If a tree falls & no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?

[James T. Kirk]

Poll question: If a tree falls & no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?

If a tree falls in the woods, and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?

You get one point for answering and five bonus points for explaining your answer.

[flamingyouth]

1. What would Spock say?

:evilgrin:

[Webster Green]

2. Spock would say....

Obviously, there would be a pressure wave created, but lacking a sensor to detect and convert the vibrations, and a brain to process the data into what we percieve as sound, the answer is no.

[Webster Green]

4. But the bunny wabbits would hear it.

n/t

[LastKnight]

5. see reply number 3...

i dont talk like spock though, so youll have to just put it in his inflections as you read it yourself lol.

-LK

[LastKnight]

3. a sound, yes; a NOISE, no.

sound can be defined as a wave traveling through a medium, a noise is how we interpret that sound, thus... a sound is made, but no noise. trippy, huh?

-LK

[Webster Green]

10. According to my Webster's...

Sound:
1a: The sensation percieved by the sense of hearing
b: A particular auditory sensation : NOISE, TONE
c: Mechanical radiant energy that is transmitted by longitudinal pressure waves in air or other material medium, and is the objective cause of hearing.

[LastKnight]

14. i was talkin in physics terms, websters isnt the source of choice there.

websters is words in common useage, and usuially not what the conventions of physics explain them to be. but im just a physics geek, dont listen to me.

-LK

[Webster Green]

23. Well, I'm no physicist, but I used to be a sound guy......

Of course you are right. There is a "sonic wave" created. Even if the frequencies created are below or above the range of hearing, the pressure wave is still there, however I don't think of it as sound unless it is processed into that sensation.

[SheilaT]

6. Of course.

To think otherwise is to think that nothing you yourself don't personally witness doesn't happen.

[Name removed]

7. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Skip Intro]

9. YIKES! n/t

[INTELBYTES]

61. I can't believe they deleted that reply! I saw nothing wrong with it.

[LastKnight]

11. she does until the tree gets sick of it and falls on her lol

im kidding... dont get mad at me ladies!

-LK

[TreasonousBastard]

32. I heard that one as...

If your wife is alone in the forest with no one to hear her, would you still be wrong?

Actually, along these lines the only truly unanswerable question is: "Honey, does this dress make my ass look big?"

[bain_sidhe]

35. The even bigger question is

If a man speaks in the forest and there's no woman to hear him, is he still wrong?

[Webster Green]

38. sexism

So disappointing, to see that even on DU, sexism and hatred towards women is alive and well. Your fear of our power prevents you from seeing us as we are. What an ignorant statement and threads that follow. This world we be a completely different place if women had equal power. Maybe more trees would be standing and our forests would be healthy if men weren't in charge of everything, and the outdated sexist and discriminatory beliefs that prevail around the world were transformed. Does it make you feel bigger, stronger and manlier to put down women?? KLC

[BlueJazz]

44. When someone posts a sexist thread I believe (hope)

that they're just being satiric and (of course) laughing at the absurdity of the post. I don't really think that true Democrats still hold on to the idiotic past.

Please tell me I'm right. :)

[INTELBYTES]

62. pffffttt....

:eyes:

[Skip Intro]

8. An unmanned tape recorder captures the (non-existent?) sound

Does the sound then exist at the time it was recorded, or does the sound not exist until someone plays the tape?

[arwalden]

22. The Tape Recorder Didn't Capture SOUND...

the microphone detected the motion of the compressed air waves and converted that motion into electrical impulses that traveled through the microphone wire and into the tape recorder which rearranged the magnetic particals on the tape. It's still not "sound" until it's actually heard by a living thing.

-- Allen

[IronLionZion]

12. are apples blue when you're not looking?

[Feanorcurufinwe]

13. Yes because

according to Webster's

Main Entry: 3sound
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English soun, from Old French son, from Latin sonus, from sonare to sound; akin to Old English swinn melody, Sanskrit svanati it sounds
1 a : a particular auditory impression : TONE b : the sensation perceived by the sense of hearing c : mechanical radiant energy that is transmitted by longitudinal pressure waves in a material medium (as air) and is the objective cause of hearing

If a tree falls, it will produce this mechanical radiant energy. That alone means it makes a sound.


Another counterargument, more to the point of the esse est percipi argument, takes note of the fact that in any forest, whether humans are present or not, there are numerous forest denizens who will have perceived the fall of the tree. Chipmunks, birds, deer or other wildlife -- and also insects, worms, bacteria, other plants, etc.

[Skip Intro]

15. woah - or does anything exist outside of one's immediate awareness?

umm, I think I'll spend some time with puff the magic dragon tonight :D

[Feanorcurufinwe]

28. Perhaps only you exist and the rest of us are phantasms in your dream.

[ScreamingMeemie]

16. If it falls on a squirrel, and the squirrel screams, is he really

screaming??? :shrug:

[ScreamingMeemie]

42. I dont know. Do squirrels scream?

[achtung_circus]

53. Yes

[sweetheart]

17. The beavis and butthead version

"if this band played in a forest, and nobody heard it, would it
still suck?" :-)

The concept of a tree falling makes no noise. The concept of
a tree making noise makes no noise. The concept of a sound is
without sound. The concept is empty.

[The Lone Liberal]

18. Falling trees is just the reason we need clear cutting

All these soundless trees falling in the forest is just the harbinger of forest fires. Clear cutting, no more silent falling trees, besides what it they fell on you, you heard it falling, but you were dead, who could you tell?

See the logic of clear cutting, besides tax cuts its the best thing.

[TacticalPeek]

19. Only God can make a sound.

:)

[NightTrain]

20. What? No "Robb is a dingbat" option?

I'm outraged, absolutely outraged!!!

[arwalden]

21. Sound Is Only Sound When It's CONVERTED TO SOUND By Your Ear And Brain...

Until it's actually CONVERTED into sound, it's nothing more than compressed air waves traveling SILENTLY through space.

-- Allen

[Webster Green]

24. Thenk yew!

n/t

[Feanorcurufinwe]

27. That's hearing. Sound is the actual vibration.

[arwalden]

34. Compressed Air Waves Are Not "Vibrating"...

they are traveling silently through space. When the waves actually bump up against something, the waves can cause that OBJECT to vibrate... and that vibrating OBJECT can transmit signals to the brain that are interpreted as sound. But the waves themselves are not sound, nor are they vibrating.

-- Allen

[Feanorcurufinwe]

36. I'm defining things one way, you're defining them a different way.

Looking at Websters:

Main Entry: 3sound
Function: noun
1 a : a particular auditory impression : TONE b : the sensation perceived by the sense of hearing c : mechanical radiant energy that is transmitted by longitudinal pressure waves in a material medium (as air) and is the objective cause of hearing


Your are using definition 1(a) and saying without an impression, there is not sound. I am using 1(c) and I'd like to point out also that the 'compressed air waves' you refer to are not the sound, thay are the method by which the sound (mechanical radiant energy) is transmitted. I should have used the word 'energy' not 'vibration'.

Besides, even in the deepest forest there will be wildlife, birds, insects, etc. to perceive the sound.

[arwalden]

41. Oh Good Grief!

Was it THAT important to you? -- At least my definition is the PRIMARY and most relevant one (a). I'd feel bad if my entire argument was based on the technicality of a lowly (c) definition.

"Besides, even in the deepest forest there will be wildlife, birds, insects, etc. to perceive the sound."

But that wasn't what the original question asked, now, was it? The hypothetical original question specified "no one". So in this hypothetical world created by the question are we to assume that "no one" means no humans and that all other life forms still exist? Or that "no one" means not one living thing is around?

I'd imagine that if it meant only humans then the more precise way to phrase the question would have been "nobody" instead of "no one". The best word to have used would have been "nothing"... or an all encompasing "no living thing". But... alas... the question was vague as to who or what exactly was around. Perhaps intentionally so.

Yes... you should have used the word "energy"... that was very big of you to admit your mistake.

-- Allen

[VOX]

47. Exactly. Sound is a perception. It requires participation in the event.

:toast:

[Feanorcurufinwe]

49. No, sound is a form of mechanical energy. The objective cause of hearing.

Which is the form of perception you are talking about.

[arwalden]

56. Yeah Right... So When You Think About It... Sound Is SOLAR Energy.

[Feanorcurufinwe]

58. You'll have to explain that one. Seems like quite a leap of logic

[Feanorcurufinwe]

48. The third definition in a dictionary is no less valid than the first.

I believe they are usually ordered by how commonly used they are.

I think the question reveals the anthropocentric nature of our world-view... so many people do forget that there is nowhere on Earth where a tree can fall in a forest without some critter being there to hear it.

[arwalden]

55. Such Convoluted Efforts To Be Judged "Correct" In Such A Trivial Matter...

Oh my! I'm afraid that I would have much difficulty in taking seriously questions such as that one. It was a straightforward question and I provided a straightforward (and correct) answer using (as you say) the commonly understood definitions of words.

I saw the question for what it was... lounge fluff. I seriously doubt that there's anything philosophical or deeply revealing about it. But I suppose that anyone could---in an effort to prove themselves correct---choose to over analyze the questions and seek third-level meaning to the words they choose to answer the reinterpreted question.

-- Allen

[Feanorcurufinwe]

57. Isn't this the archetypical sophomoric discussion?

I thought that was the point.

[TXlib]

25. "Sound" refers to two things:

One is the longitudinal compression waves travelling through the air. The second is the auditory sensation produced when said waves are intercepted by your ear, and analysed by your brain.

In the first sense, the tree makes a sound, in that it produces sound waves.

[agingdem]

26. Another poser...

If my mother-in-law comes in town and I don't pick her up at the airport...did she really come in town?

[LastKnight]

29. lol i like that one... you might have to try it out. nt

[TreasonousBastard]

30. If Scroedinger fell in the forest...

would his cat hear him?

[TreasonousBastard]

31. If Descartes was leading his horse through the forest...

would that be putting Descartes before the horse?

[TXlib]

33. A Richard Feynman anecdote

In _Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman_, Richard Feynman tells a wonderful story about a philosophy seminar that he attended, in which the participants were discussing Alfred North Whitehead's theory of 'essential objects'. After they'd been talking for a while, someone asked Feynman if he thought that an electron would be considered an 'essential object', according to Whitehead's definition. Feynman hadn't really been paying attention, so he decided to ask a question of his own, which would help him figure out what they'd been talking about.

He asked: "Is a brick an essential object?" He was going to ask a followup question - "Is the _inside_ of a brick an essential object?" - and then argue that an electron is like the inside of a brick, in the sense that we _know_ that they exist, but no one has ever really seen one. (You can't see the inside of a brick, because if you break the brick in two, you just have two new bricks, and you can only see their outsides!)

Anyway, he never got to ask the followup question, because it turned out that the philosophers at the seminar couldn't agree on whether a brick was an essential object! Some said yes, some said no, and they all had different explanations for their answers. In other words, they'd been tossing the phrase around without really understanding what they meant by it.

[welshTerrier2]

37. how do we know the tree actually fell ???

I just finished reading Clarke's book and in it he indicated that bush was obsessed with cutting down trees before he even moved into the white house ...

and i suppose you're going to try to convince me that the tree just happened to fall when nobody was around ...

clearly we're missing the big picture here ...

[ET Awful]

39. Yeah, well what is the sound of one hand clapping? n/t

[Lars39]

40. Depends. Is anyone there adhering to the Prime Directive?

:)

[Deja Q]

43. That crusty old rule of law?

:evilgrin:

[Lars39]

50. You're right.

That Prime Directive never seemed to stop the fearless crew at all!

Now if they could just fix that pesky Holodeck...:D

[James T. Kirk]

64. Prime Directive

I prefer to think of the prime directive as a "living document", which can be changed to suit whatever circumstances I happen to run into. After all, the people who wrote it never thought of the crazy stuff I'd run into out in space.
:D

[bigwillq]

45. Yes it does.

Of course when something like a tree regardless of size falls, it will make a sound. It will likely fall onto other bushes, plants or smaller trees and could crush their branches which will make a sound.

[sweetheart]

46. If you're alone on a highway and a speed camera gets you...

Were you speeding?

no.

No witnesses, no crime.

[achtung_circus]

54. An eyewitness is direct evidence, and often unreliable

A photograph will stand in court.

By your logic, if I rob a bank and kill all the witnesses, I have committed no crime.

[sweetheart]

60. probably so

But crime involves a victem, no? If you killed people, then
there were victems, and therefore a crime.

A witness is a victem of crime in the sense that they observe the
social fabric of society torn, and this wound is inside them...
being remedied by criminal justice.

A crime without witnesses is no crime.

[DS1]

51. Other

I was too busy staring at your straining corset to notice any trees

[Triple H]

52. Of course it does.

Any other answer would be idiotic.

Just because there's no one around when the tree falls...it doesn't mean it doesn't make a sound.

I'm not going to argue this.

[Feanorcurufinwe]

59. If a tree falls on a solitary deaf man in the forest will he make a sound?

[James T. Kirk]

63. CORRECT ANSWER = YES

:D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D

The correct answer is YES, the tree does make a sound. For all the people who said that the sound's existence depends on someone hearing it, you are getting bogged down in semantics and you are no fun to play board games with.:P

Thanks to everyone who answered.

BONUS ROUND!

If a tree falls INSIDE THE MATRIX, and no human is around to hear it, does it make a sound?