Whale, dolphin, or porpoise? A meaningful question about meaningless terms

[Boesse]

Hey all - in discussing my recent research on the new extinct dolphin Ankylorhiza with science journalists, I was reminded of previous frustrations from earlier discussions with students, museum visitors, fossil collectors, journalists, and even other scientists about the meaning of the words whale, dolphin, and porpoise. Some disagreements were on this forum, others were on facebook fossil groups - the whole notion of "that's not a dolphin tooth that's a whale tooth" or vice versa is plagued by the fact that these terms have multiple established meanings and are imprecise, leading to lots of confusion, to the point where I pretty much have to start every discussion off with "there are two groups of cetaceans living today..." - many, for example, are confused about toothed baleen whales existing if only odontocetes have teeth.

 

One thing I tried was to conduct a twitter poll showing four modern species and asking if people thought they were a whale, dolphin, or porpoise - and the majority was right only half the time: a leaping beaked whale was thought to be a dolphin, and a small dolphin was thought to be a porpoise.

 

I've had so many discussions on here and have had to repeat some of these arguments ad nauseam, so I thought I might as well crystallize my thoughts into a blog post. I hope you enjoy it!

 

http://coastalpaleo.blogspot.com/2020/07/whale-dolphin-or-porpoise-meaningful.html

 

[Miocene_Mason]

Interesting read, I’ll keep that in mind from now on.

[doushantuo]

That's quite a pun Thomas Holtz made there

[jpc]

Hi Bobby-

I notice that you use both of these terms in there. 

Whaleologist and paleocetolgist. 

Is the latter a subgroup of the former?  

 

 

I love this line:

So, don’t argue with people because when you get down in the weeds about dolphin v. whale, none of it makes any sense.

 

 

[LordTrilobite]

Yeah I saw the polls on twitter. Pretty interesting stuff.

[RuMert]

"The killer whale, or orca (Orcinus orca), is a toothed whale belonging to the oceanic dolphin family" - Wikipedia- so dolphin or whale?

[Boesse]

@jpc - whaleontologists and paleocetologists are synonymous, and whaleontologist is definitely a newer term, but way more fun to say.

 

@RuMert - the answer to your question is obviously "yes"

[Shellseeker]

Bobby,

I saw this post a week ago, and even in these times of covid, I would be way too busy with family needs, fossil hunting, and other commitments to consider your questions and form opinions. There are almost 8 billion people in the world and most of them do not care about the types and names of whales or whether the categories make any sense at all.

On 7/13/2020 at 11:22 AM, Boesse said:

discussions with students, museum visitors, fossil collectors, journalists, and even other scientists about the meaning of the words whale, dolphin, and porpoise.

each of these humans have different levels of knowledge and different reasons for their interest in marine mammals... Some of them are clueless and would not understand what you are talking about and others ( mostly scientists) would want to significantly improve the definitions and categories around the classification and naming of marine mammals.

Most humans have incredibly short attention spans and only really care about the high priority items they have decided interests them. I learned this from my other hobby... genealogical research. Most of my sibling's eyes  glazed over when I start telling stories about our common ancestors lives and deaths... they are more focused on taking care of their kids, getting food on the table, planning their next vacation. Life interferes. They also ask dumb questions and believe fake news when it comes to Whales.

I used to be a scientist, but no more.  I retired and now I am a fossil hunter. If you have to deal with "students, museum visitors, fossil collectors, journalists, and even other scientists",  your only way to sanity is to figure out what motivates each group and play to those priorities.  I actually did this once with a whole collection of humans who made up the interaction with my corporate entity.  And as you already know, the WORST are the scientists, because they care and they really , really want to be precise.

So,

As a fossil hunter,  I like whales, but I am not all that interested in how extant whales are categorized or named. I am more interested in the extinct whales and even here, I can deal with Baleen whales with teeth. I just wish I could find some of those teeth,  and find someone who can identify the name/classification of the whale that had those teeth.

I only have limited resources to invest into this incredibly complex topic, and so light_years before I get interested in the ancestral line of baleen whales,  I want to know lots of details specific to fossil jaw that I found 6 months ago which took me time to figure out came from a baleen whale. I realize I am a step ahead of those 8 billion people, including students, museum visitors, journalists who could not recognize a baleen whale jaw to save their lives.

I find more marine mammal verts/ribs than ear bones,  more ear bones than jaw bones and more jaw bones than other whale bones like a humerus. The fossil from marine mammals I find most often is teeth.

Sometimes, I thought that the classification might be based on what the fossil looks like: If the tooth has an enamel cap, and was found in this location, it is one of this type of marine mammal, and here are a set of marine mammals with similar fossils. Sort of like "projectile point identification" https://www.projectilepoints.net/

That "might" be OK for fossil hunters, but worthless for other groups of humans.

 

Well,  I guess that I am rambling.  My point is that Fossil hunters have priorities and way at the top is Identification... I am OK with the fossil being toothed whale, or baleen whale, or dolphin or porpoise or whatever.

Just want to know which label to put on the fossil.  Jack

 

[Boesse]

Editing: I need to not read comments at 2am anymore, totally misread the above.

[Plax]

I didn't detect any offensive intent in Jack's post and read through it twice. I thoroughly enjoyed the blog and appreciate you posting it. I have a real problem with common names and the constant conversion to scientific names. Specifically "Goblin" and "Crow" sharks. I realize the common name origins of course but don't see their relevance to fossil sharks. We are sharing our information regarding fossils and should use scientific names if we know them. Nothing wrong with nick names of course and have used them in the field for something like Eurhodia rugosa ideali, which we called race cars. Or "new potatoes' for Eupatagus. I wouldn't post an ID for either of these echinoids using the nick name. If you like common names of course, use them. Nothing wrong with that but be aware that they represent a vague identity in most cases. I confess to using common names when I can't remember the scientific name...

[Miocene_Mason]

1 hour ago, Plax said:

I have a real problem with common names and the constant conversion to scientific names.

Me too, especially when it’s an extinct shark referred to by an extant shark’s common name when they were likely quite different. 

[Shellseeker]

11 hours ago, Boesse said:

I'm sure you meant no offense by your comment, but you did really put a lot of effort into writing it, and I'm sorry I've ##### you off so much. You don't have to read it. Thanks for the "feedback".

You misjudge me, sir.

Not only did I mean no offense, I respect your expertise and communication abilities. I greatly admire how you practice your profession and share that expertise with those who need it. When I rave about TFF, I point to you and Harry as examples of experts who care.

I have read your blog entry and even researched some of the terms. I lack sufficient knowledge or expertise in your field of science to effectively comment on your statement of the problem. I forced myself to respond because I felt your questions and blog entry deserved additional discussion.

[Harry Pristis]

I think that we all have inherited to some degree the inclination to participate in passing on information . . . teaching the younger, less experienced members of our affinity groups. Let's call it the pedagogical inclination. It is our inheritance because it has provided a selective advantage for our species from our beginnings. It is this inclination that prompts subscribers here to answer questions . . . It is an engine driven by our genes.

 

Some of us, perhaps like @Boesse, have a stronger, more refined pedagogical inclination, and thank goodness for that!  When the pedagogical inclination butts up against indifference or ignorance, frustrations arise.  When it happens on TFF, subscribers here shouldn't defend indifference.  If you're not here to learn, you are on the wrong forum. 

[Boesse]

2 hours ago, Shellseeker said:

You misjudge me, sir.

Not only did I mean no offense, I respect your expertise and communication abilities. I greatly admire how you practice your profession and share that expertise with those who need it. When I rave about TFF, I point to you and Harry as examples of experts who care.

I have read your blog entry and even researched some of the terms. I lack sufficient knowledge or expertise in your field of science to effectively comment on your statement of the problem. I forced myself to respond because I felt your questions and blog entry deserved additional discussion.

 

@Shellseekersnarge I am sorry for that and glad I misread it. Disregard my above comment!

 

Thanks, @Harry Pristis!

[Huntonia]

I'm glad this topic reemerged, somehow I missed it the last time through. This was very informative, definitely helped clear up some of my own confusion with the terms and it's a good reminder not to be dogmatic about these. At the end of the day they're generalized common terms without much scientific value.

 

This forum is here as harry pointed out so that we can all learn. And we certainly have all learned much from this community and continue to do so.

 

[FossilDAWG]

The same issues arise in entomology and acarology all the time.  For example, there is no meaningful taxonomic difference between butterflies and moths, or between ticks and mites.  Common names seem very prone to this, perhaps because often they amount to grouping species on superficial traits (colorful vs drab, or relatively big vs little in my above examples).

 

Don

[Plax]

Funny how some groups of fossils don't get common names. Maybe it's because the entire group is extinct? Trilobites come to mind. Have maybe seen "bug" used for them in general though which is more of a nick name and not a common name. 

[Tidgy's Dad]

3 hours ago, Plax said:

Funny how some groups of fossils don't get common names. Maybe it's because the entire group is extinct? Trilobites come to mind. Have maybe seen "bug" used for them in general though which is more of a nick name and not a common name. 

Some trilos do have sort of common names. Flexis, kermits and the Dudley Locust or Dudley Bug spring to mind.  

[Huntonia]

15 minutes ago, Tidgy's Dad said:

Some trilos do have sort of common names. Flexis, kermits and the Dudley Locust or Dudley Bug spring to mind.  

Indeed, although a number of the 'nicknames' of trilos are shortened versions of the genus name, hence flexi to indicate flexicalymene. And Dudley bug refers to the locale. I suppose since they are extinct and most people who choose to learn about them are willing to memorize and use specific names they don't tend to get many umbrella terms like whale.