Short Summary: Do elephants and other animals have language-like abilities, such as the ability to use individual names to refer to themselves and others?
About the guest: Michael Pardo, PhD studies animal behavior at Cornell University, where he focused on animal communication and cognition. His work includes extensive field research with African elephants in Kenya.
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Episode Summary: Michael Pardo, PhD talks about his research on animal communication, focusing on whether African savanna elephants use vocal "names" to address each other. They explore the broader context of vocal communication across species like dolphins, parrots, and marmosets, discussing how these systems compare to human language and what they reveal about its evolution. Dr. Pardo shares details of his fieldwork in Kenya, elephant social structures, and their behaviors like mourning the dead, while also touching on the challenges and joys of studying animals in their natural habitats.
Key Takeaways:
Elephants may use unique vocal rumbles to address specific individuals, supported by machine learning analysis and playback experiments showing stronger responses to calls meant for them.
Dolphins use signature whistles as "calling cards," sometimes imitating others’ whistles to get their attention, hinting at a form of naming.
Elephant society features female-led family groups and dispersing males, with mating driven by female choice during estrus and male dominance tied to size and age.
Elephants show intriguing behaviors like visiting carcasses and covering them with dirt, suggesting an awareness of death uncommon in most animals.
Human language evolution may have evolved gradually from simpler communication systems, as seen in various species, rather than emerging suddenly.
Studying less charismatic animals like chickens or Japanese tits could uncover surprisingly complex communication, broadening our understanding of cognition in nature.
Related episode:
M&M #20: Language, Symbolic Cognition, Evolution, Origins of the Human Mind | Terrence Deacon
*Not medical advice.
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Episode transcript below.
Episode Chapters:
00:00:00 Intro
00:05:28 Defining Language
00:10:26 Naming in Animals
00:15:46 Dolphin Whistles
00:22:07 Elephant Vocalizations
00:29:15 Elephant Rumbles
00:35:14 Rumble Contexts
00:42:24 Field Methods
00:49:18 Playback Experiments
00:57:04 Field Observations
01:04:29 Elephant Society
01:12:05 Mating Behavior
01:20:35 Social Cognition
01:27:01 Other Species
01:34:40 Current Work
Full AI-generated transcript below. Beware of typos & mistranslations!
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