Though culture was previously thought to be unique to humans, a growing body of research finds evidence in species of all ilk, from elephants to bumblebees. That day in 1998, in his office at the University of Sydney, Dr. Michael Noad uncovered tangible evidence of a rapid, Beatlesque cultural revolution among whales: A song crossed the ocean, cleared a population boundary, and eclipsed what had come before. These song revolutions, it later turned out, happen every few years. More than a decade after his original discovery, Noad and his collaborators found that the leaps don’t stop there. A year later, a new song would appear in New Caledonia, and a year after that, in French Polynesia, in what scientists have aptly come to call “cultural ripples.”
Posted: September 1, 2025