Secondhand echolocation?

[steorran_worulde]

I wonder what the experience of echolocation would be like in a context where lots of people around you were also echolocating. How much information about your surroundings could you get by secondhand echolocation - listening to other people's clicks and how the environment modified them?

Comments

[pne]

An interesting question - especially given how many people use first-hand photolocation and how many people use second-hand photolocation - looking at light coming from sources other than themselves and how the environment modifies it :)

[steorran_worulde]

:-)

I'd argue that using a flashlight or torch is close to firsthand photolocation, since your beam source is close to your receptor (even closer analogy: headlamp), but yeah, most photolocation is secondhand.

There are some significant differences in how echolocation and photolocation work that may make secondhand echolocation less effective. Human photolocation does not make use of the speed of light, but human echolocation does make use of the speed of sound, comparing the time of the reflected sound with that of the source sound (as well as spectral properties and directional properties).

[pne]

I'd argue that using a flashlight or torch is close to firsthand photolocation, since your beam source is close to your receptor (even closer analogy: headlamp)

Yep, that's the sort of thing I was thinking of for first-hand photolocation, too.

Human photolocation does not make use of the speed of light

True - distance comes from "what blocks what" and parallax.

human echolocation does make use of the speed of sound, comparing the time of the reflected sound with that of the source sound

Ah, OK, if you rely on that, then not knowing when the sound originated, you couldn't use that information from someone else's clicks.

Also, it makes me wonder how reliably your own echolocation would work in a situation where everyone uses it - you would have to be able to reliably identify your own echos (echoes?) and distinguish them from everyone else's echos that are constantly around you.

[steorran_worulde]

Ah, OK, if you rely on that, then not knowing when the sound originated, you couldn't use that information from someone else's clicks.
Well, you might be able to get some info, even if not absolute distances. You might notice that someone else's click from one direction had an echo a certain amount later from another direction, and be able to figure out something from that.

Also, it makes me wonder how reliably your own echolocation would work in a situation where everyone uses it - you would have to be able to reliably identify your own echos (echoes?) and distinguish them from everyone else's echos that are constantly around you.

Something I read about bat echolocation talked about how bats deal with this issue, especially when large numbers of them come into caves where they roost. I think it said they decrease how often they make their echolocation sounds, but I don't exactly remember.