Alien Says What?

Big Picture Science

Science, Technology

4.6 • 986 Ratings

🗓️ 12 February 2024

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Whales are aliens on Earth; intelligent beings who have skills for complex problem-solving and their own language. Now in what’s being called a breakthrough, scientists have carried on an extended conversation with a humpback whale. They share the story of this remarkable encounter, their evidence that the creature understood them, and how the experiment informs our Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. After all, what good is it to make contact with ET if we can’t communicate? Guests: Brenda McCowan – Research behaviorist at the University of California Davis in the School of Veterinary Medicine who studies the ecological aspects of animal behavior and communication. Fred Sharpe – whale biologist and behavioral ecologist at Simon Fraser University and member of the Templeton Whale SETI Team. Laurance Doyle – astrophysicist and information theory researcher at the SETI Institute. Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support! Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact [email protected] to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to an airwave media podcast.
0:05.0	Get ready to geek out.
0:07.0	The Wired Science Podcast explores all the latest and greatest in science,
0:12.0	everything from strange diseases and biological breakthroughs
0:15.6	to interesting tech and mysteries in outer space.
0:18.7	Listen to Wired Science today
0:20.5	wherever you get your podcasts.
0:22.2	That's Wired Science, wherever you get your podcasts. That's Wired Science wherever you get your
0:24.5	podcasts. The world is filled with many questions such as did giants exist?
0:29.7	What is junk DNA? Does it mean that you're trash?
0:33.0	Do you ever wonder if aliens have underwater bases in our oceans and that's why there are so many
0:38.3	UFO sightings off the coast of islands all over the world? How serious even is climate change and when should we start building our rafts?
0:47.0	Hello everyone, you may recognize me as Gabby from the History of Everything podcast.
0:51.0	And my name is Brenna, and you don't recognize me from anything yet.
0:55.0	Together we're two scientists who explore the answers to these questions and many
0:59.0	many more in our new podcast Mystery of Everything Available everywhere you get your podcasts. We know that whales and other cetaceans like dolphins are very smart.
1:19.0	We've observed their playful behavior, their reasoning and problem-solving skills, and their keen memories.
1:31.2	But perhaps our greatest area of interest concerns their ability to communicate.
1:35.6	We're trying to decode whale communication to find out not only what they're talking
1:40.4	about in terms of semantics, but also how complex it is, trying to determine
1:45.1	how much rule structure is involved in whale communication, and so what kinds of messages
1:50.3	can they actually produce and how complex can they be.
	...

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