What Is Your Dolphin Name?

To play, simply use the name of your first pet as your first name and the name of the street you grew up on as your surname. Or, wait, no, that’s not it. Via Wired:

Earlier research by Janik and King showed that dolphins call each other’s signature whistles while temporarily restrained in nets, but questions had remained over how dolphins used them at sea, in their everyday lives. King’s new experiment, conducted with fellow St. Andrews biologist Vincent Janik and described July 22 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, involved groups of wild dolphins off Scotland’s eastern coast.

Janik and King recorded their signature whistles, then broadcast computer-synthesized versions through a hydrophone. They also played back recordings of unfamiliar signature whistles. The dolphins ignored signatures belonging to other individuals in their groups, as well as unfamiliar whistles.

To their own signatures, however, they usually whistled back, suggesting that dolphins may use the signatures to address one another.