I remember reading The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, where the dolphins escaping a doomed Earth. Their last message for us humans was “so long and thanks for all the fish”.
At the time, scientists where wondering if we could communicate with dolphins and if they might even be as intelligent as us. My belief, based on very little real data is that they probably were pretty smart, enjoying a life of swimming, eating and playing.
This was pre AI slop and internet misinformation, but there were many urban myths about dolphins. Some of these included stories of a dolphins saving humans who were drowning or pulled out to sea by the currents. The dolphins allegedly pushed these otherwise doomed humans back to the shore, saving their lives. I am not sure if the stories had any basis in reality, but it was a nice story.
Anyway, in a not-very-serious debate with my friends, we were discussing the intelligence of dolphins, based on our confident, but poorly informed expertise in the subject. Someone jokingly said that they were glad the dolphins escaped in the book because they were nice, intelligent and had saved humans by sending them ashore.
But then we wondered – if the stories of dolphins were true, were there also stories of evil dolphins pushing people away from shore.
We would never know if dolphins guided people away from the shore, because the victims would not be reporting on the outcome. So in modern terms, stories of nice dolphins might be based on survivor bias, while most dolphins might be, in fact, pretty evil.
I guess it is about perspective. To a dolphin, other dolphins are probably very nice, very civilised creatures. But to a tuna, they are probably hideous monsters from the deep that eat you and your friends.
I don’t have a lot of validated data to back up whether dolphins are out to help humans.
I always believed though that humans are nice (with a lot of lived experience to support that view) and I have extended my view to assume dolphins and whales are probably nice too (with very little data to support my view).
Of course, there is evidence available that humans are not so nice.
The news, social media streams and gossip generally, provide a lot of evidence on how humans are not at all nice.
So I wanted to share my latest evidence on the matter of whale and human decency.
I have attached a link at the bottom that captures some observations on humpback whales. They have apparently been observed on multiple occasions rescuing seals, as well as calves from other species, from impending doom.
Orcas probably find this frustrating, but the seals and the families of the whale calves are probably pretty happy that the humpback whales are getting involved, even though there is nothing in it for them.
It is worth reading, both to hear about whales and also it pick up the way the human scientists are interpreting the strange behaviour.
The scientists investigating the phenomenon are perplexed as to why. They are still looking for the reason that these humpback whales bother to save species they don’t get anything from.
But in the absence of further investigation, I am going to assume that it is because they are actually nice.
I also had a recent encounter with a human, where I was able to observe whether he was nice or not.
A man came to my front door and asked to use our toilet (or for cultures where that term is but abrupt – our powder room facilities). His car was broken down and he was stuck near the start of a long trip to a country town. He found himself waiting for a tow truck and not wanting to wander far from his car, but also experiencing a biological imperative to relieve himself.
I let him use our very basic outdoor facilities but sent him away after that because I had a meeting about to start.
After I finished my meeting I went out the front of our house to see if he wanted a cup of tea or water. He was fine though. The tow truck had just arrived though and he was sorting things out before leaving with them.
I forgot all about it until this week, when he was passing back through our neighborhood.
He came to the front door again but this time with a gift of an iced fruit bun for me to eat.
He also told me of his adventures, getting his old Landrover fixed but mechanics who had never seen one before. We spoke about the Leyland Brothers and other adventurers whose stories are lost to time and then he headed off to run some errands for his friend who was in hostpital.
Scientists might still be wondering what drove this late age human male to come back with a gift and with stories of his adventures. Perhaps there is a lot of complex psychology involved.
But based on my observation it is because he, like many of his species, is a nice guy.
James King 