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This absorbing book is the first comprehensive scientific natural
history of a dolphin species ever written. From their research camp
at Kealake'akua Bay in Hawaii, the authors followed a population of
wild spinner dolphins for more than twenty years. They observed
marked animals by ship, by air, from a cliffside observation post,
by radiotracking their movements, and by studying the details of
their underwater social life with the use of a windowed underwater
vessel. Beginning with a description of the spinner dolphin
species, including its morphology and systematics, the book
examines the ocean environment and organization of dolphin
populations and the way this school-based society of mammals uses
shorelines for rest and instruction of the young. An analysis of
the dolphins' reproductive patterns, which resemble those of other
group-dwelling mammals such as certain primates, suggests a
fission-fusion society. Vision, vocalization, hearing, breathing,
feeding, predation, integration of the school, and school movement
are all examined to give the fullest picture yet published of
dolphin biological life. One of the most striking features of the
species is the length of the period of juvenility and instruction
of the young. The authors argue that dolphins may legitimately be
called "cultural", and they turn in their conclusion to a
comprehensive evolutionary analysis of this marine cultural system
with its behavioral flexibility and high levels of cooperation. In
a challenging new interpretation of how cultural organisms may
evolve, they propose that spinner dolphin society be viewed as a
set of nested levels of organization that influence one another by
selectional biases. The resultingcooperative patterns support both
the sociology and the cultural levels of organization, without
being overridden by the supposed imperative of kin selection.
Twenty years in the making by a renowned scientist and his
associates, this absorbing book is the richest source available of
new scientific insights about the lives of wild dolphins and how
their societies evolved at sea.
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