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Comment by rwhitman | Hacker News Reader

If dolphins were land mammals, would we be as fascinated by this type of cross-species social behavior?

Dolphins are certainly interesting, but if I were to worry myself with the plight of a hyper-intelligent mammal species right now, I'd put that energy towards concern for elephants instead. They are an intelligent species that is actually smarter than humans in some aspects and being systematically slaughtered by poachers every day. Dolphin propeller strikes are sad, but potential elephant extinction is a crisis

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And orcas have vastly greater social intelligence than humans, but that doesn't stop humans from separating mother from calf at birth.

Don't get the point of this article. "We slaughter billions of cows, but walk up to one, look it in the eyes, and they clearly are saying, to any human, 'Can I be your friend, human?' What gives?"

Maybe the news should be, "Animals. So Smart and Friendly, but We Just Can't Stop Killing Them. What Gives?"

> Don't get the point of this article. "We slaughter billions of cows, but walk up to one, look it in the eyes, and they clearly are saying, to any human, 'Can I be your friend, human?' What gives?"

Having spent a good deal of time around cattle, this is absolutely not the case. They're some of the dumbest animals I've ever owned. They do seem emotional, though - they often seem sort of sad, and are easily paniced.

The smartest farm animal I've been around are hogs. They're mean, too.

I have a friend who's taught his potbelly pigs to count, and also certain tasks like putting away groups of objects when asked. Things I've never seen a dog do. If pigs were less grumpy and less tasty, I imagine people would see them very differently

In what aspects elephants are smarter than people?

They have genetic memory for one. An elephant can "remember" a water source that its grandparents once visit well before it was born.

That's certainly an impressive attribute but is it smarter?

Was this tested in a way to eliminate any possibility of communication of the location (through generations) post-natally?

Link to source? As far as I know for animals only immune system related genetic memory is possible and your example seems to be extremely prone to misinterpretation. Either way, this doesn't say anything about elephants' intelligence.

This is culture transmission, not genetic memory. Whales have the same problem and the same solutions. The grandmothers are very important in both societies.

Well, the total extinction of all native elephants was happened before once at least. In Europe, with most of the big fauna's level, big felines, eurasiatic black bears, european rhinos, european giraffes... it was a crisis for sure. The same problem as in Africa in 2015.

But this never was a question about how many clever or beauty in fact. Dolphins are much more important for us, because there are millions of humans that find their main diet in the sea. Top predators keep the diseases and predators of our food at strict control.

"If dolphins were land mammals, would we be as fascinated by this type of cross-species social behavior?"

I think yes. How many (untrained) animals out there are known to protect a human in danger ? To my knowledge there are only dogs and dolphins.

Wolves can adopt children in fact, specially when the children cry; and gorillas seem to be inclined to do this also with human childrens in danger or injured, either the children moves or not. Female gorillas in zoos have been helping boys accidentally falling or entering in the gorilla recint and returning them to the mother. Silverbacks can participate also.

You can google around for "[X animal] protects human" to find plenty of stories of apes, bears, lions, cows, elephants, even birds that have been documented. And thats just in recent english language sources - without taking into account foreign news, historic records, oral histories etc.

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