8/20/25
8/16/25
SPERM WHALES ARE IN CONSTANT COMMUNICATION WITH EACH OTHER EVEN AS THEY HUNT
BBC COM : SPERM WHALE PHONETICS check out the video too!
EXCERPT: Sperm whales live in multi-level, matrilineal societies - groups of daughters, mothers and grandmothers – while the males roam the oceans, visiting the groups to breed. They are known for their complex social behavior and group decision - making, which requires sophisticated communication. For example, they are able to adapt their behavior as a group when protecting themselves from predators like orcas or humans.
Sperm whales communicate with each other using rhythmic sequences of clicks, called codas. It was previously thought that sperm whales had just 21 coda types. However, after studying almost 9,000 recordings, the Ceti researchers identified 156 distinct codas. They also noticed the basic building blocks of these codas which they describe as a "sperm whale phonetic alphabet" – much like phonemes, the units of sound in human language which combine to form words.
EXCERPT: Sperm whales live in multi-level, matrilineal societies - groups of daughters, mothers and grandmothers – while the males roam the oceans, visiting the groups to breed. They are known for their complex social behavior and group decision - making, which requires sophisticated communication. For example, they are able to adapt their behavior as a group when protecting themselves from predators like orcas or humans.
Sperm whales communicate with each other using rhythmic sequences of clicks, called codas. It was previously thought that sperm whales had just 21 coda types. However, after studying almost 9,000 recordings, the Ceti researchers identified 156 distinct codas. They also noticed the basic building blocks of these codas which they describe as a "sperm whale phonetic alphabet" – much like phonemes, the units of sound in human language which combine to form words.
...........................Pratyusha Sharma, a PhD student at MIT and lead author of the study, describes the "fine-grain changes" in vocalisations the AI identified. Each coda consists of between three and 40 rapid-fire clicks. The sperm whales were found to vary the overall speed, or the "tempo", of the codas, as well as to speed up and slow down during the delivery of a coda, in other words, making it "rubato". Sometimes they added an extra click at the end of a coda, akin, says Sharma, to "ornamentation" in music. These subtle variations, she says, suggest sperm whale vocalisations could carry a much much richer amount of information than previously thought.
8/9/25
SPERM WHALE COMMUNICATION CODA'S
TECHNOLOGY REVIEW COM : THE WAY SPERM WHALES COMMUNICATE check out the article and the video!
EXCERPT: But there’s also a lot we don’t know about them, including what they may be trying to say to one another when they communicate using a system of short bursts of clicks, known as codas. Now, new research published in Nature Communications today suggests that sperm whales’ communication is actually much more expressive and complicated than was previously thought.
A team of researchers led by Pratyusha Sharma at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) working with Project CETI, a nonprofit focused on using AI to understand whales, used statistical models to analyze whale codas and managed to identify a structure to their language that’s similar to features of the complex vocalizations humans use. Their findings represent a tool future research could use to decipher not just the structure but the actual meaning of whale sounds.
The team analyzed recordings of 8,719 codas from around 60 whales collected by the Dominica Sperm Whale Project between 2005 and 2018, using a mix of algorithms for pattern recognition and classification. They found that the way the whales communicate was not random or simplistic, but structured depending on the context of their conversations. This allowed them to identify distinct vocalizations that hadn’t been previously picked up on.
EXCERPT: But there’s also a lot we don’t know about them, including what they may be trying to say to one another when they communicate using a system of short bursts of clicks, known as codas. Now, new research published in Nature Communications today suggests that sperm whales’ communication is actually much more expressive and complicated than was previously thought.
A team of researchers led by Pratyusha Sharma at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) working with Project CETI, a nonprofit focused on using AI to understand whales, used statistical models to analyze whale codas and managed to identify a structure to their language that’s similar to features of the complex vocalizations humans use. Their findings represent a tool future research could use to decipher not just the structure but the actual meaning of whale sounds.
***
Are you practicing your clicks?
MINKE WHALE DIES : SANDBAR : BOATS : STARVATION? : WHALE STRANDINGS DRAMATIC INCREASE
It appears that a Minke whale may have been starving, come close to shore, got stranded on a sandbar, and in it's struggle to get free, hit into a boat, throwing a boat occupant.. Here's the coverage by Newsweek.
NEWSWEEK : MINKE WHALES DIES AFTER BOAT COLLISION
Excerpt: However, vessel strikes, entanglement, and habitat disturbances remain significant threats to whales along the eastern seaboard.
U.S. maritime law, specifically the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972, prohibits the harassment, hunting, capturing, or killing of marine mammals. The law includes specific rules for recreational and commercial vessels, requiring operators to avoid approaching whales within 100 yards and to reduce speed in certain areas to minimize the risk of collisions.
CBS NEWS: MINKE WHALE DEATH EXAMINATION RESULTS
Excerpts: The whale was 26 feet, 4 inches long and confirmed to be an adult female. The MMSC said the whale's body condition was thin. It also had "superficial cuts" externally and "bruising present in the blubber and muscle in the areas of trauma on the dorsal side." Blood was also present in the whale's lungs, according to the MMSC. .... "GI tract was empty with very little digestive material present, and a scant amount of fecal matter," the MMSC wrote. "Lesions were present in the stomach."
8/5/25
SETI PROJECT : HUMPBACK WHALES BLOW RINGS ON THE SURFACE OF THE OCEAN
Excerpt: June 5, 2025, Mountain View, CA -- A team of scientists from the SETI Institute and the University of California at Davis documented, for the first time, humpback whales producing large bubble rings, like a human smoker blowing smoke rings, during friendly interactions with humans. This previously little studied behavior may represent play or communication. Humpback whales are already known for using bubbles to corral prey and creating bubble trails and bursts when competing to escort a female whale. These new observations show humpback whales producing bubble rings during friendly encounters with humans. This finding contributes to the WhaleSETI team’s broader goal of studying non-human intelligence to aid in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence.
SETI NEWS : WHALES BLOW SMOKE RINGS
8/2/25
WHALE LANGUAGE ! WHALE SETI : SCIENTISTS HAD A CONVERSATION WITH AN ALASKAN WHALE
SETI ORG WHALE SETI : WHALE LANGUAGE
YES! SETI IS MOST COMMONLY THOUGHT OF AS A PROJECT THAT WILL MEAN COMMUNICATION WITH CREATURES NOT OF THIS EARTH. In my opinion communication with the whales is more valuable...
EXCERPT: December 12, 2023, Mountain View, CA -- A team of scientists from the SETI Institute, University of California Davis and the Alaska Whale Foundation, had a close encounter with a non-human (aquatic) intelligence. The Whale-SETI team has been studying humpback whale communication systems in an effort to develop intelligence filters for the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. In response to a recorded humpback ‘contact’ call played into the sea via an underwater speaker, a humpback whale named Twain approached and circled the team’s boat, while responding in a conversational style to the whale ‘greeting signal.’ During the 20-minute exchange, Twain responded to each playback call and matched the interval variations between each signal.
YES! SETI IS MOST COMMONLY THOUGHT OF AS A PROJECT THAT WILL MEAN COMMUNICATION WITH CREATURES NOT OF THIS EARTH. In my opinion communication with the whales is more valuable...
EXCERPT: December 12, 2023, Mountain View, CA -- A team of scientists from the SETI Institute, University of California Davis and the Alaska Whale Foundation, had a close encounter with a non-human (aquatic) intelligence. The Whale-SETI team has been studying humpback whale communication systems in an effort to develop intelligence filters for the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. In response to a recorded humpback ‘contact’ call played into the sea via an underwater speaker, a humpback whale named Twain approached and circled the team’s boat, while responding in a conversational style to the whale ‘greeting signal.’ During the 20-minute exchange, Twain responded to each playback call and matched the interval variations between each signal.
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