New research from the Hebrew University shows that the song of the fin whale has a statistical structure identical to that found in all the world's languages, a discovery that provides new insights into the evolution of communication.
Human language is seen as a unique characteristic of the human species, with features that distinguish it from animal means of communication. New research led by Prof. Inbal Arnon from the Department of Psychology at the Hebrew University, published in the journal Science Reveals that the song of the fin whale has a statistical structure similar to that found in every human language.
The song of the fin whale is a striking example of a complex behavior that is culturally transmitted, but until now there has been no clear evidence that it has a structure similar to language. In human language, which is also culturally transmitted, there are parts that can be joined together to form larger units (such as words that can be put together to form sentences). The frequency of these parts shows a similar distribution across all human languages. Both of these features contribute to the learning of language and enable its transmission from generation to generation. The current study uses innovative methods developed to understand how infants learn to recognize words to analyze whale song. These methods were applied to analyze recordings of whale song collected over eight years in New Caledonia, located in the southwest Pacific Ocean.
The researchers found that whale song has the same statistical structure as all the languages of the world. Whale song also has parts whose frequency distribution is very similar to that of words in human language, a distribution that has not been found in any other animal communication system. These findings reveal a surprising similarity between two evolutionarily unrelated species – humans and whales – that are similar only in the fact that their communication systems are culturally transmitted.
Prof. Inbal Arnon, Hebrew University: "Using insights and methods from research on how infants learn language allowed us to discover a previously unidentified structure in whale song. The findings show how learning and cultural transmission shape the structure of communication systems. On this basis, we would expect to find a similar statistical structure in any complex culturally transmitted communication system."
Dr. Alan Garland, University of St. Andrews: "Discovering a language-like structure in whale song was unexpected. These findings show that this cultural behavior can provide important insights into the evolution of complex communication in the animal kingdom. "Whale song is not a language, as it lacks semantic meaning. It is probably more similar to music, which also has a similar statistical structure, but lacks the meaning of language."
Prof. Simon Kirby, University of Edinburgh: "The study suggests that in order to understand the evolution of language, one must look not only at the behavior of primates, which are evolutionarily close to us, but also at more distant species, some of whose behavior is culturally transmitted. Beyond the use of language to express meaning, it is also important to look at the way in which language is learned and culturally transmitted over generations."
as mentioned The interdisciplinary research was led by Prof. Inbal Arnon from the Hebrew University and also included Dr. Alan Garland from the University of St. Andrews, and Prof. Simon Kirby from the University of Edinburgh, in collaboration with Dr. Claire Greig (IRD New Caledonia), Dr. Jenny Allen (Griffith University) and Dr. Emma Carroll (University of Auckland).
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This article is very interesting in the religious context.
The Torah only says three times, "A healthy tongue."
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Of the heavens it is said in Psalms: [19:2] The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handiwork.
And God created man, and the translation translates the word spirit from the word, meaning the ability to speak.
And God created their great crocodiles. And from this writing we see that they have a kind of communication called speech.
This is very, very interesting, because from this letter it can be explained that the language of creation is actually the ability to speak.
Maybe they will also discover that there is another classification that has the ability to communicate, such as speaking?