No more slaughter, dolphins are humans!

Dolphins' advocates will rejoice with this scientific

discovery, a relief against "The Cove"* type of

slaughter and to give a better approach towards

dolphins, whales (and seals) and the importance of

saving endangered cetaceans and our precious oceans.

This information comes on our radar screen with the

scientific community who finally joins what ordinary

people and ocean lovers already noticed as a simple

observation of this mammal (not a fish!) for decades.

Jacques-Yves Cousteau studied this long ago (1977) in

"Le Chant des Dauphins" (A Sound of Dolphins).

Now, my question is: Are we smart enough to understand

dolphins...?

Quotes:

"Dolphins have been declared the world’s second most

intelligent creatures after humans, with scientists

suggesting they are so bright that they should be

treated as “non-human persons”. Studies into dolphin

behaviour have highlighted how similar their

communications are to those of humans and that they

are brighter than chimpanzees. These have been backed

up by anatomical research showing that dolphin brains

have many key features associated with high

intelligence. The researchers argue that their work

shows it is morally unacceptable to keep such

intelligent animals in amusement parks or to kill them

for food or by accident when fishing. Some 300,000

whales, dolphins and porpoises die in this way each

year..."

[Scientists Lori Marino, a zoologist at Emory

University in Atlanta and Diana Reiss, professor of

psychology at Hunter College, City University of New

York established] said "that the cerebral cortex and

neocortex of bottlenose dolphins were so large that

“the anatomical ratios that assess cognitive capacity

place it second only to the human brain”. They also

found that the brain cortex of dolphins such as the

bottlenose had the same convoluted folds that are

strongly linked with human intelligence. Such folds

increase the volume of the cortex and the ability of

brain cells to interconnect with each other. “Despite

evolving along a different neuroanatomical trajectory

to humans, cetacean brains have several features that

are correlated with complex intelligence.” Marino and

Reiss will present their findings at a conference in San

Diego, California, next month, concluding that the new

evidence about dolphin intelligence makes it morally

repugnant to mistreat them."**

2 comments were made following this article in the

publication:

1- "We consider ourselves inherently better because we

demonstrate an “advanced” capacity to articulate our

ideas, thoughts and emotions through written and oral

language." I wonder what a dolphin would comment?

Might be a refreshing change from the angry emotional

toxic comments people leave all over the web. The

capacity of the human to spew hate and engage in

cruelty towards other beings astounds me. Is that

seen in other animals or is that strictly a human

ability? (Japanese name was provided)

2- Lori Marino wrote: "As one of the scientists

mentioned in this article I would like to clarify one

of the statements made. The work I've done on dolphin

brains shows that, when relative brain size is taken

into account, some dolphin species are second only to

modern humans and have larger brains than chimpanzees.

However, I do not think we can "declare" that dolphins

are the second smartest animals on the planet on the

basis of just this information. I do not want to make

categorical or hierarchical statements about matters

that are clearly too complex to warrant a simple

interpretation. The point of our upcoming session and

arguments is this. Given what we now know about

dolphin brains and intelligence we need to rethink our

"accepted" cultural standards of treatment - from

slaughter to capture to confinement in amusement

parks. The scientific evidence is clear that the

suffering imposed by these activities on dolphins is

on a par with what humans would suffer under the same

circumstances. That is the message of the article."

20 minutes a French media summarized a bit emotionally

with this : "Le dauphin est une personne. De

nouvelles études relancent le débat sur l’intelligence

de l’animal. Des droits pour les dauphins. C’est ce

que vont réclamer des scientifiques américains lors

d’une conférence qui se tiendra en février à San

Diego, en Californie. Leur argument? Des études

qu’ils ont réalisées prouvent une nouvelle fois

l’exceptionnelle intelligence du mammifère. Ils

estiment même qu’il pourrait être le deuxième être le

plus évolué de la planète, juste après... l’homme."

I'm not a specialist but I found this surfing on the

Internet:

" There is no parallel between the evolutionary level

of the somatic structure and the brain. Species with

large number of conservative traits may have a very

progressive brain, while species with many derived

features may be at a low level with respect to brain

evolution". By Stephan, Baron and Frahm, in their

1991 book Insectovora (the first volume of the series

Comparative Brain Research in Mammals).

http://www.dauphinlibre.be/brain.htm

Smart enough to be a military dolphin? On this, here

is a description of military uses of dolphins in US

and Russia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_dolphin

Articles references:

-*The Cove http://tinyurl.com/y8lpm5e

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sw5qgVp0jng

-**Timesonline http://tinyurl.com/y929zwj

-20 Minutes http://tinyurl.com/ycnq8jy