
There Are Whales Alive Today Who Were Born Before Moby Dick Was Written - spking
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/there-are-whales-alive-today-who-were-born-before-moby-dick-was-written-660944/
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srean
Moby dick's kin the sperm whales are incredibly interesting. One of their
remarkable ability is to dive deep, fast and long.

Among all free diving warm blooded animals they go the deepest. They dive to
depths 25 times deeper than their other equally famous and endangered cousin
the blue whales. The blue whale is the largest known animal to have ever
inhabited the earth.

To give an idea of how deep they dive, here is a picture
[http://i.imgur.com/ESp2j.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/ESp2j.jpg) It needs to be
magnified for perspective and for the little surprise at the bottom.

It is interesting how they manage to hold their breath for so long and yet
manage to survive the bends (decompression sickness).

The whales are seriously challenging our assumptions about animal
intelligence, empathy, society, culture and language. For a long time we
believed that the primates were at the top. Search Ted talks and youtube for
dolphin intelligence, dont miss the Attenborough ones. For lack of a better
word they are just amazing.

Dolphins are for example known to build difficult to make toys (air bubble
vortex rings) just to entertain themselves.

They have to discover how to make it. Sometimes they can be quite possessive,
they would break the toy if someone not so knowledgeable wants to play with
it. Once a dolphin figures it out how to make one, his/her peers eventually
figure it out too. So it kind of spreads within a group like fashion. This
behavior has been observed both in captivity and in the wild.

Dolphins in captivity try to imitate us and seem to have no trouble mapping
our body parts to theirs. A story goes that a scientist observing an young
dolphin from an underwater portal had blown a cloud of cigarette smoke at it.
The dolphin promptly went to the mother and did the same to the scientist with
milk ! It is now strongly believed that they call each other by name. They try
to imitate human speech which takes enormous effort on their part because
unlike for example parrots their vocal tract is not conducive for this at all.
People believe this to be an indication of their strong desire to communicate
with us.

And they originated from ungulates: hoofed warm blooded animals. It came as a
surprise to me that that there were hoofed carnivorous animals.

~~~
Patient0
ok I'll bite - what is the writing at the bottom of the picture?

~~~
john2x
It's a reference to H.P. Lovecraft's "The Call of Cthulhu".

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exratione
The Methuselah Foundation has funded one of the research groups interested in
comparative studies of the genetics of longevity, helping them to obtain the
resources to sequence bowhead whales. This is one of those lines of work that
is next to impossible to get funding for from the normal institutional
channels at the present time:

[https://www.mfoundation.org/work#bowhead-
whale](https://www.mfoundation.org/work#bowhead-whale)

\-----------------

Given the declining costs of DNA sequencing, all kinds of research that used
to be prohibitively expensive even a few years ago is now becoming possible.
For example, we recently awarded a $10,000 research grant to Dr. Joao Pedro de
Magelhaes at the University of Liverpool to sequence the genome of the bowhead
whale in order to study mechanisms for longevity in this warm-blooded mammal
whose lifespan is estimated at over 200 years.

Not only are bowhead whales far longer-lived than humans, but their massive
size means that they are likely to possess unique tumor suppression
mechanisms. “These mechanisms for the longevity and resistance to aging-
related diseases of bowhead whales are unknown,” says Dr. de Magelhaes, “but
it is clear that in order to live so long, these animals must possess aging
prevention mechanisms related to cancer, immunosenescence, neurodegenerative
diseases, and cardiovascular and metabolic diseases."

The bowhead whale study will be conducted at the state-of-the-art Liverpool
Centre for Genomic Research and results will be made available to the research
community.

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samizdatum
The long lifespan of whales could actually shed some light on human evolution.

Whales, along with many other mammalian species (including humans) exhibit a
perplexing divergence of somatic and reproductive senescence. Female whales
hit menopause long before their lives are over, in some cases spending the
majority of their lives in a non-reproductive state, which prima facie seems
rather maladaptive.

A number of hypotheses have been proposed to explain what seems like
widespread evolutionary selection for menopause, and none of them are
completely satisfactory. The "grandmother hypothesis", for example, posits
that experienced grandmothers assist in the care of their grandchildren,
increasing their odds of survival.

Certain species of whales, including _Orcinus orca_ , the killer whale,
exhibit early-life menopause, and form stable matrilineal groups, making them
ideal candidates for testing the grandmother hypothesis. Interestingly,
studies on killer whales observe no significant correlation between living
grandmothers and grandoffspring survival rates, though there are plenty of
unaddressed confounding factors.

Humans are the only species where the grandmother hypothesis is supported by
data, but the dearth of corresponding data in whales suggests the dramatic
disparity in our somatic-reproductive senescence might be more strongly
selected for by factors we are not yet aware of.

~~~
maaku
> Humans are the only species where the grandmother hypothesis is supported by
> data, but the dearth of corresponding data in whales suggests the dramatic
> disparity in our somatic-reproductive senescence might be more strongly
> selected for by factors we are not yet aware of.

I thought average life expectancy of per-agrecultural, pre-technological
humans was less than 40 years? It doesn't really seem like the grandmother
hypothosis would enter into our evolutionary history then, as there would be
very few post-menopause grandmothers around...

~~~
jeorgun
Average life expectancy is calculated without accounting for infant mortality;
when accounted for, it's considerably higher, or so I'm told.

~~~
crpatino
Even if infant mortality is discarded, average life expectancy is a poor
estimator of typical expectations of life. Considering the case of pre-
industrial societies, there was a second big wave of mortality during what we
now call adolescence. In women it was driven by child bearing, while in men by
either accidents or armed conflict with other groups of men. If half of the
guys that make it to their 13th birthday will get themselves killed before
their 21st, an average of 40 y.o. gives a very misleading idea of what "old
folks" look like.

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zipfle
Interesting that their evidence --a stone arrowhead found in a whale-- is
actually also described in Moby Dick itself:

\---

It so chanced that almost upon first cutting into [a whale, not Moby Dick]
with the spade, the entire length of a corroded harpoon was found imbedded in
his flesh, on the lower part of the bunch before described. But as the stumps
of harpoons are frequently found in the dead bodies of captured whales, with
the flesh perfectly healed around them, and no prominence of any kind to
denote their place; therefore, there must needs have been some other unknown
reason in the present case fully to account for the ulceration alluded to. But
still more curious was the fact of a lance-head of stone being found in him,
not far from the buried iron, the flesh perfectly firm about it. Who had
darted that stone lance? And when? It might have been darted by some Nor' West
Indian long before America was discovered.

gutenberg.org full text:

[http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2701/2701-h/2701-h.htm](http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2701/2701-h/2701-h.htm)

~~~
huxley
Moby Dick is so encyclopedic and digressive that I'm not surprised that any
given random fact about whales might appear in it.

~~~
maw
Indeed, and this is my favorite random fact about whales in _Moby Dick_ : "Be
it known that, waiving all argument, I take the good old fashioned ground that
the _whale is a fish_ , and call upon holy Jonah to back me."

~~~
huxley
Haha ... true enough, though Ishmael is well established as an unreliable
narrator.

Here's my favourite fact: the white whale Moby Dick is based on a real-life
white whale named Mocha Dick

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mocha_Dick](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mocha_Dick)

~~~
anigbrowl
Did not know that. I echo your advice to people to give the book another go if
they haven't finished it. It is so worth it.

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madaxe_again
There are clams alive today who hatched while the Ming dynasty was extant.

There are trees alive today which sprouted _ten thousand_ years ago. Hell,
Pando (albeit a clonal colony) could be 1,000,000 years old.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pando_(tree)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pando_\(tree\))

Astounding depths of time for a single organism to persist over - but
ultimately dependent on a very sedate pace of life.

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antimagic
And they _still_ haven't read past the first fifty pages because, like
everyone else, they get bored and put the book down.

Seriously though, I find it remarkable that bowhead populations have come back
so fast considering how long they live. The oceans must have been absolutely
teeming with them back in the day, if they reproduce that fast and live that
long.

~~~
huxley
It is their loss, the modern reader needs to take a cue from Ahab and not give
up on Moby Dick.

Nathaniel Philbrick's "Why Read Moby-Dick?" gave me the kick I needed to
tackle the book and I am grateful to him that I did (and plan to do so again).

~~~
antimagic
I'm thinking that the modern whale is not a big fan of Ahab...

~~~
huxley
A discerning modern whale would know that it is a mistake to dislike a work of
literature because its characters are flawed and distasteful.

Ahab could give that whale insight into the often obsessive nature of
humanity, its willingness to sacrifice riches and life on the altar of
revenge. Plus Moby Dick really kicks ass in several scenes.

~~~
antimagic
I _think_ their objection is more that Ahab was all about killing them...
Other than that, your average modern whale is generally fairly accepting of
human foibles.

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whistlerbrk
Somewhat off topic... but I encourage everyone to watch the Blackfish
documentary. These are incredible, amazing, highly intelligent animals.
Different nations have their own languages. They know who we are, they know
what we're doing to them, they know when we're making them do tricks for them
for food for other's amusement.

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the_watcher
Aquatic mammals are fascinating. They are so clearly mammals, yet they've
adapted the mammalian traits that we take for granted as land-based evolutions
to living in the water. I'm reminded of the bomb sniffing dolphins right now.

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001sky
Not related to the content, but the construct and display of this article is
less than conducive to reading it.

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chris_wot
We really should kill them to examine them for scientific purposes. Plus,
whale blubber is yum!

~~~
chris_wot
Offended? This is precisely what the Japanese do.

~~~
grecy
It makes me very proud to be Australian when the Aussie navy puts their
warships between the Japanese whaler fleet and the whales.

The implied statement is "Shoot that harpoon at us and see what happens".

So far, it's been a lot of posturing. Many hundreds of whales have been saved.

~~~
MarkTee
Too bad they don't feel the same way about sharks...

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Australian_shark_cull](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Australian_shark_cull)

~~~
brc
Australians already eat 16,000 tonnes of shark per year.

Culling a few more to make beaches safer for swimming is hardly an issue. This
regularly happens in other parts of Australia and certainly other parts of the
world.

However, suddenly it has become a cause celebre for fashionable activists the
world over. _oh, those poor sharks_. They don't realise the underlying reason
for the protests is to give the greens more visibility in the upcoming West
Australian Senate election that has to be re-run.

Personally, I have zero issue with culling sharks near swimming beaches. There
is 17,000 miles of Australian coastline after all, and 99% of it is not
swimming beaches.

If people wish to protest about sharks, then protest about the killing of
sharks for shark fin soup, where the rest of the body is then dumped instead
of being used.

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vrypan
Slightly off-topic, but I can't help it: This is exactly why we picked the
bowhead whale for our mascot at www.longaccess.com. :-)

~~~
srean
I dont think you deserved the downvotes. longaccess indeed seems an important
endeavor to undertake. All the best.

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thebiglebrewski
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAW4mntPM-w](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAW4mntPM-w)

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arunc
And, we the humans are here to destroy everything dumping nuclear wastes into
the ocean.

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lifeisstillgood
And today is the day of vengeance !

"Planet of The Cetaceans"

~~~
huxley
[TAYLOR falls to his knees screaming]

YOU MANIACS! YOU BLEW IT UP! OH, DANG YOU! GOLDANG YOU ALL TO HECK!

[TAYLOR buries his head in his hands, point of view switches to reveal half-
buried in the sand and washed by the waves is MARINE WORLD]

~~~
lifeisstillgood
ironically, any two hundred year old whale will know exactly the feelings of
loss and devastation on finding your species has been all but wiped out.

