Whale Brains

This is somewhat old news, but I was just reading about it again and it's pretty fascinating: Whales have brain cells like us. Specifically, they have neural structures, which, like ours, allow them to process information more quickly and to communicate more effectively than many other creatures of the sea.

According to the authors of the study:

Humpback whales exhibit complex social patterns that include intricate communication skills, coalition-formation, cooperation, cultural transmission and tool usage. It is thus likely that some of these abilities are related to comparable (tissue) complexity in brain organization in cetaceans and in hominids.

Did you also know that whales evolved from land creatures which returned to the sea? "Tiny, deerlike mammals," according to this National Geographic article.