Futurology25 Nov 2025

What Whales Can Teach Us About Talking to Aliens (With David Gruber and Claire Webb)

We’ve spent decades beaming radio waves into space listening for an answer. But it might be enough to start here on Earth, or more accurately, under the seas. Sperm whales live in complex clans and communicate in rapid-fire clicks. Even if we could decode their messages, is it safe to assume they want to talk to us? What, exactly, would we have to say to them? The Cetacean Translation Initiative – CETI for whales not SETI for E.T. – is considering the implications of AI translation tools for the ocean’s depths. In this episode of Futurology, CETI Founder David Gruber joins Claire Webb – the director of the Berggruen Institute's Future Humans program – to explore what it means to approach another intelligence with humility rather than conquest. In the end, creating a direct linguistic connection with another species may be yet another white whale that humanity should abandon as folly. For Gruber, the point isn’t fluency. It’s learning to speak more softly on a planet filled with minds we’ve barely begun to meet. Resources Aglow in the Dark: The Revolutionary Science of Biofluorescence — David Gruber & Vincent Pieribone (Book, 2005) The Art of Translation — Vladimir Nabokov (Essay, 1941) Songs of the Humpback Whale — Roger Payne & Scott McVay (Scientific Article, 1970) Songs of the Humpback Whale — Roger Payne & Frank Watlington (Audio Recording, 1970) Follow David Gruber @davidfgruber https://www.davidgruber.com/ Follow Project CETI Instagram: @ProjectCETI LinkedIn: Project CETI Twitter/X: @ProjectCETI YouTube: Project CETI TikTok: @ProjectCETI Want to share suggestions or feedback? Email futurology@berggruen.org Keep up to Date with the Berggruen Institute at: https://www.berggruen.org Instagram: / berggrueninst Twitter/X: / berggrueninst Facebook: / berggrueninst LinkedIn: / berggrueninst Bluesky /futurologypod Credits Executive Producers: Nicolas Berggruen, Nathan Gardels, Nils Gilman, Dawn Nakagawa, and Jason Hoch. Producers: Grant Slater, Alex Gardels, and Nathalia Ramos. Associate Producer: Elissa Mardiney Theme Music: Marcus Bagala. Audio Engineer: Aaron Bastinelli Futurology is a production of Studio B and Wavland and distributed by Realm.

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Episoder(50)

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