(Monday, July 2, 11am)
I will present current knowledge about who dolphins, whales and porpoises are: research on cetacean brains, self-awareness (including mirror self-recognition and metacognition) and what these capacities mean for their adaptation to their natural life in the oceans. I will discuss examples of how cetacean psychology is expressed through family bonds, social complexity and cultural traditions.
Marino, L., Connor, R. C., Fordyce, R. E., Herman, L. M., Hof, P. R., Lefebvre, L., ... & Rendell, L. (2007). Cetaceans have complex brains for complex cognition. PLoS biology, 5(5), e139.
Morrison, R., & Reiss, D. (2018). Precocious development of self-awareness in dolphins. PloS one, 13(1), e0189813.
It was really interesting. I found it really impressive how much we know about the dolphin’s brain. The first question that I had in mind related to this is : how? Except a brain post-mortem, how is it possible to know exactly the areas of the brain is activated during audition, vision, emotion, etc.? How do we know and conclude that there are connections between the limbic lobe (emotions) and cognition? How do we get the result that dolphins have two primary auditory cortex, among others? In human, we will mostly use fMRI to get all these results. Is it the same in dolphins? (I guess that no since they need to be in the water!)
ReplyDeletePriscilla, the way we know that there are two primary auditory regions in the brain is that we traced the connections from the inner ear all the way up to the cortex.
DeleteWhat is your feeling about which environmental changes or biological constraints could have been the mains factors leadings the emergence and evolution of dolphins cognitive abilities, brain complexification and echolocation faculties?
ReplyDeleteWe know that at about the same time that the archaeocetes died out and the new modern forms came in that there was a substantial change in ocean temperatures which produced a lot of turnover in prey availability. The newer forms began to echolocate. So those environmental changes were important factors. Dolphins became more social, I think, and social pressures continued to lead to increased social intelligence and communicative intelligence.
DeleteIs there a part of the dolphin's brain which would explain the indivduality of the animal or is it only accumulated experiences that makes who they are?
ReplyDeleteI don't think there is one part of the brain that represents individuality. It is the whole brain plus experiences over a lifetime.
DeleteJ’ai trouvé cette présentation très intéressante. Je savais que les dauphins étaient des êtres complexes, mais pas à ce point. Les dauphins sont conscients d’eux-mêmes, sont capables d’évaluer leur propre niveau d’incertitude (métacognition), sont des êtres socialement complexes, sont capables d’apprentissage, s’offrent des présents, pourraient mêmes posséder une sorte de langage complexe, etc. Ainsi, à la question de savoir si nous devrions garder en captivité (dans des cuves) ces animaux, la réponse semble aller de soi : non…
ReplyDeleteBy curiosity, what the females do with the coral gift the males are giving them as nuptial gifts? Usually, nuptial gifts consist of food or at least something that could enhance by a way or another the female fitness...
ReplyDeleteMaybe it is a little bit outside the matter of your presentation, but it could have some implications in our interpretation of some of their behaviors. I heard about some cases of interspecific altruistic behaviors in dolphin and I would like to hear your view about it. I am talking about some dolphins that could have tried to rescue humans being in danger of drowning or some other animals in distress. I heard that it could have something to do with defect in their recognition mechanism of conspecifics. What to you think about it?
ReplyDeleteThere are a number of verified examples of dolphins saving and protecting humans from predators like sharks. I think these behaviors are a natural extension of their general empathetic nature. They seem to understand when there is trouble and infer the risk to not only themselves but members of other species, like humans.
DeleteIt is very good to know a scientist who does not fear being caught in the error of anthropomorphism, because ultimately we are not able to exclude all anthropomorphism, because we are human and we cannot be different. Our criterion always will be concepted from ourselves. I think we cannot be other things but human to do science. We need to be methodologically rigorous and that’s all. Thanks for your great work and presentation!
ReplyDeleteThank you, although I do have to say that I don't see that referring to behaviors and psychology in other animals as anthropomorphism. I still do see anthropomorphism as an error. But what has changed is that the scientific evidence is narrowing down the range of psychology domains that are actually unique to humans.
DeleteThis conference was so fascinating. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteA little earlier, i've seen on The Whale Santuary Project blog that dolphin assisted therapy is mentionned. Would it be possible to get more information about it?
Thank you.
Thank you for the interesting talk! I find fascinating that different communities of dolphins and orcas have specific dialects. I was wondering if you observed or know a case of an individual who left his community to be part of another one, e.g. one that hasn’t a central role in his home social network, and has learn the dialect of his adopted community?
ReplyDeleteThank you for this fascinating talk!
ReplyDeleteFrom the perspective of evolution, I wonder what could be the cognitive effects of returning to water after having "briefly" lived on land. We had an interesting talk last week by Malcolm Maclver that adressed the shift in cognizing capacities by transiting from water to land. Implying a development in the sensory volume (of sight for example) in an environment that was favorising it (light travels easier in air than in water) and that also had more entropy, the transition from land to water arised the development of the capacity to plan (embushing a prey for instance). This would have resluted in a greater use of imagination, and capacities of representation (planning the future in some sense).
I found interesting that you stressed in your presentation that the critical shift for cetaceans occured around 30-35 million years ago, which means AFTER they had already (and for a pretty long time) returned to water. I found mr. Maclver's work interesting due to the fact that it gives a good hypothesis for the development of cognition through land species (mammals for instance). The shift that you mentionned in your talk appears to be reciprocally important relatively to the anatomic and social changes that occured among some species of the cetaceans, I however find really difficult to imagine the underwater necessity that could have provoked such a growth of the brain and of the cognitive capacities.
Une des choses que j'ai trouvé des plus captivantes dans le discours de Lori Marino est le fait qu'elle tient une opinion qui se rapproche beaucoup de la mienne. Tant dans son exposé sur les dauphins que dans la discussion du panel de cette après-midi, je remarque que Lori est très ouverte d'esprit, respecte l'opinion des autres, mais tient des questionnements que plusieurs tendent à craindre. En effet, elle questionne le fait que l'humain se mette supérieur à l'homme, entre autre en répondant à une question de l'audience sur la surpopulation en invoquant qu'il s'agit du problème des humains si ne certaine espèce domestique nous 'envahi'. En période de déménagement, je ne peux m'empêcher de penser à tous les animaux qui sont abandonnés dans cette canicule et cela me marque quand Lori dit qu'il faut éduquer les humains et mettre plus de lois/restrictions à l'appropriation d'animaux domestiques tels les chats qui sont en trop grands nombres en Australie.
ReplyDeletePlus en lien avec sa présentation personnelle sur les dauphins, j'ai été très surprise par la façon dont les mâles entourent les femelles lorsqu'ils 'want to get her'. J'ai trouvé cela super triste pour les femelles, qui doivent subir d'importantes pressions lors de ces événements, lorsqu'elles se retrouvent seules entourées de plusieurs mâles. Je n'avais aucune idée que les dauphins pouvaient être des créatures plutôt agressives et je dois avouer que comme Lori l'a apporté, je croyais qu'ils étaient très doux. Cette présentation m'a ouvert les yeux sur plusieurs points concernant ces espèces !
Je pense que l’intelligence des dauphins (et espèces apparentées) ne surprend plus personne. Le cerveau des dauphins auraient évolues pour mieux traiter les signaux sonores, d’où la présence de 2 cortex auditifs primaires et d’une certaine syntaxe dans leurs communications. Leur cerveau aurait aussi grossi et serait devenu plus gros que ne le prédit la taille de leur corps. Cette masse cérébrale supplémentaire permettrait des capacités cognitives supérieures telles que la métacognition (connaître son incertitude dans le cas du dauphin) et le «self-awareness». Étonnement, le dauphin passe aussi le test du mirroir classique, même s’il utilise surtout les ultrasons pour s’orienter.
ReplyDeleteJe ne suis pas d’accord avec le fait que les dauphins sont sur un «continuum élevée de self-awareness». Pour moi, la conscience de soi est un phénomène «tout ou rien». Cependant, les expériences de «self-awareness» sont différentes d’une espèce à l’autre
Je savais qu’ils étaient des espèces très sociales, mais je ne savais pas qu’ils avaient des sociétés aussi centralisées. Les matriarches semblent très influentes dans leur groupe et sont des leaders gardant le groupe ensemble.
L’utilisation d’outil chez les dauphins m’a aussi surpris. Je n’avais pas imaginé de contexte dans lequel ils auraient pu se servir d’outils.
Salut James!
DeleteJe suis curieux de savoir ce qui te fait appréhender le self-awareness comme un phénomène "tout ou rien".
La présentation de Michael Hendricks sur les vers (et plusieurs autres) me fait pencher pour une position contraire, soit l'idée d'un continuum de la conscience de soi, de son corps et de sa réalité objective. Avoir conscience de son corps, de ses mouvement ou de la position de ses membres est une composante de la conscience de soi il me semble et plusieurs organismes semblent la posséder (dont les vers!). Joshua Plotnik exploite d'ailleurs un complément au "self-awareness mirror test" dans un de ces articles sur les éléphants ; le "body-awareness" test, soit la reconnaissance que notre propre corps puisse constituer un obstacle dans la réalisation d'une certaine tâche. Je trouve ce complément fort intéressant dans l'emploi que l'on peut en faire auprès des espèces ne possédant pas la vue comme sens principal et ayant donc moins de chance de réussir le test du mirroir.
Sinon, l'altération de notre sens proprioceptif ou de notre conscience de nous même n'est pas difficile a reproduire par la consomation de diverses substances. Ces expériences parlent beaucoup d'elles mêmes.
J'aimerais bien entendre ce que tu penses de cela.
What I appreciated most about this presentation is Ms. Marino emphasis on the complexity of dolphins societies, specific social roles and cultural differences. The fact that, as a neuroscientist, she could integrate cultural evolution to her researches on non-human animals and present an exhaustive view of their cognitive abilities & learning processes through their social alliances & behaviors was a very educational example of multidisciplinary science. I was already inspired by her work watching the documentary Black Fish and this presentation made me even more willing to dig into cetaceans biology and cognition.
ReplyDeleteI really appreciate that you stopped doing research on captive dolphins as it is clearly not good for them to live their lives in captivity. I wonder however, how possible is it to obtain the same kind of rigorous scientific information by natural studies. What are the salient advantages and disadvantages (besides the glaring ethical issue)? Have any interesting methodologies been developed to study wild cetaceans using control groups, etc?
ReplyDeleteThank you for your comment Jeremy. In some cases there are certain types of questions that cannot be answered in the same way in free-ranging dolphins. For instance, the mirror study required so much control and manipulation of the various conditions that it would not be possible to do with the same rigor "in the wild". So, we have to accept that. However, there are a number of interesting methodologies which can be employed with free-ranging dolphins. Dr. Denise Herzing is one such researcher who has been studying a group of dolphins off the coast of Florida for decades and she interacts with them one-on-one. So sometimes giving up captive research does require a shift in the kinds of questions one can probe. But, at the same time, it calls for creativity and a rethinking of how we ask questions about dolphins in the wild that can be quite illuminating and helpful.
DeletePosting my question for the student evaluation, already had my answer from Dr. Marino: I asked about how much importance should be give to brain size and I mentionned that within primates there is huge variability even when comparing species with similar feeding behaviors, social organizations, group sizes, etc. And if she thinks that the hierarchy of animal cognition that people have in mind is based on that.
ReplyDeleteThank you for your presentation Mrs Marino! I could read on The Whale Sanctuary Project blog that dolphin assisted therapy is mentionned. Could you tell us more about it?
ReplyDeleteThank you.
Very complete and very interesting talk, with a range of many topics from the dolphin's brain and comparative cognition hypothesis with the human species to the dolphin people's culture! For those interested in additional informations, here is some interesting articles adding to Mrs Marino's topics: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7161482 (about the limbic lobe of the dolphin brain)
ReplyDeletehttps://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0003347212003806 (sponging might have been present for at least 120 years)
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ReplyDeleteThanks for the presentation.
ReplyDeleteIn the social bonds and emotions part of your speech, you gave an example of a male adult
staying with his mom and then getting adopted by his aunt. so that's how emotionnaly
he was attached to his mom...
I was wondering what is the definition of family for dolphins? Is it just
mom and calves? Do dad has a part in it? do calves recognise their dad?
Does the female stay with the same male after having calves?
Lori Marino described a pretty disturbing case where a whole group of dolphins starved themselves to death, EVEN THOUGH they were surrounded by an abundance of edible resources. Why? Presumably because the ultra-specific food resource they collectively allowed themselves to eat had run out of stock…
ReplyDeleteThis is pretty extreme, to say the least. The likely culprit, Lori stated: cultural tradition. No one will risk saying “religion” ... arguably because that’s a very human kind of culture-tradition sorta thing. Religion is so much more complex than tradition. Or is it? To think that instead of just eating something else and live to see another day, such intelligent creatures would rather die than "sin" ... >.>
At the risk of falling into bad anthropomorphism, it’s not so rare to find cases where human behavioral flexibility seems inhibited by religion in ways that are downright counterproductive to survival. As an example (that hopefully won’t offend anyone’s religious beliefs here) … I personally grew up in a cult/religion where people would refuse blood transfusions to their own children, EVEN after being told that it was the only chance of saving their child’s life. So-called "moral obligations" based on very strong (and strange) beliefs.
Who knows... Perhaps theses dolphins were part of something akin to what we humans usually refer to as "death cults" … and I’m not even kidding!
From a technical perspective, I am curious to know how you managed to MRI the brains of dolphins. More specifically, Gregory Berns, who did a talk on dogs earlier in the summer school, said that it took him an average of 6 months to train the dogs to get them to stay still in the MRI machine while they were awake. Was the same training required for dolphins? Were they awake? And if not, how do you think this affects your findings?
ReplyDeleteOn sait que les dauphins communiquent entre eux et qu'il y a même plusieurs dialectes. Sommes-nous en mesure de décripter leur langage? Sont-ils capables de communiquer des indications spatiales comme le font les abeilles? Semblent-ils communiquer pour le simple plaisir de le faire ou y a-t-il une nécessité dernière la communication (reproduction, alimentation, sécurité...)?
ReplyDelete