laboratory. A baby dolphin was being nursed in a small tank
artificially. It apparently needed the constant attention of a human
attendant. Its mother had not been caught with it. After several days it
discovered that if it banged on the bottom of the tank with its flipper
in a rhythmic fashion it could bring the humans from the other room. (We
heard a loud thumping sound transmitted from a hydrophone in its tank.)
Previous to this it attempted to bring the humans from the other room by
whistling the distress call of the dolphins; unlike its mother, the
humans did not respond to the whistle. In a sense this distress call is
in his instinctual pattern for obtaining food and aid by other dolphins.
The secondary adaptation and the new effort was that of manipulating the
flipper rather than the phonation mechanism in the blowhole. Thus driven
by whatever the instinctual need is, it tried different outputs from its
brain and finally discovered one which brought the desired results. This
ability to change the output from unsuccessful ones to successful ones
seems to me to be evidence of a “higher nervous system” function. Of
course in fine gradation and small differences, the same kind of pattern
can be shown for smaller-brained animals. It is the seeking a new
output, not necessarily instinctually tied in, and the radicalness of
the change of output, plus the relating of many of the variables to one
another thus generating the new output, that seems to be the hallmark of
the large brain. These problems are not single variable ones with simple
cause and effect, but are simultaneous multiple variable ones.
Among the manipulable outputs (muscular groups) I would include those of
respiration and phonation. The dexterous and finely differentiated use
of these muscles generates all the complexities of human speech. As more
of the physiology and psychology of human speech are analyzed and made
part of our sciences, the sharper will be our criteria for separating
man from the other animals, and from those with smaller brains.
Scientific descriptions of human speech are of relatively recent origin.
Scientific descriptions of the physiology of the vocal tract are
anything but a closed book at the present time. The neuroanatomy and
neurophysiology of speech is in a relatively primitive state of
development as a science. With such a lack of knowledge of the intimate
and detailed mechanisms concerned, it would be rather presumptuous to
evaluate at the present time their role in the measurement and testing
of intelligence and intellectual capacity.
However, I wish to point out that these factors are important in such an
evaluation and become even more important in terms of evaluating a
species that is not human. Thus it is necessary, in order to evaluate
the intelligence of even the dolphins, much less the whales, to know
something of their abilities in the areas of phonation and other kinds
of bodily gestures and manipulations and hence in their abilities to
communicate with one another. As I implied in _Man and Dolphin_, it is
not possible to measure accurately the intelligence of any other being
than that of a human being, mainly because we do not exchange ideas
through any known communication mode with such beings.
The difficulties of such understanding as we can possibly gain of the
real situation of the whales in the sea and their adaptation as mammals
to this particular environment, can be illustrated by their use of sonic
generators for the location of their prey and of the boundaries of their
container by means of the perception of echoes. As is well known, the
small mammals, such as the bat, use this mechanism in air.[9] The
bottlenose dolphin also uses this same kind of mechanism underwater.[7]
[9][10] Because these animals are immersed in a medium of a density and
a sound velocity comparable to the density and sound velocity of their
own bodies, they can presumably use their sonar also in looking, as it
were, inside one another’s body.[7] The sonar view of the inside of the
body of a dolphin may possibly be very instructive to other dolphins and
possibly even aid in diagnosis of the causes of certain problems,
especially of those of the baby by the mother. For example, their
buoyancy depends upon maintaining their center of gravity below their
center of buoyancy; otherwise they turn over and drown. If the baby
develops gas in stomach #1, he can develop problems in his buoyancy
relationship which turn him over; however, the mother dolphin can
probably easily find out whether or not there is a bubble of gas in the
baby’s stomach by her echo ranging abilities. When she discovers such a
bubble, she can then burp the baby by banging on the belly with her
beak. We have seen such operations take place in our tanks. Here is
another instance of the animal using a given output, coupled with the
proper input, to diagnose a problem and to manipulate other outputs in
the solution of that problem. How much of this is labeled “instinctual,”
i.e., “unlearned,” is purely a matter of intellectual taste.
In the sea it is necessary to use sonic mechanisms for sightings and
recognition. If one goes into the sea one realizes that one’s range of
vision even under the best of circumstances is rarely beyond 100 feet
and most of the time is less than that even near the brilliantly lit
surface of the tropical seas. With sonic means, one’s range is extended
up to several miles under the best of circumstances and under the worst
to a few hundred feet.
Recently we have obtained evidence that shows that the dolphins
communicate most of their information in the band of frequencies
extending from about 8 kilocycles to 20 kilocycles by means of whistles
and sonic clicks.[11] However, as shown by Schevill and Lawrence, they
can hear sounds at least to 120 kilocycles[12] and as shown by Kellogg
can produce sounds at least to 170 kilocycles.[10] We have recently been
investigating the higher frequency bands in these animals and have
reliable evidence that they can hear at least to 200 kilocycles and can
produce sounds to at least 200 kilocycles.[7][13] With the proper
electronic equipment one can listen to the nearer portions of the upper
band and quickly determine that they can transmit in these bands without
the necessity of transmitting in the (lower frequency) communication
band. The high frequency information is broadcast in a narrow beam off
the front of the beak as was first detected by Kenneth Norris.[14]
In these bands we find that they can produce musical tones or individual
clickings or hissing-like noises. Recently we have found that an
emotionally upset animal threatens other animals and humans by
productions of very large amounts of energy both in the sonic
communication band and in the ultrasonic bands. Recently we have had the
opportunity of working with an old bull of 450 pounds weight who is so
old his teeth have been ground down flat. In terms of his skeleton, he
is the most massive animal we have ever seen. When he is irritated, his
“barks” have sizable amounts of energy from about 0.5 to at least 300
kilocycles. He is also capable of transmitting in bands between 100 to
300 kilocycles without transmitting anything in the band from 8
kilocycles to 20 kilocycles in a narrow beam straight ahead of his body.
When he is upset by the activities of a younger male, they face one
another and blast at one another with short barks of this sort,
meanwhile “threatening” by opening their mouths.
Since they live immersed in an acoustic world quite strange to us, we
have great difficulty in appreciating the full life of these animals
with respect to one another and their environment. From birth they are
constantly bombarded with signals from the other animals of the same
species and by echoes from the environment which they can apparently use
very efficiently. Their ultrasonic (to us) emissions are not merely
“sonar,” but are interpersonal and even emotional. These animals are not
inanimate, cold pieces of sonar apparatus. They use their ultrasounds
and their high-pitched sounds interpersonally with fervor in everything
they do.[15]
We have demonstrated that the dolphins are quite capable of using vocal
outputs as a demand for further rewards or for surcease from punishment.
Their ability in the vocal sphere is quite sophisticated. In addition to
the ultrasonic matters mentioned above, their sonic performance, when in
close contact with man, is astonishing. In 1957 I discovered their
ability to produce sounds similar to our speech sounds.[16] During the
last two years we have had many opportunities to pursue further
observations in this area. This emerging ability seems to be an
adaptation to a new environment which includes Man.[17] They quickly
discover that they can obtain various kinds of rewards by making what we
now call “humanoid emissions.” When they make a sound which sounds
similar to a human syllable or word, we express our pleasure by
rewarding the animals in various ways. We have been exploring what some
of these rewards are in order to elicit further such behavior under
better control.
[Illustration: Figure 1. _A 16th-Century Impression of a Whale_ (by
Konrad Gesner).
Notice the four large human-like breasts, the two long tubes on top
of the head, the beetling brow, the misplaced giant eye, the teeth
and the doglike snarling facial expression, the rays in the tail.
None of these exist in any known modern whale or dolphin or
porpoise. All modern whales, dolphins, and porpoises have two teats,
at the genital slit only, which are long and narrow, not
hemispherical; the blowhole slits are flush with the skin at the
true forehead; the relatively small eyes are at the posterior angle
of the jaw; baleen whales have no teeth; large toothed whales have
only a few teeth; no “facial” expression is detectable on whales,
dolphins, or porpoises; the tale flukes of all species are smooth
skinned, not rayed like a fish.]
NAVTAE IN DORSA CETORVM, QVAE INSVLAS PVTANT,
anchoras figentes sæpe periclitantur. Hos cetos Trolual sua lingua
appellant, Germanice _Teüffelwal_.
[Illustration: Figure 2. _An Improved Portrayal of a Whale_ (Gilliam
van de GouWen, 1598).
Apparently this is a toothed whale, a sperm whale. The lower body
(flukes, penis, lower jaw and moth and teeth) is quite accurate. The
ear is fanciful, as is the eye.]
[Illustration: Figure 3. _Whaling in the 19th Century._
Sperm whale being lanced and blowing blood. (Painting in the
collection of the Old Dartmouth Historical Society, New Bedford
Whaling Museum, New Bedford, Mass.; copy through the courtesy of
Phillip Purrington, Curator.)]
[Illustration: Figure 4. _Whaling in the 19th Century._
A sperm whale is attacking a whale boat with his jaws after being
provoked by Man. There is no record of an unprovoked attack on a man
or a boat or a ship by a whale. (Courtesy of Phillip Purrington, New
Bedford.)]
[Illustration: Figure 5. _One of the First Drawings of a Porpoise’s
(Phocaena) Brain_ (Gottfried Reinhold Trediramus, 1818).
This is an anterior view. The hemispheres are artificially separated
for unknown reasons. The optic nerves and tracts are shown. The
complex fissuration is obvious. (Courtesy of Dr. Mary A. B. Brazier,
UCLA.)]
[Illustration: Figure 6. _Early Drawings of the Brain of the Dolphin
and of the Porpoise by Tiedemann._
These drawings were reproduced by H. G. L. Reichenbach in his
_Anatomia Mammalium_ in 1845. These are more accurate renditions and
show the lateral expansion of these fine brains. (Courtesy of the
Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.)]
[Illustration: Figure 7. _The First 20th-Century Drawing of a
Dolphin Brain_ (G. Elliot Smith, 1902).
Lateral view. The proportions are excellent, as are the gyri and
sulci. Smith gives the species as _Delphinus tursio_; this probably
corresponds to the modern _Tursiops truncatus_ or bottlenose
dolphin. This brain closely resembles that of _Tursiops_ shown in
photos in reference 7. Langworthy’s 1931 drawings (“Porpoise”) are
also similar (Brain, 54, 225, 1931).]
[Illustration: Figure 8. _Mesial View of Same Brain as in Figure
7._]
We demonstrated that, like other animals, the monkey, the rat, etc.,
these animals can be rewarded by stimulating the proper places in their
brains.[16][18] In a recent series of experiments we have been
establishing the controls necessary to understanding what brain rewards
mean in terms of natural physiology. We have demonstrated quite formally
that rubbing the skin of these animals with our hands is a rewarding
experience to them; they will seek it vocally and by body gestures and
give certain kinds of performance in order to obtain this reward.
Recently we have found that “vocal transactions” are a reward to these
animals.[7][13] (See below for human analogies in the child.) This seems
to be one of the basic factors in our being able to elicit humanoid
emissions. The vocal transactions are started by a human shouting some
words over the water of the tank in which the animal is residing. A
single word may be used or many words—it makes little difference.
Eventually the animal in the tank will raise his blowhole out of water
and make some sort of a humanoid emission or whistle or clicks in a
delphinese fashion. If the human immediately replies with some word or
words, the animal may immediately respond, the human answers, and a
vocal transaction is under way. We have shown that dolphins naturally do
this with one another in both their whistle and clicking spheres, and
sometimes do it in the barking sphere.[13] How much of this is
“instinctual” and how much is not, there is no way of knowing at the
present time.
A physical analysis of such vocal transactions shows them to be formally
quite as complex as the vocal transactions between human beings. In
other words, the dolphin may say one word or a syllable-like emission,
or many, one right after the other, as may the humans. If the human says
one word, the dolphin may say one, two, three, or four, and if the human
says one, two, three, or four, the dolphin may say one. There is no
necessary master-slave kind of relationship in the delphinic emissions.
In our early reports we gave examples which were single words which
sounded like the words that the human made.[16][7] This presentation led
to misunderstandings among our scientific colleagues. It looked as if
the animals were doing a slavish tape-recorder rendition of what we were
doing in a fashion similar to that of a parrot or a Mynah bird. All
along we have known that the dolphins did not do such a slavish job and
were obviously doing a much more complicated series of actions. We are
just beginning to appreciate how to analyze and what to analyze in these
transactions. As I stated in _Man and Dolphin_ about 10% of these
emissions sound like human speech. In other words, the dolphin is
“saying” far more than we have transmitted to the scientific community
to date. We hesitate to say anything more about this until we begin to
understand what is going on in greater detail. We are making progress
slowly.
Let me then make an appeal to you—a long appeal to your logical and
rational views of man and cetaceans. Here I review the above points in
more general terms, and develop a plea for a new science—a new
discipline combining the best of science with the best of the
humanities.
Several old questions should be revived and asked again with a new
attitude, with more modern techniques of investigation and with more
persistence. It may take twenty years or more to develop good answers;
meanwhile the intellectual life of man will profit in the undertaking.
There is something exciting and even at times disturbing in this
quest.[19] The bits and pieces may have started before historical times.
In each age of man a new fragment was allowed to be recorded and passed
on to subsequent generations. Each generation judged and rejudged the
evidence from the older sources on the basis of its then current beliefs
and on the basis of its new experiences, if any. At times good evidence
was attenuated, distorted, and even destroyed in the name of the then
current dogma.
Today we have similar problems; our current beliefs blind us, too.
Evidence right before the eye can be distorted by the eye of the
beholder quite as powerfully as it has been in previous ages of man. We
can only hope that we have achieved greater insight and greater
objectivity than some of our ancestors. The winds and currents of bias
and prejudice blow hard and run deep in the minds of men. In one’s own
mind these factors are difficult to see, and when seen, difficult to
attenuate and to allow for their influence. If at times I scold my own
species, do not take it too personally; I am scolding myself more than
you.
You can see by now that I believe that some of the answers to the quest
are in our own minds. We must develop, imaginatively and humbly, numbers
of alternative hypotheses to expand the testable areas of the intellect
and bring to the investigation new mental instruments to test and to
collect facts germane to our questions.
To ask about the intelligence of another species, we somehow first ask:
how large and well-developed is its brain? Somewhat blindly we link
brain size (a biological fact) to intelligence (a behavioral and
psychological concept). We know, in the case of our own species, that if
the brain fails to develop, intelligence also fails to develop.
How do we judge in our own species that intelligence develops or fails
to develop? We work with the child and carefully observe its
performances of common tasks and carefully measure its acquisition of
speech quantitatively. We measure (among other factors) size of word
vocabulary, adequacy of pronunciation, lengths of phrases and sentences,
appropriateness of use, levels of abstraction achieved, and the quality
of the logical processes used. We also measure speed of grasping new
games with novel sets of rules and strategy; games physical and/or games
verbal and vocal.
Normal mental growth patterns of human children have been measured
extensively in both performance and in vocal speech acquisition. I have
taken the liberty of relating these to the normal growth of brain weight
of children.
TABLE I
Threshold Quantities for Human Acquisition of Speech: Age and Brain
Weight[7]
_Age_ _Brain _Speech stages_[9] (_first appearances_)
(_months_) weight_[8]
(_grams_)
2 480 Responds to human voice, cooing, and
vocalizes pleasure.
4 580 Vocal play. Eagerness and displeasure
expressed vocally.
6 660 Imitates sounds.
9 770 First word.
11 850 Imitates syllables and words. Second word.
13 930 Vocabulary expands rapidly.
17 1,030 Names objects and pictures.
21 1,060 Combines words in speech.
23 1,070 Uses pronouns, understands prepositions,
uses phrases and sentences.
[7]Lilly, John C. _Man and Dolphin: A Developing Relationship_. London:
Victor Gollancz, 1962.
[8]Boston Children’s Hospital data from 1,198 records, in Coppoletta,
J.M., and Wolbach, S.B., “Body Length and Organ Weights of Infants
and Children,” _American Journal of Pathology_, IX (1933), 55-70.
[9]Summarized from McCarthy, Dorothea, “Language Development in
Children,” in Carmichael, Leonard, ed., _Manual of Child
Psychology_. New York: John Wiley, 1946, pp. 476-581.
Table 1 shows relations between age, brain weight, and speech
performance, up to 23 months, 1070 grams, and the use of full sentences.
By 17 years, the brain reaches and levels off at 1450 grams and the
number of words, levels of abstraction, etc., are so large as to be
difficult to assess.
In these processes, what are the minimum necessary but not necessarily
sufficient factors?[20] On the biological side, modern theory
concentrates on two factors: total numbers of neurons and the number of
interconnections between them. On the psychological side, modern theory
concentrates on the numbers of occurrences of reinforced contingencies
experienced, the number of repetitions, and the number of adequate
presentations from the accepted set of the consensus known as “native
language,” and the total numbers of sets in the stored memories at a
given age. In addition, of course, is the adequate development of the
transmitting and of the receiving equipment needed for speech and its
ancillary behaviors.
On the biological side, modern neurology says the number of neurons in
the human brain reaches maximum value before birth at about 13 billions.
After this point, the increase in weight consists of increased numbers
of fibers, increased connections, increased size of elements, and
increased efficiency and selectivity of transmission. Thus the increase
in weight of the human brain from about 400 to 1400 grams seems to be
devoted to improving its internal (as well as external) communication,
storage, and computation networks. As I have stated elsewhere (_Man and
Dolphin_), it is my impression that there exist critical threshold
values in the brain’s growth pattern at which certain kinds of
performance become possible. Complex speech acquisition seems related to
brain weights of 800 to 1000 grams, but no smaller. This assumes, of
course, numbers of neurons (10¹⁰) and numbers of connections and
opportunities for learning and time to learn commonly found with humans.
The critical psychological factors in speech acquisition are slowly
being dug out and described.[21][22] Among these the most important seem
to be a continuous background of presentations to the child in rewarding
circumstances of speech and its close relations to objects, actions,
satisfaction of needs, and persons. Imitation of one’s use of facial and
vocal apparatus appears spontaneously in the happy child. The virtuosity
of the child as a mimic is truly astonishing.
I am also impressed by evidence for what I call the “transactional
drive.” A bright child seems to seek and respond best to those persons
who respond in kind, back and forth in exchanges of sounds and linked
actions. For example, if one starts such a transaction with a child of
22 months with a loud word, if he is ready, he may return his version of
the word or a slight variant; if one replies with another variant the
child replies with still a third, or even suddenly with a new word, and
so on back and forth in a transactional vocal dance. Or one may reply to
a child who invites such an exchange to begin. Such exchanges seem to
function as rewards of themselves, and hence the name, “transactional
drive.” This phenomenon is more than mere mechanical slavish mimicry. It
seems to aid in perfecting pronunciation, increases vocabulary,
increases the bonds with other persons, serves to substitute the
“consensus-dictionary” words for the private baby words, and is thus
essential to learning a language of one’s own species. It is thus that
the child “becomes human.”
As the child ages and grows, the exchanges lengthen, and the time during
which each member of the dyad is quiet while the other speaks becomes
longer, until finally for a half hour or so, I am lecturing and you are
at least quiet, if not listening.
How does all of this relate to modern dolphins, porpoises, and whales?
From the vast array of scientific facts and theories about our own
species, a few of those which I feel are useful in approaching another
species to evaluate its intelligence are discussed above. But before I
make connections there, let us attenuate some interfering attitudes and
points of view, some myths not so modern; these interfering presumptions
can be stated as follows:
(1) No animal has a language comparable to a human language.
(2) No animal is as intelligent as man.
(3) Man can adapt himself to any environment quite as well as any
animal.
(4) Intelligence and intellect can be expressed only in the ways man
expresses or has expressed them.
(5) All animal behavior is instinct-determined.
(6) None of man’s thought and behavior is so determined.
(7) Only man thinks and plans; animals are incapable of having a
mental life.
(8) Philosophy and contemplative and analytic thought are
characteristic only of man, not of any animal.