Oct 30 2022: How tech is helping us talk to animals

Back in Oct 30 2022: How tech is helping us talk to animals

Advancements in technology, such as drones, digital recorders, and artificial intelligence, are allowing us to listen to the sounds of nature in unprecedented ways. This has the potential to enable us to communicate with animals. Automated listening posts and microphones placed on animals gather vast amounts of data, which artificial intelligence sifts through for patterns and insights into animal communication.

Indigenous communities have long understood animal communication, but Western science has historically dismissed it. However, we must be cautious in how we use this newfound power and choose to interact with the natural world.

Fast forward to Aug 29 2023: How to Use AI to Talk to Whales—and Save Life on Earth

Michelle Fournet, a marine biologist, has spent the past decade cataloging the various sounds that humpback whales make. She believes that the "whup" call is how whales announce their presence to each other. As part of her research, she has conducted experiments using playback recordings of real whup calls to study the whales' responses.

Fournet has now shared her catalog with a nonprofit called the Earth Species Project, which aims to use AI to develop a synthetic whup and ultimately decode animal communication. The project envisions a future where nature documentaries include subtitles for animal dialogue.

How might developing a synthetic language for animals, such as the humpback whales' "whup" call, revolutionize our understanding and interaction with the natural world?