excited to see me again. She refused to move from her dark damp corner, which she adored.

The second day did not turn out any better than the first. We were not able to do much training since we were not really communicating with each other. I tried to coax Toby to do a bowing trick: "Bow Toby!", she refused. I tried to make Toby follow me around the ring, she went the other direction. When coaxing her did not work, I yelled frustratedly at Toby, hoping she would understand that I was not happy with her. Unfortunately, she did not understand. The training room was full of my frustrated screeching noise. There was no hope. We both decided to rest for the next day.

Three days ago, I was basically forced to step into the dreaded training room. I shivered, thinking of the thought of dealing with Toby again. My heavy arms and legs lagged behind as I took a deep breathe and walked into her cage. I practically dragged Toby to the training room with as much effort as I have. I kept on thinking to myself: "If it doesn't work today, Toby will have to go."

I decided to play with Toby for the first thirty minutes of training. Surprisingly, Toby seemed to be in a rather good mood today: she playfully made clicking sounds and sledded back and forth through the large room. Then, a strange thing happened. Toby was not randomly roaming around the room, she was following me around! What seemed ever so difficult and nearly impossible two days ago was done today almost effortlessly. Surprised greatly, I tried another trick that I was trying to teach Toby. However, this time, instead of screaming "bow!" out loud, I gently demonstrated a bowing motion to Toby. Obediently, she followed my demonstration. I was beaming with joy and Toby was too.

After rewarding Toby profusely by food and entertainment, I returned back to my dorm. Although me and Toby worked out more than usual yesterday, neither of us seemed to be worn out after the training. I sat on my bed, wonder what I did differently yesterday than before. Then, a spark of thought came to my mind. Previously, I was only trying to train Toby with unemotional, spoken words, that obviously Toby did not understand. I seemed to have forgotten a rudimentary aspect of dolphins: they cannot talk. Yesterday, I tried a gentler and more motion- based approach, which Toby was actually able to understand. I reflected upon our communication and performance yesterday and decided to use motion-based method more often from now.

After a couple more days of careful and entertaining training with Toby, she now even seems to understand some of the verbal words that I am using. She is very responsive to her name and other simple commands such as "follow," "quick," etc. After I really got to know Toby and work with her, we are a real team now. We can communicate effectively and effortlessly. One thing is for certain: it's all up hill from now.



Works cited

-Marino Lori, Richard Connor. "Cetaceans Have Complex Brains for Complex Cognition."__PCos Biology__ 5.5 (2007):all

 

Genre # 3 Introduction:

Since most of the components of the other two genres were rather text based, I have dedicated the third and the final genre to produce a quality visual material: collage. Each of the elements that are posted on the collage have a specific meaning. For instance, the thumbs up sign represents body signs and signatures. Other pictures either represent the natural dolphin habitat, or some of the biological components of dolphin characteristics. Please regard each element with care, for they were carefully chosen to help answer the key question: Are dolphins really able to communicate with humans?

(I could not upload this collage to internet via scanning because the collage was too big to scan. I will bring it to class tomorrow before 8:00 by hand.)

Works Cited

ns.jpg." . 25 Oct. 2009 .

. 25 Oct. 2009 .

. 25 Oct. 2009 .

. 25 Oct. 2009 .

http://images.google.co.kr/imglanding?imgurl=http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y191/stoshmaster/nowords1-1.gif&imgrefurl=http://4-eyez.livejournal.com/tag/collaboration&usg=__MOS2zgPRJimfygz2-vHEQCaDMho%3D&h=255&w=250&sz=8&hl=ko&um=1&tbnid=sTalz45DkRgKoM:&tbnh=111&tbnw=109&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dno%2Bwords%26complete%3D1%26hl%3Dko%26lr%3D%26sa%3DG%26um%3D1%26newwindow%3D1&q=no+words&complete=1&lr=&sa=G&um=1&newwindow=1&start=11

http://images.google.co.kr/imglanding?imgurl=http://www.deviantart.com/download/70045135/Dolphin_Love_by_dolphy.jpg&imgrefurl=http://dolphy.deviantart.com/art/Dolphin-Love-70045135%3Fmoodonly%3D24&usg=__Kp7juJgRIB42RdWWY4tIUElOiJ0%3D&h=578&w=800&sz=333&hl=ko&um=1&tbnid=XZI-SPpLDZWVBM:&tbnh=103&tbnw=143&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dlove%2Bdolphin%26complete%3D1%26hl%3Dko%26lr%3D%26sa%3DG%26um%3D1%26newwindow%3D1&q=love+dolphin&complete=1&lr=&sa=G&um=1&newwindow=1&start=0

Epilogue

I have always been fond of dolphins by the way they gracefully swim through the vast open waters, by their genuine smile that is always warm. However, I did not even know the first things about dolphin communications. While doing this project, by researching about dolphins and how they "talk" to others, I have learned a lot more about dolphins. This was definitely a positive experience for me and I am please to conclude that dolphins sure can communicate with humans: it is just that their method is a little different from ours. = =