Well, maybe that’s not completely accurate — but thankfully, there are no radioactive isotopes involved.
RichardDawkins.net has reported that Spanish scientists from the University of Alcalá de Henares (UAH) have determined that human beings can develop echolocation by producing particular kinds of tongue clicks.
Lead author Juan Antonio Martínez said that “in certain circumstances, we humans could rival bats in our echolocation or biosonar capacity.” This had previously been noted as a rare phenomenon, such as blind guide for the blind Daniel Kish and Ben Underwood, known by some as the world’s best “echolocator.”
Yet don’t start busting out your billy clubs just yet:
In order to learn how to emit, receive and interpret sounds, the scientists are developing a method that uses a series of protocols. This first step is for the individual to know how to make and identify his or her own sounds (they are different for each person), and later to know how to use them to distinguish between objects according to their geometrical properties “as is done by ships’ sonar”.
Now all we need to do is teach these guys echolocation, and we’ve got ourselves a superhero!
[Tip of the hat to Lee Garbett for the link]
July 6th, 2009 at 3:01 pm
I’ve seen a couple people on the assorted morning news shows who could (or at least claimed/thought they could) navigate via this rudimentary sonar. One, a teenaged kid, was also “amazing” for being able to play and win at fighting games like Mortal Kombat and Soulcalibur. That one’s not as impressive – my daughter can trounce me regularly just by mashing the buttons randomly and have the character flail madly.
July 6th, 2009 at 3:02 pm
Ah, found the piece I mentioned – “How A Blind Teen ‘Sees’ With Sound”
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/07/19/earlyshow/main1817689.shtml
July 6th, 2009 at 9:37 pm
The DAREDEVIL movie would have been much, much better (and more accurate) if Ben Affleck would have wandered around clicking his tongue rapidly and loudly as a method of echo-location.
Somewhat off-topic: Daredevil’s ability is to use a hyper-accurate echo-location to compensate for lack of sight, which is just like a bat. Batman’s ability is to use cunning and deception to strike fear into people’s hearts, which is just like a devil. I propose an immediate swapping of names for the sake of authenticity.
July 12th, 2009 at 5:01 am
Hi David
Thanks for posting this.Any chance of getting the original link source in Spanish? I am keen interested and after a bit of research on the internet I can not find it.
Regards