The Clicking of Sperm Whales Is Actually a Sophisticated Phonetic Alphabet

Amaze Lab

Sperm whale clicking might not sound like much in a recording, but their vocalizations are the loudest on Earth, with these clicks reaching upwards of 230 decibels. Now a new analysis has revealed that those clicks are a highly sophisticated alphabet system.

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00:00these are the sounds of sperm whales they might not sound like much in a recording but sperm

00:11whale vocalizations are the loudest on earth with these clicks reaching upwards of 230 decibels

00:17that's 80 decibels louder than a jet engine so loud in fact that the bodies of divers who swim

00:22near sperm whales actually heat up from the high energy transferred via the sound waves now a new

00:27analysis has revealed that those clicks are a highly sophisticated alphabet system this is

00:35dr jacob andreas a computer science and artificial intelligence expert with mit um sperm whales

00:41communicate with each other using little bursts of clicking noises sound called codas that sound a

00:46little bit like morse code our research shows that these codas have a complex internal structure with

00:52similar similarities uh to aspects of some other animal communication systems uh and even some

00:58aspects of human language he adds that these codas have fixed patterns constructed using a few internal

01:04rhythms something he likens to music the researchers say this turns our understanding of sperm whale

01:09communications on its head as it was previously believed that the clicks were more akin to egyptian

01:13hieroglyphics with each clicking pattern pertaining to a different concept meaning we're one step closer

01:19to deciphering their language but should we even try to communicate with this vulnerable species right

01:24we're just at the very beginning of this process and i think there's a lot more research that we have

01:28to do uh before we know whether it's a good idea to try to communicate with them or really even to have

01:33a sense of whether that will be possible

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