>>Wonder what would happen if someone tried a speechboard with dolphins?<<
Depends on the model, but they're smart enough to communicate if you give them a method they can use. Dolphins have managed to communicate with lights, buzzers, simple touchboards, etc. Hell, horses can all learn to communicate blanket on, no change, or blanket off based on weather.
The main limitation with dolphin-human communication is that humans expect dolphins to do all the accommodating, instead of looking for common ground. Teaching them human speech was doomed (although the subject did learn to say "ball" sort of). The limitation of a speechboard is that dolphins don't use vision the same as humans do. We'd be better off using a board with different textures and materials that would sound different to echolocation. Frex, experiments with bats use targets of different shape or density.
But there's a much easier way: Morse code. Dolphins click; it's a simple matter to teach a click-code. The problem is that once they get the hang of it, they're likely to talk WAY faster than most humans can parse without equipment. Hence the Morse-enabled T-Maldivian seaphone that translates between humans and cetaceans. You type in the top end, the underwater speaker clicks out the message, the cetacean clicks back, and you get a text response.
>>I was more thinking: Is it possible Dr. Moreau decided to try for an uplifted slave (versus an animal-spliced human), on the logic that they'd be more docile?<<
Yes. And that's why Carl Bernhardt has shifted more toward domestic animals. Too many of the mystic shifters escaped. The centaurs are mostly more docile and tighter herd-bonded.
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dancing_serpent
Re: Thoughts
Date: 2020-06-18 09:58 pm (UTC)Depends on the model, but they're smart enough to communicate if you give them a method they can use. Dolphins have managed to communicate with lights, buzzers, simple touchboards, etc. Hell, horses can all learn to communicate blanket on, no change, or blanket off based on weather.
The main limitation with dolphin-human communication is that humans expect dolphins to do all the accommodating, instead of looking for common ground. Teaching them human speech was doomed (although the subject did learn to say "ball" sort of). The limitation of a speechboard is that dolphins don't use vision the same as humans do. We'd be better off using a board with different textures and materials that would sound different to echolocation. Frex, experiments with bats use targets of different shape or density.
But there's a much easier way: Morse code. Dolphins click; it's a simple matter to teach a click-code. The problem is that once they get the hang of it, they're likely to talk WAY faster than most humans can parse without equipment. Hence the Morse-enabled T-Maldivian seaphone that translates between humans and cetaceans. You type in the top end, the underwater speaker clicks out the message, the cetacean clicks back, and you get a text response.
>>I was more thinking: Is it possible Dr. Moreau decided to try for an uplifted slave (versus an animal-spliced human), on the logic that they'd be more docile?<<
Yes. And that's why Carl Bernhardt has shifted more toward domestic animals. Too many of the mystic shifters escaped. The centaurs are mostly more docile and tighter herd-bonded.