Whales vs. Cruise Ships

Experts examine a fin whale in Vancouver

Earlier this summer "the Future" featured a report about an oil tanker that struck a humpback whale in Prince William Sound. Well, it seems that another ship has arrived to port with a whale on its prow. The Vancouver Sun reports that a cruise ship hit the carcass of a fin whale and dragged it to Vancouver. Scientists later found that the whale had nothing in its stomach and only a thin layer of blubber suggesting that the whale had suffered an illness. What's interesting about the Sun story is that the article is found in the "Health" section of the paper's online edition beneath headings such as "Family & Child," "Seniors," and "Fitness." I wonder if folks at the Sun have been reading and listening to recent reports in the Times and on Fresh Air about the surprising interactions between whales and humans, including instances where whales have playfully lifted small boats from the water and gently set them back on the surface. The most striking new information about whale behavior and physiology, however, is the recent report that the whale neocortex, the part of the brain responsible for higher-order thinking, is much larger (by percentage) than the human brain. Perhaps, argues Dr. Lori Morino, the whale neocortex is so highly evolved because during its evolution from a hippopotamus the whale experienced such dramatic changes in its physiology (e.g. losing limbs, moving its nose to the top of its head and developing sonar). No word yet on whether whales have started using Twitter though.