We think the lateral-line system is used for communication between sharks. They may not be super-intelligent but there is good evidence to show that they communicate. After 500 million years of evolution, to become the apex predator the shark surely cannot rely only on receiver mechanisms. I found that if I presented a small frontal area by swimming uncompetitively towards the sharks as they approached a bait, I was better placed to get a good photograph than if I swam vertically, breathing through my snorkel and holding the camera at waist level. This went some way to enhancing my own feeling that animals under water judge size, and therefore threat, by the vertical height of another animal rather than its length.
Most shark scientists study pickle jars because they are afraid to get in the water.
They believe old myths. It's weird when you don't share this fear, because you quickly discover that sharks are not mindless monsters. Inimitably English gentle giant Jeremy Stafford-Deitsch offered his own point of view. Erich has a much stronger sense than I that these sharks are not dangerous, period. I was very cautious, but once I saw that their focus was the bait we were feeding them, I quickly realised that in that situation they were not a threat to humans.