Dolphin games
Category: Organisms
Posted on: January 20, 2008 2:01 PM, by PZ Myers
Dolphins are really, really good at blowing bubbles.
(hat tip to Hank)
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Comments
Wow. Just freakin' wow. It's Gandalf became a dolphin...
Posted by: Moses | January 20, 2008 2:09 PM
Years ago (decades, actually) I did a freshman physics-lab project on the dynamics of ring-shaped bubbles, after watching dolphins do this at Sea World.
Posted by: Gregory Kusnick | January 20, 2008 2:32 PM
That's just amazingly cool! Nothing else to say.
Posted by: Dahan | January 20, 2008 2:32 PM
I was talking to my dad last night, about the underwater coolness video from the other day and "Your Inner Fish" (both our copies arrived yesterday--I'm only about 110 pages or so in) and I just said, "You know, the more you learn about it, the cooler this world becomes."
I just love sitting watching these videos and being amazed at the world around me...and I'm having a shitload of fun doing so.
Posted by: MAJeff | January 20, 2008 2:38 PM
No, no, no, you're doing it all wrong. You atheist and sciencey types are supposed to be draining all the mystery and wonder and joy out of the universe, not reveling in it.
Posted by: Sophist, FCD | January 20, 2008 2:50 PM
That's actually a cdesign halo.
Posted by: danley | January 20, 2008 2:58 PM
That's awesome! :)
Posted by: James | January 20, 2008 3:00 PM
Somebody just boarded train WOO WOO on that site:
Dolphins may be mental/spiritual beings, with each sub-brain acting as a quantum computer, and both of them together interacting, through interference, to give a perspective Dolphin vision of the Many-Worlds by acting like a device designed by Andrew Gray.
http://www.vald... org / hamsmith/ Dolphin.html *
*Link was already borked.
Man... how would a dolphin brain work.. on weeeeeddd?
Posted by: Niobe | January 20, 2008 3:01 PM
I'd never even heard of dolphins doing this. Even aside from my surprise at the fact that such things are possible, the way the dolphin just snatches another bubble ring off the larger one, and continues on with it ... freakin' amazing. I wish I could see that quick movement slowed down, to know just what he's doing.
I'm also curious: There's a moment when the dolphin seems to deliberately aim his melon at the ring. Is he "looking" at it sonically? Or is there some useful flow effect near the melon that helps stabilize the thing? Is there some sonic effect, a beam of sound or whatever, that he's projecting at the thing?
Also, it appears the other dolphins sort of respect the artist -- I notice they seem to take care when drifting past not to upset the ring with their own tail turbulence.
Finally, I notice only one dolphin at a time is doing it. Is it the same dolphin? I wonder if this is easy, something any dolphin could quickly pick up, or if there's a considerable amount of technique or artistry involved, and only "masters" can accomplish it.
Posted by: Hank Fox | January 20, 2008 3:02 PM
No, no, no, you're doing it all wrong. You atheist and sciencey types are supposed to be draining all the mystery and wonder and joy out of the universe, not reveling in it.
I was thinking about this. There's this strain in sociological thought, drawing on Weber, about how social organization based in scientific rationality--and the continuous attempt to strip away the mystification from life and the world--results in a form of disenchantment. The more I dig into this sort of stuff, the more enchanted I am--not because of any magical woo, but because it's just so fucking cool (along with lots of other things).
Mysteries are to be solved, not reveled in. And that process of solving mysteries, of really looking at the world around you (I really like Shubin's description of learning to see teeth and how it becomes a form of tacit knowledge), that's engaging, enchanting, amazing, and enjoyable (as well as tedious, dull....).
Posted by: MAJeff | January 20, 2008 3:06 PM
Vow... amazing... thanks for sharing!
Posted by: Ali | January 20, 2008 3:27 PM
Scientific American had a great article about this behavior a few years ago, but still photos didn't do it justice.
Posted by: O-dot-O | January 20, 2008 3:38 PM
It's not just dolphins. I've seen the beluga whales at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago doing the same kind of thing, with rings and other bubbles too, though they had less straight line water space to work in (belugas are fairly shallow water creatures for much of their lives, so their habitat is different from what's usual for captive dolphins.) That's been a good ten years now though, so I have no idea if their current belugas do this too. I wonder if this is an aspect of cetacean behavior that's actually fairly widespread and has just been overlooked until relatively recently, by being classed as "play".
Posted by: Stwriley | January 20, 2008 3:42 PM
Dolphins may be mental/spiritual beings, with each sub-brain acting as a quantum computer, and both of them together interacting, through interference, to give a perspective Dolphin vision of the Many-Worlds by acting like a device designed by Andrew Gray.
No, really, I think he may be on to something. Dolphins may very well be attempting to communicate with us. Trying to tell us how to build a stargate.
What?
Posted by: RamblinDude | January 20, 2008 4:07 PM
Does any physicist or fluid dynamicist or dolphin who may be reading have an easy-to-understand explanation of how these ring bubbles are so stable and motile?
points will be taken off for mixing of quantum mechanics and brains, unless Douglas Adams is involved.
Posted by: Mark (Monty) Montague | January 20, 2008 4:08 PM
Dolphins rescued me when my raft sank, and they told me to always vote Republican!
Posted by: cory | January 20, 2008 4:13 PM
There's a moment when the dolphin seems to deliberately aim his melon at the ring. Is he "looking" at it sonically? Or is there some useful flow effect near the melon that helps stabilize the thing? Is there some sonic effect, a beam of sound or whatever, that he's projecting at the thing?
To me it looked like he was just adding air from his blow hole to expand it but I'm no expert.
Posted by: Niobe | January 20, 2008 4:33 PM
The business of breaking off little rings with the nose is (I'm guessing) sort of analogous to magnetic fields lines crossing and forming loops. Loops are more stable than linear vortices so the ends will try to join up if they can.
There's actually a whole literature on this sort of thing in superfluid liquid helium, where the vortices are friction-free and have well-defined quantum states, like paired electrons in a superconductor.
In this video I'm guessing there must be a current in the water to keep the bubbles moving horizontally instead of floating up to the surface. Or maybe the dolphin recruits a friend to swim ahead so he can blow bubbles into the slipstream and herd them along with his own bow wave.
Posted by: Gregory Kusnick | January 20, 2008 4:42 PM
Niobe -
I think the dolphin just blasted a water jet through the middle of the ring there to increase the spin.
Most of the ring creation, etc, is lovely, but fairly simple, "inject a fast moving stream into the slow moving stuff, while capturing some air." You can do similar things in the bathtub.
But the breaking off a little ring of air from a big ring with just a nose twitch - now that is elegant.
Posted by: gorobei | January 20, 2008 5:13 PM
Given their prodigious skills with ultrasound, I can't help but think there's more to the bubbles than just air from their blowholes.
Posted by: Thanny | January 20, 2008 6:39 PM
All higher order animals play in a sophisticated fashion.
Posted by: BMurray | January 20, 2008 6:43 PM
Posted by: Gregory Kusnick | January 20, 2008 7:02 PM
I'd love to read that, Jeff; do you have a cite?
I googled and PubMedded:
shubin teeth tacit knowledge
without finding it.
Posted by: thalarctos | January 20, 2008 8:18 PM
I think he pulled it from Shubin's book, which he is reading currently.
a book that is sounding more and more like a worthwhile read.
Posted by: Ichthyic | January 20, 2008 8:38 PM
d'oh! I bet you're right. I've been holding off ordering it as an incentive to finish writing; now I can work it in as a source!
now where'd I put that credit card?
Posted by: thalarctos | January 20, 2008 8:47 PM
shubin teeth tacit knowledge
The story about learning to see teeth is chapter 4 in Your Inner Fish. I applied the term "tacit knowledge," which basically refers to the sorts of things we know (how to recognize a tooth) but that we can't always explain explicitly. The "I know what I'm doing but I'd have a hard time describing it" type of thing. (Something I've drawn from the soc of science literature)
Posted by: MAJeff | January 20, 2008 8:53 PM
actually, "tacit knowledge" is what I wrote in the margin as I was reading that section :)
Posted by: MAJeff | January 20, 2008 8:54 PM
MAJeff,
Do you recommend "Your Inner Fish"
I already have a big stack of books to read but if it is good I will add to it.
Posted by: spurge | January 20, 2008 9:43 PM
So, far? Absolutely.
Like I said, only about 110 pages in, and will have a fuller write up over at my place.
Early thoughts, though: It's incredibly accessible, quite entertaining, and draws together several areas of inquiry. Does a nice job of describing the techniques involved in very understandable terms, and really makes the ways that connections and similarities within bodies are tied to evolutionary processes, while making clear the real relatedness of life. Again, it's one of those, the more you learn about the world, the cooler it is, type of things. I'm having a blast reading it.
Posted by: MAJeff | January 20, 2008 9:50 PM
Thanks MAJeff
It sounds like something I would like.
I might try and pick it up this week.
Posted by: spurge | January 20, 2008 10:02 PM
Bob
Posted by: Bob O'H | January 21, 2008 1:00 AM
I wonder if this has to do with captive cetaceans being given hoops to play with, which I've seen at a couple of parks, and then going on to use the media with which they are familiar to create playthings.
Of course, if this has been documented in the wild, or at facilities in which natural conditions are replicated, I am answered.
Still really cool, and reminds me of my son as a toddler making things which would not otherwise be balls, become balls, just so he could play with them.
Posted by: Autumn | January 21, 2008 2:48 AM
If dolphins had hands like us... Who knows what they would have been capable of...
Hey! Didn't Basilosaurus have some fingered hindlimbs? Maybe we can invoke some avatar! :-)
Never mind...
Posted by: Fedor | January 21, 2008 4:39 AM
If dolphins had hands like us...
sung to the tune of:
"If God was one of us"
somebody clever with verse would have to fill in the rest, though.
Posted by: Ichthyic | January 21, 2008 4:56 AM
So long, and thanks for all the fish
Posted by: Saber | January 21, 2008 8:55 AM
"If dolphins had hands like us... Who knows what they would have been capable of... "
The Onion is way ahead of you: Dolphins evolve opposable thumbs - 'Oh shit,' says humanity
Posted by: Ginger Yellow | January 21, 2008 10:43 AM
I, for one, welcome our new bubble-blowing overlords.
Posted by: Raynfala | January 21, 2008 11:28 AM
I work at the Vancouver Aquarium, and this behaviour is common in our belugas, but no less amazing. They can keep a ring of bubbles going for as long as they want. Amazing creatures.
Posted by: Lola | January 21, 2008 12:40 PM
This is SO much cooler than watching them jump out of the water and doing flips and stuff! Kinda like the difference between watching a ballet and a car chase.
Sea World, are you listening??
Posted by: dwarf zebu | January 21, 2008 2:18 PM
Not just dolphins, but whales too! My friend trained 3 whales to blow bubble rings in unison at an aquarium here in Japan!
Posted by: darrell | January 22, 2008 8:42 AM