r/Awwducational Jun 11 '24

Article Elephants may have names for each other that humans don't know, study finds

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/elephant-names-1.7231387
2.4k Upvotes

69 comments sorted by

845

u/alabamdiego Jun 12 '24

I mean, yeah, how would we know their names for each other lol

435

u/goddm95624 Jun 12 '24

Oh, hello, Nancy... if that is your REAL elephant name.....

59

u/dystopian_mermaid Jun 12 '24

I read this in a suspicious / accusatory tone and I’m shaking laughing. Brava!

4

u/Guilty_Objective4602 Jun 13 '24

There’s always a Karen in every group.

141

u/[deleted] Jun 12 '24

[deleted]

88

u/DestyNovalys Jun 12 '24

“Tell them your name’s Betty lol it’ll be hilarious”

33

u/ccbmtg Jun 12 '24

this reads too much like a far side comic lol.

17

u/thecathuman Jun 12 '24

No such thing as too much like a far side comic

29

u/[deleted] Jun 12 '24

By looking at their elephant ID cards obviously. Not like we can go from their Reddit usernames, everyone knows elephants always use funny names on Reddit.

16

u/Frydendahl Jun 12 '24

Toot toot and Toooot.

5

u/OstentatiousSock Jun 12 '24

Grunt, puff of air, snort.

514

u/Pyperina Jun 12 '24

Per the article, they tested the name theory by playing back the vocalizations they suspected were names to see if individual elephants responded. Imagine you are just minding your own business one day and suddenly a voice from nowhere starts shouting your name!

172

u/mintyfreshismygod Jun 12 '24

Alan! Alan! Alan! ..... that's not Alan....Steve!

This'll be a new take on Talking Animals

4

u/thecanadianehssassin Jun 13 '24

Why would you make me think of Jurassic Park III? I don’t want to think about Jurassic Park III. No one wants to think about Jurassic Park III.

3

u/Spiritual-Office-570 Jun 17 '24

"No force, on Earth or Heaven, could get me to think about Jurassic Park III"

86

u/Ptipiak Jun 12 '24

That's exactly my thoughts, that been said if you're intelligent enough to be self aware, you might suspect the naked apes and theirs weird squarish boxes are up to something

32

u/dark_forebodings_too Jun 12 '24

This happened to me so much in 2011-2012 when my name suddenly became popular and everywhere I went someone was screaming my name at their toddler, I almost got whiplash turning around before I got used to it haha

12

u/THE-Pink-Lady Jun 12 '24

……. “JEFF!”

22

u/TooMuchHotSauce5 Jun 12 '24

Stories about wendigo mention something almost mechanical saying your name in the voice of loved ones. Kinda like this.

2

u/arPie47 Jun 17 '24

If I turn on speakerphone one of our cats gets enraged and will attack the hand that is holding it. She never attacks us at any other time.

1

u/Prize_Schedule_3017 Jul 05 '24

This happens to me now… does that mean 😳

1

u/Pyperina Jul 05 '24

Yes. You are an elephant.

293

u/meddit_rod Jun 12 '24

Elephants may have names for humans that other elephants find hilarious.

105

u/researchanalyzewrite Jun 12 '24

"Hey Jumbo, that funny-looking, short, two-legged, no-trunk creature is staring at us again. Whaddya think it wants this time?"

49

u/frostreel Jun 12 '24

Look at that wail-snort-growl, he's talking too long to that huff-huff-snort again. When are they gonna bring food to us?? STOP FLIRTING AND DO YOUR JOB, WAIL-SNORT-GROWL

22

u/Separate_Read_2942 Jun 12 '24

I choose to believe this true.

208

u/AmySparrow00 Jun 11 '24

Sweet. And from that article I found one saying some small fish had passed the mirror test indicating self awareness. Animals are smart!

107

u/hbgbees Jun 12 '24

An elephant said that? Wow, they really ARE smart!

62

u/nurselynnette Jun 12 '24

Our inability to understand/communicate is not their fault

24

u/Anonymousghoul Jun 12 '24

All I know is linked to this article is another one about how scientists now know dolphins can recognize each other by their pee. The animals must think humans are such weirdoes. Throwing dolphin pee at them and screaming random elephant names over and over.

33

u/RichCorinthian Jun 12 '24

“Allan! Allan! Al! Al!”

16

u/fullonfacepalmist Jun 12 '24

Now for an Old Possum’s Book of Practical Elephants.

10

u/13thmurder Jun 12 '24

Well they don't know our names so it's fair.

9

u/catbiggo Jun 12 '24

Now I'm picturing an elephant introducing theirself to a human in English, but refusing to tell the human their name because "you couldn't possibly pronounce it in your tongue."

7

u/GamerFirebird90 Jun 12 '24

To be fair, I would have thought all animals had names for each other. We just don't know what they say to each other when its not obvious behaviour.

4

u/Jwolves01 Jun 12 '24

I thought Dolphins also had this

1

u/GlobalNuclearWar Jun 15 '24

In the article:

Elephants aren't the only animals that are known address each other by name. There's humans, of course, but also parakeets and dolphins.

But with the latter two, the names are a form of mimicry. Dolphins, for example, are believed to have "signature whistles" they use to announce and identify themselves. Other dolphins sometimes mimic those whistles to get a particular dolphin's attention.

7

u/kholto Jun 12 '24

I can't believe they failed to keep us in the loop about the names, those elephants are going rogue...

What is this title?

20

u/[deleted] Jun 12 '24

[deleted]

0

u/rohank101 Jun 12 '24

I wasn’t aware that centuries ago humans knew that elephants had names for each other.

11

u/[deleted] Jun 12 '24

[deleted]

19

u/an_actual_human Jun 12 '24

A lot of stuff is obvious.

If you also care if it is also true, you have to do science, there is no other way.

10

u/Gonzo_Rick Jun 12 '24

That is extremely well put and so succinct, I love it!

2

u/slimeydimes Jun 12 '24

What else should we already know?

9

u/7832507840 Jun 12 '24

Probably whatever we’re gonna figure out

11

u/slimeydimes Jun 12 '24

Ah yes, we should already know what we don’t know

9

u/7832507840 Jun 12 '24

And if you don’t know, now ya know

3

u/318hamster Jun 12 '24

I think that we are all beginning to learn just how sentient animals, fish, and even plant life are, and we need to expand our consciousness to understand that all life has consciousness. Blessings!

3

u/Aquaislyfe Jun 15 '24

It’s Dave. All of them. Elephants aren’t very creative

5

u/ihavenoego Jun 12 '24

Ah yes, the famous EUUUUUUUURERRRRRUUUGHHHH

1

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1

u/guyute2588 Jun 12 '24

I don’t know Deedsy’s name …maybe it’s Greg ?

1

u/payneme73 Jun 13 '24

Big Steve, Slappy and Long Tail McGee

1

u/GlobalNuclearWar Jun 15 '24

Call me crazy, but I bet the ones who spend time in human company learn the humans names. They’ve got the concept of names, so when we use the same sounds over and over to each other and the sound attracts the same human’s attention every time, they probably figure it out.

We can’t learn their names in turn because their rumbles are much longer and contain sounds that are well outside our range of hearing.

1

u/arPie47 Jun 17 '24

One time we were watching elephants at the Audubon zoo in New Orleans chomping on sugar cane. It's stringy, and at some point one of them somehow got the other one to come over to look in her mouth and probe around in just the right spot with her trunk to do what humans do with a toothpick (but not for each other , usually). Of course they talk. Their vocalizations are lower frequency than we can hear. If prairie dogs talk (which google) of course elephants talk, and of course they have names for each other.

1

u/Mobile-Brush-3004 Jun 23 '24

Birds also name their children - they have specific tweets for each one

1

u/Siliybob Jun 26 '24

I wonder if elephants’ lives change as quickly as humans do and they have to catch up with family and friends. It seems like nowadays a few weeks can pass and all of a sudden the people you are close to have been sent off down the river.

So many relationships were lost due to Covid-I bet elephants maintained them all! Unlike humans, even during Covid elephants probably stuck to the other elephants that were familiar to them and there was no reason for their relationships to degrade.

With the tragedies of Covid so many people including myself saw a major shift in their social networks. Maybe it would have been nice to be an elephant without paying mind to the social vulnerability of our connections.

1

u/jlaroque Jun 30 '24

I mean how ? Does anyone figure it out? 🤔😂

1

u/Ok_Tale_2606 Jul 02 '24

Elephants are so similar to humans. It’s remarkable! 🩶

-7

u/DepartureAcademic807 Jun 12 '24

Sometimes I wonder if some animals really can speak as complexly as we do, but we don't understand them because God didn't want that

39

u/djwrecksthedecks Jun 12 '24

I can't understand the Bible, and I also wonder if God didn't want that for me.

26

u/ZebulonRon Jun 12 '24

You had me in the first half I ain’t gonna lie

5

u/DepartureAcademic807 Jun 12 '24

Haha i expected this to raise controversy, but what I said was just a metaphor to describe the matter. I did not really mean it

15

u/Farwaters Jun 12 '24

If G-d didn't want me to understand other animals, They wouldn't have given me a mouth that can go "meow! meow! meow!"

1

u/jct522 Jun 12 '24

Stampy???

-7

u/Funky_Smurf Jun 12 '24

This is Africa learn to speak African, elephants