In a groundbreaking experiment, scientists from UC Davis, the Alaska Whale Foundation, and SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) have achieved a 20-minute communicative exchange with a humpback whale named Twain. The study, published in the journal PeerJ, involved playing a “contact call” into the ocean to see if whales would respond. Contact calls are a form of greeting among whales, used for communication and location signaling.
Twain, the humpback whale, exhibited intentional responsiveness to the contact calls, matching intervals and engaging in what scientists describe as a communicative exchange. The researchers sailed off the coast of Alaska, emitting the contact call 36 times at varying intervals, and Twain consistently responded to each call, indicating a level of intentional interaction.
Laurance Doyle, a principal investigator at the SETI Institute, noted that Twain’s behavior could provide insights into how intelligent alien races might seek contact with humanity. The study aims to create intelligent filters, drawing parallels between communication with intelligent extraterrestrial life and Earth’s intelligent animals. The findings suggest that curiosity and the desire for contact are common traits among intelligent beings, whether terrestrial or extraterrestrial.
While the study sheds light on interspecies communication on Earth, it also informs the approach to detecting potential signals from extraterrestrial intelligence. By understanding communication patterns in animals, scientists can develop filters to identify intelligent signals from space, facilitating the search for contact with alien civilizations.
The scientists involved hope to extend similar communicative exchange studies to other intelligent animals on Earth, including dolphins, cooperative carnivores, and highly social species like meerkats and elephants. The research opens new avenues for exploring the diverse forms of communication and intelligence present in the animal kingdom, contributing to both terrestrial and extraterrestrial communication studies.