Playing sounds of healthy coral on reefs makes fish return (2019) | Hacker News Reader

Playing sounds of healthy coral on reefs makes fish return (2019)

abc.net.au

89 pointsthinkingemote43 comments

In the ethereal melody of a once thriving reef, we perceive a poignant echo of profound loss, reminiscent of hearing the tender voice of a dearly departed beloved. Drawn inexorably towards it, like a moth entranced by the siren call of a flame, we seek the comforting symphony of life that once flourished. Yet, akin to the cruel illusion of pursuing the ghostly whispers of our past, we know the vibrant chorus we seek has danced away into oblivion. Akin to the article's title, the pain of this elusive quest is a melancholic symphony, a mournful reminder of the vibrant life that once was, and the silent void that has come to be.

I don't want accuse by any means was it's as it's beautifully written, but did you write this or GPT4?

GPT 4 does not write nearly this well, in my experience.

"In the eloquent prose spun by the digital loom of GPT-4, we recognize a surprising reflection of our own cognitive prowess, as if confronted by the skilful articulation of a revered mentor. Compelled towards it, akin to a scholar drawn by the magnetic pull of an unseen truth, we explore the intricate latticework of sentences and thoughts it masterfully weaves. Yet, much like the deceptive mirage of a conversation with a conscious entity, we understand the intellectual dance we are enraptured by is but the result of advanced algorithms and machine learning. Mirroring the theme of this discourse, the marvel of this technological feat is a bittersweet sonnet—a fascinating testament to the power of human ingenuity that has breathed life into this artificial intellect, and a poignant indication of the silent absence of genuine understanding beneath its surface."

I mean it's close, if a bit less on point.

It's pretty turgid. The original comment was actually good.

Why do some people think that writing well hasn't existed before LLMs? Relax and lay off the news for a bit, maybe

Welcome to the world we have created. I have a number of artist friends who get accused of posting generated art when it’s theirs. It’s just the new standard from now on.

Data provenance is going to be more important moving forward from here, especially if copyright rules lean away from allowing generative AI outputs to be copyrighted. Providing demonstratable proof you were the original author of a work--whether it be writing, artwork, movie editing or code--may become the standard rather than the exception

Dollars to cents in is GPT generated.

It just isn't quite right: For one, redescribing a symphony as a 'silent void'

Sorry, but you should re-read that comment if you want to accuse it.

> Akin to the article's title, the pain of this elusive quest is a melancholic symphony, a mournful reminder of the vibrant life that once was, and the silent void that has come to be.

This says that there is a melancholic symphony, which is about - and reminds of - the descend of vibrant life into a silent void. Which is an apt description of the death of a beautiful ecosystem like the corals.

Fair, but even in that statement its just weird to mix imagery involving music and silence unless they are being juxtaposed.

And, it opens with:

> In the ethereal melody of a once thriving reef

So which is it, something akin to music, albeit weird/poignant/sad/ethereal music, or is it a void?

> Akin to the article's title, the pain of this elusive quest is a melancholic symphony, a mournful reminder of the vibrant life that once was, and the silent void that has come to be.

> For one, redescribing a symphony as a 'silent void'

Doesn't read that way to me. Vibrant life has become a silent void, and the pain of seeking that past is a melancholic symphony

I read this in the voice of David Attenborough. Sounds like him.

What’s even more interesting is the connection between ocean acidification and underwater sound. There’s preliminary research suggesting that the acidity reduces the dampening and the ocean is getting louder, which interferes with fish’s ability to hear each other.

Here’s one link with more details: https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/article-file/290413#:~:...

So would the expected outcome of this be an instantly-healthy reef, or are we tricking a bunch of fish into going somewhere that can't support them?

They say that instantly healthy isn't expected, but I expect that this could help some reefs that are recovering, especially since:

> However, he said that his previous research published in the journal PLOS ONE found that despite not having ears, coral larvae also seemed to use sound to find and settle on reefs.

...

> "[But] there's the opportunity that if you play healthy reef sounds you may bring back a much richer reef community than just fish."

Last year I volunteered for a few hours at a coral farm operated by a non profit that restores reefs. I didn't even know it was possible to grow coral before that.

I would assume technology like this would be useful after newly planted coral was established, or maybe at an artificial reef like a sunken ship.

what we can plant corals?

holy shit i never knew this

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0hTvGTkDpsI

Perhaps it's more like the stores that play classical music because teens won't think it's cool to hang out there

Depends on the teens.

I think the conception is that work can be done to restore the reef and then this can be utilised to promote the newly revived reef to attract fish etc back.

There’s a lot of fish that feed on corals. I would worry that inviting the fish back before the reefs are well established could cause the corals to get eaten and wiped out.

Sirens call

"What do you do for a living?" "Basically, I make machines that lie to fish."

I know there's a very good reason for all of it but sometimes I try to imagine explaining our jobs to people of several centuries prior. It's almost impossible to do without having about six whys in the list and it occurs to me that civilization is an ever-increasing layers of why atop one another.

"[Coral larvae] don't have ears but somehow they're attracted to healthy reef sounds," he said.

"Maybe they can sense the vibrations with their cilia [tiny hair-like appendages], but we don't know.".

This sounds like more of a philosophical question, but is there a difference between hearing and sensing vibrations? Is there a certain level of signal processing required for hearing? Like, I can sense vibrations with my fingers, but I wouldn't call that hearing.

Here is a dry land analogue. [1] Tree roots grow towards the sound of water.

[1] https://ec.europa.eu/research-and-innovation/en/horizon-maga...

It's physiological rather than philosophical. Auditory stimuli are sensed through your ear and tactile through the somatosensory system (in humans). There's some crossover in the frequencies both can detect.

There's also some potential crossover in how these may be perceived. For example, experiments which show you may in fact be able to 'hear' through your fingers; https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-06855-8.

> Like, I can sense vibrations with my fingers, but I wouldn't call that hearing.

Touch is a powerful sensory input and some folks who suffer from deafblindness can truly “hear” spoken words through touch.

I tried to do that once. I almost could make out what they were saying, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it.*

*ᴵ ᵃᵖᵒˡᵒᵍᶦᶻᵉ ᶦⁿ ᵃᵈᵛᵃⁿᶜᵉᵈ ᶠᵒʳ ᵗʰᶦˢ ˢᵗᵘᵖᶦᵈ ʲᵒᵏᵉ

There’s something like the human audible spectrum similar to the human visible light spectrum.

We know for a fact that animals see and hear differently than we do by observing parts of the spectrum that humans cannot.

Interesting, Maybe it has to do with the extra analyses that the brain performs on hearing. What I hear is not the raw vibration but a amonst other things a fourier transform of it. i hear a distinct pitch. The brain uses the harmonic overtones of sounds to group them together. When I feel vibrations with my finger I just feel slower or faster vibrations.

By the way, sometimes I hear a sound so low that I am confused whether I hear or feel it.

Does the fish then die from starvation?

Calling fish with a phone is also a good way to bring in the fish.

https://oceansciencehistory.com/2013/10/12/phoning-fish-the-...

Coral reef restoration: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coral_reef_restoration

"Coral restoration – A systematic review of current methods, successes, failures and future directions" (2020) https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal... ; citations of https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=5,47&sciodt=...

Sunscreen > Environmental effects: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunscreen#Environmental_effect... :

> Additionally, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has indicated that coral decline is associated with effects from climate change (warming oceans, rising water levels, acidification), overfishing, and pollution from agriculture, wastewater, and urban run-off.[155]

Oxybenzone > Environmental effects: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxybenzone#Environmental_effec... :

> [Oxybenzone-containing sunscreen is now banned] in many areas [45] such as Palau, [46] Hawaii, [5] nature reserves in Mexico, Bonaire, the Marshall Islands, the United States Virgin Islands, Thailand's marine natural parks, [47] the Northern Mariana Islands, [48] and Aruba. [49]

Thanks coral restoration volunteers!

Are there already coral restoration drones / RUVs?

Is there a SAR Synthetic Aperture Radar -like imaging capability for mapping coral health; with sensor fusion? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synthetic-aperture_radar

Sensor fusion: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensor_fusion

"Bacterial sensors send a jolt of electricity when triggered" https://news.rice.edu/news/2022/bacterial-sensors-send-jolt-...

re: sensor nets: https://twitter.com/westurner/status/1612605800576335874 ... ansible-OpenWRT, [DuckLink] LoRa, MEMS wave power

LoRa: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LoRa

#Goal14: Life below water: https://www.globalgoals.org/goals/14-life-below-water/

#SDG14: Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development : https://sdgs.un.org/goals/goal14

Do coral fragments have to be planted ashore or could they be ~transplanted by a drone?

Bait-and-switch. No pun intended.

"Switch-on Bait" too.

Makes me think of using lights to attract certain fish... although I imagine the susceptible are getting selected-against pretty heavily when it comes to evolutionary pressures by now.

Catfishing.

Fish, the easiest living organism to bait.

We mess up the environment with artificial stuff, so woo lets put up some more artificial stuff to fix it, oh wait what impact will that have?

Now we have a viable model that will allow us to study disappointment in fish.

Wait, I thought Aussie coral reefs died due to global warming?

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